Wes Anderson's Asteroid City and Lyotardian Postmodernism

A movie, a play, a town—not a person. No matter the frame, Asteroid City is about how the personal may breathe within the suffocating structures of the impersonal. How character, actor, and viewer must express themselves through the narratives they are subjected to. How to act as oneself, one must start by acting at all. Erring on the side of paradox, this is Wes Anderson’s answer to postmodernism’s problem of metanarratives.

To reach this answer, Wes Anderson attempts a holistic, postmodern critique of today’s culture through the fictitious monochrome documentary of a hyper-saturated theater play. These are the movie’s two dimensions: the play itself and the production of it. The production informs and often contradicts the play, creating an amusing and edifying narrative framework. The trend of the film is a constant juxtaposition between the two, slowly dissolving the binary until Augie (Jason Schwartzman) literally opens the quasi-4th wall in the third act. Anderson plays around this trajectory, exemplifying numerous postmodernist and poststructuralist ideas through that constant play between intra and meta. Finally, he attempts to respond to postmodernism’s chaotic and nihilistic notions with a sincere answer that I applaud but one that betrays the aforementioned form (to most moviegoers). In short, the film is not style over substance but style against substance. Nevertheless, Asteroid City serves as a breakthrough piece in explicating the foundational pillars of postmodernism and the depersonalizing effect it can have on the individual.

From its faithful exploration of theatrical productions, its relentless dry-pan humor, meticulous set design (I could stare at the panning shot for the 1950s town of “Asteroid City” many times over), and the underpinnings of a mysterious alien plot line, Asteroid City is far more than a cultural critique. Anderson’s cinematography (symmetrical shots, etc.) alone is mesmerizing and distinguishes him from most popular filmmakers to the point of meme-dom. These aspects of the film are fine and dandy; no one online seems to contest them. Aye, the rub really is the mass of netizens rightfully questioning what it means, that it is—in a word—“inaccessible.” To get to that, I want to point out the film’s messages of cultural criticism because they become both the strong points of the film and its Achilles heel.

The film is as if you found a toy spaceship which we’ll call the “Narrative,” and took it apart. You realize the “Narrative” was made of Lego bricks that are separate and irreducible (because, presumably, to reduce them any further would net them unusable). These Lego bricks were sold to children, commodified as pieces with names such as “Character Backstory 2x4,” “Romantic Subplot 1x1,” and “Mysterious Antagonist 5x1.” They were sold to them with a paper guide and in a boxed set and for $29.99 a pop. You throw this paper guide away and rebuild the “Narrative” using whatever piece in whatever order, and it comes out intact—still a spaceship. Even if it’s using a Lego guy’s head for a steering wheel and the entire thing is a hideous vomit-rainbow, it is still a spaceship worthy of being a spaceship. And this fluid worthiness—how each Lego piece could be equally foundational as another depending on the imagination of the rebuilder—is what the guide constricts. To capture this process of Lego rebuilding in a work of art is what postmodern art is all about. Asteroid City is no different and, in fact, does this to an unprecedented degree I have never seen before in film.

To start, Asteroid City displays this rebuilding through its frame narrative of theatrical production—how the actors, writer, and director try to create what is supposed to be a regular play. I even believe he chose the frame of a theatrical production because plays have well-defined parts, or “lego bricks,” that make subverting their traditional use-value more obvious than say a movie (which, for example, lacks the dividers of acts and parts). The premise within the play is stereotypical: A family on a road trip whose car breaks down and has to stay and live in this new town where, hopefully, unfiltered new truths about themselves and the domestic are unmoored (and they drive off with a new sense of ‘self’ and ‘family’). However, while the narrative subverts its stereotypical premise (with an alien), much of the characterization of those within the play, aside from a few details, becomes useless information. For instance, almost every character with decent screen time in the “Asteroid City” play enters the fray with a hasty 4-sentence blurb of who they are, where they come from, and how we should see them in this play. But, almost every backstory that tempts the conventional viewer with narrative value (surely this is important for the plot?) matters nada within the larger plot. Anderson is taking the Lego bricks of “Character Backstory” and, in rebuilding the toy spaceship, showing the viewer that this piece doesn’t have to be foundational, that we don’t have to value a particular aspect of narrative structure more than another. Asteroid City is ultimately a metaphor saying that to do so would be to submit to what postmodernism calls “metanarratives” (the Lego guide), ulterior narratives that legitimize our sense of being, knowledge, and culture.

