The 2020 Epilogue: Pop Culture and Mass Media
Pop culture and mass media found thmselves in a bit of an odd shifting point this year. While there were growing changes that came from a second wave of #MeToo along with the potential rumors of problems for Big Tech, everything was going on as normal. Movie theaters enjoyed a good year of big hits and block busters, especially for the superhero films with Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame and Justice League. The end of Christopher Nolan's Star Wars trilogy also helped brought some new life to the series as new stories were told in filling up the cracks such as between Episodes III and IV, continuation of stuff in the old past and so on. Disney seemed to begun returning to stride with the success of Elfking and rumors were ciculating that they may buy the X-Men film rights back after a decline in popularity and quality for them. Many people were looking forward to the potential new films, video games and other works of fiction coming out or continuing such as serieses coming over in 2020.
However, COVID-20 changed everything. Film theaters shut down, productions grounded to a halt for live action shows and to a lesser degree in animation and adjustments had to be made for this. This meant that the films that came out before the virus coming out in late May were largely spared, with Memorial Day being the last big day before the matters dried significially to say the least. Television meanwhile found themselves having to adjust to deal with such, some going over to reruns and using it to try and marathon some shows in order to maintain viewer watch. Video games meanwhile varied. Japanese development slowed down becsuse of the unused to working from home though some Western ones fared a bit better, especially independent ones. However, the new launch titles would become a massive boon as they would be viewed as good time sinks to help people occupy themselves during their time.
Despite this, the film industry still released some pretty good films that would be notable. Video game-based films seemed to continue their path to potential with the Sonic The Hedgehog film that outstandingly well. The plot focused on Sonic the Hedgehog and Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik (played by Jim Carey) meeting when Mobius suddenly appears on Earth (Mobius being a continent that seemingly vanished over in the Pacific). Sonic explores the open world and befriends some humans while dealing with Robotnik, here a government scientist. Another film was surprisingly a DCEU film in Manhunter of Mars, a prequel that showned the origins of J'onn, the Manhunter of Mars and his nemesis in Commander Blanc. Many were surprised by the subtle racial undertones over the interactions of the Green and White Martians along with how J'onn was betrayed by his brother, M'aal before the world would be put in danger. However, the big surprise came in none other than the post-credits, which revealed that the capital city of Mars survived the calamity, with the set-up being none other than the next foe in a mysterious computerized alien known as Vril Dox who noted the capturing of the city. Another film that was a surprise hit was Trolls World Tour. It served as an experiment in streaming cinema-first films into homes for a fee for a day. It showed a potential alternate to going to movie theaters and one that made em nervous. The film itself was fascinating, but also served as a subtle critique on pop music's tendences to copy other styles, but also on hard rock music's tendencies for overexposure. Beyond that, many films would end up being pushed toward later, either for 2021. Others would end up being released over on Netflix; either special films released there or on other streaming sites. However, there was an observation that this did lead to a lack of prominent films. Various indie films and foreign films would be noticeable. One was Parasite, a dramatic Korean film examining the divide between the rich and the poor and lauded, especially after its delays. As such, many saw this as an opportunity to explore either classics they haven't paid attention before or some new obscure stuff. Television has been doing well
Video games meanwhile would get quite a large successful boost, at least those release in the holiday season of last year and now those of the Spring of 2020. The Nintendo Switch in particular brought many new hits that many were surprised were coming for them. One of the big names was Animal Crossing New Horizons, a new Animal Crossing game focused on developing your island town, up to crafting furniture and even landscaping, public places and so on, with free downloads promising new stuff in the future. Super Mario Maker 2 brought plenty of new goodies, tips and tricks and thus had it become a successful sequel over to the original Super Mario Maker. Luigi's Mansion 3 was a welcomed sequel that had the younger brother journey a haunted hotel to save his brother and friends. However, none other was more beloved than that of the newest Super Smash Bros game, that of Super Smash Bros Ultimate. And they brought back everyone. Every playable character from the past iterations would reappear and even beyond the return of various characters that haven't been seen since Melee, there was several new characters for them to enjoy. These included the Inkling of Splatoon, that was showncase in trailers with others were Isabel of Animal Crossing, Simon of Castlevania, Byleth of Fire Emblem Three Houses and Agnès Oblige of Bravely Default. However, to further fuel fan excitement, there was the news that there would be Smash DLC, much like there was for Super Smash Bros Duels. And in fact, there was an opportunity to get the "zeroth" DLC character for free as a taste for those who were quick on the draw, that being the "mascot" of Nintendo LABO, LABO man, who many took as the "quirky" character of the game. There was even a season pass available to get the five DLC charactes that would be coming. Future announcements brought joy, such as Pokemon Sword and Pokemon Shield announced for the holiday season of 2020.
While Nintendo was the one who benefitted alot here, there were plenty of other games that were to be enjoyed. Persona 5 Royal was delayed once more so it could get an equal global release for the Nintendo Switch, Playstation 5 and Xbox X, though they noted they had the opportunity to try and do further tweaking of the game. However, perhaps to try and make up for it, the spin-off game Persona 5 Scramble came out early in 2020 for the Switch, PS4 and Xbox One with a port for the PS5 and XBX coming later. Furthermore, many standout games came out before or during the pandemic: DOOM Eternal served as just as good a sequel to the precedessor, the long-awaited remake of Final Fantasy VII came out and stunned everyone, Ghost of Tsushima brought plenty of attention, the unexpected treasure in Half-Life ALYX created a massive bombshock for eveyrone at the potential for a Half-Life 3. This and so many more games were to be coming out and brought plenty of enjoyment to people during these times, especially whe COVID came. Other big hits included the indie scene such as Ori and the Will of the Wisps and Shantae and the Seven Sirens. Online gaming continued to keep going and bringing enjoyment. World of Warlock remained popular along with new games such as Overwatch II being announced to come out, Fortnite becoming very prominent moreso and so on. Indie games in development would continue on as their developers could get a bit more help due to some being "self-employed" or very small businesses.