At the initial intersection of humans and narrative, our bodies were shackled and unable to look back at the cave entrance behind us. The flickering shadows cast by firelight on the walls were taken as living beings, and we understood all the changes in light and shadow as their love, hate, and emotional entanglements. The events depicted by the changing shadows on the wall were the "truth" to us, so we developed a whole set of methods to discern patterns and predict what would happen based on their appearances and movements.
In this Platonic cave allegory, the relationship between us and the shadows, between watching and being watched, and between creating and analyzing, constitutes the oldest and most eternal theater, embedded in the collective unconscious of humanity. Perhaps there are no "chains" at all; everything seen within the cave is narrative, and the so-called "chains" might be just an illusion in another layer of nested narratives. People often use this metaphor to describe their dark ages, but have we really left this cave?
Since humans first added flickering shadows to cave paintings, giving them a sense of motion, people have been dedicated to "image enhancement," making them appear more realistic and immersive. Later, starting in the 15th century, artists used a pinhole in a camera obscura to project scenes and portraits from outside a window into an entirely dark space, making it seem like they were painting directly from real objects. By the end of the 18th century, photography pioneers (though it wasn't called photography yet) used the camera obscura to experiment with light sensitivity. Although early experiments ended in failure, as humans were unable to capture fleeting light and shadows, and images would disappear upon exposure to light, the modern camera eventually evolved from the camera obscura as a prototype.
Now there is VR. People often regard virtual reality technology as fake, but where is the boundary between the real world we live in and the virtual world? Having broken free from the chains of the first cave, have we discovered that the world outside is just another cave? This continuous escape and exploration of narratives may be akin to Sisyphus pushing the boulder, but in the process, we have gained meaning itself.
Perhaps what's important is not finding the world outside the cave; maybe the world outside is nothingness. But in the search, we may find the closure of our own stories and complete our own hero's journey.