The funniest part of the whole “Dante’s inferno is fanfiction” crowd is that they seem to forget that none of the medieval Italians at the time considered the bible fiction.
I am trying to explain to y'all that Dantes inferno was not fiction. It was neither fiction nor non-fiction. It was a type of contemporary literature called Biblical Vision Literature.
can you move explain what Biblical Vision Literature is?
Dante’s Inferno was considered the result of a divinely inspired dream on the part of Dante. The idea being that god gave Dante a dream of all the things that happened in the inferno, which Dante then recorded in the form of an epic poem.
Oftentimes when someone had what they claimed to be a divinely inspired vision or dream, the nature of the dream was evaluated by a panel of priests who would judge the dream for how well it aligned with biblical theology. If it matched up, your vision was real. If there were discrepancies, you were a liar, or a victim of the devil, and would be punished. Biblical Vision Literature was considered 100% non-fiction for the time, angels were considered to be 100% real, and they would 100% give people divine visions.
I’m saying that there’s a shitload of historical context to this work that y'all are missing. Using the modern language of fandom to describe the Divine Comedy isnt just wrong, it’s actively creating an ahistorical understanding of an important work.
ok look. I think if we’re gonna go the historical context route something else that is important to note abt the inferno is that Dante wrote it after being exiled from his home city for backing the wrong political/religious faction in a power struggle. the inferno for all that it may be a piece of “biblical vision literature” is far more Dante‘s petty revenge fantasy where he goes to hell and meets a bunch of figureheads for the political party he disagreed with, who lament about who awful they were, one of whom explicitly states that the current pope, the one still alive and in power at the time of its writing and publication, is also going to hell. Any panel of priests that may have looked at this work would never have approved it if they valued their immortal souls (or more importantly, their pope-given positions in power). Dante, as a person in politics, would’ve known this.
I’m not saying this to argue that the inferno is pure fanfiction, but I find the argument that Dante meant for his writing to be read as 100% real and accurate or that he and anyone reading it at the time wholeheartedly believed what he wrote were visions direct from god is a bit inaccurate. Dante wasn’t a prophet and the inferno isn’t his prediction. It was a political statement couched in a Religious ‘vision’
Yes thank you! I was trying to articulate this but couldn’t figure out how
[image ID: a reply to this post by @/kaiasky. it reads: “RPF is still fanfiction!!”. “RPF” is lowercase. /end image ID]
in any event the statement that “Dante’s Inferno is fanfiction” is arguing against isn’t “Dante’s Inferno is biblical vision literature”, it’s “fanfiction isn’t real fiction”. anyone arguing that fanfiction isn’t real fiction because it depicts other people’s characters and/or other real people without their authorization? needs to consider that according to that exact argument, Dante’s Inferno isn’t real fiction either.
obviously not a compelling argument to anyone who’s saying Dante’s Inferno isn’t real fiction by virtue of being biblical vision literature! but definitely an argument known to boggle the minds of literature professors who’d never thought about it that way before.
The thing about s4 of Cobra Kai is that they really buckled down on telling instead of showing some really meaningful story/character moments for the sake of Getting Through Things Faster, making things Bigger, and providing enough material for a spin-off series. This kind of killed all of the rising action from previous seasons, which made for a lackluster climax, and an unsatisfying falling action.
I would’ve liked to actually SEE Tory in therapy, Hawk working with the rest of the Miyagi-Dos after jumping ship from Eagle Fang (and also dealing with the emotional fallout from the forced cut), Robby training Kenny for more than one scene and also his relationship with Shannon (who… got out of rehab? I guess?), and Miguel struggling with newfound issues surrounding Johnny and Carmen and absent fatherhood and other narrative issues that weren’tbrought up and haphazardly resolved in one episode? So that the way the events concluded in the finale had actually felt important? Cathartic?
However, this would’ve required either 1) more episodes, 2) longer episodes, or 3) the removal of a major storyline (the Kenny and Anthony storyline). Considering the first two options surmount to a bigger budget, which may or may not have been possible, option 3′s probably the easiest and most inexpensive way to address these narrative deficiencies?
The thing is though, option 3 was probably never an option.
And it’s because Anthony’s presence in the series (at least at this point) is likely a result of them wanting to build out the “extended karate universe” for one of the spin-off series the creators have mentioned. Anthony’s probably going to get his own spin-off since he’s the youngest of the cast and because he’s Daniel’s son.
So not only did a lot of the recurring/original cast members get their stories cut for the sake of a storyline surrounding a character who was little more than an extra in previous seasons, their stories were cut for the sake of a spin-off that may or may not gain the same traction as Cobra Kai. That may or may not be as thematically meaningful for viewersasCobra Kai had been.
And this just goes back to the way art isn’t allowed to autonomously exist as a finite piece. Everything has to connect to something else, everything has to be eternal, nothing’s allowed to end!
And underneath it all, there’s this misconception that stories have to be Big and Explosive all the time and Lots of Things Need to Happen all at once in order for the story to be interesting. And that’s not true! Season one’s still regarded as the best season – among fans and critics alike – and nothing really happened! The drama was in the quiet, slice-of-life moments of discomfort and fear and anger and empathy within boring, controlled settings! Not in grand karate gestures resulting in multiple trips to the ER!
And s4 just… perfectly encapsulates the biggest issues with the previous seasons. There’s these giant, massive stakes for characters that are – on a personal, emotional level – never really brought up again?
Like, aside from his injury flaring up at the AVT, we never really see Miguel talking about or dealing with his spinal injury from the s2 finale? The PTSD surrounding the injury or the coma or the recovery process afterwards? Likewise, Demetri never mentions his broken arm and there’s never any true blow back between him and Hawk. We also don’t see Hawk dealing with his traumatic forced cut/assault at the tattoo parlor. Etc etc etc
These quiet, introspective moments that help connect audiences to characters are skipped/washed over in favor of grand, action-packed sequences/montages that fill you in on everything you’d missed. Because, presumably, you don’t actually care about any of that, right?
And it just… creates these worlds and characters that feel so disconnected from their original product. And it feels like the show is continually building up to something. It’s trying really hard to get somewhere. But if in the process all the stories and people that’d mattered before are either getting relegated to the sidelines or being perpetually rewritten to fit the narrative, then it begs the questions: where am I going? And will I even care when I get there?