In fact, among all the art I have consumed, Asteroid City is the most exemplary of Lyotard’s seminal definition of postmodernism that (along with Jamesonian postmodernism) has become entrenched in popular culture today (examples include Everything Everywhere All at Once and Across the Spiderverse). “Asteroid City,” the play, embodies Lyotard’s subsumption of narrative and scientific knowledge under postmodern skepticism.

The conventionally irrelevant backstories; Augie’s imaginative three daughters who decide to be whatever fantastical character they want to be with no rhyme or reason; the alien as the source of conflict ultimately being shy and merely “inventorying” the asteroid; the fruitless situationship between widowed Augie and Midge (Scarlett Johansson). All of these instances question how a conventional plot—its characters, roles, conflicts, resolutions—should proceed. In essence, they question the conventional structure of how a play and movie should carry out, which becomes an allegory for critiquing the metanarratives of culture at large. One scene that I love is when Midge is talking to the mother of her biggest fan in town, and the mother says how she loved Midge as X character in Y film but it was sad that everyone else didn’t. Midge reacts to the qualification that “everyone else didn’t” with insecurity—the culture’s reception of her movie determines her and she bends to its whims. The moment just after when the camera pans to the narrator (Bryan Cranston) haphazardly and he realizes he shouldn’t be there further questions, comedically, the presumed authority of theatrical conventions.

Anderson’s inclusion of the Space Camp—its parental supervision and tween-genius competition—reflects a Lyotardian take on scientific knowledge. The kitsch, unnumbered science medals (“The White Dwarf Medal,” “The Black Hole Badge”) the participants receive during the Junior Stargazer Convention are brazenly performative and don’t confer meritocratic placing at all. The parents arguing whose children had the better invention and the motel manager (Steve Carrell) squashing the conflict with a unanimously agreed statement that “they’re all strange” forms a critique of scientific authority and its fabricated legitimation. The parents, who happen to be scientists, also argue about the chances of an alien visiting Earth. The viewer enters these arguments in media res as the camera pans in and then cuts out, only catching bits and pieces of dense terminology (“stoichiometry”) and leaving with no clue as to the characters’ reasoning. Only their stance is left. This mediated, detached perception of these scientific arguments relates to Lyotard’s take on conventional scientific reasoning—that it is predicated on a kind of forensic proof, not reality. The medals and dense terminological arguments relate to a presumed prioritization of evidence. It is not: I can prove something because reality is that way. But: As long as I can produce proof, then reality might as well be that way. This dependency on previous scientific knowledge in the film (such as the aforementioned “stoichiometry,” or “Fermi’s paradox”) is Anderson’s way of critiquing the unilateral structure of scientific knowledge as well. Unlike narrative knowledge which is more reciprocal (we must abide by theatrical conventions because the audience, industry, and culture expect us to), scientific knowledge proves its validity by pointing to other nodes of scientific knowledge. This is what scientists often call “evidence.” However, this structure creates a problem of infinite regress: The evidence a scientist marshals to validate their claim can only be other denotative statements dependent on other denotative statements, and so on and so forth. Ultimately, scientific knowledge is de facto legitimate by the never-ending references to these statements. Of course, Anderson and Lyotard would rather see these dependencies as separate—to consider the knowledge as its own unmediated claim—and the separate but connected links that power the broken TV June (Maya Hawkes) stands in front of represent just that.

