Vladimir Rizov – författare

This innovative book examines how videogames engage with crime and its control. It treats games as ideological representations, in which ideas about policing, justice, and criminality are formed and reproduced. Covering over fifty videogames and blending insights from criminology, game studies, affect and social theory, the book explores how games reproduce injustice and inequality. Central to the book is the idea of the ‘ludic unconscious’—the notion that in videogames the convergence of gameplay mechanics and narrative sensibilities are affectively and politically meaningful. It is an essential read for students and academics interested in the intersections of crime, ideology, and play.

This book uses popular films to understand the convergence of crime control and the ideology of repression in contemporary capitalism. It focuses on the cinematic figure of the fallen guardian, a protagonist who, in the course of a narrative, falls from grace and becomes an enemy of the established social order. The fallen guardian is a figure that allows for the analysis of a particular crime control measure through the perspective of both an enforcer and a target. The very notion of ‘justice’ is challenged, and questions are posed in relation to the role that films assume in the reproduction of policing as it is. In doing so, the book combines a historical far-reaching perspective with popular culture analysis. At the core remains the value of the cinematic figure of the fallen guardian for contemporary understandings of urban space and urban crime control and how films are clear examples of the ways in which the ideology of repression is reproduced.This book questions thejustifications that are often given for social control in cities and understands cinema as a medium for offering critique of such processes and justifications. Explored are the crime control measures of private policing in relation to RoboCop (1987), preventative policing and Minority Report (2002), mass incarceration in The Dark Knight Rises (2012), and extra-judicial killing in Blade Runner 2049 (2017). The book speaks to those interested in crime control in critical criminology, cultural criminology, urban studies, and beyond.