the Ken-Year Chronicle

the Barbenheirmer Saga

Announced last year, there was going to be a live-action movie about the Mattel toy Barbie starring Margot Robbie. Barbie has had a long series of animated movie with their own overwhelming lore but this movie could be a different step forward. There were would be a lot of big names including Ryan Gosling, Michael Cera, and America Ferrera along with some rising stars like Simu Liu and Kingsley Ben-Adir. I was ready to see Cera again but to be honest, I could not care for a barbie movie. The common expectation, pre and after trailer, was that this was going to be a regular family tier girly movie. Post trailer, certain folks had more expectations but not everyone watched it. The Barbie brand is a notoriously girly brand of dolls that seemed to raised the standard of beauty. Over it’s 64 years of life, white women with thin bodies have been attributed as attractive and the barbie body type was used both as a compliment or an insult. Coupled with thinner models in certain magazines, the American women would start to believe that a skeletal figure was better while fast food made everyone fatter than a Samoan. Eventually, barbie would be ridiculed and considered bimbo (term for dumb slut), anti-feminist, and childish. Eventually, little boys and girls didn’t even play with barbies anymore. If they wanted to dress someone up, they had Sims or girlgames.com. There was also a rival to Barbie, Bratz, which I grew up thinking it was the POC equivalent. Compared to Barbie, the dolls’ makeup were more flared and the dress-up style was more fashion based; whether it be luxurious or street. The Barbie dolls had soft use of makeup and their outfits were more based on professions (like doctor, marine, or beach) although there was also some fashion options. Bratz was also less relevant so while one could still use it as a derogatory term to sluts/bimbos, the doll’s reputation wasn’t lost as much. But nationwide, kids seemingly played with dolls less. They could play legos, on their ipads, or just keep an army of plush instead.

At some point, an Oppenheimer film was also announced. Julius Robert Oppenheimer was a American-born Jew and student of theoretical physics. During World War II, he was recruited the the greatest country on the planet to create the biggest bomb known to man, once theorized to chain explosions across the atmosphere to obliterate the whole planet. We really needed to beat the axis. JRO completed his task and with his science, the Americans built Fat Man and Little Boy which were dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima respectively. We really needed to beat the Japanese. Later, a quote would be attributed to Oppenheimer for his creation of the bomb, “Now I am become death, the Destroyer of Worlds”. The quote comes from the worlds longest epic poem, the Mahabharata in the chapter known as Bhagavad Gita. In the story, the deity Krishna decides to flex his power and goes super saiyan. Prince Arjuna is awed and so Krishna tells him he’s become the Him. If any zoomer knows anything about Oppenheimer, it was this quote because it goes hard. But it was definitely attributed to him (specifically about the bomb) to show his regret at making the extinctionator. To be honest, nuclear energy is not a bad thing to invent, I want to meet the guy who decided fossil fuels was better. He is death. But a gritty biopic about this woeful nerd would be an exciting thing for all the historical and scientific niggas. The film would star some people like Cillian Murphy, Matt Damon, Devon Bostick, Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh, Robert Downey Jr, and then there’s too many big stars to name. One surprise guest was Josh Peck, which apparently jump scared everyone since the last time people saw him was a sitcom a decade ago.

At some point in the begging of the year, they announced their released dates for the films. Warner Bros and Greta Gerwig’s Barbie would be released on July 21st. Universal and Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer would be released on July 21st. That’s it. That’s the whole joke. Next story? Oh…I have more to discuss. A tweeter I forget the name of pointed out this fact and made a joke about the bright girly Barbie being released next to the gritty boyish Oppenheimer. I think a day later, someone else pointed out that this is Nolan’s second offense as he (personally) released the Dark Knight the same day as Mamma Mia back in 2008. Eventually, someone combined the names and “Barbenheimer” day was announced for July 21st. Then the meme ran off virally, leaving no person with internet service immune.

A reminder to you that scheduling for films this year was already sucking ass. That whole section was entirely foreground for this section. If one or both of these movies released one week before, they’d be fighting for opening weekend money with Tom Cruise’s Dead Reckoning. The next weekend is actually empty of relevance but both of the movies would practically steal the rest of the summer anyways with reviews attracting more viewers. It would also be due to the fact that the two movies were so aesthetically polar that neither company would’ve attracted the same fans anyway. That is called counterprogramming. Then the meme spread inexpensive advertising and now people had to see both movies so it was best to keep the date.

