End Game Analysis

What an experience Endgame was.  After over twenty movies, the sequel to Infinity War has finally wrapped up everything in the Marvel Cinematic Universe- or at least wrapped up this part of it.  The MCU will probably continue until we're wiped out by self-aware sex robots, but this phase brings to a close both the overarching threat of Thanos/the Infinity Stones and the character arcs of many of the founding Avengers.  That's a tall order, but it does so with a level of spectacle and entertainment that deserves respect.

And yet, I have no idea how I feel about the movie as a whole.

I supposed I should say that I felt entertained throughout most of it, and on occasion even felt some emotion.  Endgame is well-made in a lot of ways.  Yet, at the same time, the film covers so many different characters and tries to close so many arcs that the whole thing isn't exactly a coherent, unified vision where everything works.  The best made ensemble movies, such as Seven Samurai, manage to give each character adequate attention while also connecting everything to the main plot and theme(s) of the movie.  Endgame, with half a dozen times as many characters as those movies, doesn't have that luxury.

Because of that, it felt like there were too many moving pieces for me to call this entire movie great or bad or decent or disappointing or whatever else.  I don't know how to think of it as a whole.  So, instead of trying to force some grand analysis of Endgame, I will instead go into what did and didn't work for me.  There's plenty of each.

Of course, THIS MEANS THERE WILL BE SPOILERS.  Enjoy!

WHAT I LIKED

Scott Lang Waking Up

Maybe the real Paul Rudd has a quantum universe he hides in to prevent aging?

I felt mixed about the beginning of the 'five years later' part of Endgame.  You hear in passing that the loss of so many people ruined society, but you don't see it.  There's a sense of mourning in the air, but the consequences of the loss itself is not fully dramatized on screen.  The one scene we get is Captain America leading one support group meeting, and it's a good scene, but we never get a sense of how long Evans has been doing this or how it came about, or even if part of why he's leading the support group is because so many therapists and counselors got snapped away.  After this scene, the support group is never brought up again.

This is an odd way to bring up a sequence I like, but I mention my issue with the beginning because Scott Lang returning to the normal world does a great job of addressing the loss that I think the rest of the beginning of the movie could've done better.  Naturally, the sudden absence of 50% of life everywhere means that society would face a massive crisis- when doctors, farmers, teachers, firefighters, trade workers, social workers, sanitation workers, etc disappear, that's not something you recover from quickly.  The remaining 50% of people would face a collapse brought about by the sudden absence of so many people who do their part to help keep society running.

That's why I like this sequence.  Lang running through that abandoned San Francisco neighborhood, in which we only see a teenager on a bike left, shows a serious consequence of what such a mass loss of life would actually do to a city.  Then, when he eventually finds a memorial for some of the disintegrated, we see these monuments have countless mourners somberly remembering their loved ones.  It's been five years, but the gap left by the deceased is still there.  Lang desperately looks for his daughter's name, hoping with all his heart she isn't on the list, and because of Rudd's sincerity, I'm hoping she's still alive just as fiercely as he is.

Then we have the reunion.  What's so well-done is that the scene takes its time.  Scott and his daughter recognize each other, but it still takes her a moment to truly accept that's her dad standing at the door.  Meanwhile, you can see in Lang's eyes an indescribable joy at seeing his daughter, but also a shadow of melancholy for having missed an entire five years of her life.

This plot thread is great because it does exactly what this part of the movie should do.  It really looks at the weight of the destruction caused by the Thanos snap, and it does so without the sometimes irritating MCU need to almost always undercut a dramatic moment with jokes.

Revisiting Classic Moments

Actual photographed meeting of Disney executives for this portion of the movie.

The elevator scene from Winter Soldier.  The beginning of the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie.  The classic "Avengers assemble" moment from the first team movie.  The MCU is full of some truly iconic moments that will stay in the popular imagination for a long time.  In revisiting these scenes, the Russo Brothers made a move best described as... not "bold" per se, because milking nostalgia for all its worth is hardly a daring formula, but  ambitious.  The movie going back through these moments could have come off as cringy, but they did a good job of adding something interesting enough to most of these scenes that they didn't feel to me like fan service only for the sake of fan service.

Let's look at the elevator scene for example, perhaps the most celebrated moment from Winter Soldier.  Captain America and his all-American ass get onto the same elevator with the same people he fought before.  It's tense.  I honestly expected a remix of the first fight scene, which would've been a pretty transparently empty attempt to repeat that beloved moment just for the sake of repeating it.  Then Steve "America's Ass" Rogers whispers "heil HYDRA", which not only subverts the expectations of the scene, but shows how much he has changed.  The old, more innocent Captain Dummy-Thicc would've never thought to use such a tactic.

All of these revisited moments bring something similar to the table.  Professor Hulk trying to blend into the battle of New York by "smashing" things nearby fails hilariously, as Banner has now found an inner peace that makes him feels no need to lash out with destruction.  After years of treating the Hulk like a curse, he finally found a way to embrace his gift, which was really a part of himself the whole time.  These scenes are still shameless fan-service, but they're shameless fan service that are justified with interesting twists that allow us to see how far the characters have come in clever, entertaining ways.

