Thursday, November 12, 2009

Freud and Jack Bauer

Freud would certainly see Jack Bauer as an interesting character. He would agree that Bauer conforms to the traditional gender role of the man as a protector and problem solver. He gets things done, his team sees him as a leader. He is expected to be proactive and to do whatever it takes to get the job done.
But he is not perfect; he is having marital troubles and could be having an affair with a coworker. Perhaps Freud would see these issues as signs of a repressed memory; maybe Bauer experienced something traumatic as a small child that made him feel inadequate, and thus overcompensates at his job in order to prove himself worthy, sacrificing his relationships with his family in the process.
Perhaps Freud could assume that Jack is fixated in the anal stage (occurring in children around age 2-3; as their parents toilet train them, they fight for control over their bodies, as well as their first main conflict with the id and the ego). Now in his 40s, Jack is fighting for control of his own life: his daughter is disobeying him, he and his wife are having problems, and at work he must deal with large amounts of stress and secrecy. In order to regain a sense of self-worth, he pushes all his energy in his work.

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