As the meme evolved, it wasn’t fraught with conflict. Maybe decades ago, bikers and surfers would’ve argued about being in the same place at the same time but the meme was about unity. The stars, Margot Robbie and Cillian Murphy, would be photoshopped together in various posters or even mismatched to show a yin-yang image. People made up plans and outfits to watch the movies on the same day. For outfits, it had to be pink, that was Barbie’s iconic color. The outfit could be causal, beachy, or just girly. Then, you’d go into the bathroom and switch into a gothic or greyscale 20th century outfit that represents the morality of building a bomb AND imitates Oppenheimer’s outfit from the trailers. But the timing?

1. Watching the movies back to back
   • early afternoon, Barbie first and then Oppenheimer so that your outfit also matches the daylight outside.
   • Or you’d watch Barbie first for its happy vibes and then end on the somber note of Oppenheimer. Reverse this if you want Barbie to serve as an enlightening dessert that’ll raise your spirits.
2. Watching the movies the same day
   • Specifically from one person (I think Jacob Alpharad), Barbie first, lunch and break time to clear head, and then Oppenheimer. An all day adventure at the theatre-mall.

But these were plans, the execution was not assumed by everyone.

Oh and don’t forget! Oppenheimer is 3 hours and Barbie just under 2 hours. Get ready to spend your whole day outside…

Moving on, Nintendo gamers decided to be invasive and place another feature for July 21st because that was the day Pikmin 4 was to be released. Pikmin is a video game series where you play as a microscopic astronaut that can summon (by digging out) these little minions called pikmin. You summon a certain number to help you complete the task of the level and then move on. The game is fairly popular among Nintendo gamers but niche in the general gamer sphere and so it did not catch on. But the annoying Pikmin fans that they were, were sometimes really avid in advocating for “Bar-min-heimer”. Oh there’s barely a difference if you say it fast. But these gamers are too ambitious, they want everyone to hop on the Pikmin ship but not everyone even plays on the Nintendo Switch. Did they really think they’d convince the girlies and historians to play their game? In the end, Pikmin scored 2.6 million units sold against it’s competitors of Tears of the Kingdom (at 19.5 million) and Wonder (at 4.3 million). It was the highest selling installment of its series.

Now, earlier I spoke how people will stretch their wallets thin watching the big movie coming out every other weekend but there is a different problem here, on the production side of the market. There is only so many seats in one theater and only so many shows in one day. Barbie on it’s own marketing would have naturally sold out on Barbenheimer Day but now a good majority of those people will be squeezing into the Oppenheimer premiere and vice versa. Tickets would have to be bought as soon as possible and even planning your activity that day was fault. Just go when you can cause everyone’s going. And you know what? You might as well wait a week for attendance to die down, especially if you don’t like big crowds. Oh it’s still sold out? Give 3 weeks, 6 weeks, and there will be open seats.

As the meme kept escalating closer and closer to debut, it became more and more obvious how big this was going to be for the producers. On the Official Podcast, one could hear an opinion from one outside of either audience. One opinion they held was that this was a manufactured meme which underestimates the heart of the meme community. A meme is genuinely and inherently uncontrollable. You can try to manufacturer an ad or something but whether it not it goes viral or, even more so, people care about it is uncontrollable. Them being on the same date could’ve not been noticed until the week of. That’s what happened with Mamma Mia and Dark Knight. But this event does beg the question if companies will try to ‘accidentally’ do this again. But that’s the thing. Counterprogramming inherently means that two studios would release opposing movies on the same day. They would not naturally be attracting the same crowd. This is only happening because opposing movies are on the same day. You niggas forced them to attract the same crowd. Studios could do counterprogramming again, because its optimal capitalist strategy, and it could or couldn’t happen again. It all depends on the consumers. The only thing studios shouldn’t do is actually advertise a “Barbenheimer Day” because consumers will feel cringe and condescensated. In conclusion, I see this as an invasion of irony in the economy. The strategy for Ironic Marketing is to be post-ironic and act you wouldn’t want a Barbenheimer to happen to your film. Or if you aren’t proactive, Ironic Marketing can react to unpredictable memes in the same was McDonald’s did with the Grimace Shake. Just don’t react. Let the memes market for you. You don’t even have to pay anyone. This must be what Comedeocracy feels like.