Two of my favorite moments from the time travel to the past, however, had nothing to do with revisiting classic scenes.

Parental Reunions

I'm just glad they found a way to make The Dark World relevant.

A lot of online movie buffs have talked about how a recurring theme in the MCU is daddy issues.  Thor, Black Panther, and Star Lord all have them.  Perhaps none have been covered more throughout the MCU than Iron Man's, however.  In the early movies, Iron Man recalls how distant and uncaring his father seemed.  Yet there had always been some ambiguity, as well.  Toward the end of Iron Man 2, Stark discovers his father's secret plans for the future, revealing his dad had a lot of hope for his son despite their issues.  In Civil War he recalls the last time he saw his parents before they left, then turns on Captain America and Bucky when he finds out the latter killed them.

Things change after that for Tony, however.  He becomes a surrogate father to Peter Parker in the first MCU Spiderman movie, then a biological father in this movie.  In the former he jokes that he's become like his father; in the latter, it's confirmed.  He values his daughter more than anything and wants to be there for her, yet duty calls.  Just like his father, he cannot put the good of the world aside for his own happiness.  So, when this scene finally comes, Stark talks to his dad with a profound understanding of the greater good vs personal happiness question that is at the heart of every good superhero movie.  It's a wonderful moment that brings Stark's relationship with both his father and himself full-circle.

My other favorite parental moment is, of course, Thor's reunion with his mother.  Thor has had quite the character journey throughout the MCU movies.  Even after the events of the first Thor movie got him to think about more than himself and his lust for battle, he always had a confident bravado to him.  It makes sense- he is the strongest Avenger next to Hulk and Captain Marvel, and never experienced a hard personal failure the way other heroes in the MCU had.  He loses his parents in Dark World and Ragnorak, but both are outside of his control; his mom dies when he isn't around while his dad basically dies of old age.  But in Infinity War he is powerless to stop the loss of half of his people, including his brother Loki and friend Heimdall.  Then, after immense pain brought about by all he has lost, he finally gains Stormbreaker and defeats Thanos.

Yet, due to Thor's need to gloat in the moment of victory, Thanos still manages to snap his fingers.

That would mess anyone up.  There's a reason Thor is the most sullen Avenger at the very start of the film, and why the beheading of Thanos brings him no joy.  There's a reason why he's retreated from the world after the weight of his failure and grief come crashing down on him after revenge brings him nothing.  He is completely lost.  His mother recognizes that, and gives him the support and guidance only a loving parent can.  It helps snap Thor out of his funk, restoring his warrior spirit and allowing him to fight Thanos in the biggest rematch since Conor McGregor vs Nate Diaz 2.

Captain America Wielding Thor's Hammer

FUCK. YES.

I don't have anything thoughtful to say, this moment was just fucking awesome.

The End of Tony Stark and Steve Rogers

Feeling cute rn, might give a satisfying end to the journey of MCU's two biggest characters idk~

I remember at the end of Infinity War how surprised I was at the fact they actually had Thanos win.  When Bucky evaporated, my jaw actually dropped.  The grim, somber silence was the perfect choice for letting the scene unfold.  A couple supporting characters popped and I felt a deep sense of surprise, despair, and grief for all those we were losing.  Then Black Panther disappeared, and I thought to myself "aren't there already rumors of a second Black Panther movie in the works?  Hmm, maybe his sister will take over!"  Then more and more prominent characters disappeared, and I realized that this is a fucking comic book series that could never let something like this stand.

I was conflicted.  I loved Infinity War, and thought the ending was a bold choice even with the certainty everyone would come back.  But the MCU in general has a problem with real consequences.  Heroes almost always get their cake and eat it too, with ideas of "sacrifice" often being given lip service without actually happening in the plot.  Even when there are the occasional consequences, such as the loss of Quicksilver in Age of Ultron, the losses never come up again (I actually forgot he existed until Googling images for this article).  I worried this movie would find a fun, light-hearted way to undo the snap that would only change things on the surface.

I think in some ways that did happen, but it certainly didn't with the conclusion of Iron Man and Captain America's arcs.  Perhaps the two most important MCU characters up to this point, each could be argued to be the foundation of the MCU Avengers team.  Iron Man was the first superhero of the modern day in the MCU and was the first to help SHIELD with the Avengers Initiative, while Captain America was chronologically the first superhero and had a strong moral core that inspired others long after he became frozen in the ice.  Despite their butting of heads, their leadership and heroism formed the basis of the MCU Avengers as we know them.

That's why I loved seeing them each get a great send off.  I was devastated Tony died.  But, in a movie series where examples of bad fathers come up so often, culminating in big-bad Thanos adopting Gamora & Nebula and naming his followers Children of Thanos, it made sense that Tony, both the father of the Avengers team and a literal father, would counter Thanos's example of fatherhood with his own empathetic, self-sacrificing version.

