I live in Canada but so much media I consume is from the United States that I tend to assume stories take place there by default until told otherwise. Once, I read a book set in England (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime) and I assumed it was set in the United States until the main character went to London. But the other day, I watched the new Frankenstein movie and it dawned on me that I didn’t know where Frankenstein takes place but, because it’s based on an older book, I assumed somewhere in Europe.

  • AceFuzzLord@lemmy.zip
    2·
    2 hours ago

    If it’s anime/manga, absolutely either Japan, Europe or Hawaii. If it’s a cartoon and I know what country it originates from, that country. Otherwise I’ll assume it’s some fictional place that could be anywhere if it isn’t specified.

  • isyasad@lemmy.world
    3·
    6 hours ago

    Good question. Really depends on what it is, I think. I just watched the movie Melancholia which is pretty ambiguous about its setting. I was wavering between US and UK based on the accents, but I think in the back of my head I kinda assumed vaguely East Coast -ish.

  • ICCrawler@lemmy.world
    2·
    9 hours ago

    Truthfully, I don’t think about it much unless the media bothers to bring it up. If it’s not a particularly strong element of the narrative, I’m not concerned about it.

  • GreyShuck@feddit.ukEnglish
    5·
    11 hours ago

    As a kid, in the UK, back in the '70s, I was watching Roots and was wondering why they were so keen to get to Scotland. I eventually realised that this was set in the US, of course, and the north there was different.

    So I suppose that was my default then but, these days, I typically find myself trying to work out exactly when and where a thing is set, if it isn’t obvious, automatically - before I actually settle into the plot or anything.

  • jordanlund@lemmy.world
    3·
    11 hours ago

    Frankenstein (the book) is all over the place. Haven’t seen the new movie yet so I don’t know what settings they use there.

    https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/frankenstein/setting/

    A lot of it depends on context. You’re not really told where the city in the Matrix is located, but based on the skyscrapers and freeways in part 2 it feels really LA-ish. Filmed in Sydney. But of course “The Matrix” has no physical location so it doesn’t matter.