News had come out that Margot Robbie did do some meddling, A producer in Oppenheimer had nicely asked her to change her date for Barbie but she thought it was a perfect choice. Although, she fervently made this rejection before the meme was big and so it was still simply fate that Universal and Warner Bros decided to counterprogram. Also, still neither company fed into the meme. Good for them, everything was going accordingly to my plan.

Now let’s talk about the demographics, at which point were separate, but now by the Rule of Comedy, united under God into one theater. The demographics come from a lack of data and a wealth of vibes.

Barbie is a feminine product and while it lost relevancy, a Margot Robbie film is most definitely getting watched by the female cohort. Also it was the main girly film of the year, one where being girly wouldn’t be sexualized or criticized and instead be a fun thing. Now when I mean girly, I speak to the concept and aesthetic of the bright colors, fashionism (valuing makeup, outfits, and accessories instead of just throwing clothes on), high energy, the practice of gossip, and non-physical play. This isn’t the female gender or sex but just the American social ideas (filtered by me) of a young girl. So, all the ladies will be here.Some girls will go with their girlfriends and naturally some boys would’ve been dragged in by their girlfriends. It was also marketed as a happy film so families with boy or girl kids would be attracted. There was also plenty of eye candy in the trailer coming from Ryan Gosling, which would attract both genders. Boys have been dearly in love with Gosling since Drive (2011) and girls could probably find him attractive? Gosling clips can be found on boy tiktok’s with captions labeled “i’m him” calling attention to how relatable he is as a goofy but sometimes serious actor. He is also usually co-starring with an attractive female lead making him a more desirable person to idolize. A strange detractor actually exists in Simu Liu as some people seem to hate him and I remember my female friends saying he was ugly. Crazy thing for me to point out but wish him the best career possible.Then, even naturally speaking, there was still the irony factor of attracting boys simply due to the fact that it would be ironic to go to the film. These boys could try to rizz some game if they looked away from Gosling at the same time with the single females going in groups. Age wise, we have a broad range from 7 to 70 (I don’t think toddlers should be in a theater if its not Cocomelon). Race wise, no restrictions but white women could definitely more feel natural here. Of course, Greta went out of her way to have a diverse cast when she could’ve just made them all big booty latinas.

Oppenheimer naturally speaking would attract historians and scientists, as I’ve repeated. It was a monument moment for both momentful fields. These groups could include women but that doesn’t mean they aren’t boyish. By boyish, I mean rough colors, fascism (unspoken rules like bro-code and uniformalizing behavior), high emotion, the practice of negging, and dirty physically active play. Despite being boyish, I also expect the more introverted ones to watch and truly pay attention to a potentially moralizing film. Now boys may more than likely attend this not on a date when compared to girls in Barbie by they still wouldn’t see it alone. Since it was an edgy biopic, it is most likely to be seen by young or grown adults. There will be people who are still learning about Oppenheimer and those who know the most that attend this. Those who are really old might watch this but they probably remember everything, you know? Teen boys might watch it either for genuine interest or the double irony of not going to Barbie. But it’s not that funny. So not an everyone movie.

Barbenheimer all together would combine these groups. You’re going to get chatty thin white girls sitting a row head of self-glazing nerds who point out the inconsistencies in Nolan’s film. Then a bunch of introverted men are going to be shocked and appalled at the presence of couples surrounding them in the theatre at the Gerwig film. This would be happening virtually every 5 hours for as long as the theater is open. And people would be strategically theater hopping so either theaters would enforce their rules on this or let people go. There were most definitely theaters that sold double-feature tickets so that may be a different situation. In addition to the mixture would be those attracted by the meme (such as myself) except for little kids! If parents were watching both films it would be best to not bring their kids to Nolan’s film. But this was a perfect Cinema Paradiso.

The result, in my experience, well….I watched them on different days a full week after the special day. Oppenheimer was first, at night. Greyscale clothing for sure although my friend wore the brightest whitest shirt possible. A decently fully theatre of just adults, some surpassing 50 and others closer to 20. People were quiet the whole way through, captivated by Nolan’s work but there were screams at the Trinity Test. The next day I watched Barbie with a coworker of mine who was dressed for Cillian Murphy. I and everyone else wore pink. There were many groups of young girls and seperate groups of guys along with a handful of families and senior couples. We would be captivated by Greta’s work but there was a lot of unnecessary laughs from the normies there. Also I screamed during the “Just Ken” scene. That shit was insane. I did not rizz anyone at this movie.