Anderson’s critiques of narrative and scientific knowledge, like Lyotard’s, are not separate issues but simply two branches with the same root. We see this when Woodrow (Jake Ryan) meets with Dinah (Grace Edwards) in the observatory, and Woodrow asks if Dinah’s mother likes stars. Dinah responds, saying her mother, Midge, is pursuing her own “stardom.” This line sutures together Anderson’s postmodern critique: Pursuing Hollywood stardom and the scientific understanding of space are endeavors one and the same. They both cling to metanarrative structures that legitimize their efforts. Midge is recognized by everybody because of her famous roles in Hollywood, an industry that proves its worth through financial success and popular reception. Lyotard repeats in his diagnosis of postmodernity that the speaker of a narrative assumes authority the more the listener reciprocates their attempts at carving out a presence. This process works en masse within the entertainment industry and popular culture itself. Similarly, the domain the Junior Stargazers and their parents occupy, the field of science and astronomy, is reciprocated by further evidence and re-citation of their work. For instance, the more times Fermi’s Paradox is mentioned or referenced, the more it is seen as scholarly and culturally relevant; this relevance becomes the proof in culture’s pudding; culture becomes the sustenance we consume to survive; to survive we must pursue the pudding and, therefore, what makes the pudding: more references/evidence/proof that the recipe calls for. Ultimately, both types of stardom abide by a recipe, and this recipe legitimizes the efforts of those using it. This reciprocal process is similar to playing a game and scoring points for a high score. Whether it is receiving accolades from the scientific community or being recognized by a fan, Anderson is pointing out how we play the game no matter what domain of cultural knowledge we pursue, and this game gives us meaning in the form of a score. However, such a game is not necessarily reality. In fact, the illusion of the game—that it is the singular way by which to score points or that we should score points—is what conveniently associates it with the reverence and sanctity of truth. Postmodernism and Anderson call for questioning the game, which in turn questions “truth,” leaving us with no ground to stand on. This is why it is convenient, even vital, for some to ignore skepticism: There must be a game; we shall not change the rules of the game, the steps in the recipe.

If metanarratives compromise our agency and truth but provide us meaning and structure, what should we do with metanarratives? This is a fundamental question of Anderson’s film, and while he has conveyed numerous metaphorical examples of Lyotard’s postmodernism, his answer seems to differ. Lyotard, and postmodernism, choose to be skeptical of metanarratives and even entertain the idea of escaping them entirely. However, Lyotard’s work was prescriptive rather than conclusive, and he chose to leave the idea of an exact cure or solution up to the reader.

Anderson answers with Asteroid City’s reorientation of the subject towards an emotional truth through, rather than outside of, structures. The frame narrative of a play acts as the veil of metanarrative structure that legitimizes and determines every action of the actor. In other words, when we see a play within a film that entertains the stereotypes of a widowed husband and a jeopardized family stranded in a town that is both precariously small and culturally burgeoning, expecting them to elicit new domestic truths, we assume—like we do for the heroes and villains of a story—that they represent all other plays and framework narratives to some degree. When we see Thanos on screen, we view and learn from his character as if he is another iteration of a long lineage of anti-heroes/villains with a compulsory misguided goal. With Asteroid City, we get to see the perspective of the theater’s production: the lives of the actors outside of the frame that represents all other frames. Because we see the actors of “Asteroid City” outside of the play, it transforms the frame from a reality we cannot question to simply an organizing force affecting the actors. While the actors (Midge, Augie, Woodrow, etc.) are apathetic and reserved on stage, they become animated and emphatic off stage. Augie, for instance, auditions to the screenwriter with a vigorous performance eulogizing the death of his character’s wife in the play, but when he performs the same scene on stage he is standoffish and limp. Even his lines become pessimistic, no longer speaking to the grandiosity of a dead mother in heaven but instead saying he does not believe in an afterlife. Augie’s actor even kisses the screenwriter after his audition while his character is unaffectionate on stage. He shares ice cream with the screenwriter, his “favorite food,” while his character refuses to say his favorite food on stage. Similarly, Midge can be quiet and bashful on stage but can be bossy and shrewd off stage. These polarizing differences in performance, the two versions of the actor and character, slowly dissolve as the film progresses. What we find is not a subsumption of the actor into his character but rather an actor expressing themselves through his character. The metastructures that command thee—script, character, act—instead become a medium to uncover emotional truths.

