In the spirit of Bezio’s podcast and essay, I want to use a recent example of pop culture, rather than other examples of high culture, as a prime example of how the portrayal of leadership in modern society has changed. I just recently started to watch an Amazon Prime show called The Wilds released in 2020. The story follows 8 girls who are unknowingly, and without consenting, participating in a controversial social experiment. They have been through a staged plane crash and are now stranded on a deserted island trying to survive and wait for search and rescue. A very small team of researchers are monitoring their every move– the girls just do not know this. The characters are a diverse representation of races, ethnicities, sexualities, religions, socioeconomic statuses, and regions within the US. I think this representation speaks to the movement happening at the cinematic level as discussed in the podcast from Hidden Figures to Black Panther. So far, I have gathered that the point of the social experiment in short is to prove that women are better leaders, although admittedly in a very unethical (and illegal) form of experimentation. But the show is so relevant to the content of this class. 

First, the girls amongst themselves begin to develop distinct roles. Dot, one of the girls,  becomes the first leader due to her background knowledge in survival shows that helps the group know exactly what to do to try to survive what they think is a completely deserted and hopeless island.  Harvey states that the general definition of leadership is that “leaders confront and solve problems associated with group survival and well-being” (201). The Wilds allows for a context that matches this definition at the most basic understanding: basic human survival. Dot becomes the leader because she can get water, food, and shelter for the group. She also stands out as a leader because of her ability to manage the group. The group dynamics are widely explored because of the “research” being done on the experiment, so we see how the girls work amongst each other and the disputes and relationships they have over their time on the island. Dot recognizes that there can be no “us” and “them” like Harvey suggests as a poor leadership tactic (206). She knows that even as girls have arguments and fundamental differences, the main objective of survival has to be at the front of their minds. Dot and the other girls at times also represent Harvey’s discussion about how leaders tend to look further ahead while followers preoccupy themselves about the here and now. Dot immediately recognizes that they need to ration their food and drink supplies, while some of the girls don’t ration their own personal stash well and put that burden on the group. Dot recognizes that the girls need to build a shelter to protect themselves from their new and mostly unknown elements, whereas the other girls are exhausted and too dehydrated to want to think about putting in hard labor of constructing shelter. These leader and group dynamics play out so clearly in this show. 

In the podcast, Bezio discusses that our pop culture should represent the world we want, but her example of The Hunger Games not being the literal way we want our world to be fits with The Wilds as well. We definitely don’t want to be able to run unethical experiments on people that do not know they are being experimented on. We as a society have been there and done that. But this show does call into question the beauty of diversity and women in power. Men in this show are most usually the people making bad decisions, causing trauma to these girls, or messing up in general. The underlying message of women empowerment in this show is one that could only exist in this decade of time. It is a clear representation of how we tell stories and who those stories are about has changed in recent pop culture.