The result, outside of my experience, people came out of B-Day warning folks to NOT watch Nolan’s movie first. One tweet specifically stated it was not the weak of heart so they might’ve naturally been for the Barbie film. It would be widely agreed, due to the plot of both films, that Barbie was the film with heavier thought which left people mute after viewing and it was just better than Oppenheimer. The latter film was just a biography taken from interviews and flashbacks and so it didn’t need to actually moralize the audience on the use of the nuclear bomb especially because the nerd was only involved in its creation. Barbie plot broke the character down and surgical dissected it along with its role in society. Of course it was more thought-provoking.

So since it will be shorter, I should discuss Oppenheimer‘s reaction first. It was well celebrated by film nerds due Hoyte van Hoytema’s cinematography and also the use of sound. The film starts with a flash forward to Oppenheimer meeting Albert Einstein and Anthony Stark Lewis Strauss but (due to Nolan) will bounce around to certain points of that Jew’s life. At this scene, Einstein will ask the focal question of the film, whether Oppenheimer is ready to deal with the backlash of killing everyone. Murphy actually gets to reference Krishna real early, while getting laid, thus filtering out anyone who was waiting for that line. There would actually be quite a few nude Florence Pugh scenes but female viewers were also s to the satisfied by the ndue Murphy scenes. Lots of eye candy so far. While the film was 3 hours, it didn’t really waste a minute and everyone felt that it was actually fast paced, probably because the beginning very much was. By the time Murphy actually begins working on the bomb, we are able to slow to speed 4. Now scenes are interspliced with scenes from a future court interview, which is a crazy thing for Nolan to introduce without a formal introduction. At the desert encampment, we learn much of Oppenheimer’s family and love life along with the scientific theories at which they would be testing. These scenes were also interesting as an education for how casual life was like at this nuclear colony since even commoners were put to live there. At this point, the character is adamant at least at the discovery of nuclear fission although he is hesitant around conversations of its weaponization. By now, every scene transition would have echoes of bombs getting silently louder and louder, which IMAX theater fans said was great. People also joked that the Barbie viewers next door were probably shocked by the sound of so many bombs throughout the film. Finally comes the Trinity Test scene, which felt like the slowest and most intense build up. In movie, everything has been finally set up for a successful bomb and Josh Peck finally make’s his appearance as the man who will press the buttons. The characters hide themselves outside of the blast range and everyone’s wearing shades. Finally, the bomb is dropped (which was rumored to be a practical nuke Nolan used for the film). The bright flash of the sun glares across the audiences’ eyes. It was truly the brightest moment of my life. People are screaming but also, our hearts are frozen. Our minds slow. There is no sound! Just…brightness. The screams are cut short. We see the explosion spread from a wideshot and still silence. Probably a full slow minute of silence. I turned to my friend and said, “wow it’s way longer than I expected”. Then BOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!! An earthshaking, ass quaking, heart stopping boom blares form all available speakers in the whole building. I nearly jumped out of my seat. Then I and my friends started laughing and the explosion waned. And the band wasn’t done playing yet. Afterwards, the nerd gives a victory speech to his colony but has a near schizophrenic vision of explosions enveloping all of his friends and comrades as he walks alone in the power of the sun. The sound here was continuous and repeated explosions just an inch quieter than the Trinity Test. Brilliant, Nolan, Brilliant. After that is a scene were President Harry Truman kind of berates Oppenheimer for his guilt over the bomb, despite him not actually killing anyone in the Trinity Test. Those that use the bomb in Japan have authority from Truman and so he is to blame. Audiences first reacted to this scene negatively forgetting the final point of this scene and so they hated Truman. But then literate people watched the movie and cleared their minds. Oppenheimer was then indeed made fun of and Truman was drawn as the chad in this situation for not being a crybaby. The rest of the film (where I kind think I missed something) features the rest of the trial against Oppenheimer for his affiliation with communists earlier in the movie, due to America’s Red Scare at the time. Just as ole Julius is about to lose the case, Rami Malek’s character David L. Hill came out and air out all of Stark’s Strauss’ sins and corrupt behavior all of which would show his bias in the case against Oppenheimer and so the charges should be dropped. Everyone online cheered at Hill’s folding chair clutch but since I didn’t pay attention, I did not know what they were talking about. While nobody in our generation truly vilified Oppenheimer, the ending of the film (which reveals the conversation with Einstein) would defiantly move him into a more celebrated position. He was just a nerd and cog of the machine who was too naive to see the chain reaction his fission would commit to. It isn’t necessarily amoral or moral to make the bomb but the question is what after? What next? Well, Oppenheimer would recommend a ceasing of the arms race and continues to do so in this film with Nolan’s help but that might not matter to Putin.

