The Minecraft movie an unexpected Right Wing cultural icon

Thoughts on the Movie

To get the obvious out of the way: this movie is genius viral marketing in action. Aside from younger kids and their families, nobody is really going to the Minecraft movie for the movie itself. They are going for a reason much deeper—the shared communal experience of having an ironic blast cheering “CHICKEN JOCKEY” at the top of their lungs with friends and strangers alike. My theater experience lived up to the hype, resembling a pseudo-religious experience. I came into the theater and came out a new man, having thoroughly enjoyed myself the whole time. To beat figures like ArtChad to the punch in saying obvious stuff ArtChad fans think is deep: the movie’s massive box office success reflects the desire of the public to have not just irony but authentic community experiences, which modernity has denied to everyone under the age of 60

On the topic of the movie’s success, A Minecraft Movie is the 25th biggest opening weekend of all time. As the viral marketing TikToks continue, I predict the movie will wind up in the top 20 biggest box office successes of all time. As commentators like to point out, this is despite a mediocre critical reception—once again proving that what the critics think does not matter. The audience loved it, the kids loved it, the parents loved that their kids loved it, and the teens loved the experience of it. This is how quality is measured—not the thoughts of some shitlib journo wine aunt.

As for the movie itself, I would rate it a 7/10. I watched the movie two days in a row and enjoyed myself with and without the theater experience. I thought the CGI was really quite impressive. Every character looks borderline green-screened in, but you must understand that creating an entire CGI world with natural and artificial features, then slotting real people in, is a difficult undertaking. I would say the movie just barely sells the illusion—but that’s all it needs to do. The best aspect of the movie was the characters and casting. Jack Black plays Steve—but in reality, Jack Black plays Jack Black. If you have seen Jack Black in a Jack Black movie, you know Steve as a character. I think when Jack Black was announced to play Steve, people were rightly disappointed. The public is sick of Jack Black and more sick of Jack Black millennial comedy. Yet somehow, for this kind of movie, Steve won me over pretty quickly. After Endgame, everyone thought Marvel—which uses a similar comedy—was dead. Then No Way Home comes out and everyone watched it. The public is not as sick of this humor, comedy, and actor as they lead on. Jason Momoa’s is a similarly loud character, but it again works, and I actually found his character—along with the villager subplot—to be the funniest in the movie. Dawn, played by Danielle Brooks, is a Black woman . If you like this archetype, you will like her character; if you don’t, she barely gets any screen time. Next is Natalie, played by the incredibly attractive Emma Myers, a girl who is stuck in the liminal position between being a late teen/young adult and a good parental figure to her brother Henry. Finally, Henry, played by Sebastian Eugene Hansen, is a young boy of the Dipper (of Gravity Falls) archetype who serves as the protagonist of the movie. My thoughts on him will come later. Most importantly, the entire cast seems like they are having a lot of fun—which is necessary for a movie like this—and the cast has a natural dynamic between each other, especially Jack Black and Jason Momoa, a pairing that really sells the movie.

My major gripe with the movie is the shitty plot and pacing. It really tries to do the mid-movie misunderstanding/conflict-characters-get-back-together-in-the-end thing, but fails both times it’s attempted—with both the Natalie-Henry misunderstanding and the Henry-Garret conflict coming across as unnecessary diversions. These should have been replaced with more comedy or world-building. This would also have the effect of making the plot feel less rushed. I would have just had the characters stay in the village longer and do Minecraft stuff—chuck in a bunch of fan service to all the YouTubers or whatever. Thus, the rating: 7/10.

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Why the Movie is a Right-Wing Masterpiece

Firstly, all the characters are right-wing archetypes. Henry is a creative, sensitive young man in a world of low-IQ uncreative individuals who, like Shinji, rejects the Overworld—a land of his dreams—to improve society from within. It’s a fundamentally male character designed to appeal to intelligent young men at the expense of strivers, blacks, women, hags, and everyone else trying to put guys down. The message of the movie is telling young smart men to put down the red stone and become an electrical engineer which is pretty good advice for a segment of this audence

Secondly, Natalie’s character and the themes of family predicate the movie. Natalie is not mad she has to parent Henry. She tries her hardest, going above and beyond to make him happy. If the movie were left-coded, it would include a scene where she is tossing up between career and family. Instead, the right-coded Minecraft understands family is inherently more important and makes it the top priority of Henry and his sister. On the topic of Natalie—even the movie’s casting of Emma Myers is right-wing coded. What type of woman should be the ideal shown to the public? The left-coded movie would say Rachel Zegler—a loudmouthed brown girl who “fights for what she believes in.” A libertine-coded movie would cast a “hot” girl like Sydney Sweeney or formerly Megan Fox—who are both less attractive and have worse personalities than Emma—but also stray the audience from God. A right-coded movie would cast someone cute like Emma to play an inherently feminine character.

Thirdly, the movie is essentially all white, with only a token Black woman character as an exception—and even her character is played for laughs. The movie has no oppression narrative associated, besides creative smart people being oppressed by society. This is rare—even apolitical modern movies have a left-coded oppression narrative associated. Minecraft having none is a welcome change.

My final two points are accurately stated by the Twitter user @PunnishedSkk so ill let him take the reigns

Natalie being good at self defence does not detract from my argument btw at the end of the day it is the right wing that is pro 2a pepper spray and all that also quitting an adult daycare email job to start a small buisness could be argued to be somewhat randian Dawn being some animal lady and Natalie be a naive homemaker helping her little autistic brother is enough to shore up the films anti feminist credentials

All these points paint a distinct picture that the Minecraft movie, while not inherently political, is certainly right-coded and traditional and family-oriented in its value structure, while uplifting its core audience of creative young men. Ultimately, the same kids screaming “I AM STEVE” in the theater are natural right-wing voters.