Y’know it’s funny, I just rewatched Her last night since my wife hasn’t seen it. Something that really struck me as somewhat overlooked on release was the undertone of “everyone is socially awkward and emotionally immature”, which has really aged like wine.
First of all, right from the opening scene, Theodore works at a company that writes “beautiful handwritten letters” by proxy. Later we learn there’s a married couple he’s been writing letters between since they first started dating. The whole film starts with the commodification of emotional connection.
Then there’s the phone sex girl, who asks him to choke her with a dead cat. Now, I’m no stranger to the kink community, but springing that on a random stranger mid-scene? That’s not something you just do. That’s a whole conversation with a consenting partner.
And no one takes rejection maturely. When Theodore goes on a date with Olivia Wilde’s character, everything is going great until she tries to get way too serious way too fast, on the first date. When Theodore doesn’t respond, she immediately says he’s “a real creepy dude” and shuts down. Then there’s Isabella.
Theodore is far from being unique in falling for an AI, since there’s already a service to provide surrogate bodies for human-AI relationships. But Isabella never meets him, never establishes boundaries, nothing. Now, I’m in an open relationship, and have brought women into the bedroom with my wife, but doing so without any kind of introduction or prep or anything is insane. But when Theodore doesn’t feel comfortable with the situation, Isabella has a breakdown. She doesn’t respect Theodore’s reluctance, all that matters is that she “wanted to be part of something pure”, without actually consulting the other human party involved.
Then there’s Charles, Amy’s husband, who clearly puts no effort into understanding her work, and decided he didn’t want to be married anymore after an argument about shoes.
And Catherine, who according to Amy had pretty volatile emotions, and seemed to project her own perfectionist insecurities onto Theodore, claiming he wanted her to be perfect when the story implies those were her own hangups.
I struggle to find a single character who seemed to be emotionally mature. They overreact, communicate poorly, and generally seem obsessively focused on themselves.
All of which is to say there’s no wonder they seemed to fall into parasocial relationships with AI. Having interacted with humans in the last 5 years, it seems like that kind of parasocial behavior is the most poignant prediction of the 2013 film. It seems like this “Google weirdness” is an accurate assessment of where we are as a species.
Y’know it’s funny, I just rewatched Her last night since my wife hasn’t seen it. Something that really struck me as somewhat overlooked on release was the undertone of “everyone is socially awkward and emotionally immature”, which has really aged like wine.
First of all, right from the opening scene, Theodore works at a company that writes “beautiful handwritten letters” by proxy. Later we learn there’s a married couple he’s been writing letters between since they first started dating. The whole film starts with the commodification of emotional connection.
Then there’s the phone sex girl, who asks him to choke her with a dead cat. Now, I’m no stranger to the kink community, but springing that on a random stranger mid-scene? That’s not something you just do. That’s a whole conversation with a consenting partner.
And no one takes rejection maturely. When Theodore goes on a date with Olivia Wilde’s character, everything is going great until she tries to get way too serious way too fast, on the first date. When Theodore doesn’t respond, she immediately says he’s “a real creepy dude” and shuts down. Then there’s Isabella.
Theodore is far from being unique in falling for an AI, since there’s already a service to provide surrogate bodies for human-AI relationships. But Isabella never meets him, never establishes boundaries, nothing. Now, I’m in an open relationship, and have brought women into the bedroom with my wife, but doing so without any kind of introduction or prep or anything is insane. But when Theodore doesn’t feel comfortable with the situation, Isabella has a breakdown. She doesn’t respect Theodore’s reluctance, all that matters is that she “wanted to be part of something pure”, without actually consulting the other human party involved.
Then there’s Charles, Amy’s husband, who clearly puts no effort into understanding her work, and decided he didn’t want to be married anymore after an argument about shoes.
And Catherine, who according to Amy had pretty volatile emotions, and seemed to project her own perfectionist insecurities onto Theodore, claiming he wanted her to be perfect when the story implies those were her own hangups.
I struggle to find a single character who seemed to be emotionally mature. They overreact, communicate poorly, and generally seem obsessively focused on themselves.
All of which is to say there’s no wonder they seemed to fall into parasocial relationships with AI. Having interacted with humans in the last 5 years, it seems like that kind of parasocial behavior is the most poignant prediction of the 2013 film. It seems like this “Google weirdness” is an accurate assessment of where we are as a species.