revelation essay draft 1 cont'd

A trope is a familiar theme that is continuously repeated in many stories and films as figurative language that can be portrayed through the characters, plot, or setting. A few examples of tropes are: the arrogant teacher, sympathetic people, eccentric detective, smart but dorky sidekick, happy endings, struggle between good versus evil, heroes always defeat the villains. One type of a trope is the revelation trope. A revelation is realizing that everything is not what it seems. An enlightening revelation changes your outlook/ perspective on life. Revelation reveals the unknown and is like an epiphany that begins the process of starting with your newfound insight. Crucial elements of a revelation trope consists of a prophet (who is the revealer and usually comes before disciple), the disciple, life changing views, insight/enlightenment, learning to think for yourself. Many times something big must happen to the revealer for it to process the disciple. Other times there is resistant to the message. Those that oppose the revealer tend to be portrayed as the ‘bad guys’. Throughout time the adaptations of tropes and revelation tropes have been used to convey a message to the audience. Revelations offer the audience life-changing experiences, overcoming unacceptable situations, self-reliance and self-discovery. Sometimes the revelation will cause the disciple to fight society norms; like standing up to an inappropriate authority figure. Revelation tropes can be found in films and different types of literature.

Our first introduction to a revelation through literature is The Emperors New Clothes, by Hans Christian Anderson. Two scoundrels tick the Emperor into believing that they are tailors who can make the Emperor a beautiful suite made of extraordinary material. The suite is so special that it appears invisible to those that are stupid and incompetent. Once the suite is completed the Emperor looks into the mirror and sees himself naked but doesn’t say anything because he doesn’t want to see incompetent. The Emperor holds a parade to show off his new clothes and wants to see who else in the village is incompetent. Although no one sees anything but the naked Emperor, they decide to keep their mouth shut because they don’t want to seem incompetent. The only one to speck up is a little child who shouts out that “the Emperor is naked”, and soon the rest of the villagers admit that the Emperor is naked. The Emperor thinks that everyone in the village is stupid and incompetent and he continues on with the parade. In this story the two scoundrels are the messengers trying to portray the idea that people deny the truth even though it is right in front of them. No one wants to appear incompetent in front of the other so no one speaks the truth.

In the film Foxfire a mysterious drifter named Legs enters a high school chemistry class. While in the class the teacher is forcing a student, Rita, to dissect a frog. Legs stands up to the teacher and lets the frog go free and then leaves through the same window. Later when the girls are in the bathroom, Rita says that the teacher sexually abuses her and so Legs says that they need to stick together. “If it could happen to one of us, it could happen to all of us,” and so Legs, Rita, Maddie and Violet decide to teach the teacher a lesson. In this film Legs is the revealer and the message is to stand up for each other and stick together. In the bathroom scene there is a group of cheerleaders that oppose the message that the teacher sexually abuses Rita. Since it has never been done to one of them, they decide to blindly believe that an authority figure would never do that.

One apparent idea throughout all revelation tropes is the disciple learning that there is more to life than what s/he perceived. A great example of a film that follows the revelation trope is the Matrix. Thomas A. Anderson also known as Neo is a computer programmer/ hacker who wants to decipher the codes on his computer. He has many encounters with Mr. Smith, who is the operator of the Matrix, which leads Neo to meet Morpheus. Morpheus offers Neo a chance to learn what the Matrix is. But he says that he cant tell him, but has to show him and gives Neo a choice, he can either choose the red pill that will show him the truth or the blue pill that will allow Neo to continue living his life the way it is. Neo chooses the red pill and is taken through a process of rebirth. Here Neo learns that the world he has lived in since birth is the Matrix, a world that is taken over by machines. Morpheus tells Neo that there has been a war between humans and machines for a long time now and Morpheus believes that Neo is “the one” that will end the war. In the Matrix, the revealer is Morpheus and the disciple is Neo. The ignorant masses are the agents (Mr. Smith), and all those that live in the Matrix.
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Many comparisons can be found between the Matrix and Jesus. John the Baptist is the revealer that comes before Jesus, as Morpheus is the one that comes before Neo. Also in both cases there is a betrayer; Judas Iscariot betrayed Jesus and Morpheus and Neo were betrayed by Cypher because he believes that “ignorance is bliss”.