Ageing in DIY and alternative cultures: Exploring forms of masculinity and adult play in Jackass forever

Abstract

This article explores ageing in alternative cultures and co-existing forms of hyper and alternative masculinity in the US film Jackass Forever released in 2022. The film is a continuation of the original Jackass show launched in 2000. Although a highly profitable franchise, we argue Jackass is part of an alternative culture through its playfulness and pranks that are also dangerous and revel in self-humiliation. Most of the stunts and skits also adopt a DIY approach and reflect forms of perceived masculine and adolescent pranking and clowning. We argue that such alternative and DIY-influenced activities allow men to keep enjoying alternative, ‘carnivalesque’ forms of adult play well into middle-age and can have a pro-social and beneficial impact across men's life course. Yet even if subversive, Jackass can still also reproduce masculine constraints, including suppressing the expression of boundaries and vulnerable emotions.

Introduction

In this article, we explore forms of ‘adult play’ seen in the film Jackass Forever, which is part of the Jackass TV and film phenomenon that consists of ‘skits’ and ‘pranks’ where men participate in things like dangerous risk-taking, grotesque humour and ‘carnival style’ spectacles (Bakhtin, 1984). Despite its over the top nature and commercial success, we propose Jackass Forever nevertheless has one foot firmly placed in DIY and alternative cultures and offers possible pathways of empowerment and connection for men that are particularly appealing in an era where risk and uncertainty tend to generate anxiety in adults (Beck, 1992). This is especially the case in contemporary times where pathways to ‘adulthood’ and status require navigating problematic and hierarchical gender conventions, an increasingly precarious workforce and career-eroding effects that unsettle perceived ‘traditional’ gender roles, and pathways of maturity and success for men.

DIY and alternative cultures can be the sites of creative identity-making, joy and freedom for individuals attracted to subversion and resistance, and an outlet for ‘amateurs’ without high social status or resources (Bennett and Guerra, 2019; Guerra and Quintela, 2020; Kaitajärvi-Tiekso, 2019; Langman, 2008). DIY is typically defined against ‘more mainstream, mass produced and commodified forms of culture’ (Bennett & Guerra 2019: 3), in which Jackass Forever is clearly imbricated as a multi-million dollar film released by major studio Paramount Pictures. As Oliveira (2023) observes, DIY practices and careers today pragmatically coexist and intersect with mainstream spheres that used to be opposed. Our focus is less on the material infrastructures of the film than the cultural practices and subjectivities it promotes, which as we will discuss are grounded in DIY and alternative cultures. Notably these include alternative sports like skateboarding, as well as pranks and clowning associated with historical working-class, male sociality, with deeper precedents in carnival traditions.

Jackass Forever sheds light on how men can continue to express resistance to hierarchical gender norms through enjoying adult play well into middle age, and what kinds of pro-social and beneficial impacts this can have. Yet hyper-masculine cultures, even if subversive and transgressive, can still mask hegemonic practices. We emphasise the importance of men being able to express a range of emotions, care, and respect for boundaries that can be suppressed in alternative and conventional cultures.

Background

In our sociological exploration of the film Jackass Forever, we highlight how part of the appeal is its ability to provide a sense of escapism and a detour away from the burdens of adulthood and conventional markers of maturity and success, such as seriousness and authority (Brayton, 2007; Sahini, 2013). This paper explores a range of grotesque yet transgressive expressions of hyper-masculinity demonstrated in Jackass Forever, which we argue can generate positive experiences for older men, particularly adults perceived to be ‘middle-aged’. Men who are well into their adulthood have historically faced pressure to be in control and become breadwinners, and sterner and/or more serious authority figures as they age. The world of ‘risk’ alternative cultures has typically been studied in activities and scenes once presumed to be only youth cultures but can have surprising longevity and social strong-holds as participants age (Bennett 2013).

The Jackass franchise is produced and distributed by major media companies. Yet, we argue it still stands as a strong expression of both DIY and alternative cultures due to how it revels in carnival-style spectacles and hyper-youthful masculine pranks and stunts that typically involve high levels of risk and pain endurance (Cliver, 2002; Sahini, 2013). Unlike other aggressive and highly physical pursuits typically aligned with forms of hyper-masculinity, such as those seen in mainstream competitive sports cultures (Connell, 1995), the ‘gross-out’ and extreme activities in Jackass Forever are presented above all as a quest for laughs and thrills. And, while these may be captured through high-production filming techniques for the big screen, most of the stunts and skits in Jackass Forever have long adopted and continue to lean heavily on a DIY approach of embracing home-made props, items, and obstacles that reflect longer-practiced forms of perceived adolescent masculine pranking and clowning, such as in skateboarding videos as discussed below.

