Response To Beowulf

A Reading Response of “I Am Beowulf Now, It’s Your Turn” by Jessica Aldred

This article defines the “convergence” of cinematic characters and video games characters that is represented in the film Beowulf (2007). Aldred defines the extension of cinematic franchise potential in the digitalized format of Beowulf, which was expanded into a video game. This type of marketing is part of “economic motives” for developing Beowulf as a video game character as an “interactive” representation of the film (Aldred 382). In this manner, Beowulf has “converged” a digital cinematic character into a video game character that allows the player to “get in the picture” (p.387). This type of “slider self” is part of the franchise marketing methods utilized

For instance, the video shows Beowulf climbing a cliff with his bare hands, but he is impeded “by a waist-high boulder the next” (Aldred 390). Technically, Aldred is correct in this digitally limited version of the Beowulf video game, which reveals major problems in the “seamless” connection hat the game player experiences when attempting to become an avataristic extension of the film. However, I would have liked Aldred to further discuss the premise of Beowulf as a moral/ethical avatar for game players, which also defines the limitations of video game “interaction.” In my opinion, not only does the video game drastically misrepresent the film, but it also rejects the entire meaning of Beowulf’s psychological and spiritual journey as a heroic figure. In the video game, Beowulf has been merely reduced to being an avatar for violent combat scenarios. Aldred should have also covered the digital limitations of the video game as a philosophical problem of Beowulf’s misrepresentation, which depict the moral and ethical construct of violent/combat-based gaming scenarios that presents, yet another, major disconnect between the film and the video