Augie, for instance, is a character reminiscent of the director of the film as they both have lost their wives, either through death or divorce. Augie the actor learns to express himself and grow earnestly by leaning into his character—forming a situationship with Midge, photographing the alien, and, of course, falling “asleep” inside the play. His role as a “photographer” plays into this in a fundamental way. He takes pictures of Midge, the alien, and other characters and they often ask “Will it come out” to which he replies, “It always does.” Just like the play is for the actors, the camera is the medium by which he captures the candid, personal lives of his fellow characters. Both the play and the camera are mediums through which the actors/characters can express their real, emotional selves. Even if it is locked in there, it will always “come out.”

The alien, at first glance, is the most inexplicable character in the film. As aforementioned, Asteroid City chooses to subvert the narrative conventions of plays (and movies), which is an analog for subverting metanarratives in society. The alien’s entrance in the film is a moment that confirms certain theories about the universe, theories that the parents of the Junior Stargazers argued about incessantly. It is a defining moment in the film since it sparks a revolution in the Asteroid City’s culture—from being a dead end, deteriorating pitstop that clings to its one marketable bit of scientific fame (the asteroid) to redubbing itself “Alien City, U.S.A..” The military comes to quarantine the city and research aliens. The Junior Stargazers become obsessed with the alien: Seeing the alien in Rorschach tests, conducting an underground newspaper operation to tell the world, and attempting “celestial flirtation” with it. The motel manager (Steve Carrell) renames the city and starts re-commodifying everything with alien branding. The children that June teaches begin to create all forms of art for the alien, from drawings to songs. Disrupting all previous metanarratives, the alien’s visitation forces everyone to reorient themselves around it as if it is an extension of or an entirely new metanarrative—everything must abide by it, and science, culture, and art all search for meaning within it. While Asteroid City becomes enamored and obsessed with the alien’s choice to visit them, their pursuit of understanding places them at the forefront: Questions such as “Why us?” are asked constantly. The alien might even be expected by the audience to be a deus ex machina for the play—we assume the alien’s random visit will act eventually as a solution to Augie and his family’s problems. Anderson subverts this as the alien’s visitation, which provides a collective pursuit to ascribe human meaning onto something, only exacerbates the problem.

In fact, only upon the alien’s second visit does the alien provide the message of the film, inadvertently. Returning the asteroid confirms his indifference to humanity—turns out, he is merely “inventorying” the asteroid. In a sense, he is only labeling the asteroid’s existence, the most bare-bones way to give significance to anything. The town, which is present for the alien’s second visit, sees this and realizes the alien’s disregard for the human race—none of the townsfolk are inventoried. However, the result is not a postmodern apocalypse of meaning but an emotional, personal emancipation. All the actors playing their characters begin to release themselves from their role-playing constraints and absolute chaos ensues with yelling, screaming, firing off military and space guns, and tearing down walls and clothes, ending with Augie opening the proverbial 4th wall of the play. This scene defines the film because it summarizes the postmodern view: that we cling to and are constrained by metanarratives. Only by realizing their meaning is socially constructed and ordained by the logic of an anthropocentric narrative do the characters shed their manners, pursuits, and thoughts. Their hidden raw, emotional resonance is unmoored. In a way, Anderson is showing us that to live in a metanarrative is to always act as if you are a playing character written by someone else, and real, emotional truths are only found in shedding the script and being yourself—no matter how chaotic, inexplicable, and illogical that is. Augie’s character confirms this when he opens the door into the black and white world. He asks the director (who his character is partially based off of) “Am I doing him right?” to which the director responds “You’re doing him just right. In fact, you didn’t just become Augie. He became you.” Augie, the character, eventually becomes Augie, the actor. When Augie says “I still don’t understand the play” and the director responds “doesn’t matter, just keep telling the story,” we realize the goal isn’t to act or to abide by the play’s metanarrative “correctly,” but to continue as yourself. Augie’s real, independent self eventually subsumes his character—the character begins to have his “personal heart.”

