FlickerFadeGone Critique Paper

“FlickerFadeGone” is a fictional story by Carljoe Javier that gives us an in-depth

understanding about the current crisis of addiction and the gradual loss of identity of an individual
in the process. To summarize it briefly, the boy (main character in the story) became addicted to
video games since he was a young child which resulted to him having difficulties in differentiating
fantasies from the reality now that he is all grown up. The author presented the issue of
existentialism and the essence of one’s self through this story. Although I found the story quite
interesting, there are some parts of the story that left me confused.
The author viewed existentialism in connection to a person’s life experiences. Rather, a
person’s past experiences can affect their decisions and views about the meaning of life, and
about how they view themselves as human beings. In the story FlickerFadeGone, the boy felt
empty and lonely, he grew up in his neighborhood not being able to fit in, which is why he isolated
himself from the rest of the world. He left school and his family to satisfy his longing for recognition
in the arcade. Playing video games gave meaning to his life and he was satisfied with his
existence in that way. That is, until he met a girl and fell in love. But when he realized that the girl
did not feel the same way as he did, he “disappeared” into the game.
To quote Jean-Paul Sartre, “Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the
world, he is responsible for everything he does”, his view about existentialism focused more on
how human beings live in constant anguish, not only because life is miserable, but because we
are ‘condemned to be free’. On the contrary to the author of the story’s views about existentialism,
Jean-Paul Sartre stated that because we human beings are free to choose, we make decisions
that shall define our essence. It is the decisions we choose to make that gives meaning to our
lives and affects how we see ourselves and our worth in this world, and not our past life
experiences.
The organization and style on how the story flowed was impressive. Symbols and hidden
meanings were utilized in portraying the main idea of the story such as the Key that represents
two things: one is the ideal power in the virtual world and the second one is the main character’s
loss of identity. In this way, the author is sending an indirect message to the readers regarding
how addiction can cause identity crises among the individuals.
Rather than being precise and direct, the content of the story used a narrative style in third
person point-of-view. Although the style used by the author was indeed agreeable, one thing that
left me wondering was at the ending part, where the boy was heartbroken, the impression that
the author left was that the boy just “disappeared” into the game. I would ask the author what
really happened to the boy, did he leave the arcade or actually went into the game?
To conclude this critique, overall, I found this story quite entertaining and curious. It
stimulates the readers to think analytically. The story gave the readers an important lesson that
they can apply to their lives, that is, it is better to be slapped with the truth of reality than be
comforted with the lies. As a reader and a critical thinker, I would recommend this story to my
peers because it is a refreshing story that has a twist in the plot which one would not expect.
References:
Mittal, T. (2017, June 21) To be is to be: Jean-Paul Sartre on existentialism and freedom.
Retrieved from https://www.google.com/amp/s/yourstory.com/2017/06/jean-paul-sartre-
philosophy-existentialism-freedom/amp