Pop Culture Theories: They work for Straights and Gays Alike

Nostalgia Theories: Whatever Makes us Miss “the Old Days”

                                                     John J. “Jack” Crowley                         

HUMAN-240 F2WW

Professor Harlan Schottenstein

Nov. 4, 2014

    Many theories relate to popular culture as it touches and concerns the GLBT community.  The most-interesting finding in my analysis was that theories of nostalgia are the same regardless of the community or subset of culture you study. 

    I also will think of alternative lifestyles differently because the theories of popular culture apply to them as much as they do “straight” people.

   The theories of nostalgia require a selective memory of inconvenient details of the past. For traditional America, it can be politically appealing to remember someone like Ronald Reagan, even though he required foreign-affairs briefings to be limited to 90 words. No one wants to remember George W. Bush as a fabricator of weapons of Mass Destruction to start the second Iraq War. Everyone likes John F. Kennedy, though he put the first advisers into Vietnam and cheated on his wife.

    In my selected topic about nostalgia among Gay, Lesbian, Bisexuals and Transsexuals, that community harkens back to a time of more privacy. GLBT groups would just as soon go back to the days when they were largely left to their private affairs and interpersonal preferences.  They really don’t care about Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. And they wish again for the pre-AIDs era and less public interest in them.

     “Remember when” is a popular quasi-fantasy for people of all walks of lives and sexual persuasion to engage in.  It was also true regarding my chosen topic, “Between Light and Nowhere:” The Queer Politics of Nostalgia..”  As odd as the more-liberal world seems to be, the GLBT community misses the less-understanding time. Author Nishant Shishani (1226) concedes that nostalgia still is a blend of marketing, whether it’s for GLBT as well as others in America.  It even extends to Shishani’s coverage of the music culture of drag queens and kinky queer bands.  

References:

“Between Light and Nowhere”: The Queer Politics of Nostalgia, (Shahani, N.)

       The Journal of Popular Culture, Volume 46, issue 6 (December 2013), p. 1217-1230

      ISSN: 0022-3840, DOI: 10.1111/jpcu.12085, Wiley

The Formula of Nostalgia to Alternative Lifestyles

Nostalgia’s Appeal Has a Formula

A Look at What Makes Retro Cool Today for Alternative Lifestyles

                                                     John J. “Jack” Crowley                         

HUMAN-240 F2WW

Professor Harlan Schottenstein

Oct. 29, 2014

   The more things change, the more they stay the same.  Nostalgia comes and goes, yet stays interestingly relevant in a new time. It’s all about looking back, perhaps through rose-colored glasses. Critics scoff at the conveniently forgetful aspects of selectively looking at the past. But it works. In gay culture, nostalgia in music recounts the pre-AIDs era and the later repression of open sexual culture.

     “Remember when” changes with musical, theatrical or fashion whim, historical revisionist rewrites of unpopular facts. Arguably, dusting off glory-day ideas sells new products.  Or paying tribute to a sexual freedom once less endangered.

     That’s the crux of formula analysis detailed in, “Between Light and Nowhere”: The Queer Politics of Nostalgia.” In this article, though, transgender music and gay culture join the look-back fun.  It also uses “trans” amid sexual-surgical changes to retroactively revisit transgender politics in a more-enlightened and less-conservative time. 

     Elitist rejection of nostalgia in the transgender community overlooks a simple fact. Whether a person is gay, straight, bisexual or transgender still means nostalgia still is a time of change or transition, argues author Nishant Shishani (1226)

    Shishani concludes that nostalgia formulas make just as much marketing and business as good-guy triumphs or love-seeking girl finds the right man.  She cites in her analyses a sweeping negative generalization of indiscriminate thirst for all things “retro.” It’s populist and consmumerism mixed together to generate product interest, especially in fashion. While that may appeal more to women, or so some may presume, nostalgia can even repeatedly reconstitute things such as World War II. (Fury, the current Brad Pitt tank-crewman movie,  is formula male nostalgia.)

    Nostalgia also plays a role in the music culture of drag queens and queer bands, even as they display purposeful filth, portray genital mutilations and appear on mainstream shows like (David) Letterman. One even had a song on the cult movie, V for Vendetta.