The film’s third act ends with a chant that unveils Anderson’s answer to postmodernism. Keitel (Willem Dafoe), the acting coach, orders all the practicing actors to fake fall asleep, and the film crescendos into a mantra: “You can’t wake up if you don’t fall asleep.” The scene defines the film as a response to the cultural problem of metanarratives. Anderson agrees with postmodernism and his film language reflects that but he does not see it as a loss of meaning. Instead, he argues that metanarratives—just like the characters the actors play or the alien that inspires the children’s art—can serve as the medium through which to express oneself. This expression then becomes the most authentic form of truth for Anderson, an emotional truth that is legitimized not by the metanarratives of narrative or scientific knowledge but by a compulsory inclination of feeling. The director tells Augie he “doesn’t have to know anything,” he only needs to feel. Only by Augie “falling asleep” in acting as the character and then “waking up” does he liberate an emotional truth from within himself. The mantra then argues that metanarratives are necessary simply to wake up from, for waking up is the only means by which we can filter out the oppressive constraints of acting for something else. For waking up is the only way we can begin acting as ourselves.

This brings me to my personal review of the film.

Anderson’s response to postmodernism’s metanarrative problem is as nuanced as it is compelling. It takes the seeds from Lyotard and the frameworks of plays and movies to not simply diagnose postmodernism but to prescribe a solution. It does so by leaving space for the viewer to interpret and apply the message to their life (I’m still reminded of the mantra scene weeks later). This is more than I can say of other postmodern movies such as Everything Everywhere All At Once which I found to lack breathing room for the viewer to interpret and apply. While EEAAO is a more emotionally resonant film for me, its attempt to answer postmodernism (with localized sincerity) is less nuanced and more spoonfed. This aspect of Asteroid City I found refreshing. However, no amount of armchair preaching outside the theater is going to magically convince an Asteroid City virgin that the film they watched was a complex, metafictional repurposing of postmodernism. No matter the context of the film, its major problem to most people will be its inaccessibility. Any Google search of the film will net numerous theories and discussion, and more questions than answers. Art, of course, does not need to be epistemologically coherent to be ‘good’. Where Asteroid City comes up short is how its form meets its function. If the message of the film is to repurpose the legitimizing structures of our society as mediums through which to emancipate us with more authentic, emotional truths, then the viewer should feel this as they are watching the film. In other words, we should, like Augie, fall asleep in the structure we find ourselves in (Augie: the play; us: the movie) and then wake up at the end with a newfound awareness—mimicking the very message the film is trying to convey in its ending mantra.

In my opinion, the most powerful art is art that can make you experience what it is trying to say. For Asteroid City, how it is likely to be experienced does not exactly replicate its message (or, in other words, the form/style does not meet its function/substance). Anderson’s style makes the narrative disjointed and the dialogue fast and deadpan for the majority of the film. Anderson probes the cultural pillars of postmodern society—narrative and scientific knowledge—in symbols and metaphors within the very analogous framework of the play that is then subverted. The complex structure of the film along with the fast-paced dialogue makes it hard to keep up. While these aspects of the film are intentional to subvert the viewer later on, revealing how falling in line with movie and play conventions compromises the agency of art and the viewer, etc., yada yada postmodern punchline, the subversion is an intellectual and epistemological one. Those who watch the film will be trying to keep up with the kitsch, seemingly meaningful Junior Stargazer medals. They will be trying to keep up with rapid and numerous character and actor backstory monologues. They will be trying to keep up with what the purpose of the alien is. What they’ll find is a message that does not satisfy this intellectual and epistemological subversion—they don’t get to know, instead, they should feel, right? However, the wild goose chase of attempting to know becomes prioritized over any sense of feeling. I think, for most people, once they get to that message at the end, Asteroid City would be an amazingly coherent rewatch. But on first visit—like the alien—what the average viewer will likely get out of it is an unsatisfying, compulsory search for what this “inaccessible” film might mean.

