Does Superhero Deconstruction Work?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 มิ.ย. 2024
- A video contemplating the trend of superhero deconstruction, its relationship to skepticism of the "elite" and powerful, and whether such deconstruction is effective or misguided.
My final conclusion is that we have a tendency to deconstruct without understanding why the constructs were there in the first place. I explore why the superhero is so important, and why dismissing this aspirational model is offhandedly, as we are tempted in deconstruction to do, is misguided.
00:00 Intro
03:06 Developing Heroes
05:46 A Question, to What Makes a Hero?
07:31 Nuance and Objections
09:55 True Heroism
11:54 The Problem with Deconstruction, to Conclusion
#videoessay #aesthetic
Deconstruction without reconstruction is just envy-driven destruction.
Mads Facts,bro
YES YEAH YEAHHHHHH FINALLY SOMEONE SAID IT
We've been deconstructing rubble for a while now
This totally nails it. I think one the most underrated comics to explore this is Action Comics #775 "What's so funny about truth, justice and the American way?".
Nah, I almost fully disagree.
The last 500 years of western art history is just one generation rejecting the ideals of the previous one, while subtly taking inspiration from an older predecessor.
Like, just on the debate topic of whether humans should be painted accurately we have:
Rennaissance (yes)
Mannerism (at the time, no)
Baroque (yes)
Rococo (yes, but less so)
Neoclassicism (most definitely)
Romanticism (not so much)
Realism (yes, to a fault)
Art Noveau (wow no)
Impressionism (yes, for the time)
Post-impressionism ( we're about to get wacky)
Expressionism (wackier)
Cubism (we couldnt get more wacky proportions)
Surrealism (Anatomy is healing somewhat)
Modern Art (And they got wackier)
We have more versions of “Evil Superman” than the actual good original Superman.
It’s not a deconstruction anymore. It’s just a lazy writing from Hollywood edgelords.
Most of those evil supermem like homelander or omniman came from already highly acclaimed comics and created by already highly acclaimed writters, i really cant think in any popular evil superman that came directly from hollywood itself.
@@PanStoGarChu And both Homelander and Omni-Man are distinct in the fact that they’re parallels to Superman are mostly down to aesthetics, but they themselves are widely different people even compared to each other, Homelander being an insane celebrity and Omni-Man being a soldier in a fascist empire that eventually defects upon discovering love and compassion due to his relationship with his family (making him closer to Vegeta from Dragon Ball than Clark).
There are nuances and distinguishing characteristics that make these examples stand out from the crowd of other “evil
Supermen”.
@@callmev3531Honestly Omni man is more similar to general Zod to be honest.
@@malikpierre-louis3343 That's actually not a bad comparison.
It’s funny when people make such a strong statement and it’s not even right
Deconstruction without reconstruction is just DESTRUCTION.
Thats why Watchmen works...it brings a real critique to heroism.
The whole thing about hero’s was summed up in one simple quote.
“With great power comes great responsibility”- Ben Parker/Uncle Ben
It's not pls,stop glazing spiderman
Most superhero deconstruction is boring, negative and has nothing of value to.
Watchmen is a deconstruction off the superhero genre that actually works
@@yarc9 That’s why I said most. I’m talking about shit like the boys comics.
Watchmen criticized heroes
@@yarc9 true
@@draco_1876And The Boys also has examples of good supers that work alongside normal people that actively fight against the corrupt system that has caused great suffering to the people stuck inside it.
They may not wear suits or spout wisdom, but one of the points of The Boys is that attempting to do good in a system as dystopian as the one the characters occupy, one where it is far harder to make lasting positive changes, calls for both people willing to make questionable choices in order to succeed, much less survive, and people willing to stand against that system even if it costs them.
"Nihilism has consequences"
Ya don't say
Deconstruction of heroes can be really interesting if they don’t just put it as some dark version of a superhero or make them straight up evil because they’re this way. Heroes can be inspiring and genuine good people, you just don’t have to make them literally perfect.
This essay really summarizes my issues with most "deconstructions".