"We don't trade lives" is the perfect quote to sum up the Avengers philosophy, and it's no coincidence that Captain America is the one to say it in the previous movie.  As already stated, he is the moral core of the team.  Like Stark, Rogers has done nothing but give and give, at immense cost to himself.  Perhaps no Avenger had consciously chosen to give up more to do what's right before the end of this movie.  With Thanos out of the way and no detectable threat left to the universe, it was wonderful to see Rogers get the life he so richly deserved.  It was also nice to see him pass off the shield to Sam Wilson.

Thanks for the great memories, fellas.

WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE

Comically Depressed Thor

"Thanos is evil? That's just, like, your opinion, man."

I dealt with a lot growing up.  Fortunately, my coping mechanism didn't involve me repeating past family demons like substance abuse, but I did become both a people-pleaser and a class clown.  The thing that people don't get about class clowns is that we often feel like we have to keep entertaining people, because if we are sincerely ourselves no one will like us.  For me, that meant until about my early to mid-twenties I couldn't be vulnerable, and if I started to become sincere, I had to find moments to undercut that sincerity with humor.

Now, I think humor in moderation can be incredibly helpful as a coping mechanism.  Realizing over the past few years how much I used humor to sometimes cope in unhealthy ways doesn't mean I've avoided comedy/jokes by any means.  Everyone needs to laugh and be silly sometimes, and humor during times of crisis can be a life-saver.  At the same time, however, we shouldn't use it as a shield to avoid vulnerability or reckoning with our traumas.

All of this is to say that I felt post-time skip Thor's pain was used far more as a joke than it should've been.  To be clear, I'm not saying Thor's scenes should've only been serious, melancholy explorations of all the grief and guilt he carried with him.  This is a comic book movie meant for entertainment.  At the same time, though, it seemed like almost every line and every action from Thor up until he sees his mom was meant to evoke laughs.  On top of that, during the few moments where we got a glimpse of what was underneath, there would be an immediate goofy follow up right after that made sure the vulnerability wouldn't stay.

I felt intensely embarrassed for Thor throughout the movie.  Not because there's anything embarrassing about being fat or depressed, but because the film treats this stuff as a punchline.  I would've loved to have seen a more earnest exploration of his pain that didn't feel the need to constantly undercut any emotional depth with constant jokes, as if the filmmakers were trying to say "hey, we don't wanna be unhappy for even one full minute, here are some jokes to avoid emotional discomfort of any kind!"

I know I've said this twice already, but I really wanna emphasize that I'm not looking for Thor to be dark and brooding in this movie.  This isn't Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy.  But other superhero movies like Spiderman 2, X-Men First Class, and Wonder Woman show you can be sincere while still having a good time.  It would've been nice to see more of that for Thor in this movie.

Edgy Hawkeye

"I've changed, Natasha.  You can tell by my new haircut and the fact I use a sword now."

I thought the beginning scene of the movie was great, and I've never even found Hawkeye that interesting of a character.  It shows how devastating the snap was for him, and lets you imagine how many other people probably had their entire families except themselves snuffed out by the impartial roulette of who did and didn't die.  You can only imagine how much grief that causes him.  It makes sense that after such a traumatic event he might spiral downward in an ugly direction.

Later we hear from Black Widow that Hawkeye is killing people.  The Avengers don't wanna confront him, but it seems his killing isn't slowing down, and at some point they'll have to do something to stop him.  It makes for a good conflict.  His motivations are clearly understood- they're not justified (losing your entire family doesn't make most people mass muderers, even if the people you're killing are bad), but it makes sense.  They could've fleshed out his journey from grief-stricken to killer more, but in such a crowded movie, it makes sense to not prioritize it.

Then hope for getting everyone back is found, and Black Widow shows up to the scene of another Hawkeye killing spree and... sorta lightly chides him but otherwise just tells him about their plan.  It doesn't come up again in any significant way whatsoever until Black Widow and Hawkeye are battling for who gets to die on Vormir, with Hawkeye saying "I've done bad things!!1!11!!"  Which is true, but in the past Hawkeye and Black Widow have bonded over their dark, morally ambiguous past before.  You could remove everything about edgy-murder Hawkeye from the movie and the Vormir scene could've played out exactly the same.

This sequence should've either been more fleshed out or removed entirely.  In such a crowded movie, it may have been better to do the former, and just let the Avengers find him sad and forelorn like they do almost everyone else at the start of the movie.

But, going back to Vormir...

Death of Black Widow

 *insert that one GIF of that one guy saying "haha, this sucks man" here*

So, how about the fact that the place where the first female Guardian of the Galaxy died also became the place where the first female Avenger died?

I know the automatic response to this is "she wanted to atone for her past of violence and death!"  And, yeah, this is certainly one way for her to achieve that.  However, one thing you learn in a creative writing class is that killing a character to "redeem" them is the easy shortcut countless beginning writers will take.  There are many alternatives.  You only need to watch almost any anime ever made to see a villain's life get spared so that s/he may repent for what they've done and maybe even become a member of the team.

As a matter of fact, this is the approach Black Widow has taken at the beginning of the movie.  She's directing the team from the Avengers headquarters, making sure that even in the face of such grief and loss (not to mention disaster brought about by so many disappearances) that the Avengers continue doing what they can to help the world.  Seeing a woman who has helped save the world on the frontlines now transition to doing the same thing in a position of leadership was pretty cool.