Next, Barbie. But first, a history of Feminism.

Feminism is the belief that women should matter as much as men do in society and in fact that both genders are treated equally. It is then, against both misogyny and misandry. It is also supportive of transgenders as it’s focal point is quality between any gender.

So the first wave is usually defined as the Fight for Suffrage which started all of the way back in 1848, just before the Civil War. Actually, that year went crazy for national rights in Europe, but the American women were not as violent. They just wanted enfranchisement. The ability to own property, to be educated, to act independently of men, and to vote. Now if I remember my history class correctly, the reason women were in such a poor position in God’s America was that it was a puritan slave state founded by greedy business and landowners from a Pre-Victorian England. There is no way a woman could have power initially so it took around three generations, a Civil War, Imperialism, rise of liberalism, and World War I before finally the 19th Amendment. That was the big goal. By the 1920s, women were educated, could vote, and decidedly bought flapper dresses to roar that decade. That generation of women were happy and powerful enough but that power was waning and then WHOOPS everyone’s poor. One leader during this time period was Susan B Anthony. There’s a bee? AHH! (if you laughed, you’re a millenial).

Wait a second, a Second world war? Yessir, the country’s rich again. And this time there was waaaaaaaaay less men in weapon’s factories so now we need the women to have a job and oh, the war’s over. Go back to the kitchen. Now would be the reaction to that first wave feminism which can be called Household Slavery. No, go look up “Woman are Household Slaves”. The conversation moved away from women should have rights to woman should have made the right meal for dinner. Millennials and zoomers joke about it now, that the 1950’s husband beat their wives, but it was doctrine! Dogma! There would be a genuine effort to remove women from the workforce, shorten their pay if they stay, and socially restrict them to the home. Oh and dinner better be ready. It was helped with the adoption of urban sprawl by God’s America and so the only reason they had to go outside was possibly to water the plants. Also, there was the adoption of the Nuclear Family, named for the nuclear age, as a replacement for Village Raising. It included parents from either the Greatest Generation (Gen U) or the Silent Generation (Gen V) and 2 children of the Baby Boom with a stay at home mom because there would be no support from relatives, friends or neighbors such as with Village Raising. It was not automatically adopted everywhere but slowly spread along with Urban Sprawl. In the classical Village Raising, children were subject to any relative or member of the clan as everyone took care of everyone. This style of family would actually continue to be seen in media from then and until now. While Boomers grew up in this era of beating wives, they would also be the ones fomenting the Sexual Revolution.

As they grew up, roles of women in submissive positions were doubly cemented so that it was ‘traditional’ to the common boomer when they were adults. But science came to save the day! As long as a woman could reproduce, they would be economically dependent of men who may or may not want to wear a condom during reproductive activity. But with a special pill, now a woman could painfully sabotage her reproductive systems and still share sex with a man. Liberating, as this meant they did not spend the majority of the year pregnant instead of working and could try to further cut the pay gap. This would come up during the general 1960s-1970s protest sagas for Americans. Pacifism, Black Rights, better pay for female workers, rise of hippies, and rise of queers. This was all the pressure from the college-aged boomers which would be strongly aided by abortion rights granted by Roe v Wade in 1973. The Sexual Revolution meant that the previously puritan meta of Americans would be found weird in the few following decades (although the meta is so ingrained that European sexual behaviors are still commonly seen as exotic in American media and black Americans may even find anal to be ‘too freaky’). I will be clear that the Sexual Revolution upscaled both the female sex and the bounds of having sex, finding gays to be slowly more acceptable. But the 70s-2015 would still be hard for queers anyway. By the births of Gen X, flappers resurrected as disco dancers with more and more women being found at the workplace and even daringly living on their own. Another upscaling from the Revolution is looser relations between men and women (which gay people already enjoy). With a guarantee of removing a fetus, men and women could have affairs so often that they weren’t even labels anymore; Hookup Culture. And then, divorce rates seemed to rise at the same time, even after people had kids. They didn’t want them and potentially hated their partner for not preparing well enough to avoid the child. So Baby Daddys and Baby Mommas (not married) rose, especially in black areas. Not that white people were safe from the Divorce Curse, as both their own finances and promiscuity ruined their marriages. These might’ve been motives as to why, at the same time as the Revolution, the Evangelical Counter-Revolution loudly argued against them. They tried to push harder for Nuclear Families, chastity, and traditional roles for men and women. Also brainwashing queers to not be so. The movement was Christian based so many other denominations were allied. But religiosity was dying anyways. Their voices would not be heard for a whole other generation. Um, but forgetting all of this, the Second Wave was an argument for enfranchising the feminine economy via independence from men and cutting the pay gap between genders. There was also the curbing of traditional roles which facilitated domestic abuse or the curbing of sexual abuse. They also fought against pornography which rose in the 70s. A leader in this time period was Betty Friedan of the National Organization of Women.