They point out problems, but they offer nothing in response beyond an adolescent power fantasy in of violent retribution and nihilistic cynicism. They ironically inspire nothing but more apathy by saying that all the problems of society are too big to fix and the only thing you can do is become even more brutal than the elites causing the problems. That there is no sort of organization or ideal worth preserving in the end and that the public so pathetic that there's no reason to care for them either. Even the people trying to fix the problems are written off as fools who should "grow up" and simply adopt the same sort of self-centered, amoral viewpoint of the main characters as "correct".
I mean if they are writing about problems but aren't offering solutions then maybe that means the solutions don't exist yet or won't ever exist
Your critique highlights a significant flaw in many narratives that lean heavily on nihilistic cynicism and violent retribution: they fail to provide a constructive vision for the future. While it's true that these stories can compellingly depict societal problems, their solutions-or lack thereof-often perpetuate a sense of hopelessness and apathy.
These narratives tend to glorify the notion that the only viable response to systemic issues is to become as ruthless and self-serving as the elites causing those problems. This perspective not only undermines any potential for positive change but also dismisses the value of collective action and the possibility of a better world. By portraying those who strive for change as naive or foolish, these stories effectively endorse a defeatist mindset, suggesting that the only path forward is one of moral compromise and selfishness.
In contrast, narratives that balance critique with a vision for improvement-emphasizing community, empathy, and perseverance-can inspire genuine hope and action. They remind us that while the challenges we face are indeed formidable, they are not insurmountable. Such stories can foster a sense of solidarity and motivate people to engage with societal issues constructively, rather than succumbing to despair.
By acknowledging the complexities of the problems while also highlighting the importance of ideals, organizations, and collective efforts, these more balanced narratives can offer a more realistic yet hopeful outlook. They affirm that while change is difficult and often slow, it is possible-and that striving for a better world, despite the odds, is a worthwhile endeavor.
@@Wiworgsh273 That mind set mean nothing ever gets better. It's the death of hope.
@@Wiworgsh273 in many cases, those writing much of these deconstruction stories won’t come up with solutions. It comes across more as they’d rather complain than help in any way. Consider how many people likely came up with real solutions but get shut down because it doesn’t fit someone’s agenda or doesn’t fit their worldview. Those thoughts spread and then it leads to exactly where these stories have become.
@@Vergil14 I guess but making these kind of stories may also show people that there is a problem and then people can come up with solutions
I am basically done with deconstruction of heroes because it isn't interesting but super boring and lazy in my opinion.
in small doses, but today that genre overstayed its welcome. there are too many deconstructions
One issue I have with Superhero Deconstruction is that it often comes from a place of malice for the genre itself.
Look no further than The Boys comic.
That and just in general people who write stories like these often steep them in nihilism, or at least pessimism.
The idea that Superheroes are inherently ridiculous and fit to only be ridiculed and mocked, and by extension, those who enjoy Superhero stories.
They take hope, optimism and virtues like courage, selflessness and integrity, and replace them with pessimism, misery and hopelessness.
Stuff like Marvel Zombies or the Marvel Ultimate Universe are just depressing and gross to read.
I blame Frank Millar's The Dark Knight Returns for this attempt to Deconstruct the Superhero.
Original ultimate Spider-Man comics were pretty neat. New ultimate marvel universe that started last year is very interesting.
With the Dark Knight Returns, you can't blame it. That was the actual perception of Batman at the time.
This comment may run a bit long:
It's indeed fair to say their are less examples of traditionally virtuous superheroes in fiction, with various superheroes are depicted as bordering on egotistical and are sometimes focused more on personal issues or their own gratification than protecting people and various superhero media both being focusing on their adventures than their relationship to interactions with normal people on top of usually being either excessively serious or comedic.
However, there are still notable examples of flawed characters that still embody traditionally heroic virtues, like Annie from The Boys, who goes through periods of despair and bitterness as her naive and idealistic perspective of the dystopia she lives in is broken, yet still manages to have hope and the will to fight after being inspired to defy the corrupt system she was raised in by the determination of regular humans that have to live in this flawed world.
In Invincible, Mark Grayson and Atom Eve, to varying degrees and at different points, allow their power and superhero status to get to their head, making them think they can do whatever they want and are justified in it due to their superhero status (incidentally, a majority of young superheroes in Invincible tend to be quite selfish, focused more on fighting villains than helping people), but while fallible, both characters aren't beyond humility and each are ultimately motivated to help others even at great personal risk, with Mark pushing his body and will to their limits to save people, even in defiance of those he once trusted and as he battles his fear of his own nature as a powered being corrupting him, just as Eve seeks different ways to help other beyond the expected path of fighting supervillains.
