American Gods Is The Story We Need Right Now
American Gods premieres tonight on Starz. The new television series is Bryan Fuller’s adaptation [...]
American Gods premieres tonight on Starz. The new television series is Bryan Fuller's adaptation of Neil Gaiman's Hugo and Nebula Award-winning novel about warring gods in America.
While a war between deities written over 15 years ago may seem like a fairly distant and unrelatable concept, the themes of American Gods seem more urgent and important today than ever.
Regardless of where you fall on the political, philosophical, or ideological spectrum, it is hard not look at the mood in America today and not see a house divided. The 2016 political election did not create this divide wholesale, but it certainly brought divisive issues that have been bubbling beneath the surface of the national discourse to the forefront. America is struggling to find its modern identity, and that identity is at the core of American Gods.
Mr. Wednesday is one of the old gods, figures from the lore and myth and pantheons in the old countries that traveled to America along with the immigrants who believed in them. However, those beliefs have waned and been increasingly forgotten, and the stature and power of the gods who rely on that worship to exist have lessened. They fear being entirely forgotten and thus dismissed from the world while new gods, gods like the Technical Boy and Media, rise to power in their place. But Mr. Wednesday isn't willing to let the old gods fade away quietly and begins launching a plan to rally the gods for one last all or nothing battle.
It isn't hard to see the how the divide between the gods mirrors, or perhaps even foreshadows, today's political divides. Mr. Wednesday's crowd feels left behind by an increasingly modernized world that depends more and more on technology instead of people. The new god faction is all progress and globalization, personified in their leader, Mr. World.
Gaiman's vision for them puts each in an equally questionable light. One would think that, with protagonist Shadow Moon working for Wednesday's underdog faction, the old gods would be the heroes, but it isn't that simple. They have admirable strength and wisdom that only comes through living many hard years, but are also stubborn and set in their ways, and are unwilling or unable to move forward as the country around them does.
The new gods, for their part, believe they're building a better tomorrow, but come off as hollow and smug, their message tinged with an unearned confidence, and they are all too willing to leave behind anyone who isn't on board with their particular vision for the future.
Both sides are willing to do whatever is necessary, make any sacrifice, to further their cause. Without giving too much away about where American Gods is headed, neither side comes out looking like the heroes.
American Gods is about the search for what makes America the unique country that it is. The story was written a decade and a half ago, but the questions still ring in our ears today, perhaps now louder than ever. As a country, we seem to struggle today to find a means to have a discourse about the gulf between us. Perhaps fiction can help bridge the divide.
American Gods couldn't have come along at a better time.
American Gods premieres tonight at 9 p.m. ET on Starz.
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