KultureDrome

Living Dead (Two)

Remember little Anthony from the 1961 Twilight Zone, “It’s A Good Life”? The original episode has a small town in a mid-Western fly-by state tormented by the whims of a six-year-old kid. The child is as cute and all-American as they come, and even though he was born with incredible superpowers, he still acts like any other boy his age. When we see him for the first time he is sitting in a puddle of mud in his overalls, proudly showing off his latest invention — a three-headed gofer. He can rearrange other living beings and people into horrifying never-before-witnessed deformities and mutations just by willing it to happen. He can mix and match human and animal limbs and appendages to create any atrocity he wishes, but the kid is emotionally unstable. He is not always in such a happy-go-lucky creative mood. Anthony has an even darker side. The next thing he likes best is to make those things he likes worst disappear forever, and kids at that age can come up with some pretty bizarre idiosyncratic criteria for lashing out. Even more than those folks who annoy him, which is just about everyone, for some reason Anthony particularly dislikes electricity, automobiles, barking dogs, and singing songs. Needless to say, he has already wished almost all those things that have anything resembling those characteristics well out of existence. Everyone is death scared of him. As far as they know, he has already banished the rest of the world into oblivion. The town, itself, is a toothy relic, just about entirely decimated. The wind whistles through the chalk-dry ribs of ruined barns, and the dusty landscape is littered with the bone-like hulks of broken down industrial farm equipment. Those who have not been mutilated or have not already magically vanished into the ether, the lucky ones that live among the skulls and tumbleweed of their former existance, silently hope that it is somehow possible for the monster to realize the error of his ways before it’s too late. They are hardworking people who maintain their convictions no matter what. Faith is all they have. It is the only thing that has got them through hard times before. If the boy stays happy, they inwardly pray, the same act of divine power that spawned the monster might intervene on their behalf, and maybe all the terrible things that plague them will finally stop happening. It’s a foolish prayer, but their friends and their land are all destroyed. They hope it is only a stage in the boy’s development, and desperately hold onto the idea that it is still possible to turn him into a good son. So what do they do? They fawn and scrape around him, complement him no matter how heinous the crime against nature, or humanity, mostly because they are mortified by what the insane maniac might do next. But what if no one ever stopped little Anthony? What if he grew up? I wish it was an idle question, but it’s not. Our culture produces many such monsters. Not that the Decider is a product of the heartland. He is just another semi-retarded super rich kid out-of-control. They don’t have super-human powers. They can’t will physical deformities onto their enemies or mix and match them in new and never before seen humanoid grotesques, nor can they wish those they don’t like away, along with everything else they don’t like, into the “cornfield” — although they are born into positions of power and they can and do have their enemies ruined and murdered. On “It’s a Good Life” everyone had to always tell Anthony, “That’s a real good thing you done, a real good thing you done.” And that is exactly how the cabinet had to answer the President. No matter what The Decider did his senior advisors had to say, “That’s a real good thing you done, Dubya, a real good thing.” However preposterous the Decider’s mandate, they said it for fear of severe retribution. But this time when the chorus of cabinet members chimed, “It’s a real good thing you done,” although it came out right on queue as always, The Decider couldn’t help but notice there wasn’t any sympathy and remorse mixed up with the fear and paranoia in their voices. Anthony’s parents, who were just as petrified of the little horror as everyone else, still managed to address their child with real feeling no matter how grave the circumstances. Dubya couldn’t help think it was the least the cabinet could do, so he pounded his fist on the desk, to get their attention. He wanted them to say it again. “Only this time,” The Decider demanded, “Say it with some REAL heart!”