Chapter 94: Competitors
"Lieutenant Colonel, about the ending of the script..."
Closing the script Lieutenant Colonel Lenho had handed him, Duke stood up, raising his voice for emphasis. "The one to destroy the alien ship's weapon must be a civilian, not the president or someone from the military!"
"Why?"
The two had worked together once before, and the Pentagon representative was waiting for Duke to explain.
What was the biggest reason? Naturally, audiences loved seeing a nobody save the world. Mainstream American culture still carried distinctly anti-intellectual and anti-elitist traits, and playing to that mindset would make viewers eagerly open their wallets at the box office.
An ordinary person saving the world while the higher-ups acted like complete fools—this viewpoint was vigorously promoted in Hollywood films. But the studios didn't do this because they actually endorsed anti-intellectualism and anti-elitism; they did it because it generated commercial profit.
The most typical example was the Hollywood high school movie, where over ninety-five percent of the time, the football team's quarterback was the villain. Films always portrayed them as simple-minded, muscle-bound idiots. But in reality?
A quarterback was the core of a football team and usually its leader. Not only did they direct the offense on the field, but they could also change the coach's strategy on the fly. Most of them were physically strong, clear-headed, and quick-witted, possessing extremely sharp judgment and the resolve to execute plays. They were often the most popular guys on campus, true elites in every sense of the word.
Yet within this anti-intellectual and anti-elitist culture, they became the most frequently mocked targets in movies, just like the senators in Congress and the successive occupants of the White House.