The third wave would seem to arrive by the 90s. By now, the Boomers are parents of millennials and Gen X are leaving college with big hopes in the computer industry. The country was the only superpower on the planet as supported by God himself. After a sexual allegation against Judge Clarence Thomas, Rebecca Walker would practically call upon a third wave to crash upon our beautiful shores. The question for current and future feminists would be; what can a woman be if she is equal to man. With suffrage and decent finances, women would now be equal to men (not totally and not across demographics obviously) so what can they achieve at this point? A good career in sciences or the technologies? Even minimum wage jobs so as long you can take care of your children that your lover so kindly decided to forget about? Well, they had to keep moving forward, no matter how fast, to perfect the feminist movement. For the lifetime of millennials, women could become accepted in any public space (even tech, gaming, or STEM) along with media portraying women in diverse roles. Not just the damsel or an emotional support friend but as Buffy, the Bride in Kill Bill, Kim Possible, or Bayonetta. Okay, yes, women can be badass killers but what else? Well they can be sexy, that’s cool was cool for men. But this new wave would have several antagonists to deal with by the time the fourth came in.

1. Pornography; or the display of women in flexible body positions as they were dominated by the other gender. Some feminists found this disrespectful as a women had to willingly, or unwillingly, make herself below that of the male pornstar in the situation. It was also demeaning to allow men to freely masturbate to this woman who is eye-dinner (not just candy). Now an unlearned male might respond that female pornstars are the famous high-paid ones and no one was getting seriously hurt (as they would easily leave if that happened). Regardless, a feminist seemed to not be able to appreciate any sexually explicit situation such as strip bars, brothels, Hooters and the like. They felt their ideals would be compromised as they saw themselves in the women abused in sex work. This is unfortunate as other women, feminist or not, were the ones performing the stripping and they were at least coping with it. They were either too unskilled for any other finance (whore) or found too much fun in this work (slut). They porn industry was also very very initally abuse but has gotten better with actors finding themselves to be more comfortable with it as the 3 decade conversation continued. A conclusion of the conversation would be reached soon enough…it would be reasoned that a fully autonomous female had as much liberate to choose porn as a man did. And to be honest, both a male slut and a female slut would do so because they live off sex and like to be watched. So it is actually pro-feminist if the women accomplish economic success in this role. Of course, coerced porn was always wrong. The conversation would move to respecting ‘sex workers’ (which means not calling them prostitutes I guess) and providing care so their customers can’t abuse them. This would be greatly helped by Onlyfans and other sites allowing for remote display so an actress could even feel fully in charge in her work.
2. Sexual Abusers, such as Clarence Thomas, who would be able to continue getting away from accusers Scott free. Women’s rights groups rightly hated this and continuously fought for more awareness of sexual abuse; in porn, in the lower classes, and in the higher classes. Especially in the higher classes as it would be found that Hollywood and other entertainment locales were hotbeds of abuse. Born with Sonic 06 was the MeToo movement of women coming out in packs to accuse the powerful elites of sexual abuse. Some would be successful and it would continue to grow to be a massive culture in the age of early social media with a whole hashtag. Now an unlearned male may argue against these feminists by informing them that abuse against men do not also get talked enough about or that women even do this just to steal money from Mr Playboy when the situation isn’t that serious. The response to the first is to also push for male abuse awareness (obviously) as feminism is meant to equalize both genders. The response to the second seems to be simply ignoring them. Some also complain that just wholeheartedly believing any female victim is destructive as false accusations have come and passed which have potentially ruined the lives of rich men. The conversation continues…
3. Misogynists continue to pester for the complete submission of the female gender in various ways. Some of them try to compromise when their traditional rhetoric isn’t heard. Instead of arguing for full submission, they argued that feminists were far too reaching with their goals and successes and attributed them to being feminazis. Feminazism was an idea during this third wave to favor women over men or to even totally forget about men. In anecdotal cases, Men felt forgotten and women felt fine forgetting them. The misogynists also became more aggressive with the GamerGate movement that fought against female roles in the entertainment industry or more specifically gaming. It would fall away by the rise of Trump.
   • I have not mentioned male feminists which were a good number in the feminist movement. But misogynists or any God-fearing man found them heretical, submissive, homosexual, and cowardly. It was even taboo to admit one was a feminist I think pre-2019. The trope of a feminist male character would also be made fun of in media although understood to have a good interest at heart.