What we are left with is a film that will largely be viewed twofold on the first watch. First: Those who want to understand the film—questioning directorial decisions and plot turns as they are happening—will be left dazed and confused as the final message does not validate their search for meaning whatsoever. Second: Those who would rather feel the film and watch it for its cinematography, comedy, and style—not primarily questioning its meaning. This second lens might have a smoother viewing experience but risks not interpreting the Lyotardian moments of the film en route to its mantric climax. To be clear, this is not the fault of the viewer. I can’t really imagine a third or in-between way to view the film (on first watch) that fully satisfies both the epistemological and emotional expectations of what culminates into the film’s conclusion. In fact, my criticisms are experiential qualms, rather than artistic disagreements, since I personally have no clue how I would remake this film in a way to wed form and function together with this premise. I think Anderson struggled with that balancing act because he gave himself the task of creating a film that fundamentally clashes form with function—no, you should not have been trying to understand it like a normal film despite tempting you to; instead, you should feel it and express through it as that is the only way to repurpose our narrative crutch as human beings.

Some might argue that to simply feel but not understand on the first watch (the second option) would be the shortcut to embodying this message. I can’t help but think that this is not what Anderson would have wanted because it would imply that this kind of viewer never “woke up” after falling “asleep” to the movie magic. It would imply that the film’s style should inspire alone rather than its substance—that it should be reduced and re-commodified en masse until it reaches aesthetic memedom. Ultimately, the film and Anderson might occupy a space within popular culture the way a Mondrian painting does—there is a sincere, liberating message underneath but most people will see blocky patterns of primary colors and be satisfied enough by recognizing the Vans shoes and Saint Laurent dress as oh my gosh, that’s Mondrian! And maybe Anderson does want his distinct style to be replicated as a trend rather than a message across social media dimensions—oh my gosh, that’s Anderson! Admittedly, it does help spread the film and give a chance to those chronically online to watch and hopefully understand it beyond the delight of stylistic mimicry. However, for a film that so intricately recreates and deconstructs the pillars of a cultural movement that continues to breed our knowledge, art, and sense of being today, I would have wanted more people to both fall asleep and wake up.

Asteroid City ends up being a film that inadvertently finds itself in a precarious position for its artistic message. With an experience that nearly divorces style and substance for many viewers, a heady amount of cultural criticism, and a trend that bottles the film as purely aesthetic, Asteroid City is another film appended to Anderson’s catalog that does not entirely surmount the deluge of critics and casuals alike boxing him in as that one guy with that one style. I truly appreciate Anderson and this film because it goes beyond any other I’ve seen in concisely reiterating the major ideas of Lyotardian postmodernism and attempting to answer them in its own, emancipatory way. However, the postmodern subversion of the proverbial Lego guides, recipes, and games can only go so far for a film that ends up asking the viewer to stop building, cooking, and scoring after they have been doing so for an hour. But if the viewer never even built, cooked, or scored to begin with, then the film—the kitsch Stargazer medals, Midge’s insecurity with potential infamy, Augie’s character becoming the actor, and Keitel’s final chant—loses all oomph in telling them to stop. Despite its postmodern liberation and stylistic depths, Asteroid City will still leave many asking, like Augie: Am I doing it right? Am I watching it right?