#RAHH THANK YOU FOR ASKING I'M SORRY IT TOOK ME A HOT MINUTE TO GET BACK TO YOU

[postapocalyptic-cryptic]

@messyspacespades HI THANK YOU FOR YOUR INTEREST

Basically, I started out thinking "I bet I could write an essay about how tf bayverse is military propaganda for this class about toys and entertainment." Consulted my prof and she gave me the green light bc she's wonderful. Dove into the research sauce and the first thing I pulled up was an essay detailing how the US military actually funded Bayverse.

They gave money, they gave props, they let them film parts of it in the fucking Pentagon.

Obviously, this piqued my interest. I looked a little further and found a Master's thesis about the USAmerican politics of TF. This was right up my alley (my area of expertise is pop culture and american politics) so I started going a little crazy. I found out that not only did the Department of Defense fund Bayverse, they gave specific instructions on how bayverse would be written/portray the US. Apparently, this is a common thing that the DoD does regularly.

So that was part of the essay. The other part was about how the first bayverse movie pushes an american exceptionalism agenda and justifies American presence in the Middle East. It was super fun to write, and now it's gotten me money AND an opening slot at a symposium which is WILD.