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Star Wars, Pokemon, and the return from my extended vacation

Posted by Chris OBrien on December 8th, 2008 at 6:50 am | Categorized as Off Topic | Tagged as , ,

Greetings! This blog has been quiet for a couple of weeks due to the fact that I’ve been on vacation since Nov. 21. I meant to hang an “On Vacation” sign here. But never got around to it. So apologies if it seems like I mysteriously vanished from this blog, from Twitter, and all the channels where I frequently babble.

But even though I tried to unplug, I still found myself using my various social networks, which made me realize how much they’ve become a part of my personal as well as my professional life. And I must say that in sharing a couple of fun events in my life, the experience was enhanced by the comments I received via Twitter and Facebook from my friends in my network. I felt it was social networking in the best sense of the phrase.

The first event involved what felt like an epic moment in my household: The first viewing of “Star Wars” with my children. I have two kids: Liam, who is about to turn six, and Kalian, who is 3.5 years old.

Liam and Kalian watch Star Wars for the first time.

Liam and Kalian watch Star Wars for the first time.

In recent weeks, Liam has become obsessed with reading The Star Wars Storybook, a cheesy book that I got when the original Star Wars movie came out. The storybook tells a somewhat sanitized version of the movie, and includes lots of movie stills. What’s great about the storybook is that it must have been produced before the final edit of the movie, because includes several scenes that did not appear in the movie, including several scenes with Luke’s friend Biggs, who was all but erased from the movie. You can search YouTube and find Biggs’ deleted scenes. And they’re awful, by the way.

Also, the book ends by noting that now that the Death Star had been destroyed, the rebels had won, the empire had been defeated, and the old Republic had been restored. Um, nope. Turns out there were two more sequels.

Anyways, after weeks of begging by Liam, we finally relented and rented it. The geek part of me and the daddy part were, I think, maybe even more excited than the kids. I wanted to share my excitement, so I grabbed my BlackBerry and tweeted about watching the movie. That generated a few responses:

I liked that immediate gratification of sharing a special moment and getting some instant validation and feedback.

I was even more surprised, though, a week later, when I shared a parenting dilemma. Liam has just started kindergarten. And apparently, all the kids are totally obsessed with Pokemon. Now, I consider myself to be pretty savvy about pop culture. But as far as I knew, Pokemon was one of those fads that came and went years ago. Nope. Turns out that every kids everywhere is a Pokemon. But I’ve never seen the videos, played the games, and have no real concept of what it’s about.

So when I was the library in Oakland, debating whether to let Liam check out a Pokemon video, I posted a tweet about my dilemma, which plugged the following into my Facebook status:

Apparently all the kids at my son’s elementary school are way into Pokemon. I thought that fad died years ago? Do I cave or resist?via Twitter - 2:27pm
That generated the following conversation:

- 12 Comments

Jon Healey at 2:41pm December 5
It’s gotten to my son, too. Resistance is futile.
Catherine O’Neill Goodbred at 2:49pm December 5
My twin boys are obsessed with Pokemon despite all my efforts to resist. At least they play nicely with the cards for hours…and it can be a good exercise in pronunciation for them! Some of the names are actually pretty clever…
Marc Brown at 2:59pm December 5
My 7-year-old daughter has developed a sudden obsession, too.
Kalpana Mohan at 3:06pm December 5
Don’t resist. Use it to your advantage:-) Our music teacher found out how crazy my son and the other kids were about Pokemon (late 90s) - so she, with the help of my son, devised a board game using these characters to teach music theory. My son has left the studio but the game lives on!

One more thing: I find that in the case of my son (now 14, a…  Read More 9th grader) these early passions have actually fueled other interests: at 4, he was flag crazy; then at 6, it was Pokemon; at 9, it was video games and literature on video games; at 12, it was crazy teen music (or whatever they call it). But through the years, the passion for Indian classical music and great literature have stayed and they shaped him. Today he’s on a quest to finish ALL the great works of English/American literature. We know where he’s going to go with that!!!! When he asks to read “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” is when I’ll protest.

Tom Langlois at 4:26pm December 5
Chris…it’s been 12-14 years…and it’s one of the most successful animated shows/video games/trading cards/approaching parental world domination!! I suggest you surrender peacefully and make Liam happy!!!
Enjoy!!!
Todd Woody at 5:23pm December 5
Pokeman is just the gateway trading card to Yu-gi-oh and Naruto, the fav of the 9-10-year-old set.
E.L. James at 5:38pm December 5
the cards are kind of fun(yes, that means we caved in) the tv show makes my head want to explode. Leo’s cousin Dylan was waaay into Pokemon, and I blame him. haha
JonAnn Steinmetz Lindsey at 5:47pm December 5
i myself am a sucker for togepi. i vote for cave.
Patrick Chu at 6:17pm December 5
at least he’s not playing Warcraft… yet
Nicole C. Wong at 7:39pm December 5
some retail expert just told me this year’s hot toy is a step up from pokemon, a game using magnetic cards and plastic marbles encasing action figures that pop up when they roll over the cards. called bakugan. popular with 8-year-olds, etc. maybe your son can start the fad at his school!
Diana Measham at 9:54pm December 5
resistance will only enhance his interest … he’ll move on from this, just as he did from firetrucks, dinosaurs, superheros…..
Mary Cornatzer at 11:27am December 6
i resisted and it worked but then i’m a really mean mama
And this conversation thread happened on Twitter:
  • Photo_14_normal
    ericajfinley: @sjcobrien I actually know people who play, and while it isn’t as big as it used to be, it’s still quite intense & you can win money!
    1 day ago · Reply · View Tweet

So the overall consensus seemed to be: Cave. And so I did. We rented the video. He watched last night at a sleepover, so I’ve not year got the full report. But I have a feeling that I’ve just taken the first step into a multi-year obsession with Pokemon.

One final thought on all of this: One challenge with the way these networks interact is that one question from me can start a conversation in several different places. I’ve talked to folks at times about this notion about how disaggregated conversation has become on the Web. I wonder what solutions people have found to this problem?

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1 Response to “Star Wars, Pokemon, and the return from my extended vacation”

  1. Joan OBrien says:
    December 12th, 2008 at 7:25 am

    If I recall the editor of this blog grew up with Star Wars and GI Joe (of all things!!) I didn’t see that it made him violent or that he decided to march off to war. I think you are thinking too much!!!
    Mother

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