Postmodernism in She Hulk

 

Describe a text, or texts, which are essentially postmodernism

Postmodernism is the rejection of modernism, where everything is a copy of a copy. It has been discussed extensively by the Frenchman Jean Baudrillard, who conceived four key components of postmodernism, which are the following: hyper reality, meaning implosion, and simulacra. These components can be found in postmodern texts found today. The characteristics of a postmodern text include intertextuality, parody, bricolage, irony, and many more. In this essay, I will analyse a postmodern text and identify its postmodern elements.

The She Hulk series released by Marcel is a textbook example of a postmodern text. it contains lots of self-reflexivity, intertextuality, parody, satire, loss of reality, just to name a few. Throughout the show, especially towards the end, we witness the main character, She Hulk, personally addressing herself and communicating with the real audience by facing the camera. This is an example of self-reflexivity, or breaking the fourth wall. We were introduced to a robotic, machine like creature named KEVIN. He was introduced to us as the person, or machine, who creates stories for Marvel. This humongous robot is an example of loss of reality, because obviously we can't and won't be seeing a talking, self-autonomous robot until like the next three centuries. The main character also mocked KEVIN the robot, itself being a parody of Marvel's leader, which parallels the existing debate of whether Marvel has been recycling their superhero ideas, resulting in a lack of innovation and diverse stories in their movies. This criticism of the system can be classified as satire. 

One of Baudrillard’s idea of postmodernism is hyperreality. It can be defined as when we are unable to draw the line of whats real and what’s fake when portrayed in media. He even believes that audiences in the postmodern world would prefer consuming hyperreality media than to actually experience things themselves, for example, people would watch other people playing video games than to play games themselves. An example of a documentary with heightened reality is David Attenborough's A Life on Our Planet. This scientific documentary is about the environment and how it has changed and how it will change in the future. It is presented as reality, however, there are several scenes in the documentary which raises suspicion on how real it is. For example, there was a scene where he discusses about the forest. It included a video of a tree falling, presumably intentionally cut down, with a camera hooked on the tree trunk. The way this scene was being presented to the audience is as if it was a natural thing, the tree falling or being cut down by lumberjacks. However, what are the chances that David's tree with a camera on was targeted by lumberjacks? Obviously this is a set up by the filming crew, being presented as reality. Therefore, it isn't real. There are heaps of other examples in the documentary, like the inclusion of sound effects. Another example of a hyper reality documentary is the show Keeping up with the Kardashians.This reality TV show gives us a glimpse into the life of the Kardashian family, showing us their everyday activities and happenings. The authenticity and how real these events can be questioned. However, this would make sense for the directors to do (scripting drama), because as I have already mentioned, Baudriallrd believes that audiences prefer hyperreality, meaning they find it more interesting to see other people fighting and having drama.

- Incomplete example (no evidence for 2nd example) 

- No critique

- No topic sentence

Comp 3 - Permission Email

This post was made by Jason.

The song we chose was "Out of Time" by the Weeknd. He is signed to Republic Records which is a subdivision of Universal Music Group. Today I will attempt to obtain permission to use their song

the frontpage of their website

I went onto their website where I could not find any option to contact them nor any email which I could send my requests to. The only resemblance to a contact was only used by their merch store which in this case would be irrelevant for us.

With that I attempted to contact their parent company instead which was Universal Music Group. Over there, I found it after some searching.

the FAQ page on UMG's website

Because we were in Indonesia, it redirected us to the Universal Music Group Indonesia's Instagram page. Unfortunately it was a dead end. 

The link on their IG page leads to here, where there was no option to contact them. I will try to find another way tomorrow

Because there is no way to contact them, I will mail their office in Jakarta instead.

Component 3 - Storyboard

 This storyboard was made by Niki and Baron

Reflection: 

After having made storyboards countless of times in previous projects, we realised that it is not necessary to make detailed storyboards, but instead just simple drawings of what we roughly want to do in each scene. I believe this is the best thing to do as it would save lots of time that we could instead spend on doing other things, like scouting locations, production, etc.

Component 3 - Terminology

Component 3 - Technical Skills (online)

Component 3 - Actor/Performer Screen Test

 

These are the results of our actor screentest.

Reflection:

u

Component 3 - Location Scouting

From the research we've done, we found that the times to record are morning, afternoon, and at night. The best locations that look good in those times is the beach. Therefore, we focused out location research on finding the best beaches to record in. Of course, the beach is not the only place we had in mind, so we also looked for cafes, malls, parks, and others to include. Because our idea of our music video will be romantic, we made sure that the locations we choose conform to the stereotypes of romance, such as time set during sunsets, lots of silhouettes of things like buildings and people, etc.

