From a place where it can no longer be a joke—Reality invading at the speed of fiction, and pop culture running in circles

At the beginning of 2026, as I followed the news, there were more and more moments where I didn't know if I should be laughing.

It is not that fiction has overtaken reality. It is that reality has begun to intrude into the context of fiction.

What kind of American are you?

It is the beginning of 2026, and my head is aching. I felt I had to write something down.

The United States has begun an invasion of Venezuela, is simultaneously withdrawing from 66 international organizations, and domestically, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, a shooting of civilians by ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) has occurred.

Triggered by these events, I rewatched director Alex Garland's film 'Civil War.' But what I felt was not the kind of pop surprise that 'fiction predicted reality!'

Rather, it is the feeling that reality has quietly but surely begun to intrude into the context of fiction—I have been alive for 45 years, but honestly, I cannot find the right words to describe that feeling.

As a reflection at the time of the film's release, the author wrote,
'It depicts both the danger and the hope in the young protagonist journalist,'
.

While she carries the danger of being caught up in attention and echo chambers, on the other hand, she loves analog film cameras, goes through the complex development process, and has the temporal and economic leeway to cool down regarding the events captured in her photos.
Perhaps this perspective has gained even stronger contrast now.

This film, which depicts an America under civil war, offers neither sensational explanations nor an easy-to-understand composition of good and evil. It simply lines up the landscapes after order has collapsed in an eerily flat tone.

At the time of its release, I have the impression that there were quite a few reactions like, 'It's interesting, but the details of the civil war are weak,' or 'It's just too absurd.'
However, the sense of distance this film possesses suddenly feels realistic now.

But it is not 'scary because it is accurate.'

It is closer to a sense of crisis that we can no longer consume it as fiction from a safe distance.

And this atmosphere is beginning to cover American pop culture as a whole.
For example, Jimmy Kimmel's series of monologues about Trump after the incident also feel like they are spinning their wheels somewhere.

What must not be misunderstood here is that Kimmel is not unconsciously consuming laughter.
He clearly possesses sharp critical faculties, chooses his words carefully, and is struggling with reality using the form of humor. He is also a legitimate successor to the tradition that American stand-up comedy has inherently possessed: relativizing power through laughter.

Even so, it feels like it is spinning its wheels.
Why?

The problem is not whether the jokes are in poor taste (that is a risk that has always been accepted in this cultural sphere).
It is that events such as military actions by the state, the dismantling of international order, and violence against citizens are still being immediately converted into monologues at the 'usual distance,' and are being consumed while bypassing their true meaning.

This is likely less a problem of Kimmel personally, and more a sign that the very preconditions under which laughter and criticism have been established are quietly expiring.
Are we really at a stage where we can still laugh at this distance?
The question is not directed at his monologue itself, but is being thrown back at the footing of the audience.

The defeat of the Democratic Party in the United States and the collapse of liberal democracy include as a factor the dysfunction of the cynical attitude (as it appears) of celebrities and pop stars like him.
It is not because justice has run wild.
Rather, it is because a 'time of suspension' has arrived where, even after exhausting all words, reality still precedes them in its speed and weight.time of suspension

Now that even fiction can no longer maintain a safe distance, pop culture is losing its place in the face of reality.

Pop stars who lack words, like Taylor Swift, are not the problem.
The problem is the state of pop culture itself—the way it remains suspended, spinning its wheels even when it has words, critiques, and attempts to fight back.That is exactly what the atmosphere of 2026 feels like.

And that is precisely why we need to re-examine the danger and hope embodied by the protagonist of 'Civil War' now.

The memetic 'What kind of American are you?' no longer functions.

Born to Be Wild—Post-war Democracy and Pop Culture

I believe the direct catalyst for the development of modern 'pop culture' into its current form lies in the aftermath of World War II.

The birth of rock and roll, the industrial expansion of cinema which began at the end of the 19th century, and the spread of television and mass media. These expanded in step with the development of Western democratic nations and the dominance of liberal democracy.

There was an implicit premise there. At the very least, a sense that 'the great war is over,' and an arrow of time and thought pointing toward 'moving toward a better society next.' Pop culture, while incorporating criticism, rebellion, and counterculture on that premise, was fundamentally a form open to the future.

