THE PHILOSOPHY OF “FREE GUY” (Film, 2021)

Just watched the new “Free Guy” film I loved it. It’s like the Truman show meets the matrix meets ready player one, with Fortnite in Grandtheft Auto baked in.

I think what people don’t appreciate about the film is just how philosophical it is. Some thoughts:

1. The eternal return

The life of guy is like the same day, stuck on loop. Kind of like Groundhog Day notion or even the Tom Cruise movie, where are you die and repeat and wake up again to just restart.

Philosophically, this reminds me of Nietzsche’s notion of the ‘eternal return‘–

If you knew that you were doomed to live your entire life on loop, for ever … with all the upsides and downsides, would you think of this as the ultimate blessing or the ultimate curse?

2. The ultimate open world?

The thought:

Do we *really* want 100% true freedom? Freedom from the laws of physics, gravity and reality?

If so, is Virtual Reality or Oculus the way?

3. What do we really want?

More experience points? To level up? To get more ‘loot’? To get more rare items, to go on ‘missions’ or ‘quests’?

To build an epic loot stash? To challenge other players?

4. Are you one of the ‘sunglasses’ people?

Interesting analogy to the ‘Sneetches’ from Dr. Seuss. Are you one of the ‘sunglasses’ people– in which you are the hero, or are you an NPC (non playable character?)