The Worst Thing To Be In An Action Movie Is A Small Business
Action movies are not good to small business owners, and I can’t think of a less deserving target of wanton destruction than a mom-and-pop shop caught in the middle of a gun fight. Imagine opening a bar that you sank your entire nest egg into, only for Steven Seagal to sit down at a table, get approached by a bunch of guys wearing sunglasses and leather jackets, and immediately start a fight that will make your insurance premiums skyrocket. Chairs get thrown through windows, light fixtures get ripped from the ceiling, and that old-time jukebox that you paid $18,000 to get restored (which you just started financing) gets annihilated when somebody gets drop-kicked through the front of it.
Small Business Owners Get A Raw Deal
Small business owners are the recipients of a disproportionate amount of abuse in action movies, and there’s so much to unpack here because in this economy, shouldn’t we be staging these fights in bank lobbies instead? It’s easy to root for the Joker in The Dark Knight because what’s the harm in orchestrating an elaborate bank heist when all of the stolen assets are FDIC insured? But we still root for Sheriff Mark Kaminski (Arnold Schwarzenegger) in Raw Deal when he wrecks an entire store in a shopping mall when he’s ambushed by a bunch of thugs.
Lots Of People Are Impacted
I know you’re thinking, “that shopping brawl set in a shopping mall isn’t hurting the little guy,” but you need to realize that somebody took out a loan to open that place, and they probably put their house up as collateral to be able to get that loan. Action movies never address how much collateral damage occurs when the hero tries to take out the bad guy. If the shop is insured, there’s a deductible that needs to be satisfied, and there’s staff that will need to have their employment temporarily suspended while renovations take place.
What Happens To These People?
In other words, not only do small businesses in action movies have to close after their entire store gets wiped out, the employees working for these businesses now have to figure out how they’re going to make a living for the time being. Those employees have student loans, car loans, medical bills, rent or mortgage payments, and families to feed. I need closure here, because I want to know what happens to these people after their entire livelihood gets blown up for the sake of storytelling.
Let’s Change The Focus
Here’s what needs to happen: there needs to be a series of action movies that follow the lives of small business owners. I want to know what happens to the guy who sells hotdogs on a New York City street corner so he can put his kids through college. Does he turn to a life of crime so he can recuperate his losses after a police car drives through his place of work?
Give this guy a villain origin story!
Small Business Owner Revenge!
I want to see a series of action movies that addresses small business abuse and the potential fallout. Let’s round up every single small business owner who has had their life destroyed by an action hero, have them form a union, and let them exact revenge on the people who put them in such a difficult position. This kind of plot has the potential to be the next action-packed revenge saga that we’ve been waiting for.
