The Philosophy of J. J. Abrams THE PHILOSOPHY OF J. J. ABRAMS Edited by PATRICIA BRACE and ROBERT ARP Due to variations in the technical specifications of different electronic reading devices, some elements of this ebook may not appear as they do in the print edition. Readers are encouraged to experiment with user settings for optimum results. Copyright © 2014 by The University Press of Kentucky Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth, serving Bellarmine University, Berea College, Centre College of Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky University, The Filson Historical Society, Georgetown College, Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky State University, Morehead State University, Murray State University, Northern Kentucky University, Transylvania University, University of Kentucky, University of Louisville, and Western Kentucky University. All rights reserved. Editorial and Sales Offices: The University Press of Kentucky 663 South Limestone Street, Lexington, Kentucky 40508-4008 www.kentuckypress.com Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The philosophy of J. J. Abrams / edited by Patricia Brace and Robert Arp. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8131-4530-3 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-8131-4534-1 (pdf) — ISBN 978-0- 81314533-4 (epub) 1. Abrams, J. J. (Jeffrey Jacob), 1966—Criticism and interpretation. I. Brace, Patricia, 1960– editor of compilation. II. Arp, Robert, editor of compilation. PN1998.3.A27P55 2014 2014006363 791.4302’3092—dc23 This book is printed on acid-free paper meeting the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence in Paper for Printed Library Materials. Manufactured in the United States of America. Member of the Association of American University Presses C ONTENTS Introduction Patricia Brace and Robert Arp Scene 1: Identity Issues “Grey Matters”: Personal Identity in the Fringe Universe(s) A. P. Taylor and Justin Donhauser Person of Interest: The Machine, Gilles Deleuze, and a Thousand Plateaus of Identity Franklin Allaire Are J. J. Abrams’s “Leading Ladies” Really Feminist Role Models? Cynthia Jones Scene 2: Memento Mori The End Is Nigh: Armageddon and the Meaning of Life Found through Death Ashley Barkman The Fear of Bones: On the Dread of Space and Death Jerry S. Piven and Jeffrey E. Stephenson Do We All Need to Get Shot in the Head? Regarding Henry, Nicholas Wolterstorff, and Ethical Transformation Adam Barkman Scene 3: Moral Matters Fringe and “If Science Can Do It, Then Science Ought to Do It” Phil Smolenski and Charlene Elsby An Inconsistent Triad? Competing Ethics in Star Trek into Darkness Jason T. Eberl The Monster and the Mensch Randall E. Auxier Scene 4: Friends and Family Abrams, Aristotle, and Alternate Worlds: Finding Friendship in the Final Frontier Joseph J. Foy Heroic Love and Its Inversion in the Parent-Child Relationship in Abrams’s Star Trek Charles Taliaferro and Emilie Judge-Becker You Can’t Choose Your Family: Impartial Morality and Personal Obligations in Alias Brendan Shea Scene 5: Metaphysically Speaking Is Abrams’s Star Trek a Star Trek Film? Daniel Whiting Determinism, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility in Alias Vishal Garg Finding Directions by Indirection: The Island as a Blank Slate Elly Vintiadis and Spyros D. Petrounakos Scene 6: Your Logic Is Flawless You Can’t Change the Past: The Philosophy of Time Travel in Star Trek and Lost Andrew Fyfe Rabbit’s Feet, Hatches, and Monsters: Mysteries vs. Questions in J. J. Abrams’s Stories Paul DiRado Scene 7: Considering Cloverfield Monsters of the World, Unite! Cloverfield, Capital, and Ecological Crisis Jeff Ewing Cloverfield, Super 8, and the Morality of Terrorism Robert Arp and Patricia Brace Scene 8: Talkin’ ’Bout a Revolution A Place for Revolutions in Revolution? Marxism, Feminism, and the Monroe Republic Jeff Ewing A Light in the Darkness: Ethical Reflections on Revolution Michael Versteeg and Adam Barkman Acknowledgments List of Contributors Index I NTRODUCTION Patricia Brace and Robert Arp American auteur Jeffrey Jacob “J. J.” Abrams has a knack for creating the kind of twisty, densely plotted TV series and films that keep us on the edge of our seats and begging for more. His particular genius seems to be in the