The Jackass Forever film features key original cast members such as Johnny Knoxville (52), Steve O (49), Wee Man (50) and others who have been predominantly white, heterosexual men (Brayton, 2007). But as post-subcultural theory (Bennett, 2011) reminds us, individuals in scenes are not necessarily homogenous, and participants may have varying associations and expressions of identities, especially in more contemporary eras. Interestingly, Thomson (2022) points to how Jackass Forever is multiracial, with an expanded cast that includes Zach Holmes, Eric Manaka, Eric Andre, Japser and his father Compston ‘Black Shark’ Wilson, and there is also one woman, Rachel Wolfson. However, our main focus for this article is on the original cast.

As we shall see, similar to alternative music scenes (Bennett 2006, 2013, 2018) and even in highly physical scenes such as surfing (Wheaton, 2019) and skateboarding (O’Connor, 2018, Willing et al., 2019), older men who continue to participate in alternative cultures into middle-age can gain relief from social expectations, as well as a sense of bonding, status and acceptance that we will address further in the discussion.

As the following examples from different historical time periods will suggest, an emphasis on pranks and stunts has long been evident among youth. However, there is an absence of understanding into how such behaviours may continue to be of interest or attraction to men who have reached middle-age. The guiding research questions for this study are: What kinds of positive collective meanings and experiences can we observe in Jackass Forever? Plus, what types of masculinity are observed to underpin the clowning and carnival style adult play that these older men engage in? And, what are some of the constraints and challenges might men still face despite their attempts to subvert conventional forms of masculine power and status as they age?

Pranks and risk in the context of adult resistance and adult play

As an object of academic study, pranks, risk, and carnival style adult play as a form of middle-aged adult resistance as seen in films like Jackass Forever remain an under-researched topic. Not surprisingly, the Jackass franchise receives more attention in studies of youth cultures (Brayton, 2007; Sahini, 2013; Yochin, 2010). It is also studied within research on alternative cultures in a debate on whether it represents a liminal form of art when once featured in the Museum of Modern Art (Roy 2022).

The cast of Jackass is also comparatively wealthy due to the franchise's success and their own subsequent careers which situates it as an expression of resistance that is also commodified. The original Jackass movie in 2002 cost 5 million and made 60 million dollars upon its release. Johnny Knoxville, a key cast member, is a well-known entertainment figure and has starred in a range of Hollywood productions. Other cast members such as Spike Jonez is an Academy Award-winning director of serious feature films, and the production side and cameos include professional skaters such as Bam Magara and others who are actors.

The characters of Jackass nevertheless exemplify and indeed personify, an anti-heroism in alternative cultures while leveraging this with forms of ‘subcultural capital’ (Thornton, 1995). The main men ‘characters’ are represented as ‘ordinary guys’ who have grown up doing working-class jobs and who have various alternative interests in men-dominated activities and interests, including skateboarding (Willing et al., 2019) and through dress styles, tattoos and soundtracks (Bennett and Guerra, 2019).

Importantly, in the case of Jackass, this subcultural capital is converted to economic capital, with Jackass Forever grossing $57.8 million in the US and Canada, with a worldwide total of $80.5 million. The financial success of Jackass thus indicates that despite its DIY approaches and aesthetics, it is an entangled form of adult resistance rather than wholesale rejection of corporate distribution and backing. Jackass Forever was produced by MTV in conjunction with Dickhouse Productions (co-owned by Jackass creators Johnny Knoxville, Jeff Tremaine and Spike Jonze), and distributed by Paramount Pictures. Such ties between ‘carnival and commerce’ (Anderton, 2011) are however also co-existing paradoxes in music scenes and festivals (see e.g. Cummings, 2008) and also scenes such as skateboarding where it is noted how it is shaped by both elements of flexible opposition and late capitalism (Dinces, 2011).

The humour in the Jackass franchise is purposely low-brow and ‘tasteless’, rejecting middle-class manners and witty satire to instead employ grotesque toilet humour, jokes with farts and about genitals, and other humour that can be described as in ‘bad taste’, fitting what Bakhtin (2009: 147 cited in Hackley, 2013: 939) refers to as ‘scatalogical liberties’. Men losing their composure and yelling, groaning or even passing out in pain, often from ridiculously designed stunts, continues as a staple in the Jackass franchise.

Several examples of ‘clowning’ activities discussed in existing sociological work also help to illustrate how all the Jackass shows and films build on a long-established and temporally varied form of alternative cultural practice. For example, Pearson (1983, 1994) cites the intriguing example of the 17th century London apprentices known as ‘hooligans’ who engaged in ritualistic, often reckless, activities that earned them a reputation for rowdiness and anti-social behaviour among the authorities and members of elite society.

Taking a broader look at why transgressive behaviours could both provide relief and offer a way to resist various pressures associated with oppressive forms of adulthood in society, we can also turn to Beck (1992) who argues that prominent characteristics of everyday life in late modernity are risk and uncertainty. In late modern society and the ‘age of the precariat’ (Standing, 2011) people must now face the prospect that they are likely to experience non-linear and unpredictable life pathways (Furlong and Cartmel, 1997; MacDonald, 2011). This motivates some young people to reject expected pathways and lifestyles, and pursue more ethically and creatively fulfilling DIY practices in punk and alternative music scenes, for example (Threadgold 2018).