It's a shame they have to do that, especially when Hawkeye, could've also sacrificed himself to protect the universe, further reinforcing the theme of fathers sacrificing themselves to create a better world for both their families and everyone else as a whole.  It could've helped make the movie feel slightly more cohesive by hinting at what Stark would do later.

But, this could've been more forgivable if the other prominent woman of Endgame were give more to work with...

Captain Marvel's Absence

"I'm here to kick ass and take names... in other parts of the galaxy, off-screen, unrelated to this movie."

I'd write a lot about Carol Danvers' role in Endgame, except there isn't much to write about.  In a movie where only two female Avengers are given a prominent role, it's a pretty bad look for one to die and another to disappear.  To be fair, if you count Nebula she had a decent role in the movie as she learns to further embrace her change to the good side, but that's just not enough in a movie where so many male characters get so much attention.

Valkyrie Becoming Queen

How is Tessa Thompson not in literally everything

Man, I love Valkyrie (and also Tessa Thompson in general).  She was my favorite part of Ragnorak next to Thor himself, not only for her badassery and drunken charm but because of the surprisingly substantive arc she had throughout the movie.  She goes from someone struggling with alcoholism to someone who faces her demons in order to help defend her forsaken people.  Seeing her become queen at the end of Endgame should've been an awesome moment.

And yet... it wasn't.

The problem is that this isn't something that has been built toward at all.  Her character arc in Ragnorak is her learning to face her fears and care again; it's good, but has nothing to do with leadership abilities.  She is then entirely absent from Infinity War (we aren't even told in the movie that she and half of the Asgardians survive).  Then, in Endgame, she first shows up to tell the Avengers that Thor is now depressed, then doesn't reappear until the giant battle scene toward the end.

I love the idea of Valkyrie being queen of Asgard (or the idea of Tessa Thompson being queen of Earth in real life), but this moment feels so hollow because in no way does any movie in the entire MCU canon build or even hint toward it at all.  Hell, even if Valkyrie had been shown in both Ragnorak and Endgame on the battlefield issuing orders and giving a quick inspiring speech at some point, we'd at least have something to go off of.  Or if during Infinity War there were a quick scene of her being the one to inspire the survivors who escaped Thanos after the scene of the movie.  Or even make it so that she is the one who convinces Thor to rejoin the Avengers in this movie.

But, no, we're given none of that.  We have nothing building toward this moment at all.  Thor could've given the crown to Krog and nothing about it would've changed.  I'm still excited to see Valkyrie be queen of Asgard, but the lack of set up leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

Closing Thoughts

We've seen the last of at least two of the big three as superheros.

Whatever the shortcomings of this movie, it was an entertaining ride with a satisfying blend of charming character moments, big spectacle, and even some occasional strong emotional moments.  It's wild to think about what has happened in eleven years. I mostly only knew of Iron Man from all the references the rapper Ghostface Killah made to him, and I remember everyone (myself included) being skeptical that the first Avengers movie would work out or that the MCU would last much further past it.

The MCU has changed the cinematic landscape.  Movie snobs used to complain when movies got turned into a trilogy; now movies have interconnected cinematic universes.  Now movie series can go on indefinitely, as we've seen with franchises like the Fast & Furious movies and even DC's movies.  It'll be interesting to see what Hollywood can do with this new approach in the long run.  Perhaps directors who grew up on the MCU will be able to take all the strength of Marvel's movies and infuse them with their own strengths that'll make this current MCU chapter look rookie by comparison.

Regardless of how I felt about Endgame, these eleven years have given me some great memories.  For all the MCU's faults, they've created some damn good movies and even all-time great superhero movie moments ("briiing meee Thaaanooos!" is one of my all-time favorite moments of superhero spectacle, and the MCU is also filled with many intimate character moments that I love).  Here's hoping the future of the MCU brings just as many treasures.

Thanks for reading!

Why the Suburbs are Terrible

Ah, the suburbs.  A place away from the hustle and bustle of the city, where families can live peacefully and raise their children behind the safety of a white picket fence.  It's the American Dream.  Sure, in the 1990s it was trendy to complain about how monotonous and boring the suburbs are, but a little restlessness is a small price to pay for stability.  Beyond angsty 90s counter-culture, surely the suburbs are great, right?

Well, you saw the title of this post.

The problem with the suburbs is multilayered.  Their rise is the reason when we say "inner city" we think of hoods and barrios, for example, and they have in general exacerbated a lot of problems related to class and race beyond just where people live.  On top of that, the suburbs aren't even that great for the people fortunate enough to live there.  Feelings of being disconnected and lonely are common among many young people today, but those who live in the suburbs have it the worst.  So, what gives?

In this post I'll briefly summarize the historical roots of US suburbia, summarize how suburbia expanded after World War 2, mention what initially drew Americans to suburbia beyond just the promises of prosperity, and then finally explain various problems that emerged as a result.  I will be drawing from books I read during graduate school for many of these sections, so there will be less links than usual to support my points, but at the end I will include a section on sources for anyone interested.

