196) Hype Me Up

(Tim Curry, never sexier. Photo from Gretchen Jones.)

Hype, in general, is a good thing. Retail and entertainment brands know that hype for their product/movie/book/service will translate to consumption and sales.

But sometimes, hype can be off-putting, and in some cases, debilitating. We all have those movies or books that we know we should watch/read based on the unanimous praise they've received. The ones that glean the wide-eyed, intonation lifted, "You haven't seen [insert movie here]??" response. These pieces of media get so built up in our minds that a sort of mental block gets formed. It becomes something you know you should do, not something you actually want to do.

I consider myself up to date on pop culture, but by current standards, I watched The Shawshank Redemption, Godfather I and II, Rocky Horror Picture Show, and Let the Right One In way later than I should have. All suffered the same mental block, sitting on my Netflix list, just waiting for me to come around. The silly thing is, once I did watch them, I loved them just like everyone said I would. (Same goes for anything written by Malcolm Gladwell, Freakonomics and Fast Food Nation.)

It makes little sense, resisting something that the masses and close friends have deemed a must-see. But something - the high expectations, another thing on your to-do list, the mental joining of said masses - requires a little extra effort.

PS - currently on the mentally blocked list: Oldboy, Glee, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.