In re-empowering themselves, some people are argued to draw on resources more available or appealing (and amusing) to them – their leisure practices, which can include alternative cultures and DIY cultures – and perhaps the most important yet overlooked resource, their own bodies. As Shilling (2003: ix) observes, the body is ‘central to our ability to “make a difference to,” to intervene in, or to exercise agency in the world’. In the case of alternative cultures, the body has typically been analysed in terms of its functioning as a vehicle for re-empowerment through a variety of practices including stylistic innovation (Hebdige, 1979), body modification (Sweetman, 2004), dance (McRobbie, 1994), or sports such as skateboarding (Willing et al., 2019, 2020). Each of these categories are now well recognised aspects of youth leisure and ‘subcultural capital’ (Thornton, 1995) and, from the point of view of academic studies of DIY cultures, are easily recreated, adopted and embraced in a global context.

In this study, we introduce the term ‘adult play’ to refer to a form of relief and resistance that can be observed to be embraced by adults well into middle-age, and which builds on concepts found in studies on urban nightlife and young people. Chatterton and Hollands (2002) coined the term urban ‘playscapes’ to describe the urban spaces – typically, bars, pubs and nightclubs – where young people congregate and are able to embrace acts of buffoonery and clowning and often spontaneous displays of comic and risk-taking behaviour. In these lifestyle spaces, where transgressive forms of play and risk-taking are normalized, accepted conventions of social normality can be more easily eschewed.

In this respect, pertinent comparisons can also be made with Bakhtin's (1984) concept of the ‘carnivalesque’. Bakhtin's analytical point of reference is the Middle Ages, a period marked by a rich ‘unofficial folk culture’ which, as Bakhtin observes, was characterised by ‘its own territory’ (Bakhtin, 1984: 154). Within this space, carnival humour is ambivalent in its content, which is ‘gay, triumphant and at the same time mocking, deriding’ (Bakhtin, 1984: 11), and universal in its targets, including the participants themselves. According to Bakhtin (1984), the carnival traits he describes in relation to the 16th century market place can be universally applied to any culture at any time in history. Acting the fool, through buffoonery or engaging in dangerous yet simultaneously comic stunts, are among the carnival strategies that people employ as a means of subverting the official culture.

Historically speaking, the clown figure is also relevant, as it has been characterised by its quintessentially non-serious and un-heroic mannerisms and demeanour. Rather than craving respect, the clown figure invites laughter and ridicule (Newton, 1958). A broadly similar stance is adopted by the cast in Jackass whose antics are intended to produce a comparable response among peers and other onlookers. Such objectives are in sharp contrast to those pre-figuring more conventionally understood manifestations of hegemonic masculinity and adult image and style where the emphasis has been very much upon being taken ‘seriously’, by peers and superiors (see, e.g. Chambers, 1985; Hebdige, 1979).

An example of where clowning and risk merge into defiant acts of individual thrill-seeking, social bonding, and resistance to adult norms is the highly popular activity of pranking in public for Internet and social media videos which can range from shopping cart racing to ‘planking’ and various other absurd, risk-taking and/or dangerous challenges (Abraham et al., 2022).

Rojek (1999, 2015) also explores in his studies of ‘abnormal leisure’ a moral dimension that has historically been constructed as part of the role of leisure that can push less ‘wholesome’ or palatable forms to the periphery. As Rojek observes, originally leisure was seen as a social good and even medicalized and, as such, leisure habits seen as ‘abnormal’ were framed as deviant and attached to lower status. Rojek (1999: 28) maintains ‘that there are three types of abnormal leisure in contemporary society: invasive, mephitic and wild’. The first two are not as relevant, with the invasive type referring to activities such as drug taking and being taken up mostly by introverts, and the mephitic type to things such as external aggression and abuse and even killing.

The wild type of abnormal leisure however is more carnivqalesque and involves spectacle, ‘where a ritualized loosening of civil culture occurs’ (Rojek, 1999: 31). Wild leisure is however linked to a kind of temporality and seizing of the moment such as joyrides or riots at events and festivals rather than more ongoing abnormal ‘leisure careers’. Rojek (1999: 33) explains ‘since part of the pleasure of wild forms is to be noticed by others, participation carries the risk of detection and censure. If wild leisure careers develop, they are typically less durable’. Here, we argue that Jackass Forever is a form of wild leisure that has been transformed into a leisure identity that can endure into middle-age, partly due to its commercial success but also, as shall soon discuss, the broader sense of resistance and identity it offers.