     Shishani revisits the often-criticized use of nostalgia as a convenient way of dividing high versus low classes. Middle-class people might like retro comic books, while the upper crust consumer prefers original paintings that reference retroactively “good” times. The latter takes big money. The comic book fan can subsist from one collectible to another.  Both like things gone by; one pays more.

   Nostalgia is not the fashion of history, but rather its scraps. The post Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell world has dulled the transgender or gay world’s political teeth amid neo-liberal concerns about “privacy” among consenting adults. (Shishani, 1228)

 Conclusion

     Nostalgia offers a chance for society – and people of alternative sexual preferences – to return to the days of the past. When they can – at least in their political and cultural lives – return “the intimacies of exile in the past.” When it was OK to revel in their “otherness.” Shishani eschews the class-divisional shunning of nostalgia, both as a formula and as a fact. The author asserts that remembering the privacy of the past is important. It is a continuum. Politically and sexually, it permits transgender, gay and other couples to honor a more-private past, recognize the continuities of the politically correct presence, and work toward “a more-radically democratic future.” (Shishani, 1228).

   I always thought nostalgia was about remembering old times, glory days and neat pieces of history. About comic books, romance and good versus evil. This analysis, however, takes a different view of nostalgia. It’s one I’d never appreciated because I don’t live in the world that is explored. Yet nostalgia is a formula for alternative-life partners too.  Looking back is a continuity of their own unique circle of life.

    Shishani’s writing added a dimension of nostalgia in a political sense in the context of those often shunned in traditional political, sexual and cultural circles. To those with alternative lifestyles, there is a nostalgia for the days when there was less disease, fewer well-meaning but misguided societal inquiries and more interpersonal and cultural privacy.

References:

“Between Light and Nowhere”: The Queer Politics of Nostalgia, (Shahani, N.)

       The Journal of Popular Culture, Volume 46, Issue 6 (December 2013), p. 1217-1230

      ISSN: 0022-3840, DOI: 10.1111/jpcu.12085, Wiley

Camo, Dog Tags and "Support the Troops:" Military's Invasion of Popular Culture

Camouflage, Movies and Bumper Stickers (Crowley)

Popular Culture Adopts Military Trappings and Terms

HUMN240, E1WW – Fall 2014

Professor Harlan Schottenstein

John J. “Jack” Crowley

Nov. 2, 2014

   Popular Culture was inundated by the influence of former soldiers after World War II. In the more-immediate past, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were similarly pervasive in movies, fashion and even colloquial phrases. I saw it evolve from afar via my iPhone and web access as I patrolled in 2012 near Sangin in Helmand Province.

   I’ve been amused and impressed by popular culture’s reaction after returning to “The World” after my time outside “the wire.” Even that phrase turned into a television feature, figuratively referencing the boundary between a safe base and enemy territory.

     “Stolen valor” even prompted a 2013 federal criminal statute. Political candidates and warrior-wannabes claimed wrongly to be decorated Navy SEALs, Marine Special Operations Command or Army Green Berets/Rangers. The Persons other than Grunts (called POGs) also wanted to play soldier at home with pop-culture paint-ball and AirSoft guns. They safely “hunt” each other wearing masks and protective gear. No blood, no death. Video games such as Call of Duty grew concurrently. I play them.

    No body bags. Just hit reset and start over. Arguably shows such as AMC’s “Walking Dead” are an extension of overall dehumanization for people who have never held a dying comrade in their arms. They also reflect our fear of real-world terrorists.

    World War II’s impact was most-profound on public popular culture. Television, formally invented in 1926, exploded in its influence. GIs came home, began working, and their wives shed the Rosie the Riveter role – or merged it – with having babies. More income meant the ability to afford a TV, as well a house. The Baby Boom resulted, and today they are America’s bell-curved demographic as the United States ages.

     Television launched TV stars and action shows such as the “Lone Ranger,” or comedies like “I Love Lucy.” Stars such as James Arness played in shows like the western, “Gunsmoke.” Lucille Ball, Milton Berle and Jack Paar became household words. Paar’s “The Tonight Show” continues today with Jimmie Fallon. The mass media also made East and West Coast “move” closer. Los Angeles Dodger Jackie Robinson became a household name as he also simultaneously broke baseball’s color barrier.

