Two Sides

Comparing colonial writings with an 80s John Hughes film doesn’t seem possible, but it’s easier than one may think. In both cases, the underdogs of society (like Wyatt and Rory or the colonists from Europe) try to create something amazing (like Lisa or settlements in the New World) that would be coveted in a normal context. In both cases, their creations each end up being too difficult, larger than life, for the underdogs to handle, and they get stuck with cleaning up the messes of the somewhat out of control Lisa and somewhat divided new colonies in America. Neither Wyatt and Gary nor America has a true place in the world. They’re rejects because of how they’re each kept separate from what’s considered to be normal in society. Lisa was someone who showed Wyatt and Gary how to have fun, and America was a place for those who did not fit into European culture to stay and create lives for themselves. But good things don’t always lead to better things. To Gary and Wyatt, Lisa was a great person to be with and talk to, but she ends up acting recklessly in an effort to get the boys to man up. Similarly, according to Crèvecœur, “...American abundance did not automatically lead to American freedom and equality” and that “too much freedom and too easy a subsistence threatened to barbarize the newcomers rather than redeem them” (Taylor 44). Lisa and America were neither good, nor bad, but instead laid somewhere in between where the two blurred. Both Lisa and America were created at the same time that other parts of life were destroyed. Like in Weird Science, different parts of Wyatt and Gary’s town are blown up due to the power surge needed to make Lisa, and to create America, not only did the Protestants start by pushing natives off of their land when they came to the New World, but later, during the Revolutionary War, the British and Patriots engaged in a conflict that was seen “as a bloody tragedy provoked and waged by greedy leaders on both sides” (Taylor 45). The result of all of this was neither entirely negative nor entirely positive. Long term, Lisa got a job and America became free, but short term, Wyatt’s house was destroyed by the motorcycle gang from Hell and towns in the New World were letting themselves go. The fact that there were several bad outcomes is not surprising “for it is said, that when that due time, or appointed time comes, their foot shall slide” (Edwards 54). Nothing can stay terrific forever because a fluctuation of good and bad will always happen in life. So no matter what the subject, and no matter how terrific it may seem, there will always be some downside, whether it be small or large.