The google images are found by Jason 

We visited these locations and here are the results

Location 1: Sanur Beach

The four images were taken by Jason at Sanur beach

Sanur beach is a nice beach, however, there are several issues that we may encounter if we were to record here. Firstly, some segments of the beach contains construction sites of sidewalks and neighbouring buildings, which would not be great to include in the music video. Therefore, we are limited to which sections of the beach we can record at. Secondly, we are still in rainy season. Although it does not rain as often than it did months ago, the cloudy weather may interfere with the lighting of the camera. Thirdly, the beach gets crowded at certain times of the day, usually in the morning and in the afternoon. This means we can only record at noon or night, forcing us to record on weekends.

Pantai Sanur
Purpose of the shoot:	We want to create some extra footage that we can crosscut with the performance video and record some additional performance clips here
Media Language:	Sunset, empty beach, bare feet in the sand, urban costume (not beachwear)
Pros of Location:	Very near, looks very good, cheap parking, relatively safe, easy access for equipment, many spots to choose from
Cons of Location	Could be crowded, some spots are a bit dirty, there is construction ongoing, weather is questionable early in the year
Alternative location:	Mertasari Beach, Kuta Beach
RISK ASSESSMENT
Potential Hazards	Tsunami, Earthquake, Rain
Evaluate Risks	Big earthquakes are quite unlikely given that they occur about once every 100 years, we can ignore earthquakes and tsunamis because of that. The only possibility is rain. Little rain came in during the rainy season which may mean extreme weather conditions coming up
Control Measures and Timeframe implementation	Prepare a place to runaway to in the case of a Tsunami (probably Gemi’s house) Prepare extra rain coats to cover electronics in the event that it rains suddenly. Plan our recording day based on the weather forecast Go on weekdays, forget weekends
Alternatives	Mertasari Beach Kuta Beach

Location 2: Level 21 Mall indoor

If we were to use a mall, Level 21 would be one of the best options to choose from. It is in Renon and only approximately ten minutes from school, which would save us a lot of time. Our main focus in this mall in particular is the arcade, due to the fact that its neither crowded nor empty, making it a perfect place to record in. It has a bowling alley which is a huge plus as not every arcade has one, and our research has told us that bowling alleys are pretty romantic and is often used not only in romantic music videos, but also movies and films.

Location 3: Road between Level 21 Mall building and parking lot

This road is very unique as it houses tons of small shops, cafes, and restaurants, which features bright neon lights (not all), illuminating the street at night, giving a futuristic and romantic atmosphere. It also has an equal, if not more, amount of pedestrians than motor vehicles, which would make it easy for us to record at. Its directly next to the mall in location 3, saving us huge amounts of time which we would otherwise would have wasted sitting in traffic.

Location Assessment
Purpose of the shoot:	Dates
Media Language:	Outdoors, brightly lit at night, lots of pedestrians
Pros of Location:	Has tons of shops and cafes, so we can also shoot inside stores.
Cons of Location	Quite crowded, although we want it to be that way we could also be obstructing traffic and disturbing pedestrians
Alternative location:
RISK ASSESSMENT
Potential Hazards	Getting hit by a car or bike.
Evaluate Risks	Not super dangerous, vehicles stop for pedestrians in this street
Control Measures and Timeframe implementation	Be wary of surroundings, have someone help block the way when recording.

Location 4: Pantai Mertasari

This is by far the best location we have scouted so far and will 100% use. Not only is it a beach, but it also has a river, a lake, and a park literally right next to each other. The beach and its surrounding areas are very empty and very rarely populated, other than some times in the afternoon. This gives us way more freedom and opens the door to more possibilities that we otherwise would not have and won't be able to do in a crowded area. The road leading to the beach's huge parking lot (almost always empty) is pretty clean, well paved, well lit, and covered by trees and shrubs on the side, and is empty 99% of the time. This means if we were to involve vehicles, this will definitely be the place to record.