     War also affects the economy and thereby indirectly pop culture. World War II ended the Depression. Along the way, the Lend Lease Act had been pumping American war material into the Allies hands long before we declared war on Japan – and then Germany/Italy – after Pearl Harbor. After World War II, the Ohio History Connection reports, Columbus’ place in the housing boom took hold. The city was the home of Lustron Homes. An exhibit of such a prefabricated house is on display at the Ohio Historical Connection’s museum at 800 E. 17^th Avenue by the Ohio Fairgrounds.

    In addition, many of the profound post-war popular culture impacts from Howdy Doody to Schwinn bicycles are on display and chronicled if you visit the museum or go online to  http://www.ohiohistory.org/exhibits/ohio-history-center-exhibits/1950s

   Through it all – and with recessions during the inter-war periods between WWII, Korea and Vietnam, America experienced great economic growth. Ex-warriors and their families beget voracious consumption. The racial integration of the armed services in 1947 by President Harry Truman’s Executive Action also was a popular culture phenomenon. As such, more blacks were drafted -- first in Korea, and then for Vietnam. Both wars were fought under America’s post WWII alliance with the newly effective United Nations’ South East Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO).

   Civil Rights also grew slowly, then exploded in the 1960s, in part due to African-American demands for equality off the battlefield as well as on it. The Baby Boom simultaneously fed the economic growth also fueled by war production for our various wars, “police actions” (Korea) or “incursions” (Cambodia, where Americans chased Viet Cong from Vietnam, prompting the May 4, 1970 Kent State shootings.) College campuses then were engorged in the late 1960s and early 1970s by ex-combatants eager to use their GI Bill tuition and other benefits. These vets infused conscience into protests.

    Anti-war activism fueled a popular-culture reaction manifested by heavy use of marijuana and psychedelics. It also infused what had been a British Invasion of the teen-era rock-music scene with unique sounds introduced by at least one former soldier. James Marshall Hendrix drifted to England after being mustered out of the Army Airborne for a jump-caused broken ankle/leg. He’d been “encouraged” to join up and go to Vietnam after a spate of West Coast car thefts near his native Seattle, Washington. He gravitated to guitar, learning to play a right-handed Fender Stratocaster upside down and backward in songs such as his signatures “Fire,” or “Purple Haze.”  Jimi’s “Star-Spangled Banner” rocked the 1969 Woodstock Music Festival – though most people already left.

    Once in Britain, Hendrix joined with Neil Redding and Mitch Mitchell to form the Jim Hendrix Experience. Other American rock innovators followed such as Jim Morrison and the Doors, or Janis Joplin and her Big Brother and the Holding Company. Within a few years, however, all three of those major artists would be dead of drug overdoses.

   The Vietnam generation also became politically aware, and active. Now-Secretary-of-State John Kerry even returned home to toss his valor-earned medals on the Capitol steps and to testify before hearings into the Vietnam War. He had gone from warrior to “peace-nik.” Many other veterans followed suit, as portrayed in the Tom Hanks’ movie portrayal entitled, “Forrest Gump.”  That film also touched on black activism, drug use and America’s self torment at its inextricable weaving of war, free speech and soul-searching.  Other disturbing “ ’Nam” movies include Oliver Stone’s Platoon, and a plethora of others involving all-star casts and producers. They include: We Were Soldier;, Good Morning Vietnam; The Boys in Company C;  Hamburger Hill; Uncommon Valor; Born on the Fourth of July; Deer Hunter; Full Metal Jacket; and Apocalypse Now.

  Wars regarding wars in Iraq include the much-referenced Hurt Locker. They also include many stars and well-conceived realistic special effects in movies such as: Home of the Brave; Grace is Gone; The Tiger and the Snow; American Soldiers; Stop Loss; Green Zone; the Battle for Haditha; Redacted; and the Valley of Elah.

     And, closer to my experiences, the conflict in Afghanistan was portrayed aptly in Hornet’s Nest (limited release); and quasi-realistically in Lone Survivor. I heard that ex-Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell speak earlier this year at the Ohio Theater. His therapy Golden Retriever wandering about among the many Afghan and Iraq-War vet crowd.  I would have loved to buy him a beer, but only Ohio-State alumni vets were sponsoring him. I went to Hocking College, and now attend Franklin University online. Whatever.

