The Truman Show

The Truman Show has got to be one of the most influential pieces of media of the era. It was made ahead of its time. It takes the place of a man called Truman who's the first guy to have his whole life on camera.

The most memorable scene was the ending where Truman repeats his iconic line, "Good afternoon, good evening and good night" before leaving through an ominous door. We're never given a true ending after that which represents Truman's life on camera is over. What's key about this ending is the aftermath. After the show is over, the policemen decide to switch the channel to watch something else. This is an obvious indicator that this whole movie is a critique of consumerism and particularly criticizing the low attention spams the world is soon to face. Instead of reflecting on a over 10,000 day long show, people simply just moved on. This is typical of today where people's attention spams has decreased so much that apps like TikTok and YT shorts are able to thrive. With my research on both, more people are choosing this quick form of entertainment over longform videos. This is what makes Truman ahead of its era.

Recently there was a trend particularly on YT shorts where people would recreate the events of The Truman Show. This is a completely different direction for the film. The film about criticizing the low attention spams on consumers all of a sudden being recreated on a worse version of this.

A game that appears very inspired by the Truman show is called "The Stanley Parable". This game also criticizes consumerism of games. The way gamers prefer high intense games over slow games although unlike The Truman Show, this game literally tells you that if they make it more intense, they could be rich. The narrator of the game comedically jokes about how consumerism only helps developers and teams, players gain little benefit besides a game to play before eventually getting bored and moving on.

Overall, The Truman Show is indeed influential but is also one of the most critical pieces of media to criticize the same format it uses.