The Karli Morgenthau Problem - YouTube

I already know people are going to be commenting like “but Karli killed people!

She was evil!” like that’s not the entire point of this video.

So I was very invested The Falcon and the Winter Soldier because I have a

deepseated love for Sam Wilson.

And uh. James Bucharest Barnes I guess.

But mostly Sam. I love him.

And I do love the Mackie dynamic with Sebastian Stan,

because their chemistry and friendship is iconic.

I did do episode commentaries for the first 5 episodes.

I didn’t do one for the 6th one so I’m kinda rolling my commentary for that into

this video.

So who is Karli Morgenthau? (If you didn't watch the series)

She’s a character based on Karl Morgenthau from the comics.

His alias is the Flag-Smasher (yeah I couldn’t believe there was actual textual basis for

that.

I really thought the pentagon was funding that part but i guess marvel was really just

creating propaganda for free).

His character is described as a freedom-fighter whose goal is to liberate Earth from the oppression

of national rule.

I guess "smash borders" again, just like in the show. which uh, the ideology?

Not bad.

But the connotation…

In the comics he actually ends up teaming up with the new captain america john walker

along with battlestar (uh rest in peace hoskins).

Them changing Karl to Karli and making Karli a mixed race young woman…was an interesting

choice, given her ultimate fate in the show.

But before we get into that, let’s take a step back.

And get a look at the broader picture.

Because we are going to TV Tropes!

It's great website to read through various tropes

that appear in popular media, and also a great

way to waste hours of your time.

The page we’re gonna focus on is

The Well-Intentioned Extremist.

I’ll just read that off verbatim. A Well intentioned Extremist is:

“A villain who has an overall goal which the heroes can appreciate in principle, but

whose methods of pursuing said goal (such as mass murder) are problematic; despite any

sympathy they may have with their cause, the heroes have no choice but to stop them.”

the villain may be out for simple revenge against a person, corporation or other entity

that has undeniably wronged them.

Again, the heroes may sympathize with their plight, but are obliged to stop them because

they care not who gets in the way of their planned revenge.

However, the heroes will often investigate the villain's grievance themselves and will

complement stopping the villain with bringing the offending party to justice as well."

Basically just centrism, right? But like a very idealized version of centrism where things

actually get done (laugh)

"Maybe they started out with actions as good as their intentions, but were forced to take

more extreme measures.

Either way, it's a common end result of Jumping Off the Slippery Slope.

Their favorite phrase is I Did What I Had to Do.

The page defines 4 variations of this trope, including:

The problem is the goal

The problem is the consequences

The problem is the 'problem'

And then, The problem is the means.

For the purposes of this video, I’m going to be focusing on the problem is the means,

as in, the villain has noble goals, but their means of achieving them are problematic.

It was actually kind of hard for me to find scholarly articles studying this trend in

film. Um I may just be bad at researching though

so if you have any suggestions for further

reading please let me know in the comments!

I did find this culture article written in 2019 titled, “A New Trend Among Superhero

Movies: The Villains Are Right” by Dan Schindel, and I feel like it’s only gotten more true

with time.

Schindel discusses the pivot from having villains be evil caricatures of bad ideas and bad intentions,

to morally grey, sympathetic characters with goals that make a lot of sense.

There was the Vulture in Spiderman Homecoming, who represented the marginalized working class

that was directly harmed by the actions of billionaire playboy

"philanthropist", Tony Stark.

Do y’all remember that?

I remember sitting in the theater like "wait so Tony Stark literally put all these guys

out of a job and he never gets any heat for it?"

In fact he actually takes Peter Parker, and makes him a mini iron

man as if Peter’s whole thing isn’t your

friendly NEIGHBORHOOD spiderman.

I didn't realize that "neighborhood" was a gated community (sarcasm).

I think to some extent marvel must’ve recognized that it wouldn’t play well to completely

villainize the guy, so he kind of just becomes more of like

a lawful evil type of villain.

He plays by the rules (you know, not revealing Peter’s

identity) and he's quietly jailed. You know.

Our next villain does not get similar grace extended to them.

In the same article Schindel brings up Erik Killmonger from Black Panther.

He states, “When movies can’t contradict their bad guys, they resort to dirtier play

to ensure viewers root for who they’re supposed to.

Black Panther undermines Killmonger’s anger at Wakanda for electing isolationism instead

of helping black people around the world by having him frequently murder women.

The movie also eventually reveals that Killmonger just wants to form his own empire, seeking

"black supremacy" instead of equality — disturbingly becoming an avatar of what many racists claim

civil rights activists really want.

Killmonger’s political resentments are also sublimated into his jealousy of his cousin,

T’Challa.

Ultimately, we see that he doesn’t really care about saving the world’s black people.

This happens even as the film halfway accepts his arguments, as T’Challa is moved to open

up Wakanda by the end.

But instead of taking any strong stance against structural inequality in other nations, he

… builds some outreach centers.”

A perfect example of this kind of wishy washy attitude toward radicals,

is when Killmonger is at a Museum in the “African Arts” exhibit.

This scene was filmed in the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, according to Gizmodo,

but it serves as a thinly-veiled stand-in for London’s

British Museum.

The harsh truth of the matter is that most of these museums did steal from nonwhite countries,

(That they had previously colonized or imperialized)

taking artifacts and stealing art pieces to display for their visitors to ogle at.

And then, Killmonger poisons the art curator and steals

the piece he had been eyeing, after making

the comment:

“How do you think your ancestors got these?

Do you think they paid a fair price?

Or did they take it… like they took everything else?”

And.

He’s absolutely correct though.

And sure, the argument might be that he didn't -- he shouldn't

have killed the woman to achieve his goals.

But that’s the point right?