    There were good, and bad, movies about Afghanistan and Iraq, as detailed in a sort of top/bottom list of 19 such flicks on IMDB.com. It’s a safe bet that many of the stars assigned were put there by warriors, not just “POGs” who never left the wire.

See:  http://www.imdb.com/list/ls006118614/

   Through it all continued a war-related population boom which contributed to increased demand for consumer goods. This also added to the accessibility of popular culture items such as transistor radios, teen magazines and action toys such as GI Joe and the girls’ domestic version, Barbie. Both of those action figures are still infused into our lives today. M-16s supposedly began as a Mattel toy, then morphed into a weapon, according to some unsubstantiated urban legend. Even such stories themselves become pop culture.

    Increased prosperity contributed to a change in life style of most of the people. Ownership of houses increased and many people moved in from cities to suburban areas. The Ohio Historical Society has an excellent exhibit that includes a Columbus-built metal house. Other similar “pre-fab” homes were made of sheet metal similar to that used to build World War II bombers. With these, housing need and ownership of cars also increased. This in turn encouraged building of new highways, including the Autobahn-influenced interstates championed for Cold War defense by former Allied General turned president Dwight D. “Ike” Eisenhower. Road trips became a national vacation tradition.

    People started to take more holidays, and to support this many new roadside motels and restaurants were set up. This included along Broad Street also part of U.S. 40, the National Road. Use of many new home-use appliances similarly became popular. This included TV, mixers, washing machines, dryers, dishwashers and waste-disposal units.

   But as the nation grew to accept the failure of Vietnam, and even their continued uneasiness with our involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, bravery thieves thrived. An initial attempt to punish them criminally was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2005. Finally, in 2013, President Barack Obama signed the current Stolen Valor Act.

    Public Law 113–12 (113^th Congress, H.R. 258) makes it a crime to claim a person received a military decoration with the intent of obtaining any “tangible benefit.” It was tightly written to overcome the 2005 objections of its predecessor law on free-speech grounds. Now employers, VA lenders and real vets have protection from not-so-valant warrior wanna-bes. That’s affected Vietnam and later vets because it ensures that the blood they spilled in earnest is not sullied. The law lives on for we Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom (OIF/OEF) former warriors.

Conclusion:

   We are a warrior-predicated and validated society. If America shares its 200 years of peak fame, like other empires in the past such as Rome, Greece or the British Empire, perhaps our time is fading. What cannot be turned back, however is the impact wars and the military has on popular and economic culture. Whether it’s kids using terms like “flak,” “fragged,” “the wire,” or “offed,” the impact is clear. People wear mock dog tags, or various kinds of camoflauge. They play Special Ops games, or shoot paintball and AirSoft guns. In an eery way, however, regard for human life has become a casualty.

    We’ve become very gun-happy and possibly by necessity in the age of ISIS.  Even shooters rush to buy AR-15 assault rifles, the non-semi-automatic versions of the M-16, and its Israeli-adapted little brother, the M-4. I carried an M-4, more adapted to house searches etc. due to its shorter profile.

      Even Ohio police departments in Fairfield County, Lima Delaware and at Ohio State’s main campus have been given Mine Resistant and Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles such as we used in Afghanistan and Iraq. Sadly, such vehicles were slow to come into use because of America’s loss of basic-steel manufacturing (another saga.)

    As the military winds down from our two longest wars, local law enforcement also is given night-vision goggles, grenade launchers and old HUMVEE ambulances formerly destined instead for National Guard Units. See http://www.wsmv.com/story/26502822/militarization-of-local-law-enforcement

    That story was most recently updated last night on the same link by Mike Bowersock.

   To sum up, the military affects popular culture. And vets who have returned home struggle with hyper-situational awareness. They have trouble relating to those who have not “been in the shit.” As OEF/OIF vets transition, we, too, will learn to deal with Post Traumatic Stress Injury (no longer called a Disorder). For prior vets, it was called shell shock, battle rattle, or battle fatigue. Either way, you work to get around it, understand that you are but one of 411,000 veterans seeking help from a strained VA, and move on with life. Popular culture, meanwhile, will adopt what the military imbued in us, and repackage it for public consumption. Most of that is good, but you take the bad with it too.

