Hooray for Hollywood's Demise

Political radicalization includes cultural radicalization, and just as we abandon old political institutions now seen as corrupted and hostile, we abandon similar cultural institutions.

What child of post WWII America would have thought he'd find himself rooting against Hollywood and the movies? Against football? Yet here we are. It's not just schadenfreude that makes this a feel-good news item:

Hollywood is suffering one of the worst domestic March downturns in its recent history, according to the latest comScore box office figures. By Sunday, the month’s total box office intake was approximately $722.5 million, a 27 percent fall compared to the same period last year, with releases such as Pacific Rim Uprising and Tomb Raider failing to bring in audiences relative to their large budgets.

The month’s figures have also been significantly boosted by carryover revenue from February’s Black Panther, which has generated in $200 million this month alone and since become the highest grossing superhero film in history.

Hollywood and Poz-land's all-hands on deck effort to promote Black Panther absorbed a lot of ticket dollars that would have went to other films. It of course generated much more of its own interest, which means this month's numbers would be worse if not for the remarkable push to promote Panther.

Great efforts at uplifting blacks distort our politics, the economy and the culture. Panther has had a negative effect on the industry as a whole, even if its studio is making a killing now:

“A reliance on one title — namely Black Panther — to do the heavy lifting while a host of newcomers over the past few weeks have faltered to one degree or another has resulted in a deficit situation that will take some time to reverse,” box-office analyst Paul Dergarabedian of comScore told The Hollywood Reporter.

More, because, after all, we're at war.