Culture wars?

My granddaughter has this  on her facebook page:

and if you aren't into "tweendom", they are Katnis, the heroine of the Hunger Games, Harry Potter, and Percy of the demigod triology.

All three are young teens who with their friends, Peeta, Hermione, and AnnaBeth, risked their lives to save their loved ones or the world.


So who is Disney picking for the next teen franchise? ArtEmis Fowl, a teen aged thief.
Wikipedia says by the last book he has developed a sense of morality thanks to the fairies, but I didn't get that far.

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Hieropraxis discusses the need for a happy ending, and the modern tendency toward nihilism.

Is a story that lacks clear redemption—or in which a character’s misfortunes are not turned around, or in which darkness and strife rather than healing and renewal toll the final bell—worth reading for someone who believes in the happy ending of the universe?

short answer: No.

Because ultimately it lacks wisdom: it is like a man with blinders who only sees thing in tunnel vision, without the depth of the entire picture. So why waste your time with superficial crap?

Tolkien has one of his Maia Niena, the goddess of tears: Who takes suffering and makes it into wisdom.

Aeschulus:

He who learns must suffer
 And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget
Falls drop by drop upon the heart,
And in our own despite, against our will,
Comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.

When the Japanese films show the horrors of war, Americans who never faced such things blithely think they should eliminate war. But Japanese see the soldier's suffering as a noble example of what a man should be.

 And if two million Pinoys attend the Black Nazarene procession, it is because they identify their own sufferings with that of Christ, and it becomes meaningful and helps them to bear it.