References:

Exhibit: “1950s: Building the American Dream,” Ohio Historical Connection (formerly the Ohio Historical Society), 800 E. 17^th Avenue, Columbus, Ohio

       Retrieved from: http://www.ohiohistory.org/exhibits/ohio-history-center-exhibits/1950s

And

http://www.lustronpreservation.org/

“How did Popular Culture Change in the Post-World War II Years?” eNote

    Homework Help (Seven Responses)

    Retrieved from:

    http://www.enotes.com/homework-help/how-did-us-popular-culture-change-post-ww2-ye-395354

“Militarization of Local Law Enforcement,” WCMH-TV, Channel 4, online stories

     Sept. 10, 2014, referenced below. See also update Nov. 3, by Mike Bowersock, not yet posted.

      Retrieved from: http://www.wsmv.com/story/26502822/militarization-of-local-law-enforcement

U.S. Congressional Bill Summary, Stolen Valor Act of 2013,

     Retrieved from:

      https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/258

 “Update on Stolen Valor Law,” based on book “Stolen Valor,” How the Vietnam

       Generation was Robbed of its Heroes and its History, (Burkett, B.G.

        and Whitley, G.), 2014, 692 pages, privately published by B.G. Burkett

        and Glenna Whitley.

        Retrieved from: http://www.stolenvalor.com/

War Movies: Afghanistan, Google search results

         Retrieved from:

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=Afghanistan%20War%20movies

War Movies: 19 Best and Worst from Iraq and Afghanistan, Google search results

          Retrieved from: http://www.imdb.com/list/ls006118614/

War Movies: Iraq, Google search results

         Retrieved from: https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=Iraq%20War%20movies

War Movies: Vietnam, Google search results

         Retrieved from: https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=uncommon+valor+movie&stick=H4sIAAAAAAAAAD1RMW7bMBS1ihZ1gy71CdJM3SyRIimNvUIvQISkaZmmaIkWHEq9Q9cOvUWRoQcoEMBTgG4duiUo0Es0Dv739h753uf7j7PPv-7-zmYvvs9fXb1Ztsu80m6syOKwWQ3hur28uY6X7e6J7Y_Z_HS_T206Zq9P0E03cEgpHY7Zs59ORc6P2cUJk67inQKN6x0DTcG3yaKe5CoCroLgEvEpB2Ct5UjQ2xS6A8ymJk-Ay3o64HxFQ5xQU9exgzxlyJ33cCHWB27QMLB1gSK63U49hFbGoYZGogMOlbwYQdLJHvMz31AB2KRWlWjd2inH8a5QIxbESBckbmD2Ulbn5phs8LUy8YBPmNKSEkTGh2gUOkQaTA0k0sgcNiBSb7EZnbM1xVRUjDWOtcmcF21YrwCT9dhhDDFWqQHMc2mwVVIxcbBnwm1FgOioUsAShKh9jhsNqcN_KN0TA4PwpZTxPnv5O3t_8W6pd96v9LDZhaXd-Ha_eDufLZ5LFzLYP9Pj17t_Vx9-rL59vH-4_fLzk7v9D7yvEFLPAgAA

Commonalities and Change: Formulas Survive Despite Variances

“Up” and “Star Wars” Each Showcase Beliefs,

Myths, Heroes, Rituals and Stereotypes

John J. “Jack” Crowley

HUMN240-F2WW (F14)

Professor Harlan Schottenstein

Nov. 2, 2014

    Both Up and Star Wars are excellent movies in their own genre of animation and science fiction respectively.  Though Star Wars is an older movie, good still triumphs over insurmountable evil.  A young dreamer becomes a battle-tested Jedi Knight.

   In Up, there is a love story chronicled between two kids, Ellie and Carl. They build a fort together, and though they can’t have kids they dream of visiting picturesque Paradise Falls far away. Alas, Ellie dies, but Carl persists even in his old age.  The conflict peaks after Carl accidentally injures a construction worker who wants to tear down the homestead. He must flee literally in his house in order to avoid a nursing home.

   Ed Asner’s animated curmudgeon Carl has other rituals, but different than Luke’s coming of age in Star Wars. Carl must get over the death of his beloved lifelong partner – and learn to tolerate Russell, a pesky, well-meaning Boy Scout. Ellie is gone, but Carl sets off with Russell to South America to fulfill his promise to Ellie.  Stereotype subtlety also is evident in that Carl looks like Spencer Tracy.

