Feels Good Man, the directorial debut of Arthur Jones, centers around the cultural transformation and appropriation of an innocent cartoon character: Pepe the Frog. The film follows Pepe's creator, Matt Furie, as he tries to comes to terms with all that is happening to his creation and eventually fights back to regain control of what was once his; meanwhile, we are also treated to a full unravelling of how Pepe was meme'd into internet infamy among fringe, alt-right groups, discovering just how powerful a tool the Internet can be and how hard it can be to turn back what's been done. The film's pacing is very good, the story is captivating, and the people brought in to break it all down are very interesting; however, while being well worth the watch, I think it falls short in its overall takeaway and message.
The film does a great job of bringing in a diversity of interviewees to help detail both the personal story of Matt & Pepe, as well as the digital journey that transformed Pepe into a profound hate symbol. Insight into Matt's life is drawn primarily from discussion with his wife and housemates, as well as from getting to see him interact with his daughter. It all draws a very quaint portrait of a guy who seems nice and, to be honest, pretty average, which makes Pepe's journey all the more startling while also helping to explain Matt's initial reluctance to act and rather just lay back. For deconstructing the underbelly of the web, we're introduced to a 4chan lifer (or a NEET - this guy's reality may in fact have been the scariest part of the film), my first-ever sighting of a memetist, an occultist scholar / magic librarian (can we talk about how this guy used the force to pull a book off of a shelf???), and the director of the Network Contagion Research Institute at Princeton - all these just to name a few. While the story itself is captivating at parts, what really pushes the movie towards success is the people you meet; the most interesting part of the film may in fact be when Matt meets up with a 20ish person group in San Fran composed of people who have devoted themselves to deconstructing and understanding these sort of internet phenomena; the sheer fact that these groups exist was quite eye-opening, and the juxtaposition of their deep concern and worry for what has happened to Pepe versus Matt's laidback nature was both hilarious and a little tragic. All these people understand something that Matt is seemingly still fully unaware of: he has completely lost control of his beloved character, and frankly, there is almost no turning back. This is not to say that every interviewee lends value - the two female cartoonists / writers seemed to contribute very little and felt more like a "We've already recorded the interviews so let's just use them" situation.
The film should also be given enormous credit for its efforts in trying to trace the origins and gradual transformation of Pepe. I think we all know how difficult it can be to find any "starting points" or sources of actual truth online, but the crew seem to have done very well in their research; likely helped, and perhaps influenced, by their interviews with members of these Internet hordes. Another short note is that the animation throughout is very solid and felt like a strong tool to complement the film's narrative. It wasn't overdone and tied nicely to the scenes where it was used.
With regards to the film's overall goals and purpose, Matt Furie's story is interesting and he is a generally likeable guy, but the real meat of this film is its examination of internet culture and how it can basically turn anything on its head and morph it for its own use or gain, without almost any repercussion. The way in which we see an innocent frog cartoon slowly become a symbol of hate and bigotry is enthralling, but also terrifying as we realize that it all happened through the efforts of people sitting right at home and operating under the anonymity given to them by the Internet and its platforms (e.g. 4chan). Once they took hold, there was really no going back. Sure, Matt's been able to win lawsuits with public figures that have appropriated the character, such as Alex Jones, but almost nothing can be done to the thousands (or millions) of people still using it for their hateful purposes online. While the film tries to end on a positive note by displaying how Pepe went from an alt-right symbol in the US to a symbol of freedom in the Hong Kong protests, it feels like a lackluster solution and rose-colored view, frustratingly trying to give the viewer a hopeful message while denying the harsher truth and reality that it itself has painted. While it's great to see that Pepe can still be a symbol of hope and positivity, the true conclusion is much more ambiguous, demonstrating how we can project almost any emotion onto a character or piece of media, meme-ing it into "this" or "that". Everything comes with a dark side or at least the potential of evil - while we can hope that good is the stronger force, it doesn't really make it any easier to put a stop to the bad.