Adult play as seen in Jackass also subverts this sensibility in several ways. Firstly, it displays a lack of concern for issues of personal comfort and safety, such things being commonly ascribed as desirable in the context of physical ageing where the body is more susceptible to aches and pains and physical injury is typically accompanied by a longer and in some cases more arduous healing process. Against this backdrop of an ageing and increasingly risk averse society, the ageing cast of Jackass continue to subject themselves to acts involving personal discomfort and danger. Secondly, the Jackass cast's behaviour subverts the accepted mainstream notion of age appropriate behaviour through maintaining as a focus the engaging in precisely the same kind of ‘daring stunts’ and idiot-like spectacles that first earned Jackass its status as a cult TV series back in 2000–2001 among a then primarily youth audience.

Similarly in the context of Jackass Forever, the spaces appropriated for DIY forms of high risk pranks and dares are those same spaces where the Jackass cast first earned global notoriety as younger versions of themselves. Again, this serves to subvert mainstream notions of ‘respectable ageing’ as the now middle aged Jackass cast are seen pursuing their extreme antics in places such as shopping mall car parks, street corners and the gardens of each other's houses. Each of these and similar locations in Jackass continue to be demarcated as the playscapes of youth from the perspective of a dominant society who also consider this a means through which youth can frequently be sanctioned due to threats to public order or their labelling as a public nuisance. For the middle aged cast of Jackass to be seen using similar spaces in similar ways issues a series of challenges to conventional perceptions of public (dis)order and its reliance on strict observance of codes governing age (in)appropriate behaviour. There are clear parallels here with Bennett's (2006; 2013; 2018) work on ageing punks and other music genres such as Electronic Dance Music where, through their ongoing engagement with such genres, ageing fans subvert mainstream expectations of ageing through maintaining individual and collective cultural sensibilities, tastes and practices acquired during their youth and now firmly entrenched as part of their ongoing ageing identities.

Men and masculinity

Our exploration of Jackass Forever focuses primarily on men who are cisgender, which refers to people who identify with the gender assigned to them at birth. Our study is framed by the stance that gender is not biologically determined and expressions of gender are socially shaped, embodied and constantly performed rather than being set and innate (Butler 1990). Gender is also more varied than binary categories of just men and women (O'Sullivan 2021), including individuals who are agender, non-binary, transgender and gender diverse. However, for the purpose of our study, the seminal work of Connell (1995) and later Connell and Messerschmidt (2005) is valuable for understanding how formations of gender can be hierarchical, with ‘masculinity’ accorded the highest status in Western society and ‘femininity’ positioned as inferior and submissive.

The term ‘hegemonic masculinity’ refers to a type of gender expression and performance that is centred on notions of winning, maintaining dominance, upholding power and an assumed superiority (Connell, 1995; Connell and Messerschmidt, 2005). ‘Hegemonic masculinity’ as an ideal also subordinates the value of things like learning from losing, failure, fear and being openly emotional and being respectful to other genders and treating them equally. ‘Hyper-masculinity’ refers to exaggerated forms of masculine traits such as being strong, powerful and aggressive, which in sports and alternative scenes can also involve extreme physicality and risk-taking. For example, Willing et al. (2019) argue that hyper-masculinity has been a common feature in the male-dominated, world of skateboarding for many men, where those who have overt physical strength and are risk-takers with less regard for safety are admired and given status.

Hall et al.'s (2007) study of typically working class and male dominated occupations, which have valued hegemonic masculine traits, supports the work of Butler (1990) who argues that gender is ‘done’ but also ‘undone’. Their study draws attention to the mental health benefits for men of acknowledging stigmatized acts like crying and being caring (Hall et al., 2007: 549). Studies of ‘alternative masculinity’, ‘caring masculinity’ and ‘new masculinities’ (Lund et al., 2019) also shed light on ways masculinity can allow for more emotional range, less emphasis on winning and less dominant ways of relating. Such forms of masculinity in DIY and alternative scenes have been observed in Willing et al.'s (2019) study of a documentary following the lives of professional skateboarders who, once they reached their 40s and 50s gave themselves permission to be vulnerable and cry. They note, ‘such displays of vulnerability and the emotional impact skateboarding has … sits in contrast with the performances of more hyper and hegemonic masculinity seen in other parts of the video’ (Willing et al., 2019: 12). In other words, ageing appears to be one of the factors that opens up avenues for alternative forms of masculinity to co-exist with hyper-masculine forms.

Indeed, ‘ageing masculinity’ and ‘mature masculinity’ are also observed as leading to a similar softening and easing of hegemonic forms in traditionally male dominated scenes, even where hyper-masculinity is a central feature in other studies of skateboarding (O’Connor, 2018; Willing et al., 2020). O’Conner (2017: 12) states that one of the appeals for older skaters is that, ‘age and subcultural knowledge of skateboarding positioned many skateboarders in unique situations, and in turn provided them with access to social networks that further enhanced their social and cultural capital’.

