The very fact that John Wick's newest iteration is around the corner is making the genre of "revenge action" see some sort of hike. I mean, it's not that we ever stopped loving these stories, but if online consumption algorithms are an indication of something, Revenge is all the rave.

I know and at the same time, don't know why we love these type of stories so much. Yes, we get an adrenaline shot from watching someone get justice, fix the wrong, avenge their loved ones, etc. Without a doubt there is a chemical release in our brain that is very pleasurable. But... Why? Why do we need to feel this?

What we know...

Plenty of people who are a lot smarter than me have studied the science of revenge, if you can call it that. We know, almost for as long as humanity has been living in societies, that revenge doesn't really work. It extends the cycle of violence, and in the end fixes nothing.

Therefor we know that taking revenge might give us a small hit of dopamine, a short lived high, but only to be followed by the ugliest of crashes. It's like keeping a wound alive for the sake of feeling the pain for ever.

What we don't know...

Is why we evolved to love revenge so much. The idea, that is, not actually partaking of it, as I've explained before.

I love entertaining myself with hypotheticals at times. I love thinking about the ancient man, how some behaviors, how some abilities we have, don't seem to be useful anymore but they were a necessity in our early development.

Our ability to store a lot of fat in our bodies, for example. Our ability to fast, to sweat like we do, etc. Our mob behaviors are also a remnant of our earlier years, and I can with some brain muscle imagine why the mob was needed before we would enjoy today's calm realities.

With this in mind, I've been trying to build a mental framework for the usefulness of revenge, and failing to see how "it helped" back in the day. How it was a net positive for us simple humans.

I realize

Any sort of philosophical exploration is not needed to enjoy a movie. A movie is just entertainment after all. I would not expect many people to spend much time thinking of these things, nor do I think it's very useful to do so. But curioisity seems to get the best of me these days.

Let me ask you... Why do we thirst for it? Why did we evolve to do so?