Series: Popular Culture and Philosophy

In one of HBO's promotional videos for the eighth season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Larry David appears as Godzilla, walking through the streets of New York City, terrorising everyone who sees him. People scream and run for their lives. Larry, meanwhile, has a quizzical look on his face and asks, 'What, are you people nuts?' There's something very apt about...

The philosophically rich David Bowie is an artist of wide and continuing influence. The theatrical antics of Bowie ushered in a new rock aesthetic, but there is much more to Bowie than mere spectacle. The visual belies the increasing depths of his concerns, even at his lowest personal moments. We never know what lies in store in a Bowie song,...

What explains the huge popular following for Dexter, a show which sympathetically depicts a serial killer driven by a cruel compulsion to brutally slay one victim after another? Although Dexter Morgan kills only killers, he is not a vigilante animated by a sense of justice but a charming psychopath animated by a lust to kill, ritualistically and bloodily. In Dexter...

Inception, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, is the most philosophical, thought-provoking, and disturbing movie since The Matrix. It was the 'existential heist film' of the year 2010. The very idea that our dreams and reality are one and the same has caused many sleepless nights and deep vexing conversations around the world. The spontaneous association of the film with philosophical dream theories...

In his brief career, Jimi Hendrix transformed rock music, established himself as the greatest guitarist of all time, and left a rich legacy of original songs and dazzling recordings. In Jimi Hendrix and Philosophy, philosophers come to terms with the experience and the phenomenon of Hendrix, uncovering some surprising implications of Hendrix's life and work. Much of this book is...

More Doctor Who and Philosophy is a completely new collection of chapters, additional to Doctor Who and Philosophy (2010), by the same editors. Since that first Doctor Who and Philosophy, much has happened in the Whoniverse: a new and controversial regeneration of the Doctor, multiple new companions, and a few creepy new enemies of both the Doctor and planet Earth....

This follow-up to the hugely successful The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real explores the issues of fate, fortune, causation and determinism as presented in the Matrix trilogy. It asks the reader to consider notions of freedom and analyses the metaphysical links and breakdowns between the three movies. Delving into the controversial issues of race, humanness,...

This collection of 18 chapters by talented philosophical minds probes some of the many lessons to be learned from Orange Is the New Black. The show and the book that inspired it both dramatically highlight the troubling, stressful situation of millions of incarcerated Americans. How do the show's shower scenes shed light on the classical mind-body problem? How can we...

Philosophers look beyond the sea of red dresses to reveal insights about gender inequality, religious oppression, power, and violence. In The Handmaid's Tale and Philosophy, philosophers offer their insights into the blockbuster best-selling novel and record-breaking TV series, The Handmaid's Tale. The story involves a future breakaway state in New England, plagued by environmental disaster and a plummeting birth rate,...

The Americans, a dark, tense, action thriller with comic touches, has been hailed by many critics as currently the best show on television. The story, created by a former CIA spy, centres on two Soviet agents posing as an ordinary American couple, Philip and Elizabeth Jennings, in 1980s Washington DC. They have two teenage children who know nothing of their...

A humorous and philosophical look at life in Heaven, or is it Hell? The Good Place is a fantasy-comedy TV show about the afterlife. Eleanor dies and finds herself in the Good Place, which she understands must be a mistake, since she has been anything but good. In the surprise twist ending to Season One, it is revealed that this...

Designed for philosophers as well as readers with no particular philosophical background, the essays in this lively book are grouped into four amusing acts. Act One looks at the four Seinfeld characters through a philosophical lens and includes Jerry and Socrates: The Examined Life? Act Two examines historical philosophers from a Seinfeldian standpoint and offers Plato or Nietzsche? Time, Essence,...

This unconventional and lighthearted introduction to the ideas of the major Western philosophers examines The Simpsons—TV's favourite animated family. The authors look beyond the jokes, the crudeness, the attacks on society, and see a clever display of irony, social criticism, and philosophical thought. The writers begin with an examination of the characters. Does Homer actually display Aristotle's virtues of character?...

Since 1968's Night of the Living Dead, zombie culture has continued to limp and claw its way into the centre of popular culture. Zombies and vampires now thrive in TV shows, comic books, cartoons, video games, and movies. Zombies, Vampires, and Philosophy will do for Socrates and Descartes what Pride and Prejudice and Zombies has done for Jane Austen. Philosophers...

Martial Arts and Philosophy have always gone hand in hand, as well as fist in throat. Philosophical argument is closely paralleled with hand-to-hand combat. All of today's Asian martial arts were developed to embody and apply philosophical ideas. In his interview with Bodidharma, Graham Priest brings out aspects of Buddhist philosophy behind Shaolin Kung-Fu - how fighting monks are seeking...

In Westworld and Philosophy, philosophers of diverse orientations and backgrounds offer their penetrating insights into the questions raised by the popular TV show, Westworld. Is it wrong for Dr. Robert Ford (played by Anthony Hopkins) to "play God" in controlling the lives of the hosts, and if so, is it always wrong for anyone to "play God"? Is the rebellion...