way he combines geek appeal and broader commercial and critical successes in TV shows like Felicity, Emmy-nominated Alias, Emmy-and Golden Globe–winning Lost, the critically acclaimed Fringe, and films such as the Godzilla-inspired Cloverfield, the reboot of the Star Trek franchise, and his Spielbergian ode to the late 1970s, Super 8. As writer, director, producer, and even composer, he puts his particular stamp on everything he touches—a stamp that at times is rife with philosophical themes. His name on a project promises that your heart, mind, and sometimes even your soul will get a workout. The Philosophy of J. J. Abrams is a collection of chapters by thinkers highlighting the philosophical insights present in Abrams’s television and film work. Using Abrams’s works as a touchstone, the book leads the reader through some basic concepts in philosophy, making it useful for an introductory philosophy course, but it also contains enough content on Abrams’s individual works to satisfy his fans, media and popular culture students, film students, and people who would like to dabble in a little philosophy. Philosophical themes may be found throughout Abrams’s continuingly popular works. As cocreator of Lost, Abrams melded the popularity of the reality show Survivor to the twisted concept of a living island with incredible monsters and a fascinating set of characters—many of them named for famous philosophers—whose interactions take place in the past, present, and future via flashbacks and flash-forwards. And if that wasn’t enough, in the final season we got flash-sideways into alternate pasts, presents, and futures! If any show contains philosophical analysis, it is this one. Man of science or man of faith? Nature vs. nurture? Live together or die alone? The Island could be seen as a heavenly tabula rasa—or was it purgatory, or even hell? Would we ever get any answers to the show’s many mysteries? Continuing his pattern of having an overarching mystery move the action of a television story, Abrams next took on Fringe, with its “Pattern” mythology slowly revealed as we learned more about the heroes of the piece. As with his other works, relationships are central; in this case, those caught in the orbit of the unconventional and at times quite mad Dr. Walter Bishop, whose highly unethical medical experiments on young children allowed him and his partner, William Bell (played by Leonard Nimoy), to find and eventually travel to a second Earth. When Walter’s son, Peter, died as a child, the grieving father kidnapped his doppelganger from the other Earth—what parent wouldn’t at least contemplate it? That Peter grows up ignorant of his true origins and estranged from his father (who has gone slowly mad and been institutionalized) is just the sort of poignant irony Abrams’s work celebrates. Abrams’s film work champions the ability of ordinary people to undergo transformation and become, in their own ways, heroic. In Armageddon the least likely guys, a bunch of rough oil drillers, face their fear of death and save the world. On a more personal level, his script for Regarding Henry uses a sort of reverse flashback technique to show how a damaged man regains his simple humanity. In the wrong place at the wrong time (another common problem for Abrams’s heroes), Henry is shot in the head and loses his memory. His struggles to refill his blank slate reveal a portrait of a hard-driving, unethical corporate lawyer who was estranged from his family, having an affair, and ignoring his wife and child. It turns out that the damage was not the gunshot; that bullet to the brain was his salvation or a reset, bringing him into accord with his true ethical and familial center. This “resetting of reality” is found in most of Abrams’s work (in television, we see how 9/11 played out in two different ways on Fringe as well as seeing the alternate worlds on the final seasons of Felicity and Lost and Sydney’s missing three years on Alias) and most recently in his big-screen version of the classic Star Trek. Again, a framing device provides continuity for the piece— Mr. Spock, long retired from Starfleet, has lived among the Romulans for decades, working to reunite them with their ancestors, the Vulcans. When catastrophe looms, his efforts to save their planet fall short and set into motion a