There will be a presidential debate inside Fortnite, or something like Fortnite, during the 2024 election cycle. And the broadcast will be even more stiff and embarrassing than today’s non-digital debates. Because this weekend, the digital venue became a must-visit stop along the major mainstream media campaign when J.J. Abrams and the Disney Star Wars machine turned a stage within Fortnite into just another gathering for a corporate keynote event. It showed not only where everything from movies to books and brands and politicians will be pitched to mass audiences but also just how painfully uncool it will be.J.J. Abrams is a Hollywood director. On Friday, his latest movie, a movie we’re supposed to believe is the final installment in the main Star Wars saga, will hit theaters. The studio behind it, Disney, is unsurprisingly making it impossible to avoid. But by far the most interesting piece of Disney’s attention-blanketing marketing campaign was the fact that Abrams showed up inside the game Fortnite to screen a new scene from the movie. What was less interesting was the actual content of the event itself, though. The Millenium Falcon flew in.
Then a host introduced a stormtrooper who moonwalked out of the spaceship. This was the first attempt at puncturing the awkwardness of the event with humor. Then a Fornite version of Abrams walked out. Then the host, the stormtrooper and Abrams tried to fill time on stage and grew even more stilted and awkward in their digital avatars, desperately reaching for much-needed comic relief. As popular as prancing around in Fortnite is, it's still inescapably goofy. Finally, an exclusive scene from The Rise of Skywalker played inside the game, projected against a digital sky. The game is as much the de facto social gathering place for an entire generation now as it actually is a game. That this social gathering place happens to be digital is not as important as how universal it is. It’s really just a big place to reach a lot of people at once, most of them young people, in a world where that is increasingly rare. This is so self-evident to Epic, the creator of Fortnite, that there is even a special designated presentation area within Fortnite called Risky Reels, a drive-in theater within the digital world. This is where the Star Wars event took place.
Gatherings like Comic-Con are already routine stops in the rollouts for major tentpoles movies, big gatherings where teasers and trailers and scenes are premiered in front of crowds. So it's natural that the keynote event, pioneered by Apple and now de rigueur for a corporate behemoth like Disney, will move from the physical convention center to the digital convention center. But in the process, we'll have to suffer through infinite jokes about how awkward it is to not only inhabit a digital avatar but also to have to play with the native languages and codes of whatever digital world these performances take place in. Right now, that world happens to be Fortnite, so the jokes in the Abrams performance are about emotes and dances because that's what Fortnite characters do. But no matter what digital world comes after Fortnite, or if it remains the most popular digital gathering place, performing within it will always be unnatural. So many of our public figures are already unnatural performers who look like they feel uncomfortable in their own skin.
Imagine how much more uncomfortable and awkward political debates, keynote speeches, roasts, award ceremonies and product launches will be when they're held in digital venues. If you thought it was hard to look cool with one of those TED headsets on, imagine how hard it will be to look cool as a floss-dancing cartoon character.
The shorter stuff
DaBaby performed live in concert via FaceTime. (YouTube video from the fans' perspective) (Twitter video from DaBaby's crew's perspective)
The Irishman is as big of a hit as Bird Box with no hit meme. There were memes, yes. But there was no Marriage Story fight scene or Baby Yoda. Impressive! (The Verge)
Chloë Sevigny called John Mayer's Dead & Co. cheesy. (VF)
Speaking of John Mayer, who is famously a fan of both Japanese Americana brand Visvim and high-tech outdoors-nerd brand Acronym, this profile of one of my favorite authors William Gibson not only mentions his nearly identical Mayer style but also, in a completely unrelated detail, his CD collection which includes "multiple bootlegs of live performances by the goth band Sisters of Mercy." (TNY)
The closer Grimes gets to her dream of never physically appearing on stage again the less it seems everyone cares. (Vulture)
The Vacation reboot aims to hit that sweet spot between people too old to figure out how to download HBO Max and too young to know what Vacation is. (Variety)
Jeremy Gordon did a much better job than I ever could of covering Quibi's "adult Legends of the Hidden Temple." (The Outline)
With Parasite, Uncut Gems, Marriage Story and The Irishman sucking up all the movie oxygen over the past month, it's easy to forget about Tarantino: "Me and the guys at [video store] Video Archives would have absolutely had a podcast." (CoS)
A rare peak into the genius of the guys who made Game of Thrones: their pitch. "The filmmakers are keeping it close to the vest, but I’m told the movie asks a horrifying question: what if H.P. Lovecraft wasn’t making it up? What if the monsters he created are real?" Isn't that the conceit of every monster movie? (Deadline)
One of the most best and most underrated bands in the world, the Dirty Projectors, quietly released a little live album. (Pitchfork)
And as John Frusciante rejoins the Red Hot Chili Peppers, I'd like to point everyone in the direction of his song "Murderers" because it rules. (YouTube)