Location Assessment
Purpose of the shoot:	When the characters are spending time together
Media Language:	Sunset, dark but not too dark, silhouettes, calm waters, not crowded
Pros of Location:	Its empty most of the time, has other natural features like lake, river, and a park next to it so we can shoot other things as well,
Cons of Location	Not super far but not that close to where we all live. Farthest location from the school so far.
Alternative location:	Pantai Sanur
RISK ASSESSMENT
Potential Hazards	There are some ditches that are hard to spot at night because it is not well lit. Rain
Evaluate Risks	Pretty dangerous, if anyone were to fall they may get injured. Rain will ruin the video
Control Measures and Timeframe implementation	Make sure to be aware of the surroundings before shooting, light the dangerous parts with a torch

Location 5: Living World Mall

Relection:

I think we need to discuss more about different locations because so far the locations we have are beaches, and it would be best if our locations are more diverse. We also need to have a plan for when the weather or other factors force us to ditch our original location. We should be realistic with the locations because it would not be ideal to travel very far while carrying camera equipment and a bunch of people only to record a short scene.

Component 3 - Development

This blog contains the process of developing the music video

When we first gathered as a group, we did not waste time in discussing what genre of music we want to do. We debated on several genres, such as electronic or rock, but settled on RnB. We created a shared google docs document to compile our ideas for artist names, potential casts, and a general idea of what the music video will contain.

Artist name 

Decision: vertical phone shots banned, fade out before spoken word

Singer + Character sing in the same place

Artist Name Ideas

• Tukang bakso jalan sudirman - irrelevant

• Sate Madura Men Niki - Samameni - thats cringe, thats our own band name

• Bufo Ferulabitus - Means Cane Toad

• Te Amo 

• Our Lovely Years - song title skip

• Lil meatball - horrible

• Liebe

• Das Bett in Flammen - the bed in flames, irrelevant

• Uncertainty 

• Orange Winter - ????

• Yellow Winter - Piss

• Infant Consumer - first to go

• Amerika - strange, doesn’t fit

• Bed wetter - No, Just no

• High az - no

• Homietime - skip

• Sonne - possible

• Bodjo telu - what

• Hysteresis -

• Analepsis - 

• Arjuna 

• Ardjoena

• Djoen

• Jun

• Juniiah

We settled with the name 'Jun' as our research of artists of similar genres says that simple names are the way to go. Not only is it short and simple, it is easy to say and very recognisable, so it stays in audience's minds more. 

Casts

Cast:

• Baron/Deva/Melon

• Davin + Melody

• Kenrick (incredibly shy)  + Nico/Steven

• Danny + Nay

• Niki + Rania 

Screen test: Stage directions + improv - emphasis on body language

Calon Star:

• Juna - priority

• Kenrick - audition

• Deva - audition (grabfood driver)

• Steven

• Timo

• Maxi

 Screen test: Lip sync to “Out of Time”

When After having decided the artist's image as indie and softboy, we scouted the students at school to see who fits this role the most. After not much debate, we settled on our friend, Arjuna Nakao. He fits the softboy fashion, wearing baggy clothing. We made a rudimentary and crude screenplay to test the potential casts. As for the couple actors, we had a list of several people, but settled on our own people, Niki and Rania. This is mainly for practicality as it is incredibly difficult to coordinate shootings with people outside our media studies group.

Storyline

Timeline

• Carscene

• Cutaway - breakup

• Meet Cute - Cafe 

• Last few months - singer starts singing

• PDKT

• Happy Hour

• Top 10 Star Wars Betrayals

• Sad Hour

• Cope

• —---------------------------------------- nah

• Recover

• PDKT another

• Mann gegen mann

Scene ideas:

• Clubbing

• Karaoke

• Beach

• Makan-makan

• Car front camera scene

Storyboard

Storyboard

Box - Box - Box

Box - Box - Box 

Early sketches

When The images above are the initial storyboards we made for our early scenes. From previous projects we discovered that detailed storyboards are not important. However, we can't settle on simple sketches, so we decided to make newer, better ones.

Example of one of the scenes

We wanted to make better storyboards, so we asked our friends who are talented in drawing to assist and teach us skills in storyboarding and drawing. We also watched several YouTube videos on how to storyboard and draw better. We learnt that it is important to draw grid lines, which will make shooting easy and help the cameraman put into perspective of what shot we want.

Location scouting

#1 Selfie time ID - photo booth living world

#2 Mertasari Beach

#3 Genteng Biru Alley

#4 Level 21 Mall

#5 Sanur Beach

#6 Regents School

Relfection: Progress for this project has admittedly been slower than previous projects due to our time being cut by a semester break, distancing us from each other. However, we still managed to develop this project quite well, and I would say the quality of several of our works, such as storyboarding, has improved significantly thanks to us learning from the internet, friends, and our teacher, Mr. Nick.