HISTORICAL ROOTS 

"Way back/when America had the red and black lumber jack/with the hat to match."

One thing we take for granted today is that we have anything resembling a common culture.  That was not the case when this country was founded.  Sure, there were some common values, technology, and mythology about the founding of the country, but there was no mass culture or strong government process that connected people the way we have now.  Historian Robert Wiebe coined the term "island communities" to describe how US towns and cities functioned largely by themselves.  While I don't fully agree with the term (trade, travel, and the occasional popular book or song created some common cultural elements, along with the things I mentioned above), the basic idea behind it is correct.

Things began to change with the dawn of the 1900s, however, when industrialization led to the growth of cities, both in the sense that new cities formed and previously existing cities experienced a huge population explosion.  Along with this urban growth came a new "professional" class of people such as teachers, lawyers, doctors, engineers, accountants, and other specialists who filled various needs within the city (today much of these people make up what we call the middle class).  At the same time, governmental bureaucracies grew in order to meet the demands placed on the state by the expanded cities, and big businesses grew bigger than ever.

The growth of these various groups created the foundations of our current society.  The professional/middle class was the foundation of the Progressive Movement, which lasted roughly from 1900 to World War 1 and demanded things from the government like social services, regulations on businesses, and even giving women the right to vote.  They also, according to historian Michael McGerr, tried to mold the rest of US society to fit their values of moderation, formal organization, professional education, deference to expertise, and centralized bureaucracy.

McGerr also points out they generally weren't associated with the laborers in factories, whom many of them looked down upon as uncivilized.  Though there were exceptions, Progressives believed their professional values were superior to both the greed of the rich and the barbarism of the working class.  They also were generally fine with segregation, too.  Those in the government went along with the Progressives for three reasons: (1) the Progressives were good at mobilizing both popular support and resources for their causes, (2)the bureaucrats saw themselves as part of the professional/middle class, and (3)those bureaucrats recognized increasing the role of the state in things like regulating industry would result in the increase of its overall scope and influence.

This was the beginning of the state as a presence in the daily life of people who didn't directly work for the government or military.  And, speaking of the military, the mobilization for World War 1 helped further entrench the government's ability to organize and expand its authority far beyond what it had been even during the Progressive Movement.  Everything from recruitment drives to manufacturing arms to creating a bureaucratic infrastructure big enough to organize its troops grew the size of the state exponentially.

"Come give your life for literally the most pointless war in modern history!"

In addition to the growth of the public sector, the private sector grew as well.  Of the countless ways this influenced the modern United States, the most immediately relevant here is the growth of consumer culture during the 1920s.  This was helped not only by industrialization creating more consumer products, but also innovations in communications technology like the radio.  Mixed with billboards, newspaper advertisements, and other such avenues of advertising, the United States had more of a common culture than ever before, and it was largely based on buying stuff.

During this time there was also the creation of a limited amount of suburbs in Boston and New York City, the first of their kind.  The previously mentioned information is arguably more important than these early suburbs, however, because it helped set the stage for the expansion of the suburbs after World War 2.  The increased power of the state is why the US would later subsidize the creation of the suburbs; the creation of a mass consumer culture is the means through which the suburbs were marketed to people; finally, the people who bought homes in the suburbs were often (white) members of the professional class.

The explosion of consumer culture and the professional/middle class during the 1920s was slowed down by the Great Depression in 1929.  Herbert Hoover, the president at the time, was an ardent believer in free markets, and did little to stop it.  It was here when Franklin Delano Roosevelt won the 1932 election on his platform of using the government to help people.  His New Deal policies drastically expanded the role of the state, even going beyond the scope the Progressive Era had established.

POST-WORLD WAR 2 SUBURB EXPLOSION

"Surely our victory will mean Nazis will be gone forever!"

Along with the economic boom brought along by WW2, FDR's policies helped bring the US out of the Great Depression.  His policies were so popular that he won reelection in 1936, 1940, and 1944, and helped revitalize the Democratic Party.  In the fifty years before FDR, the Democratic Party only held the presidency twice.  It wasn't doing too hot in Congress, either.

FDR turned that around based on a platform of using the state to help organized labor, provide expanded public services like Social Security, and build an unprecedented amount of infrastructure.  It should be noted, though, that a lot of these policies came about because of both popular pressure from grassroots activists and the more left elements of his cabinet, particularly his secretary of labor, Frances Perkins.  Many scholars now see the New Deal as a compromise that helped prevent socialist revolution.

During World War 2 the United States experienced unprecedented growth because of the production demands placed on the wartime economy, as well as the fact that Europe had been weakened by WW1 and further weakened during WW2, which created openings in the international economy for trade that the US happily stepped into.  Women in particular benefited from this wartime economy, even Mexican American women, as they were allowed to work in factories out of necessity while the men went off to fight (though they were, shamefully, essentially forced out of their jobs when WW2 ended).

When the fighting ended in 1945, the US came out stronger than ever.  Because Europe was in shambles, it and the Soviet Union were now the world's economic superpowers who created their own spheres of influence through trade and diplomacy.  They also mutually feared one another.  The US also feared a number of domestic issues, too, especially another catastrophic depression.  The consumer economy of the 1920s, after all, hadn't been enough to stop the collapse of 1929.  How could the US know it was safe from another such catastrophe in the near future?

