ScreenFish

where faith and film are intertwined

game

A New Civil War? Squid Game

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The country has never seemed more divided. New data suggests that many Americans think it’s “time to split the country.” Are we in for a new Civil War?

In this new episode of the Your Sunday Drive podcast, we use an article by David French, a quote from Andrew Yang, the recent controversy surrounding Facebook, the current congressional fight over Biden’s infrastructure bill and the debt ceiling, and other angles to take a look at this topic. What underlies such division? How is media and social media involved? Would there even be something ultimately “wrong” with an actual split in the country? Most vitally, how should individual Christians and the church navigate the opportunity of our polarized times?

In our second segment, we shift focus to the uber popular Netflix show Squid Game, relating it to another current cultural obsession, the Gabby Petito case. Why are people fascinated by “true crime” stories and violent media such as Squid Game? What are the dangers and what elements of the redemptive can we discover in this human impulse?

Come along for Your Sunday Drive – quick conversation about current events, politics, pop culture and more, from the perspective of a couple of guys trying to follow Jesus.

Hosts: Matt Hill and Nate Polzin. Presented by the Church in Drive of Saginaw, MI, as often as possible. Please visit churchindrive.com and facebook.com/thechurchindrive

what it means that you like things that are like other things that you like

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///begin quick minute

in a quick minute
i’m finna go
pick up this game
from this pic ^
(this new PS4
action RPG
called Nioh)

why?

cuz it’s a
“soulslike” –
it’s like Dark Souls:
my personal
all-time fave series

in other words:
i’m finna get it cuz
i already like it cuz
it’s like something
i already like

like, do you do that too?
like things that are
like other things that you
like?

not always, of course,
but in general?

of course you do

but why?

cuz
ppl prefer patterns,
live and die by them,
love them,
crave them,
create them when absent;
cuz
we’re in a world
where patterns happen
and mean things,
and we can see them
and understand them
and act accordingly:
as pattern seers,
pattern readers,
pattern lovers

seriously,
stop and summon
your mind to
dwell a spell
on how patterns
dominate,
dictate,
infuse your life with
meaning

(

….. (day/night = pattern)
(the season this is) ……
*pattern*
sounds that correspond
to words that – .
correspond
to thoughts that
. . – co
rrespond
to a person’s
essential intentions
(pattern) — ………..
black screen, white screen,
so you can see what the
phonemes mean screen
*(pattern)*

)

seriously,
stop a second
and ask yourself
why once more:
why this
worldwide
domination of
patterns in
endless array?

truly!
why!? if
(as some say)
the wide world be
“random,”
“sprung from ‘chance,'”
“meaning free”

consider how
we’d even seek,
find,
create, crave
patterns in
such a world?

ask how we
could even ask
such a question
in such a world?

then,
seriously,
stop and smile . .
– …
.. – 🙂   — ;
revel in realizing that,
at least,
“random,”
“sprung from ‘chance,'”
“meaning free,”
can’t possibly
adhere,
can’t possibly
correspond,
can’t possibly
fit the pattern of
this wide world,
such as it is,
where we
mostly uniformly,
in general,
like things that are
like other things that we
like

///end quick minute

gaining from the waiting

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2886483-tlg_e315_06

do you know about
The Last Guardian?

it’s this game
that’s infamously been
in development
since 2007;
spiritual successor to
2001’s Ico and
2005’s Shadow of the Colossus

it was originally slated
for release in 2011,
then pushed back,
moved from system
to system,
and re-slated in 2015
for release in 2016, October,
then delayed once again
until December, 2016 –
mere days away
as i write these words

now, you may have predicted that
i’m one of the
eager anticipators
of this game –
one of the many who
*loved*
Ico and Shadow of the Colossus,
and if so,
your prediction is correct

you may have also predicted that
i’m one of the many
who find this
waiting excruciating;
but if so,
your prediction is not correct

not only are these games
suuuuuuuuper zzzennnnnnnn,
attracting and instilling a sense
of calm reflection,
antithetical to things like
excrutiating over waiting,
i also like to think
that this particular
waiting situation,
like other, bigger,
more well known waiting situations,
is generally a *good* thing –
a thing to be embraced,
benefitted from,
enlarged by

how so?