In My Adventure’s With Superman, Clark is pitted against characters that use cynicism to excuse or dismiss their own immorality, being driven at his lowest point to believe he is a danger to their world simply by existing, but beyond his naivety and insecurity, he is an honorable, compassion and brave individual that cares deeply for others, earning their trust and respect through his selfless acts, risking his own well being for others safety and, when pushed, fighting against those that would exploit their power to harm others.
In both the Daredevil series and The Batman, Matt Murdock and Bruce Wayne are torn between their desire to punish others as an outlet for their trauma and their desire to see their community rehabilitated with law and order, with Matt overcoming his rage and shame over his many mistakes and losses by refusing to indulge his desire to murder Fisk and sparing him to be judged by his community after subduing him, while Bruce recognizes his misguided over-fixation on punishment and gradually becomes a symbol to inspire his city towards rehabilitation.
Hopefully, there will be more examples in the future of flawed, yet virtuous characters with nuanced stories that are tested to their limits by their stories yet still manage to embody what it should mean to be a hero, although, while reconstructionist stories are important, that doesn't devalue the deconstructionist stories that preceded them as they can make for some valid critique at times and the total lack of them leave open the door for interesting story potential.
In the X-Men series, the species of superpowered beings written with various parallels to real world minorities, but this metaphor can only extend to a certain point, as it excludes the fact that humans, similar to humans in The Boys, do have valid reasons to fear and desire means of defense against mutants, as the X-Gene and the supernatural conditions and attributes it manifests are highly random and as unpredictable as the individuals that carry it, some who also have valid reasons to not even like being mutants, as their conditions can become torment for them, but instead of playing into the complex position humans have, humans are instead almost exclusively treated as villains if they don't support mutants, which is made even more overt in the animated X-Men series and it's sequel series, where humans are depicted as vitriolic savages stupidly attacking people with supernatural abilities with sticks instead of fleeing from them in terror, all the while various mutants perform various morally questionable acts (from the team holding hospital staff hostage while forcing them to give medical help to a pregnant Jean Grey even as the doctors voice concern over wether her baby's power would be dangerous to them, to Rogue rampaging through a military base endangering several lives on a grief-driven revenge quest, to Erik removing the planet's electromagnetism out of spite of the Genosha Massacre instead of directly targeting the man responsible, Bastion, to Rogue and Roberto abandoning the X-Men on a dying planet to join Erik) that get excused or dismissed due to their status as an oppressed group, with Rogue and Erik being the most egregious examples, as they're respective actions are practically forgotten by the stories instead of mined for story potential.
In the end, a lack of nuance can go both ways when it comes to cynical or idealistic narratives, meaning that reconstruction can only ever be better than deconstruction in how well it can tell a complicated narrative with complicated subject matter.
Yes, and I wish I had more freshly seen superhero content to be more detailed in my critique - there are certainly examples where tropes can be "deconstructed" and have the result be productive, end with some kind of positive vision.
My issue is the sense I sometimes get, that the heroes who try to act well are being "naive" compared to those who don't, which is the opposite of the lesson that ought to be taught. Or, perhaps, there is no real lesson beyond what you see on screen; I don't want to see a "slice of life" in a world worse than our own.
I also don't know if picturing powerful, evil superheroes is very true to our world's elite villains. Most often, it seems like some form of aged and unhealthy boomer is the one "in charge" of ruining things. The classic superhero represented a recognition that a world without strength or valor is a big problem, and that even flawed people, with courage, are to be preferable to the empty suits populating our board rooms and capitol buildings.
That said, these are just my first thoughts, and this might be a topic worth contemplating in more detail.
Thank you for the considered critique.
I find naivety is a tricky characteristic to implement effectively in stories, since it seems various writers are more interested in either keeping a character naive or immature for comedic effect or having their naivety breaking lead to them being bitter and cruel instead of growing wiser from their new experiences.
These kinds of character lack a sense of wisdom, humility or maturity that can make them go from simply being interesting or relatable to genuine role models.