Those fears, along with pressure from organized labor and the legacy of FDR's economic policies (the man himself died in April 1945, about half a year before the end of WW2), came together to create what is often referred to as the US Economic Golden Age.  The war time economy boosted the strength of both the private and public sectors of the US.  Unlike after WW1, however, the new set of policies put in place made sure the wealth brought in was more equally distributed and the private sector had more oversight.  There was still poverty (especially if you weren't white), but things were much better than before, even for people of color.

Here we can see Fat Joe and Lil Wayne demonstrating the effect WW2 had on the US economy.

The US was now at a crossroad: what would it look like after WW2?  It not only had to worry about preventing another depression and trying to create growth, but also had to make sure it looked like a more attractive option than the Soviet Union.  Socialists and communists had always existed in the US, but ever since the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, they had a model to turn to in the Soviet Union (though there was plenty of debate among leftists if the Soviets were a good model, especially after Stalin came to power).  The US wanted to prove itself a more attractive option for people outside of the elite in order to make sure it didn't face a Bolshevik Revolution of its own.

One of the main answers was the suburbs.  The GI Bill, a bill which still provides benefits for people in the military to this day, was signed in 1944 by FDR about a year before his death.  Among the many benefits returning veterans enjoyed, perhaps none were as important as those related to housing.  Veterans received low interest home loans, only had to make small down payments, and received many tax credits that helped them afford homes in the suburbs, which were created in large part thanks to government investment in both the houses themselves and the infrastructure around them (think of that next time someone from the suburbs talks about the evils of big government).

The result was an influx of many (white) people into the suburbs.  The GI Bill helped make sure many had the opportunity to get the house, while others afforded it thanks to their salaries as members of the professional/middle class; the booming post-war economy helped make sure both groups could afford to keep their houses.  This was a huge contrast to how Americans lived before, and not just in terms of the increased amount of consumer goods available.  Previously people lived in the city in apartments or small houses, in much more tightly-packed neighborhoods than those of the suburbs.

Now they had a ton of space and a ton of stuff.  The American Dream had been realized.

THE ANXIOUS PROMISE OF SUBURBIA

"Gee willickers dad, I sure hope you aren't secretly a miserable booze hound!"

As mentioned above, another depression and the Soviet Union loomed large as fears in the minds of many Americans.  For the former worry, a big part of why Americans embraced the suburbs wasn't just because of a desire for affluence, but also as part of a call from both the public and private sector to spend enough to prevent another depression.  It wasn't just self-interest to buy a house, car, and variety of home appliances.  It was your patriotic duty!

That went double for Cold War anxieties.  The suburban consumer was not only doing their part to prevent another economic collapse, but was also doing their best to show the superiority of US capitalist democracy to Soviet communism.  As historian Elaine Tyler May points out, this created a symbolic link between the nuclear suburban family and US capitalist democracy.  This put a lot of pressure on families to buy into the suburban lifestyle.

Obviously left out of this equation was people of color, but especially black folks.  Latinx, Asian American, and other non-black people of color occupied a weird social status where they sometimes counted closer to white than to black, but other times didn't.  Latina/o people, for instance, often weren't formally segregated from white folks the way black people were, but were still informally discriminated against in housing practices- especially if they were brown, poor, and/or didn't speak fluent English.

Even for those inside the suburbs, however, the previously mentioned pressure to conform to suburbanized patriotism created a mess.  LGBTQ folks had to live in the closet, often having to settle into a heterosexual family lifestyle that made them miserable.  Suburban women, who had tasted freedom during WW2 factory jobs, now were pressured to stay in the home as housewives, with no recognition or appreciation for their domestic labor; those who did get to work were generally only allowed to do clerical or other "pink collar" work.  Leftists and labor leaders had to conform out of fear for being labelled a communist/Soviet sympathizer.

Also, there were plenty of white, heterosexual people with no leftist tendencies who nevertheless just didn't want a suburban lifestyle, but didn't want to stand out in an era dominated by fear and paranoia.

"You're damn right I'm a miserable booze hound. This place sucks ass."

"Wow, dad, I didn't know you were a commie!  Prepare to feel the wrath of Joe McCarthy, Soviet scum!"

Now, all that said, society pressures us to do things all the time, and that's not always a bad thing.  After all, we're pressured to wash our hands after going to the bathroom, brush our teeth, and not murder people.  So, even if people were pressured to go along with the suburban lifestyle, that doesn't automatically make the suburbs bad, right?

That would be correct.

The suburbs are terrible for different reasons.  Let's get into why.

FRAGMENTIZATION

"David, why is there a picture of broken glass here?"

"It's supposed to be symbolic of a deeply stratified United States."

"Wow, that's some 'intro to creative writing' level corny symbolism."

"Shut up, Gary."

