It's hard to miss Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson nowadays. November marks the release of "Get Rich or Die Tryin,'" a movie about 50's progression from dealing drugs to a career in rap music, and the video game "50 Cent: Bulletproof," where you can guide 50 through his mission to get revenge for being shot nine times.
While the two seem thematically different, what they share is the portrayal of 50, not as a music artist, but as a gun-toting criminal.
And 50 seems to be the film's only lure. Thousands of voters on the well-known and generally respected film authority, the Internet Movie Database gave "Get Rich or Die Tryin' " a whopping 2.8 stars out of 10, putting it on par with such classics as "The Real Cancun" and "Leprechaun 4: In Space."
The story has been done before, as well, vis a vis "Hustle and Flow" and "8-Mile." Though 50 said during an interview that it's 70 percent based on actual events, the gangsta-turned-rapper theme lacks novelty.
Of course, despite all of this, it's still in the top 10 at the box office. While this might say something about moviegoers' bad taste, it also speaks for 50's powerful influence.
Granted, I'll probably end up buying the game just because it looks cool. Most games with pop-culture themes or based on films are often slapdash attempts to cash in on movie fans -- blending crummy graphics with generic engines and either painfully brief or completely repetitious game play. But "Bulletproof" is put out by the same company that made "F.E.A.R" and "Empire Earth," and the story was written by the executive producer of "The Sopranos."
Of course, with "Get Rich of Die Tryin'" it seems as though they won't have to worry about having any movie fans.
It's not as if the game is trying to come off as factual, though. There are elements in "Bulletproof" that make it fantastic. No matter what 50 did on the street before becoming a rapper, he probably didn't have a LAW rocket, nor did he survive intense shootouts wearing bling the size of a Chihuahua.
The thing is, while games such as "Grand Theft Auto III: San Andreas" and "True Crime: New York City" have black protagonists committing every crime imaginable, this does not strike me as problematic; there are just as many games with likened violence that have protagonists of every other color.
Hell, sometimes you can choose your color.
The problem with "Bulletproof" is what it says about 50. Just as with the movie, which was advertised as a sort of wake-up call for getting 50's priorities straight, there is no shame in his game.
One post in particular spared "Get Rich of Die Tryin' " an abysmal rating and justified this by saying that it took a lot of courage for 50 to display such a shameful part of his life. But that's what is clearly missing from both the movie and the game -- 50 is not the least bit ashamed.
While the poster for the movie has him holding an infant, he is not rapping about family picnics and the importance of a good education. Even if the movie is about the prevalence of making music over slinging rock, it no sooner looks down on the street life as it lauds family values.
'Cause like it or not, 50 is a role model to a lot of people. That is the key difference in having a figure in a game steal, use people as human shields and deal drugs -- they are not role models.
People don't write "Grand Theft Auto's" Carl Johnson saying how he's changed their life: He's fictional, and his influence ends when the game is turned off.
50's doesn't.
Darren Todd is an English literature graduate student. Reach him at darren.todd@asu.edu.