As an example, Holland’s Peter Parker was portrayed as highly immature and irresponsible, learning very little from experiences that would translate into his next film appearances and eventually ending up indirectly killing his own aunt over a scholarship, only he chose to blame Goblin exclusively for it and became intent on murdering him even when he had the means save Norman from, something he would’ve done had Maguire’s Peter Parker, an older, wiser and morally strong hero that became that way through years of trials and hardship, not stepped in and gotten himself stabbed in the back for his troubles.
Thankfully, there are examples of these more “well rounded” superhero characters in modern fiction that aren’t treated by their stories as wrong for trying to make their community or their world better, such as Superman And Lois’ take on Clark, whose idealism and experience as a superhero and a powered being does occasionally clash with the regular people around him, who often have more pragmatic perspectives built around their various limitations and vulnerabilities as regular people, but he is also a strong willed and principled individual that inspires goodness in others (a direction, it seems, the newest iteration of Superman will supposedly be leaning towards).
Insomniac’s Spiderman (and to a lesser extent, Miles Morales) embody what it means to be “friendly neighborhood” Spidermen in devotion to their communities and to their loved ones, even as they are tested by their enemies and by their own traumas.
If anything, there should be more examples of heroes that are portrayed as not just powerful, brave or compassionate, but as humble and wise, being able to share wisdom with others, teach them instead of just protecting them or fighting their enemies, as heroes can and arguably should represent more than just a power fantasy, but as inspiration for their audiences.
@@callmev3531a small subset of this same problem that honestly might be bigger than I realize is the fact that naivety is often subjective in many people's eyes and only goes as far as your own perspective. For example, in much of anime, a character can have great, altruistic ideas of what they want to accomplish in the world and be found naive by others. And, as in much of media, instead of standing up for an ideal that is good and worthy, they will apologize, seemingly for no reason, citing that they hadn't thought through all the problems. The idea that every worthy idea has to be perfect before you enact it pervades much of media and has invaded the understanding of many people as well. It communicates, "If it doesn't work, why start?" Rather than, "Even if it ain't perfect, even if you need critique, font just give up." Heroing becomes a science rather than an act by someone who simply has the ability.
@@xavierthomas5835From a narrative perspective, having a protagonist be naive or lacking in wisdom can serve as an internal obstacle, along with whatever other flaws they may possess, they are to overcome along with an external one, as opposed to only having external obstacles and neglecting the opportunity to truly test these characters beyond their abilities.
This is how characters like Lucy from the new Fallout show or Cal Kestis from Jedi: Fallen Order come about, both naive or ignorant in their own ways, but through various circumstances not only become stronger willed or physically capable, but also stronger mentally and morally as they come to grips with their new circumstances and decide who they want to be despite them, Lucy maintaining the will to hold on to compassion and civility even against the savagery of the world around her while still becoming an excellent survivor in it and Cal overcoming guilt, shame and doubt over his worthiness to be a Jedi after his failures and the loss of his order to find empathy for those around him and the courage and hope to endure his losses.
Both these examples additionally feature moral victories over there antagonists, Lucy refusing to become completely ruthless as The Ghoul as he insists she should to survive and Cal successfully helping to convince Trilla to relinquish her hatred towards Cere just for a moment before she is killed by Vader.
As for characters trying and failing to change the status quo, having characters be able to do so without proper understanding of just what it would take to do so from a writing perspective can come off as arrogant or lazy.
Something like Sam Wilson’s confrontation with political officials at the end of Falcon And The Winter Soldier ultimately rings hollow as it presumes Sam is right that these officials have far more individual influence than they actually would and that Karli, despite openly murdering defenseless people, isn’t the terrorist that she actually is for doing these things.
Having a character be naive before realizing their mistakes and attempting to make up for them is one thing, but the story itself being naive enough to make ignorant critiques without nuance about a subject the writers don’t fully understand, wether in the spirit of proposed reform or condemnation, is quite another.
Regardless, it’s naive to think one individual can permanently change such a complex world, just as it is naive to believe that all issues can or should be solved by tearing them down, both lack nuance and ignore the complexities of various subjects.
@callmev3531 Of course, and what I meant by my statement wasn't that naivete is a great attributen, but rather that what is called "naivete" can often feel contrived for the sake of rebuking the protagonists for being altruistic. After all, a certain level of naivete is necessary for altruistic goals, a certain level of ignorance, and a certain sheltered attitude.