And while there’s various progresses, the masculine half of society was kind of left behind. Besides general right’s movements of workers, men did not make any notable social progresses in the last century. Why? Because what better is Perfectionism. Since the dawn of time, in any field or action that exists, men have done their best in being the best. Even in cases where we didn’t exclude women from competing, we dominated. While I grew up thinking nursing, teaching, and dancing were female dominated fields (thanks to Second Wave) I would soon learn that the men dominate this stuff too. There was only one territory kept to women, giving birth (although testicular cramps hurt worse). There was though, still one more territory to win back from them; Romantic Dependence. While millenials and zoomers grew up in the on-going Third Wave conversations of what women could be in ways that fulfilled them as people, there seemed to be a rise of incel behavior.

Men that are involuntarily celibate (ugly) and are thus spiteful at all women for not fucking them. The incel communities would come up with conspiracies about the romantic life and argue that a reversion might be better for the future of society (themselves). There is also women that grew up knowing how brash and abusive men and can be, being further exposed to middle school boys, and then finding themselves to completely hate men. They would become celibate (at least mostly) in their twenties and be full of negative conceptions about any man. The women were still friendly, carefully choosing whichever man they would like. The lonelier man who usually only games with his boys would obviously say yes to any chance at any romance. And this would go unnoticed to women who only learned this year, from a virialized study, that young men are much lonelier than women. The most shocking info to them was a boring rerun to the men that had been living that way for years. So, after GamerGate came the rise of various Men’s Rights groups that would make up the Manosphere, including Andrew Tate. They resurrected the traditionalist arguments, Nuclear Family plans, and tried to uplift men in terms of inspiring them at the gym. Types like Tate even pushed for domestic abuse after achieving your submissive waifu. Tropes such as Tradwife, cottagecore, and daddy’s kitten would be idealized even if not economically achievable. There were also other groups that either mirrored hate toward women or indifference (Men Going Their Own Way). As for women, its not like all of them are feminists and especially those who aren’t will hate men. But there’s other groups among women that don’t care about being super actively feminist as activism for Americans has been neutered by the economy. This leads to them being confused about the movement, others who are interested to act confused when pushing the movement’s ideals, and still others who are just complacent. Throughout each wave, turthfully, the majority of women were actionably complacent due to their ECONOMY.

I understand that if you’re reading this, you’re a Historian and thus understand some sociology. Then you must understand a law of life that a civilization needs to have a healthy economy for citizens to have healthy relationships that can then continue to uplift civilization in a continuous cycle. By economic disparities and crises under capitalism has seen to degrade American romance to the point of friend zones (thanks millenials) and situantionships (thanks zoomers). If sex life couldn’t be any looser, a situationship is any relations between a z male and z female where they are dating/fucking but they aren’t dating/fucking because of some complication in their situation. Maybe their parents don’t like blacks, maybe the relationship would be harem, maybe the guy is still fucking his ex on the side but whatever…

This is the Third Wave (we’re probably at the end though) world Barbie would find herself in.