Willing et al.'s (2020) research on older high-profile skaters is a way to link the relationship that can exist between more ‘caring’ forms of masculinity and ‘ageing’ masculinity. Their research identifies how in the 1980s, hyper-masculine ‘bad boy’ archetypes were pitted against men who were described by one competitor as ‘boy scouts’ due to their less aggressive personas. As both groups of men aged, they were able to embrace a wider emotional range such as crying and showing admiration and respect for men from other teams through what they shared in common with them rather than narrow perceptions of ‘manhood’ and being pressured to conquer rather than care about them.

The original cast of interest in Jackass Forever are predominantly cisgender, white and heterosexual men who express and perform a variation of hyper-masculinity (such as physical risk-taking) and with occasional alternative formations (such as being non-competitive) and ageing masculinity (self-aware of not being at their ‘peak’, having admiration for other men). However, it is worth noting observations of, at times, appreciative relationships between Queer and in particular Gay audiences and the Jackass franchise too. Thomson (2022) argues that the hyper, yet also alternative masculinity in Jackass is something that Queer people can embrace, and star cast member Knoxville also positively acknowledges this in an interview in Flickering Myth (2022). Halter (2022) in a film review of Jackass Forever also argued the franchise has created:

An atmosphere of intense homoeroticism, as palpable as that found in any fraternity, barracks, or locker room. “Jackass” now seems ahead of its time in depicting a misfit masculinity that allows for a great deal of shared nudity, bodily exploration, and taboo busting, and the inclusion of cameos over the years from the likes of John Waters and the late Rip Taylor brings the occasional element of authentic gay camp.

Here we suggest that it is helpful to trace the origins of the youthful, alternative, even transgressive, masculinities celebrated in Jackass Forever to earlier forms of D.I.Y skateboarding and snowboarding niche media (i.e. films and magazines).

Research on masculinities in alternative sports, such as skateboarding and snowboarding, has drawn upon the concept of fratriarchy to explain the gendered performativities of young men (Nicolls, n.d.; Thorpe, 2010). Fratriarchy refers to a group of young men who compete for prestige through demonstrations of physical prowess, courage and gameness. Put simply, fratriarchy is the ‘rule of the brother-[hood]s’ (Remy, 1990, cited in Loy, 1995: 265). According to Remy (1990), fratriarchy (a) ‘is a mode of male domination which is concerned with a quite different set of values from those of patriarchy’; (b) ‘is based simply on the self-interest of the association of men itself’; (c) ‘reflects the demand of a group of lads to have the ‘freedom’ to do as they please, to have a good time’; and (d) ‘implies primarily the domination of the age set . . . of young men who have not taken on family responsibilities’ (cited in Loy, 1995: 265). While fratriarchies work to ‘develop male bonding, maintain sex segregation, and generate an ideology of male supremacy’ (Loy, 1995: 267), they are also about men's relationships with one another, brought together through humour, bodily and emotional vulnerability, and often pain.

Across the social world, young men engage in action situations in which they display, test, and subject their behaviour to social evaluation, including a range of sporting cultures. Physical prowess, risk taking and a ‘hard-core’ image (e.g. hedonistic and party lifestyle, disregard for authority, hetero-sexual pursuits and high jinks) are all important aspects of the fratriarchal masculinity embodied by many young men in alternative sporting cultures (i.e. skateboarding, snowboarding), and endorsed in D.I.Y and niche media during the 1990s (i.e. Whiskey snowboarding Videos, Big Brother skateboarding magazines) (Thorpe, 2007, 2010). Various cultural commentators have acknowledged these niche media as predecessors to the highly successful Jackass series (Nicholls, no date). As one writes, ‘Whisky was Jackass before Jackass was Jackass’ (Slap Magazine, 2011). For young men to feature in the Canadian-produced Whiskey videos, for example, they were required to break empty beer bottles over their heads, vomit and perform a range of pranks, some including homo-erotic humour (Thorpe, 2010).

There are important synergies between the early skateboarding and snowboarding niche media, and the Jackass series. Many of the original Jackass crew began their careers in the skateboarding culture of the 1980s and 1990s, with their early media productions finding popularity for their unapologetic celebration of a range of fratriarchal practices (i.e. pranks, disregard for their own and other's bodies, damaging of private and public property). While they were not the first to develop this hyper-fratriarchal style of media product, they were the first to introduce this ‘genre’ to the masses. Interestingly, however, Jackass Forever is a celebration of middle-aged men continuing to practise and perform fratriarchal pranks well beyond their youth. Importantly, Jackass Forever has clear traces back to the skateboarding and snowboarding ‘core’ scene of the 1990s of which many of the original and ongoing members of the group emerged. The effect of middle-age men performing such pranks, however, offers a unique opportunity to reflect on the possibilities and problems of these alternative masculinities.