Deconstruction allegedly means taking a fictional concept and apply real life logic to it.
But the examples we know wouldn't work like they're presented either.
Some of those versions are so extreme that they become even more absurd that the classic superhero idea.
For example, the whole Industrial military complex would never let Vougt have a monopoly on superheroes even if they didn't know they were the ones who had created them (even less after the truth about compound V went public).
Vougt had to create at least another 2 companies so people and specially the government would believe there was a competition between the corporations that controlled the sups.
What I find funny about deconstructions pointing out that people with powers will abuse said powers, is those people already exist in the source material. Super villains were already a thing and tend to out number the heroes, as evidenced by Batman and Spider-man's large rogues galleries. Even in the original comics acknowledge that people are more likely to abuse their powers than they are to use them benevolently.
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I had 9 subscribers 3 weeks ago, at the Backrooms video, so this [79 now] actually feels relatively special. Thank you for the comment though!
@@PennedLionsPenThank you for this video bro please keep it up
Very well done. We need our superheroes as much as an ancient Greek needed stories of the demi-gods. Such stories go all the way back to the cave paintings of the last ice age. They are part of what makes us human, a fulfillment of a deep need, within, and what encourages us to remember our own inner hero, even if that recognition is entirely unconscious. I've always been impressed with the Superman myth because I find its roots in world mythology, but also, he isn't an elite, not at all. He's a farm boy from Kansas who happens to have come from another planet, and therefore, can do extraordinary things. He doesn't need power, wealth or celebrity to be complete - he has power, he could be the wealthiest man on earth if he wanted to be, and he is famous because he done so much good and the world is grateful for his help. He has everything that most people think would improve their lives, but he is wise enough to know what is really valuable.
What he really lacks and longs for family and a sense of belonging. The loss of Krypton did not make him evil, bitter and angry. It doesn't make him resentful. It made him grateful and kind. That to me is what a hero really is. Awful things happen but the hero doesn't let that make him a destructive force. Not noble because of family name or place of origin, but nobility of spirit.
He does enjoy a home cooked meal, a date with his beloved Lois and a chance to use his powers in a good, useful way. He is the common man with a red cape. That brings to mind the need for humility in an age known for it's rampant narcissism and a love of the simple things of life, in an age impressed only by power and fads. This reflects on another favorite story of mine. The Lord of the Rings. I let you fill in, why.
I'm personally getting kinda sick of this cynical 'deconstruction' of superheroes. Why does it matter? What even is the point here anymore? That you can't always trust the 'good guys' or something? Ok, sure but what would be the solution? Oh, you have nothing to offer on that front except 'let's kill superman' or whatever the plot is supposed to be. But what about after that? Oh, NOTHING.
You know *why* the Justice League Unlimited cartoon was so fucking good? Not just because their animation and scenes were good, or that they had actually intriging and somewhat original plotlines, or interesting interpretations of vintage characters, or really fucking good voice acting. It was because the superheroes in that were fundamentally good people that were often confronted with dilemmas, self reflection and questioning themselves (often painting them as in the wrong) but always came out on top and with even more resolve that what they were doing was good. Not just people with superpowers, actual GOOD PEOPLE. In fact, they have an episode tackling this exact problem and it's better in every way than whatever slop they have been serving us in the past years.
I really like that this wave of nihilism and cynicism from Hollywood is finally getting some pushback. It was novel at first, but when everything becomes: 'You CARE about something? Lameeeeeeeee' it becomes boring.
Ok, fine I won't care anymore. And that includes your little cashgrab of a show/movie. *turns off the television*
At least for the purposes for something like The Boys show, the more positive read is simply that in a world so dystopian, genuine good, while theoretically possible, is far harder to enact with the kinds of obstacles these characters face from both an intellectually lazy populace to a corrupt corporate system in a struggle to wrestle power away from the government.
Still, it is true there aren’t many series like Justice League: Unlimited or even Star Trek: The Next Generation that deal in exploring moral and philosophical topics and learn valuable lessons from the perspective of flawed and nuanced, yet ultimately virtuous characters.
There are instances of it like with Superman And Lois, but generally, on one side, there are more serious and cynical takes on various stories and subject matters and on the other, there’s cheap and reductive stories with a heavy dose of forced humor and clumsy attempts at addressing social issues (especially on Disney’s Marvel front) or that simply only exist to kill time before being forgotten.