The narrative is trying to undermine his message by saying “See?

Even if he has a point, he’s definitely evil because he just killed that nice blonde

woman!

And stealing is bad in modern times!”

This actually mirrors another conversation that’s been happening at the international

level for a while now.

I’ll try and simplify the concepts for clarity.

But the basic idea is this.

Western European countries and America underwent their industrial revolutions in around the

18th to 19th centuries, right?

These were periods of rapid economic growth and exponential population booms, but these

were also times that were

wildly detrimental to the environment.

Entire forests would be cut down to make way for new settlements and farming, stacks of

smoke would be pumped into the sky as the factories pumped out textile after textile

and new assembly item after new assembly item.

All of this was terrible for the environment of course, and we recognize that now, right?

We've supposedly gotten more knowledgeable about it, and

we understand that there should be efforts

made to be more sustainable.

If countries are going to develop now, they should do so in a way that's sustainable

and good for the environment.

The problem comes when international organizations and like, the United Nations, try to place

these sustainable

development goals on developing nations, because then it’s like wait a minute, you all irreversibly

f--ked over the planet in your quest for wealth and power, but now that you’re at the top,

it’s all “actually wait, but the environment!”

Not to mention the fact that most of this wealth was built on the backs of peoples from

colonized and imperialized countries, and out of materials stolen from their countries

in the first place.

Like, did you know that if the UK were to repay

India for all it has stolen from the years

of colonialism and imperialism, it would owe over 45 trillion dollars?

That's trillion with a "T".

(jalebi bai plays)

How do you reconcile that kind of damage with modern ideas about sustainability or being

a responsible world power?

Basically, how do you reconcile that kind of damage with modern ideas about what kinds

of “means” are acceptable to achieve your

goals?

And this is the ultimate problem with this recent trend of super villains.

The argument always is, their goals are noble, but their means are inexcusable.

But when the villains are also parts of marginalized groups - as they typically are, especially

moreso in recent times

- as in the case of Karli and the rest of the Flag Smashers -

Marginalized groups that have gotten to their disadvantaged

position in life as a result of unfair treatment and targeted violence, why is the burden then

on

them to follow the rules in the first place?

Rules that were put into place by the very same structures and the very same groups of

people

that put them in this disadvantaged position.

Karli and the Flag-smashers' goals made a lot of sense.

In a time of global upheaval, with record numbers of refugees and economic disparity,

a story about a group of refugees that have been overlooked and forgotten by the very

organizations and leaders that are meant to represent

them is not unique.

Positioning them as having morally acceptable goals, but being irresponsible in their methods

is not only a cheap cop-out of exploring these issues in a meaningful way, but also applies

a skewed perception of what morally acceptable means look like.

If you've been following what's been happening with Pa lestine lately,

Which, if you have no idea what I'm talking about, I will link some more resources to

further educate yourself

In the description below.

But I want you to take a look at this news clip where an interviewer is asking about

the protests going on about the mistreatment of Pal estinians.

It’s not on the same scale, because I'm talking about fictional stuff,

and this is the real world.

But you can see these kinds of respectability politics and this tone policing reflected

in real life too.

As you could see in the previous clip I just showed, the interviewer was focusing on the

means when

people are being violently forced out of their homes! People are being killed, and systematically

harmed!

And so many people who self-identified as allies

and anti-racists came out of the woodwork

to denounce Black Lives Matter protests last year after the murder of George Floyd because

“it was wrong what happened, but I don’t condone the protestors actions.”

Even when they were engaging in civil disobedience, peaceful protests, or even simply stating

the fact that in 2020 cops killed 1021 people.

And that's just about the peaceful protests.

And when we passively accept the idea that radical

ideas or any idea even slightly challenging

the status quo is only acceptable in a watered down, soft and sweet way, it does impact the

way that popular culture responds in real life.

It’s really frustrating to see honestly, because -- especially

when so many of these issues are deeply ingrained

in American society and sometimes require something that would end up uprooting the

whole system.

Because at the end of the day, if it's a society that wouldn’t survive without racist, classist,

and misogynistic systems, I don’t even want it.

If you’re similarly frustrated, I’m linking a few organizations down below that are putting

in

the work and enacting meaningful change for all of us.

Don’t feel guilty about not being able to donate much, even a dollar helps if you’re

able to do so!

I usually try to donate like a minimum of around

$5 to causes that I like to support because that’s

what’s accessible for me, if you'd like kind of like a baseline.

And that, is the Karli Morgenthau problem.

Please let me know what you thought, you know um... I just had a lot of feelings about Karli

and the Flag Smashers and how

everything was handled.

How we went from the show-runners showing the police racially profiling Sam Wilson in

one episode,

To like

The cops, fondly looking at Bucky in the last episode going all,

"Lieutenant Barnes?" and then Bucky kinda just slapping him on the shoulder like he's

an old buddy?

Like, what? Ugh. I don't know. It's just like --

I know that we're all like, here, with like, watered-down versions of military propaganda.

But like. Man. (laughs)

You would think they would rein it in sometimes (laughs)

But yeah. So please let me know what you thought of this video, if you have any other thoughts,

I'm open to other opinions and perspectives, you know like.

Oh, and please like the video, you know, for the engagement. Um.

I also have a Patreon, um, where you can support me, because...

I don't know! If you just like me and you wanna support me, that's what that's there

for.

And I - I do love money, so. You know.

Oh! Uh (laughs) I also forgot, um, let me just plug my merch real quick.

Um yeah, that's also down there. It's really cute. And um, I've had a few people actually

receive their merch

And they've worn it around in public -- nobody knows its youtuber merch.

It's super discreet AND super cute. So. You know.

Yeah.

Alright. Thank you for watching!

(upbeat music plays)