Analysing Jackass forever: contemporary carnival, clowning and masculinity

The research was qualitative and employed a thematic analysis approach (Braun and Clarke, 2006). We base our analysis on the whole film and have developed key themes drawn from observations of the reactions, interactions, physical and vocal expressions, and general responses of the cast in the videos throughout, where they are regularly subjected to numerous extreme physical experiences. This included looking for common patterns of coping (laughing or crying) and reacting (enthusiasm, fear, excitement or anger) to various pranks, dares and stunts. Attention was also given to the general image (workers and skater style clothing to elaborate costumes) and physical appearance of the cast (such as signs of ageing to body shapes). The research was guided by deductive categories of hegemonic and hyper-masculinity but took an inductive approach for key insights on if and how there may be alternative forms of masculinity.

The research team included two women and two men. One of the researchers is a skateboarder and another is a snowboarder, therefore assisting the researchers to have familiarity to risk-taking DIY and alternative cultures. The other two researchers are not part of any risk-taking scenes and this assisted with inter-rater reliability. Emerging insights during the analysis were checked with secondary sources in relevant literature as well as media articles about Jackass. The analysis was continually categorized and refined until main themes were developed and these will be introduced in our findings in the next section ahead.

Ageing alternatively

The opening sequence of Jackass Forever at first glance could be confused for a standard, high-budget Hollywood film in its recreation of Godzilla. We are introduced to a street battle where a monster is stampeding over buildings, cars and people. It is expertly shot, full of extras dressed in military outfits and scenes filled with special effects. However, it does not take long for the ‘gross out’ humour to begin and any hint of a ‘tasteful’ cinema experience is defiantly and explicitly stamped out. This includes an extended close-up shot (2.37 mark) revealing that Godzilla is Chris Pontius's penis painted green and attached in an amateur way to puppet strings to ‘play’ the role of the rampaging dinosaur. While Johnny Knoxville, who is dressed in army clothes, fights him, Steve-O who is playing the role of a construction worker dressed in a high visibility vest and construction hard hat runs away in fear. He takes refuge in a portable toilet to escape (2.30 mark) and ends up messily covered in its contents.

Here we can turn to observations from Hackley et al. (2013: 941) on how such scatological-based humour, combined with a carnival type of ‘grotesque debasement’ (Bakhtin, 2009: 147) of lower body parts and functions, acts to generate a sense of exuberance and freedom. In this case, for the audience of Jackass Forever, the carnival humour is evoked from turning things around in the world, from it being ‘drawn out of its usual rut’ and ‘turned inside out’ and upside down (Bakhtin, 1984: 122).

There are numerous DIY skits in Jackass Forever that are firmly planted within a canon of clowning and carnival spectacle that we outline in the earlier section on adult play such as using pain for laughs. The jokes, pranks and dares in the men-dominated world of Knoxville and his co-stars on screen are something teenagers can relate to and re-create. For older men with more resources for leisure and thrills, however, the Jackass world is also a rejection or defiant stance of independence from pressures to have status aligned with adulthood and traditional success typically associated with wealth and power. Jackass Forever is an avenue to bypass being measured up to being a winner or heroic through its celebration of having fun through humiliation and bonding through pain, ridiculous risk-taking and even failure.

Hackley et al. (2013: 942) highlights how representation of ‘the grotesque body’ is inherently transgressive, and particularly through the lens offered by Bakhtin's (2009: 320) theory of the carnivalesque which embraced how it ‘protrudes, bulges, sprouts and branches off and exaggerates and caricatures the negative, the inappropriate’ (Bakhtin, 2009: 306). The men in Jackass Forever are also clearly no longer young men and represent a turnaround to the worship of classical masculine bodies. In several scenes that have been filmed more recently, Johnny Knoxville's hair is natural and completely grey. He is slim-bodied and appears in youthful clothing and has a ‘conventionally handsome’ masculine appearance that in Hollywood terms is marketable. However, rather than exploiting this, the filmmakers acknowledge ageing is a part of the cast's journey. In one DIY ‘homemade’ stunt in the film the cast are divided into two piles of bodies lying on a suburban lawn on top of each other and a piece of wood is placed on each to form DIY ramps on either side of a gap. A pro skater Dave Gravatt is on a BMX and rides over them, later followed by another skateboarder. The men under the ramp look squashed and in pain but everyone is laughing, fist bumping and taking it in good humour.

At one point Johnny Knoxville gets up to stretch and says in a mock threatening tone to the camera operator ‘you’re not filming my bald patch are you?’ (7.30). In the next scene the men are lying back in formation on the ground, with Knoxville lying flat under another man who has the wooden ramp on top of him, making both of them unable to move. Spike Jonez, a Hollywood film director and co-creator of the Jackass franchise who is also a skateboarder, now with grey hair and noticeably ageing skin, then goes up and spray-paints black paint over Knoxville's bald patch and everyone laughs harder (7.59 mark). Knoxville's reaction includes that he jokes with mock surprise in this make-shift ingenuity ‘no more bald patch!’