In fact, the pivot to these more graphic media in terms of the action & adventure genre can be seen as a response to how “safe” and silly it has become in the mainstream, along with just how much negativity regarding the state of the world and how its various flaws are constantly being broadcast around because of social media.
It’s the lack of nuances and poor writing in either side of the spectrum where these stories fall apart, regardless if we’re talking about something as excessively self-serious as Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice or as mind-numbingly silly as Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania.
Either one is poorly written regardless of its tone or themes (or lack there of), just as excessively focusing on promoting or destructing something can lead to creative bankruptcy.
There’s the hope that better writing will eventually make its way back into the mainstream, but with the state of Hollywood and the entertainment industry in general, it likely wlll take time, if it ever happens at all.
There's an anime that tries this with sentai. Its good. The only hero I think needs deconstruction is Batman. He keeps sending serial killers back to prison only to escape later on and kill again. To me it looks like someone taking advantage of a crisis to keep reminding people of Gotham that they need a Batman. If he had a code of rules that determines when he needs to kill instead of never killing, I wouldn't suspect him that much.
Nolan’s Batman notably has a more nuanced take on the “no killing” rule, as Bruce is indeed willing to kill when he has no other means to pacify or subdue a threat, from leaving Ra’s to die to cut the head off a dangerous organization composed of agents each with combat and espionage capabilities similar to his own, tackling Harvey off that platform to save Gordon’s family while he was injured and crashing Talia’s truck in an attempt to get to the nuke she was trying to bomb Gotham with.
In contrast, he spares Joker and other criminals because he can afford to spare them due to just how capable he is and that once arrested, the law would ensure these individuals would be punished, especially ones who have antagonized everyone in the city from average citizens to established criminals to even government officials.
The whole constant escape thing is the result of comic book nonsense. Reality is most of bats gallery would still be in person or shot dead.
I can actually think of one deconstruction super hero story that didn't need to be edgy or grim dark or cynical. And that story is Japanese super hero show Kamen Rider OOO. Now for context the Kamen Rider Franchise, has a recurring theme of the selfless hero, who safeguards everyone ease's happily ever after, at the cost of never having one of their own. OOO is a unique entry in the franchise because it deconstructs that idea and show just how toxic and self defeating such "total selflessness" can be. And the the heroes arc is him actually finding something to live for, something to fulfill himself beyond being in service of others, to find his own happiness. Because in the long run, all he will achieve by dedicating his life solely to saving others, is ensure that he won't be able to save anyone. The is a clever deconstruction of the selfless super hero, while still being an optimistic story, while still having a sense of fun and adventure, while still being a hopeful story.
"Modern deconstructions" is just a fancy way to say "shock value". It's a mere mascarade to hide a malevolent intend to pulverize the values and optimism of the society just to apeace edgy people, who are ignorant of the actual intend of the superhero concept. For them, the superhero Is only known for His superficial or visual characteristics instead of what they represent.
To be fair, the genre, and by extension, any genre, already has a wide variety of character types and themes to them that don’t always reflect traditional virtues like optimism, honor or even compassion.
From Superman’s benevolence to Wolverine’s ruthlessness, not all “heroes” are the same or go about being heroes in the same way, and nor should they, as they would all lose their specificity after a while.
The best deconstruction can do is tackle at the various tropes and cliches of a genre when they’ve become a crutch for creative bankruptcy, just as the best reconstruction can do is find new and engaging ways to portray old stories.
Without nuance or creativity, any story can fall apart.
@@callmev3531 yeah, I totally agree with you on that point. So to be clear, I'm only refering to the ones with those specific characteristics that currently are being subverted.
That feels generalizing. I think a lot of writers simply find normal superhero stuff boring or tired or are inspired by the other stuff you don't like. You make them sound like heretics lmao
Super-Hero Deconstructions, are often NOTHING MORE, than a mere attempt to ruin our Childhood Memories.
It would be interesting to see the superhero trope deconstructed as a more nuanced critic of politicians. I doubt many politicians would admit to themselves they are corrupt or hinder the values they themselves hold. Instead, their self-image must be an overall good, someone ”doing the right thing.” Even if even the people sharing all the same values see them as crooks and dissapointments.
