As I was sitting there watching The Lone Ranger, I couldn’t help but feel as if it was designed in a laboratory to be the perfect device with which to troll conservatives. As it had nothing to do with the artistic merit of Gore Verbinski’s effort, I didn’t get into it in my review (coming tomorrow morning to a computer screen near you!). But I still found it obnoxiously humorous for a few reasons I’ll explain below (some spoilers after the jump).
First and foremost, this is classic western revisionism. The Indians are noble, peace-loving people who keep their word; the invading white man, meanwhile, is filled with greed and happy to slaughter any native who gets in his way. Americans frequently decry the Indians and say things like "I’m no savage," but as the carnage mounts and the innocent suffer, we’re left to ask: Who’s the real savage?
The Army, naturally, is a tool of oppression. As is business, which essentially employs the army to wipe out undesirable elements. It’s like, the military-industrial complex is evil, man.
The film's convoluted plot revolves around the connection of the transcontinental railroad and the stealing of silver from Indian lands. This endeavor represents the pillaging of the native lands and the deviousness of America. Agreements are torn asunder in the name of "progress," though progress means little more than "wealth accumulation for the corrupt one percent." The train that runs on the tracks (and is later used to carry unimaginable wealth out of Indian territory)? "Constitution."
Get it?
The icing on the cake, of course, is that they’re using a classic American hero (the Lone Ranger, who has been around in one form or another since 1933 or so) to do all this. And they’re releasing it on the Fourth of July weekend, naturally, as if to really drive the point home.
As I said, it’s almost as if the film is a $215 million experiment designed to get traditional conservative types riled up. And it's much more effective at doing so than on-the-nose efforts like The Purge, which essentially just came out and said "The Tea Party is evil and stupid!" I'm not even mad. I'm impressed. As someone who is well-versed in the art of trolling, I have to salute Verbinski and co's efforts on The Lone Ranger. Though I imagine the targets of the trolling will be less pleased.