This form of ageing masculinity builds avenues for signs of becoming older to be embraced in good humour, which can create forms of bonding with other older men, rather than be seen as a debilitating flaw and experienced only as a form of social stigma and loss to be suffered in silence. Notably, in keeping with the hyper-masculine, carnival spirit of Jackass, this ‘good humour’ nevertheless involves grotesque and violent elements. Rather than interpersonal compliments, which would be jarring in this context, or even a subtle editing-out of Knoxville's bald spot, this embodied sign of ageing is a subject of direct self-mockery and physical attack.

In another stunt several cast members are thrown off an exercise belt machine at high speed and their bodies are piled up in a corner. Steve-O appears to be unconscious while one of his friends who is in a daze states, ‘Oh my god, he's bleeding’ then jokes ‘and my hairline is receding’ (52.41 mark). In that same sequence, Johnny Knoxville makes a joke about Steve-O saving his million-dollar smile before he takes out the fake teeth to reveal he has lost one of his front teeth. Although not from ageing, again the ‘imperfect’ bodies of the cast are flaunted proudly with the owners laughing at their flaws rather than the audience having a sense they are simply being laughed at. Like the grotesque realism of Bakhtin's carnival, this humorous focus on bodily flaws and vulnerabilities, especially in the body of the ‘star’, challenges prevailing social hierarchies by emphasising our shared corporeality and mortality. The performers in Jackass Forever are using their bodies as a resource for laughs and also resistance to conventional notions of hegemonic masculinity associated with body image that has also worked to promote a positive form of ageing (similar to humorous videos of ageing skateboarders explored by Willing et al., 2019).

Alternative and transgressive, but not necessarily progressive

In this section, we turn to be mindful that being alternative and transgressive can resist but does not automatically equate with being progressive and can reproduce hegemonic forms of masculinity, something that was observed in earlier studies of Jackass (Brayton, 2007). In Jackass Forever one of the prank scenes involves men being trapped in a pitch-black room in the dark believing they are there with a deadly rattlesnake. The skit shows Knoxville using low-vision goggles like those used in the horror film Silence of the Lambs by Jonathon Demme. The Demme film becomes problematic with its portrayal of a character who is depicted as transgender and a serial killer, and who in one scene is naked and dances in front of a mirror with their genitals ‘tucked’ between their legs. The character is portrayed in an offensive way that has the effect of portraying a transgender or gender queer person as an object of horror. In Jackass Forever, cast member Chris Pontius recreates this character as a figure of humour, dancing naked in the same manner, and the soundtrack features a song quoting one of the lines from Silence of the Lambs repeatedly. The joke leaves the door open for permission for transphobia as it crosses a line to laugh at, not with, a parody of the character.

There are however hints of Queer representation and a rejection of stereotypical Hollywood masculinity in cast member Zach Holmes, who is large-bodied and fat. While his and other cast members’ sexuality is not discussed, there is a scene where Holmes hang glides with a rainbow parachute in rainbow pants and the camera films his back that states ‘I love fat c*ck’ (33.51 mark). The film has traces of ‘fratriarchal’ masculinity (Thorpe, 2007, 2010), particularly in the adult men's playful and homo-social relations with each other. For example, Poopie who has a traditionally athletic body that is slim and muscular, approvingly hugs his fellow cast member Zach Holmes and calls him ‘one bad ass dude’ after they fall together in a stunt down a steep hillside (21.97 mark). The paradox here is an embracing of the non-normative, so-called ‘grotesque body’ but with the approval resting in the hands of someone with a ‘classical body’. The hyper-masculine hallmarks of being strong are also rewarded here with the main subversion being a non-conventional body being admired for male power. It is only a partial subversion of traditional hierarchies, but does portray an effort to normalize body diversity through the film's cast.

DIY hyper-masculinity: revelling in risk, conquering feelings

An important characteristic of Jackass Forever is that many of the pranks and stunts resemble something children would imagine creating and find funny. Pieces of wood become ramps for spectacular stunts. Mundane footwear becomes a part of a painful contraption that hits people in the genitals. Ordinary living rooms with ‘cookie cutter’ features of run of the mill American households such as fireplaces and tame appearing furniture become set pieces for ostentatious but also impromptu looking game shows. In these spaces, the mundane becomes the site of risk-taking, thrills and laughter. Moreover, men in such households who would typically be represented and expected to occupy ‘serious’ roles of husbands, fathers and being in control are instead both making fun and having fun with each other through giving up control and resisting lifestyles that prioritise male authority and seriousness.

Men humiliating each other, often through putting each other through some form of pain such as being hit in the groin, is something that is repeatedly featured in the film. One cast member ‘Poopies’ states after being hit there with a home-made contraption with a strategically placed shoe attached to it, ‘dick pain hurts’ (mark 9.37) while his friends sitting on a couch burst into laughter. Despite this fact, he lines up for another round as part of a trivia game that is set up inside someone's living room with two other ‘contestants’, Aaron and Wee Man, who are all wearing t-shirts but have no pants and are just in white underwear from the waist down. After enduring being hit in the groin numerous times, the winner of the game show stumbles in pain away from the ‘stage’ and gives the ‘game show host’ Knoxville a genuine hug while their friends, including two women and a group of men, applaud while laughing and smiling.