     In each movie, there are formulas: romantic love; betrayal;  heroes; and dark challenges (Darth Vader or Up’s evil explorer Charles Muntz). In addition, each fulfills our view of stereotypes. Obi Wan is the wise and sage adviser to the young Luke Skywalker. Carl is the typical grump, battling hearing aides, arthritis and his own emotional baggage.  And both Muntz and Vader are deceptive and purely mean-spirited.  Christopher Plummer’s Muntz wants to return with Kevin the rare bird to show Muntz’s not crazy, and to ruin mankind. Vader just wants to destroy the rebels, and anyone who gets in the Emperor/his way.  Both have henchmen (even if Muntz’s are dogs that talk.)

   Whether it’s an animated old widower, or a young futuristic space warrior, heroes in each movie confirm our beliefs and reinforce our myths. They also deliver rituals of passage while entertaining us. And the protagonists triumph in the end, a hallmark of any enduring action-adventure formula. The bad guys are mad with power and malevolence.

    I’ll answer three questions about each movie:

What formula can you identify?    

 

     Star Wars has adventure, boy-pursues-girl and the stereotypical rogue with a soft heart (Hans Solo). Luke learns from the older Obi Wan, embraces adventure to make himself a man, and confronts the evil of Darth Vader’s Empire. (Later he will find out that Darth is his father.)

   Up also has adventure involving a love-lost Carl. He’s intent to turn his house into a flying airship buoyed by helium balloons. He will keep his promise to the departed Ellie and fly his home all the way to South America’s Paradise Falls.

What are the commonalities (in each column of the grid)?

    In each movie, the male character seeks their “leading lady.” For Luke, it is Princess Leia (later found to be his sister), but he is bested by Solo. For Carl, his lost compass is the late Ellie for whom he still opines. Other likenesses are the stereotypes: young warrior versus old “fart.” Myths surface in the pursuit of Up’s Carl of a special place Ellie and he will never see together. Luke has a myth both about the ease of becoming a Jedi – and the real fate of his lost father.

How do formulas change over the years?

    I don’t think they do. In popular culture there always is implied optimism, as our various readings seem to indicate. In every action movie there is an ultimate desirable outcome. And even animated movies such as Up can teach a valuable real-life lesson.

HUMN240, Jack Crowley, 11-2-2014

Grid for Formula Analyses of Star Wars and Up

Artifact	Beliefs	Myth	Hero	Setting	Ritual	Stereotype	Formulas
Movie
Up	1. You can adopt a child, even if you can’t have your own. 2. Beneath the gruff surface is Carl’s alter ego "good man."	Happiness in old age Nursing homes beat living at home. Not all old people are “disposable.”	Carl and Kevin, persistent against odds Possesses qualities our culture values: Boy Scout ingenuity and wisdom in old age	A bustling city that wants to move an old man who has no usefulness. A far-away paradise, with bad guys and animals to save.	Rites of Passage: Aging and Russell growing up with a father figure, even an old one. Rites of Unity Strength in numbers, shared experiences and mutual assistance of young with old.	Nerd Boy Scout; and Selfish old man. Villain who is misguided, and will do anything to prevail over his critics. (Carl Muntz)	Animated Action-Adventure Youth and Age begrudgingly work together. Old man intent on keeping lifelong promise, learns to accept help from a  boy.
Star Wars	1. Travel is always fun. 2. Team work can defeat any evil, it just takes persistence.	Rebellion is romantic, easy. Bad guys like Darth Vader never had a good side; there is never a reason for their downward spiral.	Luke, Obi Wan, Princess Leia and Hans Solo  each doing their part to push for the goal. Change, survive or die trying to defeat evil. Self-evaluational learning and coming of age as well as maturity (Hans and Luke).	A limitless universe caught in desperate good v. evil battle. Still-relevant lessons about pushing toward a good goal – even in a place far away.	Passage: Becoming a Jedi, acting like a princess, or Hans’ becoming less selfish. Shared suffering that bears fruit after tough fights, & cooperation.	Cocky pilot, All-seeing bad guy and youthful bliss.  Opportunism: Lando Calrizzian, Hans and even Darth Vader seeking their own glory.	Sci-Fi Action &Adventure Good has to fight to overcome evil, but does eventually. Romantic tension and competition; victory despite overwhelming odds.