Modern Television is almost unrecognizable from past decades. It’s not just the inflated budgets or big name actors taking television roles, but the content. The plucky sitcom still exists, but it shares airtime with Game of Thrones, American Horror Story,Breaking Bad, and a myriad of other programming meant for very mature audiences. Even mainstream comic books are not just filled with icons of truth, justice, and the American way, but with hard tales of vengeance, murder, and illicit sexual conduct. What caused this change? Was it the natural progression of storytelling and pushing boundaries? Or have we as a society changed and become more cynical?

It’s in human nature to push further than those who came before us. To stand on the shoulders of the giants in our history and to push the sky back another inch. There was a time when KISS was considered to be satanic enough to cause small protests. What would those same protesters and concerned mothers think of Marilyn Manson, who is quickly being eclipsed in content and visuals by hundreds of modern day metal bands? Applying this to television and film also works. The Twilight Zone took us to the darker corners of the human psyche, but they could only press so far. There were still heroes and villains, good and evil.

A show like Breaking Bad comes along and it changes the paradigm. It makes the bad guy the very center piece of the show. We watch a man lose his soul and fall into greed and despair. True Detective is steeped in darkness and angst so thick it might make your TV depressed. When people talk about these shows it is often remarked that they are more realistic, less predictable. There isn’t a single character in Game of Thrones who is safe. Think a character will be around a few more seasons? Well, off with his head. The idea that the hero always has to win is being brutally dismantled.

The desire to see heroes fall may come from a place of cynicism. Knowing that the superhero always wins can be uplifting but it also steals the narrative power. A writer is left with different roads leading to the same result which makes a story have less impact. On top of this, people deal with failure every day in their own lives. They are the heroes of their own stories, but most have a hard time dragging themselves to work in the morning. Watching the Ubermensch with perfect features and a trophy spouse destroy an ever more “powerful” bad guy of the week starts to ring hollow.

This leads to an audience that wants to watch someone who has been kicked around. A character who deals with adversity, who struggles with ego and pride and sometimes even makes the wrong decision. A character that is a mess that they can relate to rather than feel separate from. Anti-heroes, or at least the grittier protagonists like Rust Cohle and John Wick, offer a different kind of emotional outlet than The Flash.

This isn’t to say that the bright and safe shows and books aren’t necessary, only that an audience is demanding more. Many people can’t watch a show like Game of Thrones or enjoy Daredevil because it is unrelenting in its grim nature. People who do enjoy these darker shows understand that nature itself is harsh and uncaring, and that the sugar coated existence of a sitcom is at minimum a farce and is at worst insulting to humanity as a whole.

Whether these dark forms of media expose human nature or simply give an outlet for it is hard to gauge. Their growing popularity seems to indicate a lingering dissatisfaction with generic popular media. If it is born out of cynicism then it might be an indicator that society as a whole is dissatisfied with the current course of events. If it is boredom rather than dissatisfaction that causes these stories to be so well liked, then writers need to know the formulas of the past will not work to keep people interested.

Personally, I get energized when I watch a show like Game of Thrones. The tension makes my palms sweaty, and it makes me want to write, to be a complete sadist to my characters, and never let any of them (or my readers) feel safe. It isn’t about horror or hurting people, it’s about telling a story that actually hits on an emotional level. If I have to go to dark places to make people feel that, then I’m not afraid to. It feels like show runners and movie makers are starting to understand the nature of unrepentant storytelling, and I hope that this bravery toward dark and gritty fiction continues to grow.

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Tony Southcotte: Tony hails from the Rocky Mountains somewhere around the state of Colorado. Possibly raised by grizzly bears, this gritty denizen of the arena now spends most of his time grappling with Java updates and dysfunctional RAM. With not much fiction under his belt, it might seem tempting to bet against Mister Southcotte, but an impressive knowledge of everything from PVC pipe to psychedelic drugs makes Tony a storehouse of fiction waiting to hit the paper. Plus, you know, there’s the possibility of him ripping you apart like a grizzly bear.