On the essay itself, I don’t think you quite got what I think is the key point of Marxist critique of great man theory of history. This could be approached from two angles:
If we view historical materialsm as a deterministic process, the extraordinary people are no less the products of their environment than the common person. It doesn’t matter how Napoleon personally thinks if those values are pulled from a slow-moving dialectically evolving pool of social ideas, values and norms.
This doesn’t mean our opinions and values are all invalid: rather, our free will exists only on the level of our lived and shared existence, but siezes to be useful consept once that moment becomes history. So to be more precise it no longer matters how Napoleon saw himself or his choices, even if it definitely mattered for him and those close to him. Any idea he had can now be seen as overdetermined by the society he existed in.
And from second perspective, we can apply Marxs theory of value and his vision of communism as a basis for understanding morality of individuals. It is still meritocratic view, as what one deserves is tied to the value of ones labour, something highly individual.
But importantly, their more valuable contribution is not seen as extraordinary or some inate goodness in them. The concept of elite is discarded, even if extraordinary brilliance is recognised and rewarded. The soviet hero is still an everyday person, and there is no fundamental difference between them and the less productive members of society.
Their hard work, motivation, and what clearly is their own effort is seen as a byproduct of their surroundings. Even their physiological attributes. So when they use their motivation and work hard and produce something very valuable for society, it is admired and rewarded, but still seen as fundamentally the same as someone who is less motivated, works less hard and produces something of average value.
This is a double edged sword: as a positive, it abolishes the modern workship of ”genious people”. The artist who has a team of unnamed artists actually fleshing out their ideas and making them reality. The professor who published multiple papers a month, while in reality reading only half of them. Their name is there just to bring prestige.
But as a downside, it gives the elite the excuse of ”being just like everyone else”. Once we forget to inspect the extaordinary circumstances and opportunities behind the elite, it seems even more that they deserve it all. As long as there is clear separation between the elite and the everyday people, we can critique and challenge their position. But if we only hide it in an attempt to abolish it, we lose the tools to even critique it.
This is very obvious in Soviet union, where circumstances and opportunities like corruption were behind much of the elite. But because elite was supposed to be abolished, the undeserved luxury could be hidden as something similar to ordinary, merely reward for ones contribution. Yes they all were thankful for their circumstances and reminded the working class of the value of the common man, but this was only a facade over their very obvious corruption and unjustifiable position.
I think we have fundamentally different frameworks. I see nothing wrong with universal healthcare, or using the government to crush corporations - economically "left wing" positions writ large. But I am not a materialist, nor a determinist. I think that basic human experience attests to the reality of something which you could call magic. We are not "meat computers;" as computers get better and better, producing results like ChatGPT, the fundamental distinction between the human "machine" and a complex computer gets, if anything, starker. Artificial "Intellgience" can not think, in any meaningful sense of the term.
We can agree that the dignity and "value" of a person does not depend on their power, nor especially on their wealth and influence. However, the Elite seems to me impossible to avoid, whether you try to create an American utopia or a Soviet utopia. The best solution seems, to me, the classical understanding that elite status confers both privilege and responsibility. That those with power - regardless of whether inheritance or "meritocracy" blessed them with a fundamentally unearned gift - have a moral obligation to use it nobly. Indeed, the concept of a "nobleman", and the resultant positive connotation of the word "noble," is an outgrowth precisely of this understanding.
Even flawed noblemen of the past at least had a standard to be held to, and a contract they could be said to be violating. Looking at today's elites, I think we see the consequences of such an understanding dissolving, in the desperate hope that no elite will reemerge.
I appreciate your willingness to cede difficulties with reality, but I think there is a solution, in recognizing virtuous elite status. It's hard, because our current elites suck, and not one of them deserve to be named "noble" in any positive sense of the term. But we need people, like Superheroes, I dare say, that will take those roles. If not, then others will - in all likelihood, others we don't especially want there.
@@PennedLionsPen I would have to disagree with you assessment of the past of Noblesse Oblige. Nobles in the past more often that not only held those standards of duties and righteousness as far as society demanded of them. Nobles, aristocrats, and elites were often born into systems that rewards cruelty. Slavery, assassinations, and petty wars, were all things considered the norm. Romanticizing the Elite of the Past while criticizing the Elite of today fails to understand they were both cruel and flawed.
