Fiction/Reality Emotion Phenomenon

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers from the movie U.S. Marshals.  If you haven’t seen it and you want to, don’t read!

            I believe very strongly in the reality of Star Wars and Harry Potter.  I can tell you who my favorite DC and Marvel heroes and villains are (I usually prefer the villains).  I will fight you if you say Prince Caspian never lived.  Fictional characters have had a profound impact on my life; I would not be me if I hadn’t lost Archie Kennedy in the eighth episode of Horatio Hornblower.

            The first Robert Downey Jr. movie I ever saw was U.S. Marshals (1998), with Tommy Lee Jones—the sequel to The Fugitive (1993).  My very favorite character in both movies is Deputy Marshal Noah Newman, played by Tom Wood—not a hugely major character, but one of Tommy Lee Jones’s henchmen, and a wonderful man.  He’s the “kid” of the bunch, but we see him mature quite a bit between the two movies.  I loved him; halfway through U.S. Marshals, I was planning our wedding.  It came as a heartbreaking shock to me, then, when he rushes into the room to help his supposed “friend,” played by Robert Downey Jr., and Robert Downey Jr. just turns and shoots him.  Noah Woodrow Newman, age 32, died on the way to the hospital.  I could not get over it—either Robert Downey Jr.’s character’s treachery, or the fact that my favorite character had died!  After the movie was over, I had to walk around outside for twenty minutes just to cool off.

            Ever since then, I have not been able to have the same enthusiasm for Robert Downey Jr. that my friends have.  When we went to the movie theatre to buy our tickets for the midnight premiere of The Avengers, I could hardly look at his face on all the posters and displays.  It’s a good thing I root for Loki¸ I thought, because I’m pretty sure I could never like Robert Downey Jr.  My friends thought I was insane.  They told me he was a fabulous actor, and how could I not think he was wildly attractive?  They said I just needed to see Sherlock Holmes and I would feel different, and how on earth could I have never seen Iron Man?  But it just didn’t work.

            After I had my ticket in my hot little hand and the deal was sealed—I would indeed be seeing Robert Downey Jr. in another movie—I decided it would be a good thing if I learned to like Robert Downey Jr.  So I watched interviews and movie clips; I learned about his personal life, about his children, Indio and Exton.  I looked at pictures of him on Pinterest.  Sure, he looks great with his shirt off.  I even repinned a picture of him with the caption, “Fine.  I admit it.  He’s good-looking.”  But all it took was one glimpse of him young and clean-shaven, and I wanted to puke.  No matter how much effort I put into it, I still associate him with his character in U.S. Marshals!  I see him as a traitor and a murderer.  I see him as the man who shot and killed my beloved Noah Newman. 

            Isn’t it interesting what an impact fiction has on reality?  If I were ever to meet Robert Downey Jr., who knows how long it would take me to get over this dislike of him?  It’s not his fault his character was a git—worse than that, a murderer of perfectly wonderful men—or at least, one.  But still I hold it against him.  Is this some sort of certifiable mental illness?  Nerd Syndrome, or something?