Here again, we see the carnival type of ‘grotesque debasement’ (Bakhtin, 2009: 147) where a literal attack of men's genitals that has the potential for asserting masculinity (enduring more pain than others) is also reducing them to being an object for laughter. This has the potential to unsettle masculine power. We also return to Rojek's (1999: 33) study of abnormal leisure that can offer the freedom ‘to ‘be ourselves’ and to get in touch with those areas of the self which are repressed by the necessities of work and family life’. We reflect on wild versions of leisure that can involve or provoke violence and have a collective impact on people that gives them a genuine sense of togetherness in the moment, which in this case is from enjoying seeing masculine power reduced to a humorous spectacle.

Some of the pranks take cast members unaware or deceive them into thinking a situation is more dangerous than it is. This includes Knoxville sending a soccer ball into Steve-O's face as he unsuspectingly leaves his movie trailer (13.04 mark), to men struggling to leave a dark room believing they are trapped there with a lethally poisonous snake. In their attempts to escape, the men are first hit on the face with frying pans that are strung up to the ceiling in strategic ways, and then are left with a table lined with mouse traps and sharp thumb tacks to lead them out. Zach Holmes, one of the cast members, has several of the mouse traps snap at his arms and hands before he rolls on top of the table and breaks it forcing the crew filming to eventually turn on the lights (18.47 mark).

It is clear through the film that the men are not always consenting to the activities, even if they gave it initially. When the cast clearly reach the end of their pain and risk tolerance threshold and wish to quit or start to plead to be let out of situations, they are often refused relief and are trapped in them. This includes ‘Poopie’ (19.27 mark) in the dark room skit who appears to be terrorized, but with the cameras filming him closely once the light is on, makes a joke ‘I want to stay here the rest of my life’. This is an instance, which is seen in most scenes, where vulnerability and emotional release such as crying are quelched, averted and avoided with sarcasm and humour.

The pranks in Jackass Forever hover across a grey area of consent where men start with being in on the joke and are then forced to stick with it. Things such as not showing vulnerability are rewarded. This grey area is reminiscent of how ‘banter’ works in mainstream sport cultures where permissible teasing moves over to ‘meanness’ and ‘sledging’, which can encourage unchallenged bullying (Duncan, 2019). A key motive attached to the latter is that ‘mean spirited’ efforts aim to put opponents off their game. However, the motivations in Jackass Forever appear to align more with a ‘fratriarchal’ culture of bonding even if through forms of extreme teasing and actual physical pain and torment. Here we argue that there are serious limits in their adult play, and where what is carnivalesque can be coercive and conformingly oppressive.

Conclusion

The content in the Jackass films including Jackass Forever now discussed resonates with contemporary practices in real life, which are then often given an extended life again through either spontaneously shot or purposely produced content for the Internet. It is also an important reminder that there are not always clear-cut boundaries between DIY cultural practices in ordinary spaces, content on the Internet and the higher budgeted scenes of risk and spectacle in Jackass. On the contrary, we argue that key to the appeal of Jackass is how it is able to blur such boundaries for audiences. The cast are a part of Hollywood, but they present as regular individuals. The scenes and spectacles are extreme and absurd, yet most are not entirely out of reach of ordinary viewers should they want to attempt to emulate or recreate most pranks and dares (even if there is an obligatory warning in the credits about the dangers before each film begins).

The insights from our exploration of Jackass Forever are that older men too can participate in carnival style adult play to feel relief from and resistance to societal pressures and feelings of anxiety through physically ageing. They give each other permission to have grey hair, no hair, missing teeth, body rolls and fatness and to be physically exhausted, in pain and even passed out cold. There is no real status in ‘winning’ challenges except approval from each other and a chance to laugh with and at each other, but ultimately, altogether, creating a sense of fraternity. The bond these men show is fratriarchal rather than patriarchal.

Even so, we have also shown that emotional vulnerability such as crying, and showing weakness by yielding too soon, are devalued or at the very least, not given space in this hyper-masculine yet alternative world of adulthood and ageing masculinity. The problematic handling of one scene that plays into rather than challenging transphobia also shows some of the limits that Jackass can have in advocating for the acceptance of gender diverse people, despite observations that Jackass films can have appeal to some Queer audiences and Knoxville's embrace of that potential (Earp, 2021, Flickering Myth, 2022). For insights on the broader social impact Jackass has we recommend interviews with male fans, especially those who have aged with the films but also young and queer audiences on what meanings they attach to the film, their responses, and whether they also incorporate similar forms of adult play into their own lives and the impact they feel it has on them.