Joe Gamer

Watching television recently I caught a movie that I personally had not seen in over thirty years. In this story the protagonist is trying to live free when he has a run in with a crooked law man. The movie is the 1978 story of Western Ruggedness, Convoy.

While watching the film I was struck by how the protagonist, Martin ‘Rubber Duck’ Penwald, was a very reluctant leader and hero. Rubber Duck simply wanted to live his life doing what he loved. When the antagonist, Arizona Sheriff Lyle ‘Cottonmouth’ Wallace, entraps Duck and his friends, the truckers haul tail for New Mexico to avoid a wrongful prosecution.

One might ask why I’m talking about a 70′s trucker film in a gaming blog, and that’s a valid question. Rubber Duck struck me as an archetypal Chaotic Good character. Duck is a genuinely good guy that typically follows the rules of the land, but when those rules are used unjustly he has no qualms about ignoring the rules or those that attempt to enforce them. Duck has no dreams of being a leader or messiah even though others want to thrust such a mantle upon him. Even as others fall in line with him, following him almost blindly, he’s simply driving to be free.

Cottenmouth similarly strikes me as very Lawful Neutral, perhaps even Lawful Evil, but I don’t really think he is evil. Cottenmouth does have a bit of a sadistic streak when it comes to truckers, and he uses his authority to his own ends in these regards. Never during the course of the film did I consider him evil however, though I must admit that right at the very end as Cottenmouth is firing a military machine gun mounted on a Texas State Riot Police tank directly into the Rubber Duck’s truck, Cottenmouth had a bit of a sadistic grin going. I also have to admit that Rubber Duck really pushed all of Cottenmouth’s buttons simply by ignoring the sheriff and everyone gets a little extra sadistic as he or she finally gets to swat at that really annoying bug once and for all. Ignore the fact that it was Cottenmouth that riled up that bug to begin with.

There is one quote that really outlines the two characters and their representations of Chaotic Good and Lawful Neutral. It is:
Sheriff Lyle Wallace aka Cottonmouth: I am the law. Don’t you understand, I represent the law.
Rubber Duck: Well piss on ya, and piss on your law.

Check out Convoy. It’s a fun, if slow, movie. It nicely illustrates how you can have real conflict with very little in the way of violence and between adversaries neither of whom are evil. Also notice how as the conflict escalates so does the violence to the point where I don’t think either of the characters would have seen themselves capable of committing in the beginning of the movie.

© 2011, admin. All rights reserved.