Monday, April 27, 2015

So Austin Miller of The Art of Writing asked me a bunch of questions about Compulsion Games and We Happy Few...

Q. From the little I've been able to see (the masks, the irony, the drugs etc.) Happy Few seems to have a more "critical" voice to it, as if it has something to say about society and the way we live. Do you care to indulge us as to what that might be?

A. Sure! We Happy Few is inspired by, among other things, Facebook culture -- the idea that if you're sad you should take a pill and be happy. No one shares their bad news because it would bring everyone down. As a culture, we reject sadness.

But hey, the narrative is much more than its theme. As Sam Goldwyn used to say a long time ago, “If you want to send a message, there’s always Hotmail.” We have other themes in there, like “what is truth?” and how people remember things that never happened, and how the heroic choices sometimes look like the cowardly ones, and how people can talk themselves into anything, and other subtexts and allusions and other good stuff in there, and we’re putting more in there every day, consciously and unconsciously...

More at AustinRayMiller.com.

To clarify, I don't meant to say that you shouldn't take a pill if you're depressed. You should. I do. I'm saying we shouldn't consider it a character failing if someone is legitimately sad about something that happened. We shouldn't feel vaguely creeped out if someone is mourning. 

5:18 PM

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