This is why the counterculture of the 60s and 70s is often cited in the critic's narrative that 'pop culture moved the times.'
Even in the face of the real violence of the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement, they still had room to dream of 'a different kind of society.'
Pop culture functioned as a circuit for sharing those dreams.

On the other hand, the atmosphere of cultural criticism in Europe before the last great war was on completely different soil.

The Frankfurt School criticized mass culture (not pop culture) as a 'culture industry' in some respects, pointing out the dangers of art being reproduced and commodified. Hannah Arendt also analyzed how totalitarianism arises from within everyday life, depicting the horror of the suspension of thought.

They were sharp. However, despite that sharpness, they could not stop the rise of fascism (of course, that was not their position). Words to criticize culture existed, but they never caught up to the speed of real-world violence.

What is important is that the world they lived in did not yet have the premise of recovery—the 'post-war' after '45 (though they certainly had the perspective from after World War I). Pre-war cultural criticism is written on the premise of the fact that order has collapsed, not on optimism for the future. In the midst of a crumbling order, criticism and mass culture were always forced to play catch-up.
On the other hand, post-war pop culture was a culture established within an order reconstructed after that catastrophe. This difference in soil is decisive.

Pop Culture Facing the 'Pre-war'

We are currently losing the 'correctability' of the 60s and 70s, while at the same time, we are not yet standing in a position to witness the defeat of humanity like the pre-war thinkers.
We are left standing in a suspended place where neither the premises of post-war culture nor the resolve of pre-war criticism hold true.

Under these conditions, it is no coincidence that modern pop culture chooses cynicism, irony, and escapist existentialism. It is a technique chosen by process of elimination to postpone involvement, rather than a form of resistance as it once was.
(Media researcher Moe Yamauchi mentioned in a YouTube stream with viewers that the lyrical world of Mrs. GREEN APPLE and Yosui Inoue's 'Kasa ga Nai' might have a similar structure, and I felt it was a discussion that connects to this article in an existentialist context.)

In pop culture, politics is often reduced to the problem of 'conspiracy theories' by viewing the right wing as the 'ignorant masses,' and is vaguely handled with well-made words while turning a blind eye to the structural changes in ideology.

Not speaking, laughing, and keeping one's distance are themselves already a political choice. What is protected by choosing these is not order, but merely the prolongation of culture itself.
But that is a choice one cannot resist unless one has a great deal of resolve, including oneself.

So, what attitude should pop culture take in this era?

What is needed is not the presentation of hope or the declaration of righteousness.
Rather, in the face of a present where there is no guarantee that dreams and order will be updated, is there any choice but to continue to ask, speak, sing, and draw without cynicism?

For a long time, pop culture has played the role of
chewing up complex reality and translating it into shareable emotions.
However, today, reality itself has taken on the speed and absurdity of fiction.
Trying to force meaning here is what is truly meaningless.

The way we view "House of Dynamite," released in 2025, has likely changed significantly now. At the time of its release, many felt a sense of dissatisfaction with its ending, but I left the following impressions myself.

Now, or rather as of 2026, the attitude of presenting things while they remain unstable, withholding conclusions, and returning the inability to understand back to the audience—a form that accepts "not knowing"—has become one way to keep up with reality, and Bigelow's choice in this film is more suggestive now than it was at the time of its release last year.

What Alex Garland shows in "Civil War" is not an answer, but a stance.

The film begins with various noises playing randomly from the top, bottom, left, and right of the speakers.

It does not reassure the audience, it does not guide them; it simply places them at a point where a safe distance has been lost. Not above or below, not to the right or to the left.

Refusing catharsis and not resolving anxiety can sometimes become a new ethic.

If pop culture is to have meaning again, it will not be through performative attitudes or behaviors that pretend to restore the world.

Barely showing that a subject still exists to tell the story even after order has collapsed is the only way. Hope may lie beyond that, or it may not.

To continue holding onto both precariousness and hope. That is, at the very least, more sincere than cynicism.

Author: Takeo Nagamori