Barbenheimer … or Oppenbarbie?
The debate rages on over which film you should see first.
Forget your sun/moon/rising, your Enneagram, and your Myers-Briggs type—this weekend, there’s only one personality indicator that matters: Are you Barbie-Oppenheimer, or are you Oppenheimer-Barbie?
After many months of hype, the joint release date of Greta Gerwig’s Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer is almost upon us, and as you’ve doubtless heard, many moviegoers are planning double features. But precisely the order that double feature should go in—do you want to start with a literal bang or end with one?—has become a highly contested topic. People are arguing about it, declaring their allegiances, posting their official schedules for the day, and riffing deliriously on social media. Many of the stars of the movie were asked the question on the red carpet too. (Issa Rae recommends going Opp, then Barb.) I even saw one voter registration nonprofit talking about the order question on Twitter—it’s taken on a life of its own
The more interesting question, then, might be what your Barbenheimer order says about you. Katie Kasperson, a writer and photographer based in the U.K., thinks you can actually tell a lot about someone from whether they’re Barbie-Oppenheimer or the other way around. (She’s ending with Oppenheimer: “It would feel criminal to watch Oppenheimer at, like, 10 in the morning,” she said.) “I think it shows a person’s tolerance for seriousness over silliness, for being able to sit with something that’s maybe a bit depressing,” she told me. “There are some people who need a ‘cleanse’ after they’ve watched something scary, disturbing, upsetting, etc., and then there are people who prefer to sit with those feelings and let them sink in. I’d consider myself in the second group—I like to really reflect after watching something rather than instantly washing it away. Maybe I’m weird for that. But I think I’ll need to sit with Oppenheimer longer than I’ll need to sit with Barbie. Barbie feels like the cleanse. Maybe it also has to do with a person’s tolerance for seriousness at a certain time of day—I’d rather start my day light and end heavy.”
You heard it here first: Your Barbenheimer decision may have more existential implications than you realize. Or maybe it’s the new BuzzFeed quiz result, just a fun, dumb thing to chat about. Disagree? Well, that sounds like something someone who’s seeing the movies in the order that you are would say
Oppenheimer Is Now Available to Stream! How to Watch the Film at Home
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