\n\tFor those who are not chronically online (like me), you may have seen images of Ryan Gosling floating around, next to the word hopecore, and wondered what it all means.<\/p>\n
\n\tPer the Urban Dictionary, it\u2019s a genre of videos that invoke a feeling and emotions of hope, glee and wholeness. That sounds pretty nice given the current state of the world, which may be why movies in that vein are doing so well this year.<\/p>\n
\n\tProject Hail Mary<\/a>, the Ryan Gosling-led film that released on March 20, has earned more than $300 million globally<\/a> and has become the poster child for this genre. It follows science teacher Ryland Grace (Gosling), who wakes up alone on a spaceship with no memory, and is aided by an unexpected friendship with an alien to stop a mysterious substance killing Earth\u2019s sun. For such a depressing topic, it focuses on optimism, not doom and gloom.<\/p>\n \n\tKit Lazer, who has built a mass following on social media with his passionate reviews of film and TV, has noticed the recent hopecore movement. \u201cThere was this trend in media for people to view any kind of sentimentality or earnestness as cringe or corny,\u201d he tells The Hollywood Reporter. \u201cAnd that was a shift from the way it was in the early 2000s.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe Phil Lord and Christopher Miller-helmed pic isn\u2019t the only optimistic film making waves recently. The animated film Hoppers<\/a>, released on March 6, scored the biggest launch for any Hollywood original animated title<\/a> since Pixar\u2019s Coco in 2017, grossing more than $297 million worldwide. Directed by Daniel Chong, it centers on a 19-year-old animal lover who uses technology that places her consciousness into a robotic beaver to uncover mysteries within the animal world beyond her imagination.<\/p>\n \n\tMovies have long been used as a way to escape what\u2019s happening in the real world. And when the real world is giving dystopian-like vibes, seeing a movie about an apocalypse or dystopian future definitely isn\u2019t giving that sense of escapism.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cYou do kind of see the shift back now, and I think it is a result of how much craziness we\u2019re seeing daily,\u201d Lazer notes. \u201cThe world seems to be crumbling more than usual for the last five to 10 years.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tDarker themes, of course, do still succeed with audiences. There\u2019s undoubtedly been a major focus on films and TV shows with grittier tones in the last two decades, going back to 2008\u2019s The Dark Knight, with shows like The Last of Us and Andor earning praise and winning over audiences.<\/p>\n \n\tAt least in some corners, that\u2019s changing.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWe\u2019ve seen a lot of cynicism and kind of an artistic shift away from sentimentality in a lot of the 21st century, and I do think it\u2019s natural that it\u2019s gonna turn back, especially with the way that the world looks,\u201d Lazer notes to THR, adding that he\u2019s also seen rom-coms and stoner comedies starting to make a comeback.<\/p>\n \n\tBut for sentimentality specifically, Project Hail Mary delivers just that. While most space films emphasize suspense and existential dread, the Gosling-led pic was grounded in a much more optimistic spirit, specifically with the collaborative friendship between the actor\u2019s Ryland Grace and the alien Rocky (voiced and puppeteered by James Ortiz).<\/p>\n \n\tThe hopecore bandwagon is likely fueled by younger millennials and Gen Zers craving nostalgia<\/a>. Amid so many uncertainties in the world right now, with heightened political tensions and ongoing global conflicts, people long for the feelings they had when life seemed simpler and less stressful.<\/p>\n \n\tPaul Anleitner ignited a similar discussion about hopecore<\/a> on social media recently when he pointed out the \u201cvibe shift\u201d in Project Hail Mary, writing that he predicted years ago this type of content would explode in pop culture, \u201cfrom deconstructing the past, to a nostalgia for some positive \u2018vibe\u2019 we lost in the deconstruction.\u201d <\/p>\n \n\tLast year\u2019s live-action Lilo & Stitch, which thrived at the box office, grossing over $1 billion globally, also backs up this assertion. Non-families made up 57 percent of the opening weekend audience, proving that \u201czillennials\u201d have a hold on childhood viewing habits. And more recently, the Miley Cyrus-focused Hannah Montana 20th Anniversary Special tallied 6.3 million views in its first three days<\/a> on Disney+ and Hulu.<\/p>\n \n\tWhen these shows and movies first came out, decades before the remakes and anniversary specials, these now-adults were in their pre-teens and teens. And for most, those years fostered more social connections, as it was before life revolved around social media and analog experiences.<\/p>\n