TOW #3 - Article: The Hero of "Breaking Bad"

In the New York Times opinion article by Ross Douthat titled The Hero of “Breaking Bad”, the author and editor discusses what he considers to be one of the show’s greatest accomplishments: the creation and development of a “compelling, interesting, entertaining, good person.” (Douthat) Douthat first sets up his claim by stating that far too often, bad guys will have the best lines not only in “dumb action movies” but in works by Shakespeare, Milton, and Dickens. By comparison, Douthat argues that the good guys usually tend to seem excessively one-dimensional and boring, using this as a reason why television series such as “Mad Men” (in its later seasons) no longer have an easily recognizable good guy type character. Douthat states that this is part of what sets “Breaking Bad” apart from its competition, having a complex good guy rather than having a straightforward one or not having one at all. This character is Hank Schrader, Walter White’s D.E.A. brother-in-law. Douthat states that what makes Schrader interesting is that, at times, he hasn’t always actually been seen as the good guy. In fact, at the beginning of the series, Douthat argues Hank was somewhat of the opposite, being portrayed as a jerkish and blunt government officer acting as a foil for the originally sincere and kindhearted school teacher, Walter. He continues to argue that it isn’t simply having a good guy chasing Walter that makes “Breaking Bad” special, but rather the “moral stake” that Hank provides for the audience during controversial events.  Douthat goes so far as to state that having a character that displays everyday heroism and moral decency actually makes the show more realistic than it would be without. Overall, I do believe that Douthat successfully achieved his purpose of explaining how having a complex “good guy” character has contributed to “Breaking Bad”’s wild success and popularity. As I, along with millions of other viewers from across the globe, tune in to watch the series finale tonight, I will be sure to keep Hank and the role he played in the show, and in its success, consciously in mind.

R.I.P Henry R. "Hank" Schrader 

TOW #2 - Article: Will You Still Love Me When I'm 164?

In Sonia Arrison's opinion article published by Time, the national bestselling author discusses the possible effects she predicts will result from Google’s new company, Calico. Calico, which was publicly announced this past Wednesday, is another branch of Google that specializes in health and well-being, with a focus on aging and the detrimental diseases that come with it. Due to the simple fact that it is an opinion piece, her article will obviously be biased with the intent to convince her audience, which most likely consists of almost everyone besides young children, that her viewpoint is the correct one. To achieve this purpose, Arrison uses examples, multiple statistics, and attempts to discredit opposing opinions. The first possible effect she discusses is that people will have more time to spend with their spouses, with different spouses, and having children decades apart. To support this, she uses actress Elizabeth Taylor as an example who has been married eight times to seven different husbands. She then uses a statistic that compares the average age men and women married at in the 1950s compared with 2013. Comparing the two shows that men and women are more likely to marry 5-6 years later in life in 2013 than in the 1950s which she attributes partially to increased life expectancy. Later on in the article she references a statistic from the University of Chicago that states $3.2 trillion per year have been added to the national wealth due to increased life expectancy from 1970-2000. Lastly she refutes the opposing opinion that a drastically increased life expectancy will potentially devalue the richness of life by saying that will more able years, people can spend more time with friends, family, innovating, exploring, learning, and helping others. Ultimately I do believe that Arrison achieved her purpose of convincing her audience that her opinion of increased life expectancy being good was successful due mainly to her appeal to logos through the statistic and pathos through being able to spend more time doing good things.

TOW #1 - Visual Text: Old Spice Commercial

If you have access to either a functioning television or youtube, chances are that you’ve seen or at least heard of the ultra-popular Old Spice ads featuring the impossibly handsome and charming Isaiah Mustafa. The most popular commercial begins with Mustafa in a bathroom wearing nothing but a towel around his waist and holding a bottle of the featured body wash while speaking directly to his primary audience, ladies. Mustafa’s very first lines make it explicitly clear who their target audience is when while staring straight into the camera he states , “Hello ladies, look at you man. Now back to me, now back at your man, now back to me. Sadly, he isn’t me.” The purpose of this series of commercials is rather obviously to sell Old Spice Body Wash by using Mustafa as rhetoric himself. Firstly, this is extremely persuading rhetoric for women buying for men given that Mustafa is an exceptionally handsome man and that all they need to do for their men to be just a little more like Mustafa (devilishly attractive) is to buy and use Old Spice Body Wash. But wait, of course there’s more. The commercial presents Mustafa not only as good-looking, but as if he is the perfect man. After the bathroom scene, the commercial advances to Mustafa on an expensive boat holding “two tickets to that thing you love” which then magically mutate into countless diamonds and as the camera zooms out we see that he is actually riding a horse on a tropical beach with an ocean sunset in the background. As if his looks and charming voice weren’t enough, he is shown to also be thoughtful through the “two tickets to that thing you love”, as well as genuinely romantic through the horseback ride during a picture-perfect tropical sunset. Aside from using Mustafa himself as rhetoric, the commercials also utilize comedy to appeal to males buying for themselves. If having the chance to become more like an ideal man isn’t enough, the outrageous and ridiculous perfection should without a doubt seal the deal. Through the rhetorical strategies of using Mustafa himself and outright humor, Old Spice successfully convinces its audience of both men and women that buying its body wash will be one of the best decisions they can make.

MP1 IRB Intro Post

For the first marking period I plan to read Outliers by multi-award winning journalist and nonfiction author Malcolm Gladwell. While Outliers is one of his more well known publications, the list of his most popular works also includes The Tipping Point and Blink. Throughout Outliers, as its title suggests, Gladwell explores what causes certain people rather than other to achieve exceptional levels of success. I decided to read this as my first independent reading book for a couple of reasons: one, because many of my friends and teachers have read it and recommend it highly; and two, because I’ve simply always been interested in looking at what other factors lead to success besides the cliché, although true, hard-work and determination. I’ve often thought to myself how it could be possibly for two people, even being born into nearly identical circumstances, to end up in completely different places. Especially family situations in which two brothers, for example, who both initially had very promising futures end up with completely opposite lives interest me greatly. With that being said, I think it’s clear that by reading Outliers I hope to gain a greater insight into the lesser known factors of success, and if possible, apply any of those to my own life to aid in hopefully becoming successful one day. Additionally, it will force me to go out of my fiction-based comfort-zone as I assume the APELC course in general will do as well.