consider:
“absence makes the
heart grow fonder;”
so too waiting

consider:
since 2001,
i’ve had the pleasure
of playing through
The Last Guardian‘s
spiritual precursors
several times,
enjoying their
artistic vision,
their quiet, sublime statements
about love, loss, life

even now,
mere days away
as i write these words,
i’m taking
yet another opportunity
to revisit them –
like a ritual meant
to more than remind,
but to ingrain
essence,
to create and underline
identity,
to birth and stoke
love,
to form
followers fit for waiting,
because:
such things are fit for followers
and waiting for such things
is worth the wait

do you know about
Jesus?

he’s this random guy
who claimed to be God
like 2,000ish years ago

these old stories about him
say he died, but came back to life,
and he’s supposed to be returning
sometime to sort of set
everything with the world
right

now, you may have predicted that
i’m one of the
eager anticipators
of his return,
but i bet now you know
that i don’t find this
waiting excruciating

i bet now you know
that i think it’s
part of the point

i bet now
you’re thinking of
rituals –
Sunday morning meetings,
bread and cup,
witnessing to the
ends of the earth –
rituals to ingrain,
to create and underline,
to birth and stoke,
to form
followers fit for waiting,
because:
such things are fit for followers
and waiting for such things
is worth the wait

i bet now,
i hope now,
in waiting situations,
you’ll get
suuuuuuuuper zzzennnnnnnn
and
calmly reflective,
and
benefit from,
get enlarged by,
the gaining from the waiting

The Witness (to God)

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jonathan-blow-the-witness-game-wallpaper

[Note 1: The following includes mild, implicit spoilers. Note 2: This is not an in-depth review of The Witness and assumes some prior knowledge of and interest in the game. For an excellent, straight piece that describes the game’s mechanics, contextualizes, etc., please see Jonathan Clauson’s article at Christ & Pop Culture here.]

dots and lines
intersect in the trees,
asking:
just what
is the meaning
of these?

i walk and run
through forests,
past streams,
among architecture
conjured from dreams,
across platforms
suspended from cliffs,
seeking the meaning
of all of this

you see:
the dots and lines,
each and every time,
bespeak reason,
betray rhyme,
without words
and without sign,
still they speak
each and every time

and so i ask
as they demand:
what is the meaning
of these things
in this land?

why am i here?
how did it start?
what’s just the thing
that sits at the heart?

and then at the end,
i circle, ascend,
a mountain that beckons
from island horizon

it is tall, it is wide,
it has secrets hid inside

and now i know:
the dots, the lines,
they pointed upward
the entire time

the contraptions work
the mountain’s door,
to allow safe passage
to the mystery’s core

and then, deep inside,
eyes wide,
mind plied,
the puzzles cease,
the speaking stops,
and the game . . .

resets

and that’s it . . .
. .  … ..
. .
.

however:
the point?
it’s already been made . .
has already been being made . .

the point:
that there’s such a thing as points

that things mean things

that in The Witness,
as in the world,
there is an
ever present
invitation to
understanding everything
afoot at all times

and though our
interpretations
be
difficult,
varied,
incomplete,
frustrating,
they are
nevertheless prompted,
demanded,
because
words are occurring . .
as long as we have
ears to hear

and . .
if we’re being honest . .
doesn’t this
point also
point to another
point?

doesn’t the
existence of points
point to the existence
of a point maker?
a pointist?

isn’t it the case that
that there is no
speaking machine
without a
machine designer
who speaks?

isn’t it the case
that there’s no
speaking without
language
(whatever it may be)
and no language
without a
master linguist?
a prime languager?

————————–

if i were
Jonathan Blow,
designer of
The Witness,
i might have included
the following
in one of those
beguiling bits of recording
found scattered
throughout the island . .
it seems to belong . .

“The heavens declare the glory of God;

the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

Day after day they pour forth speech;

night after night they reveal knowledge.

They have no speech, they use no words;

no sound is heard from them.

Yet their voice goes out into all the earth,

their words to the ends of the world.” (Psalm 19:1-4)