Ready Player One

This film explores many global issues that fit within the areas of exploration listed below. As you watch
the film, identify as many elements as you can in the boxes below (some may overlap). These may be
represented through setting, character, dialogue, visual elements, etc. For future discussion and essay
organization, be as descriptive as possible in your note-taking to help you return to the evidence.

▪ Science ▪ Community
▪ Technology ▪ Power
▪ Environment ▪ Politics
▪ Culture ▪ Justice
▪ Identity

Area of Notes
Exploration
Science - can modify everything about them in "The Oasis"
- evolved enough to create technology allowing for people to spend most of their
times in virtual reality

Technology - have drones to deliver things, such as pizza

- almost everybody has VR ("The Oasis"; whatever you imagine is your reality)
- have scanners that scan people
- omnidirectional treadmill
- virtual screens in schools instead of markers and such (on tops of desks)
- people's lives (such as the CEO, Halliday) can be archived in The Oasis so that
you can see everything that happened in a person's lives
- technology in real life (i.e. suits, better equipment) to make the gaming
experience more powerful
- holograms in the real world
- technology enables people to lie and deceive others
- the zombie dancing in the Shining was included (not originally in The Shining)
to show that you have to take the loop

Environment - filthy environment, with a lot of garbage, metal, and trash

- stacks (homes one on top of each other)
- people try to outlive their problems instead of try to fix them
- people can suffer in the real world based on the outcomes of The Oasis
- there are parts of the world that resemble today's worlds, with the ghetto parts
and corporate buildings (Wade lives in a technological place, with no plants;
meanwhile, Samantha/Artemis lives in a society where there is "normalcy” and
plants)

Culture - most people live in the stacks

- form groups in the Oasis
- people's identity in life is based on how they perform in the Oasis
- use language similar to our current world (except there are more curse words?)
 - they still have some aspects of our world, such as horror movies (The Shining)

Identity - Columbus identifies as a "modern”and "developed city

- they identify with their avatars; when their avatars lose their life and lose
everything, they lose a sense of purpose
- identity relies on power and artifacts
- people's social lives mostly revolve around the Oasis; it rarely expands to the
outside world
- people can hide their identities in the Oasis; they may not actually be like who
they are in real life
- people can have online crushes on people they don't know anything about

Community - the stacks (everybody living on top of each other)

- people make friends with one another in "The Oasis", but it doesn't mean they
meet with one another in real life
- people find community within their clans
- Halladay wants whoever wins the challenge (the new owner of the Oasis) to be
connected to the world
- the Oasis allows people to make friends and find love
- people will unite for justice and for a cause (in this case, against IOI)
- the community (the Stacks) united with the Wade, H, Artemis, and the others
against IOI
- Wade decides to split everything with his "clan"

Power - artifacts and money give people power in "The Oasis"

- if you find the easter egg that the creator left in the Oasis, they get special
powers and everything the creator left (total control over the Oasis)
- Sixers (work for the Innovative Online Industries) - put everything into winning
to gain power
- can also get power through streaming sites (i.e. Artemis on Twitch); allows
them to become popular
- risk their actual lives and finances in order to succeed in The Oasis
- more money in real life allows you to gain more power in The Oasis
- can control people through bribery
- the people with money and power in the real world can control The Oasis and
the world with technology and money
- IOI controls everyone and causes people to go into debt to play the game,
leading to them using the debt to keep people under their control
- they also have power in IOI, with their own factory where they make people in
their debt do their bidding
- everyone can just die by use of certain weapons
- Wade had the power to to end Oasis and be the sole proprietor of the Oasis, but
he chose not to

Politics - in the Oasis, the powerful are the people with the artifacts and money
- clans and industries have more power, allowing them to squash their opponents
- the large industries, such as Innovative Online Industries, control The Oasis and
the real world
- the people with power and money, such as the IOI, can control whoever they
want with their resources
Justice - fighting against the Innovative Online Industries so they don't gain complete
control over the real world and The Oasis
- Artemis is trying to get justice for her dad against IOI, who her dad went into
debt for and never recovered
- all the players banded together to fight against IOI