Why Are We All Obsessed with Our Bosses?

Words: Naomi Kline

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Boss makes a dollar, I make a dime, but what if the boss had a life like mine? From Mr. Potter to Mr. Burns, the greedy, cruel, and one-dimensional employer has made for a classic villain, but as we move through the 21st century, this archetype has grown more sympathetic and complex in culture. 

Where the old boss moved through the story with familiar wretchedness, the new boss is allowed an explanation for their selfishness, an origin story for how they came to be. But unlike classic tragedies like Citizen Kane, these characters are not merely meant for the audience but are directly in contact with another character more scrappy, relatable, and poor: the employee. Media today is fascinated by the complicated connection between an employer and their subordinate, a line that blurs between transactional and defiant.

What makes this dynamic unique is how the character holding power and authority must directly contend with their flaws via the person most affected by them. The minute Ava Daniels sets foot into her boss’s garish home in HBO’s Hacks, for example, she is thrust into a fraught employment under the notoriously difficult comedian Deborah Vance. 

Deborah is a classic diva with unimaginable wealth and even more incomprehensible standards. But over the course of the series, we come to understand her frivolity and coldness as collateral from a past marked by betrayal and prejudice, and it is Ava herself who successfully encourages this vulnerability from her. Ava’s ability to pry this backstory from her boss allows her to grow more empowered to challenge Deborah while advocating for her own personhood. The fearsome lustre that once kept the boss content with their behaviour is shattered by the very person it once kept in check.
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Similarly, Julio Torres’ 2023 film, Problemista, depicts a power imbalance on several fronts. His character Alejandro is a Salvadorian immigrant on the brink of being deported and in desperate need of a job to maintain his residency. Enter Elizabeth. She’s frazzled, oblivious, and cruel (to the point that she’s sometimes literally depicted as a hydra), but most of all, she holds an immense amount of power over Alejandro himself.

Throughout the film, Alejandro tries his best to satisfy her whims and specificities at the expense of his own well-being, frightened of displeasing her and losing his opportunity to stay in the US. But in his time working for her, he learns more about her life before him, how her grief and her own desperation have moulded her into the difficult and problematic person she has become. The more he learns about her life, the more he finds himself able to speak to her freely and stand up for himself. In seeing her in such a vulnerable state, Alejandro doesn’t merely slay the beast, but brings her to heel.

“To be without power can make one feel disposable, but seeing such a dynamic in fiction reminds us that however indifferent these dynamics can be, the one who wields power is just that: a person.”

Deborah and Elizabeth are not kind people, having very little regard for those they wield power over. While one could argue that giving these characters a tragic backstory is giving them an out or an excuse for bad behaviour, they function as merely and explanation and not an excuse. Though they may have come from humble beginnings, their tragedy is that they did once struggle under someone else’s thumb only to become the very antagonist they once pushed against. The catharsis from depicting such sympathy on screen does not come from the boss facing consequences, as they really don’t. Ava and Alejandro do not annihilate or defeat their bosses, but instead bring them down to earth. In showing someone else their humanity, the powerful are forced to view the powerless as individuals who exist beyond serving them. Film and television have always offered a means of escape from reality, an outlet for the people we wish we could become. But unlike gods and monsters, these kinds of characters allow us to divulge in the fantasy of bridging the gap.

In real life, we all answer to someone. While most probably are not jumping through hoops for an eccentrically terrible employer, we can all relate to the frustrations of feeling powerless and unheard. “The Boss” in reality is not always a needy diva or brow furled banker. They are the ones making the decisions that affect our livelihood, faceless entities only known through email signature. In today’s work culture, one can feel both distant and smothered. On the one hand, capitalism creates vast networks of departments, managers, and policies in order to maintain constant growth, making work life feel impersonal and distant. But on the other, the rise in remote work as well as technological advancements like Zoom and Slack blur the ever-faltering line between work and personal life. With employee time being taken and dismissed by with such indifference, this dichotomy is understandably exhausting.

Depicting this relationship in fiction offers hope and reprieve from a world where we feel powerless, and in being forced to see humanity in the boss, it seems more fathomable that one day they might see the humanity in us. Such media mingles our current frustrations with work that feels both alienating and overbearing by fusing together the personal and professional. If the mentality that keeps the employee in line is “you can get here someday”, then the mentality that justifies this power imbalance for the boss is “I used to be you”. By directly confronting the boss with their own struggles and humanity, the subordinate can level with them and from there, possibly find common ground. 

To be without power can make one feel disposable, but seeing such a dynamic in fiction reminds us that however indifferent these dynamics can be, the one who wields power is just that: a person. We aren’t so different after all, but that doesn’t mean we have to be complacent. Even those with wealth and privilege that are entirely foreign to us have hopes, fears, and wounds just like everyone else. After all, to remedy the conflict from all kinds of power dynamics, the first step must be to recognise the humanity in each other.