Now, I don’t have to talk about the film because all of that was in the subtext in the movie. What literally happened was firstly, a music number that introduced the Barbie world and regular day to the audience. It is an actualized world of the Barbie dolls with a different barbie in every ruling position. Doctor, lawyer, president, ect ect. There are Ken dolls as well, who all do beach. Beach does not require them to know CPR. Instead, they just play with volleyballs and water toys when the barbies want to have fun with them. Michael Cera’s role, Allan is also introduced as neither although some fans theorized they’re supposed to represent an androgynous person. Instead, all he does is side comments and have a brutal fight with a couple of business suits. There is Ken Liu who is a rival to Ken Gosling in their affection of Barbie Robbie. At night, Gosling asks Robbie to continue hanging out, but since she doesn’t want to, he has to retreat back to the ‘streets’ as Kens are implied to not have dream houses. Very good opening number. Next day, Robbie has a malfunction and after asking Weird Barbie for help, she travels to the real (with Gosling) to visit Mattel to get fixed. They are first surprised by the modern world where boys and girls act completely unexpectedly compared to their world. Some of the funniest scenes in the movie, my theatre thought. The characters are somewhat more cartoony here physically since it’s the real world. There would be a lot of references here to the subtext, especially as Barbie and Ken realize the differences between them and their role in society. Barbie is also deeply shocked that her brand has led the world into deeper unhappiness rather than the opposite. Barbie wallows as she’s overwhelmed about it but meeting an old lady brightens her spirits. Ken discovers the Patriarchy while trying to get a job as he suddenly feels like he needs to be productive. Patriarchy would eventually convince him to usurp the ruling power in Barbieland. But first, the two would come across a troubled mother and daughter at school who are actually the source of their problem. The mom drives the gang to Mattel’s HQ where they meet Will Ferrell, the CEO of Mattel. Again, the gang is surprised that the entire board of executives are males in a position of power. Ferrell and his suits try to reset Barbie but she resists as she gains an ambition to change Barbieland for the better. They then have to escape, as suits chase them around the building. In one room, Barbie meets Ruth Handler who inspires her to keep moving. Ken was able to head home first so when Barbie bring Ferrara and her daughter into the world, it has been completely changed. Patriarchal Kens are in control due to manipulation of the barbies who are now submissive wives that hang on their every word. Ken’s motive was due to a lack of respect he discovered real men did not have from women. That tied into the disrespect from Barbie not even wanting to hang out from him and made him feel he had no worth to society. He was in solitude but now cuddled by other barbies, he believes he has learned about love. So he founds the “Mojo Dojo Casa House” with an aesthetic of the Manosphere. The phrase would become a small meme. Robbie comes to see him and he feels she misunderstands his pain leaving him more heartbroken. In all honesty, Barbie takes this as tomfoolery from Ken but it is a serious problem in the democratic world of Barbie that will vote for a brand change to Ken tomorrow. So while Robbie, Allan, and weird Barbie are thinking of a solution, Ferrera relates to them about the truth of contemporary femininity. There were tweets that felt this wasn’t as hard hitting as the movie characters found it but some people really liked it. The gang would decide to relay Ferrera’s treatise to all the barbies which is able to break them out of the manipulation. The next step is to gaslight the Kens into hating each other with various tactics in reference to real life dating as a woman. One such tactic was to nod your head as if you were appreciating a song a guy was singing to you. Then turn to a different Ken forcing the first Ken to grow to hate him. Expectedly, the Ken party devolved into infighting. Ryan Gosling led his band of Kens against Simu Liu’s Kens in a beach battle while singing “I’m Just Ken”. The performance and editing of this song in film was extraordinary (I was screaming and jumping out of my seat, tears on my face) while the theme of the song, just being oneself, was something felt by anyone in the theatre. It would be a fairly popular sound on tiktok. Serving as the culmination of Ken’s character ark, Gosling also uses the song to unite all of the Kens thus ending the war. A woman can never keep men down. But now the Mattel suits are here and its time to end the movie. Barbie has her own climax up meeting Handler a second time, who describes to her that just because she made Barbie for happiness, doesn’t mean Barbie can’t find her own. Barbieland then decides to shift to greater autonomy between barbies and kens with Barbie deciding back to the real world to see what happiness she can find. She walks into a doctors office and is called in for a gynoscopy, ending the movie.

The film would be rewarded with much praise from both sexes, especially for breaking all expectations. Seriously, this was suddenly not a kids movie when they reached the real world. It also felt like an awakening for both men and women as it push for self-worth and happiness from that rather than a crush/lover. The sale of Kenough hoodies, the thousands of Gosling memes that weren’t of the chad archetype or incel behavior, and popularity of Kenergy would also rejuvenate normal men. Normal boys that don’t fit any of the perceived incel behavior and could just be boys. As a response to Tate’s reign in the Patriarchy last year, this popped off really well. I have nothing specific about female feelings toward this film.

The meme was a crazy success. Alone, Oppenheimer made $326 million domestically giving it a #5 rank out of the year. Barbie would be ranked at #1 for the year with a domestic box office of $636 million and a global $1.442 billion. That leaves Barbie at an all time rank of #14 not far below Frozen II. Afterwards, there are rumors that Mattel will continue with a cinematic universe about their other products while a combo day like this may always or may never happen again.