There are a few reasons I'm gonna explore here, but they all tie to the core problem of how fragmented the suburbs have made society.  Before World War 2, almost everyone except the ultra wealthy lived in the cities.  From the poor to the middle class, those who lived in the cities went downtown to get their shopping done and enjoyed leisure time in public places like parks.  Because of this, people spent more time around people unlike themselves (though black folks and some other people of color were largely excluded from many of these areas thanks to segregation).

The suburbs changed that.  Shopping centers outside of the downtown area sprang up in mass, thanks in large part to the new roads created by the New Deal and drastically expanded by Eisenhower in 1956 with the Federal-Aid Highway Act (again, think about this the next time a suburbanite talks about the evils of government spending).  Now the middle class no longer had to associate with those filthy poor people.  Instead, suburbanites lived in what historian John Teaford calls "edge cities"- enclaves where they could get their shopping done and spend time in public spaces without having to spend time with anyone unlike themselves.

If we wanted to, we could even apply the homie Robert Wiebe's term "island communities" here.

As mentioned in the intro of this post, this is why the term "inner city" now means the hood/barrio.  As affluent people left the city, downtown areas lost steam.  They had less customers, and those they did have were often low income.  The rise of local city councils and use of local property taxes to financially support edge cities only furthered the growing divide between the city and suburbs, as now suburbanites demanded their taxes only help themselves and not the cities from which they fled.

"Oh Robert, it was awful! I actually had to come within thirty feet of a poor person today!"

The changes didn't come about by themselves, either.  To backtrack to the late 1800s, laborers often fought with people who owned factories during the beginning stages of mass industrialization.  As mentioned above, the cities that resulted from industrialization gave birth to the professional/middle class, who had far more people among their ranks than the rich, but also way more money, resources, and connections to people in positions of power/influence than the poor. These people took action partially because they were exposed to the lives of the poor and working class.

While they created the previously mentioned changes of the Progressive Era, working class people still fought during this time for a better world as well.  This continued into the 1920s.  They gained an incredible amount of ground during the 1930s thanks to the Great Depression and helped add popular support to the New Deal.  The gains from the New Deal created what historians and other social scientists refer to "New Deal liberalism", which loomed large over US politics until Nixon began to challenge it after his 1968 electoral victory and Reagan finally broke it with his election in 1980.

The suburbs played a key role in the destruction of New Deal liberalism, despite the fact that the affluence of the suburbs came from New Deal liberalism.  Suburbanites, now affluent and isolated from anyone unlike themselves, became increasingly fiscally conservative.  As mentioned above, they fought for increasing the power of local city governments and using local property taxes to pay for things like schools.  This not only exacerbated inequality, but also further isolated suburbanites from the rest of the world.  Society became further fragmented.

It can't be said enough, though, that these suburban communities wouldn't have existed without the New Deal.  Not only because it helped create the suburbs and surrounding infrastructure, but because it distributed wealth enough to make sure that a WW2 veteran could easily buy a home and support a family by working even a blue collar factory job.  The middle class became populated not just by the professional class, but even by some people who would have previously been part of the working class.  The resulting society enjoyed much prosperity, but became less connected and conscious of the fact we all depend on one another.

RACISM

"We demand to stay bland!"

Okay, so it's pretty obvious that the suburbs were racist because segregation existed during the time they were created.  Even someone who isn't a historian could guess that the suburbs weren't welcoming to people of color during their invention.  But, hey, everywhere was racist back then, right?  Why single out the suburbs?

Part of the problem is that, because the suburbs were planned during this time, practices like redlining made sure that the suburbs were literally founded on exclusion of people of color, particularly black people.  Even those who served heroically in WW2 or became educated professionals were still kept out.  Confined to their own neighborhoods and kept far away from suburban shopping centers, people of color were kept to the cities.

What makes this more relevant to the present day, though, is that when the Civil Rights Movement began gaining ground, the suburbs is where segregationists retreated.  As historians like Kevin Kruse and Robert Self point out, the battle against segregation occurred in public places in the city like schools, parks, pools, and public transit.  Because of the previously mentioned fragmentation of society, however, these places were already increasingly neglected by affluent white people anyway.  Integration gained ground not just thanks to the heroic efforts of civil rights organizers, but also because affluent white people simply felt less protective of public areas in the city.

Kruse even details in his book, which focuses on the city of Atlanta, that many suburban liberals supported urban integration.  White people of means showing up in support of city integration was by no means uncommon; it was the white people in the cities, who had less money and power, who mainly opposed integration. When the latter group lost the battle for segregation, they used everything from protests to violence to try to undo integration, but it was too late.  Desegregation won out.

Then civil rights activists turned their attention to the suburbs.  Suddenly, white suburban liberals became indistinguishable from KKK members.

Fun fact: Joe Biden got his start as a politician by opposing integration.

The civil rights coalitions around the country began to fall apart after the 1964 Civil Rights Act and 1965 Voting Rights Act for a variety of reasons.  The discomfort of affluent white liberals, who had sometimes helped integration efforts before, was one of those reasons.  Segregationists with money retreated to the suburbs.  Suburban liberals, while not always actively opposed to integrating the suburbs, very rarely offered the sort of helped they offered before.

