Looking back over them, I suspect most of my recent blog entries could be criticised for being somewhat superficial. They lack the depth I should be giving them. For example, a week or two ago I noted how the character of James Bond might somehow be involved in the olympic opening ceremony. That is indeed rather cool, but what does it mean? What does it signify? I failed to ask the truly interesting questions. Could it be that, in involving this piece of fiction in such ceremony, are we pandering to a form of modern british folklore, telling stories abut ourselves? Is it not odd to have a womanizing, hard-drinking government assassin, albeit a fictional one, involved in the proudest moment in our countries modern history? It is high time I started asking such questions again.

The same goes for yesterday’s entry. Describing Game of Thrones and telling you all how much I like Sean Bean is all very well and good, but what does it mean? What does the resurgence of the fantasy genre mean in cultural terms? Is it for example, a reaction to 9/11, a symptom of a desire to retreat into a fantasy world? Of course, the lord of the Rings was in production long before 2001, but could part of it’s success and that of things like Harry potter be in the fact they are set in worlds with simplistic notions of good and evil? We, or rather american audiences, don’t seem to like ambiguity, much preferring to be told that good is good and bad is bad and the good guy always win. That must be a factor involved in the resurgence of fantasy.

I suppose I have grown out of the habit of asking such questions, dealing with such issues, especially on my blog. It’s probably time I got back into it, and stopped simply noting how cool I find things.