Went to see the new Batman movie with my older boys tonight. I had mixed feelings after seeing it. Part of me liked it, but another part was depressed by it. I found myself realizing that I like story telling that lets me not think about how brutal and uncaring the world can be. There's enough death and craziness on the evening news - I think I like my movies and books to be more like what the A-Team was. Sure, lots of guns going off, and explosions and such... but rarely did anyone get hurt much less killed.
Maybe I'm getting old, maybe I've been a parent too long, I don't know. But more and more it seems that telling a "realistic" story that includes detailed violence is just wallowing and reveling in that violence. Can't we treat violence in art the same way we do the fact that everybody poops? You don't see the lead characters making potty stops during the story.
I don't think that as long as we use media (tv, movies, games, music) to convey violence that we'll ever be able to grow out if it in the "real" world.
As for me, it's off to the padded (and sheltered) walls of whatever institution Murdock's in this week....