Legal challenges to suburban segregation were harder to make than legal challenges to urban segregation because the suburbs weren't explicitly segregated.  Though redlining was racist in nature, there was nothing formally outlawing people of color from the suburbs the way there was in the previous form of explicit public segregation.  Because of this, while there were some isolated cases of individual legal victories, as a whole suburban segregation remained in place.

Segregationist Dixiecrat George Wallace campaigned for the presidency in 1964 and found a lot of success by appealing to the racism of some working class white voters.  Richard Nixon clearly took notes from George Wallace, but refined that message to be less explicitly racist and more about "freedom of association" (that is, freedom to not associate with black people).  In doing so, Nixon created what we now call the "southern strategy" in politics: using culture war terminology against the "liberal elite" while using racially coded words to appeal to white voters.

The rising conservatism in the suburbs also worked wonders for Nixon.  A part of Nixon's electoral strategy was appealing to what he called the "silent majority" of voters, which he framed as people who were sick of the civil rights and anti-war protestors.  He campaigned on a "return to normalcy" for the US.  This struck a cord among the suburbs, who wanted to be left alone and not worry about problems outside of their suburban bubbles.  Ronald Reagan would go on to perfect this electoral strategy and reflect the power of the suburban conservatives as an electoral force.

LONELINESS

Why does every stock photo make loneliness look so artsy?

So, we've established that the suburbs were super exclusionary.  But, hey, there are some suburbs that are pretty diverse in the present-day United States.  While the racism is unfortunate, some people in affluence is better than none, right?  We should be focusing on making the suburbs more diverse, not talking about how bad they are!

The thing is, aside from the fact that the suburbs perpetuate inequality today through things like property taxes to fund schools, the suburbs suck for people who live there, too.

Even after the pressures of the Cold War to conform to suburban lifestyle faded, many still saw the suburbs as the key to happiness.  Many feel that way today.  Some people who live there may even enjoy them.  As a whole, though, we are social animals, and the suburbs aren't designed with that in mind.  The isolated houses with few public spaces give suburbanites few places to socialize and interact.

Related to that, as historians Elaine Tyler May and Stephanie Coontz have talked about, the fact that we went from urban neighborhoods with strong family and community ties to nuclear families with weaker ties to both the community and extended family hurt us further.  This trend has happened all across US society, but is especially bad in suburbia.  While we have the myth of the isolated prairie house of the old West, the truth is that many people created communities back then to survive; many who tried to live with no help beyond their wife and kids didn't make it.  As a whole, the myth of US self-reliance is just that: a myth.

"I reckon this town ain't big enough for the both of us.

Let's giddyup and toward creating bigger communities to change that, pardner!"

That matters not just for the sake of truth, but for the sake of how we live.  We've always loved the myth of a self-reliant homestead, but in reality we were forced by circumstances to live interconnected lives with our communities.  The fragmentation brought about by the suburbs changed this.  Now, thanks to New Deal liberalism and the gains brought by an interconnected society, many people (especially affluent white people) are able to live lives isolated from the rest of society.  Now, thanks to how society is structured, they don't "need" anyone else, and don't have to be around anyone else.

And even they're not sure if they're happy about it.

CONCLUSION

No sassy comment here, this actually seems like a cool idea.

So, yeah, the suburbs suck.  They hoard a lot of tax revenue that could be used to help needier communities, and they trap those within into an isolated, fragmented bubble that gives a lot of people mental health problems.  They're not the sole cause of these problems, of course, but they are especially egregious examples of them.

Luckily, there is hope.  A big topic in the field of urban planning is how to make cities less lonely; affordable housing advocates generally demand expanded public housing, which is much less isolating than the suburbs; recent teacher strikes and the unionization of service sector employees, such as retail and fast food workers, are showing a reemergence of organized labor, which means less economic inequality; on top of that, today's unions are much more diverse and willing to fight against other forms of discrimination than the unions of yesterday; the topic of loneliness itself is becoming a big issue that professionals from many disciplines are now explicit talking about.

I could go on, and I'm sure there are tons of groups of people doing great work I know nothing about, but the point is that the world is constantly changing.  Those in history sometimes view the conditions they live in as permanent or unalterable, but it's important to remember that the conditions we find ourselves in today have only been this way for the last few decades.  The fragmented, lonely, society we live in today is not guaranteed to exist as it is in the future.  After all, the US went from the beginning of the Great Depression to the beginning of post-World War 2 prosperity in about a decade and a half.  That's not a long time.

What's important is that we do what we can to make sure we work toward a better future.  Sometimes that means getting involved in politics, other times that means simply getting to know your neighbors or being kind to a stranger.  Not even for moral reasons, but because it's how we're built as humans.  For all of our societal problems, we need one another.

Except Nazis, who should always be punched in the face.

SOURCES
Here are the books that I referenced in this post:
"The Search for Order" by Robert Wiebe
"A Fierce Discontent" by Michael McGerr
"Homeward Bound" by Elaine Tyler May
"The Metropolitan Revolution" by Jon Teaford
"White Flight" by Kevin Kruse
"American Babylon" by Robert Self 
"The Way We Never Were" by Stephanie Coontz