The idea that the elite are impossible to avoid is a conceit that applies to many western cultures but is not true across human kind and civilization in its entirety. Many cultures throughout our world functioned more as a anarchist Commune. People who accel in their field will always exist but a elite is someone that is allowed control without the consent of the group or individual.
@@thomascochran7907 Many people acted well only insofar as they were expected to, but they *were* expected to. We have lost that expectation, and elites have gotten worse.
While past elite have had their own host of issues - I am not suggesting a return to the past wholesale - we have missed something profound in separating the elite from the expectation of virtue. While flawed, I daresay it is the best option we have, because:
I believe that, in any sufficiently large and complex society, the emergence (and, if the society itself continues, maintenance) of an elite is inevitable. While anarchoprimitivist dreams of sub-300 population, local, connected communities are a powerful Romantic ideal, it's not one I see us feasibly able to return to (barring apocalypse). The allure of technology, of growth, is too great. It would be lovely if every leader were local and connected enough to the people as to be "of a like class" with them, but I really don't think that will happen.
I also don't think that the emergence of elite is uniquely western - I think it's present in almost any large, centralized civilization - and in most small or decentralized ones too.
If we are to have a society as complex and oversized as today's, our "democratic" processes clearly do not ensure that an elite acts well. I don't see a way out of the elite trap, and it seems to me that the only path through is to own it, actively compensating for elite status in our societal structures. It would be nice if the elite were closely tied to the people they ruled without tyrannizing them, with leaders distributed with a careful mind to decentralization - but we can't erase the elite totally. My dream is the improvement of a proven path, and one at least better than trying to wish it away - the temptation of many in the modern world.
@@PennedLionsPen I feel like the expectation of virtue is a romanticization not reality. The Elite of the past are held to the same standard of virtue of todays elite. Meaning their only held accountable by other elite, and only to the point where their crimes can be used against them by other elites.
The Romans were murderers and betrayers, but usually only held to account for it when their downfall would benefit another’s rise.
Same with most empires, the put the illusion of virtue to hide more honest political moves.
I would argue that while a anarchist society has yet to be truly tested, elitist society is both more romanticized and less realistic as it has proven time and time again to repeat the problems of the past. The French Revolution and its co-opting by different elite groups, the Industrial Revolution spoke of elevating the common man but in truth just became another system of oppression. A system that places itself above the will of all individuals will inevitably lose the value of collective consent.
However its the exact evolution of technology that should allow for greater freedom not less. As distance becomes less relevant due to communications, individuals can gather resources and info from anywhere. As sciences progress the reliance of massive farm or corporations to develop foods or medicine diminish.
I also would argue that the complexities of large civilization are made to keep elites in power rather than elites form due to the necessity.
If energy is infinite, resources are easy to gather and replenish, and information and community and accessible regardless of distance, what need is there for a group of elites to decide who is allowed to do what?
I’m also think while superheroes do have a large indication of connection with the elite, I also think another strong connection, especially tracing back to other origins, is that often parallel the “others” of society. This does apply to all heroes mind you. Green Lantern, Batman, and Iron man are pretty tied to the Elite. But I would argue Superman, Spider-man, and especially the X-men parallel the others of society much more than the Elite.
@thomascochran7907 As I stand, having seen the conference between the both of you in full, I must also concur that the idea of a communal relationship between folks leaves as much room for destruction as another. The words of the wise are snuffed out because they are heard among a cacophony rather than on a pedestal. And I praise no man, neither do I trust them, nor do I laud them as THE ANSWER. I do, however, have a healthy respect for a well-rounded individual with high marks in several qualifications. Where they come from and what they are expected to do should be no different from anyone else, but how much they CAN accomplish, how much one should hope they accomplish, should be different.
Your comment about how it's difficult to imagine a superhero politician is interesting because I can think of three off the top of my head. Barbara Gordon was a U.S. congresswoman (unclear if she was in the Senate or the House) back in the 1970s. The comic _Ex Machina_ was a Wildstorm hero who became mayor of New York City. Most recently, Luke Cage became the mayor of New York City in Marvel comics.
However, the effects of these examples on their fictional worlds are telling. Barbara Gordon's time in Congress was more of a political statement at the time, acknowledging that women can function in leadership roles -- and surely a superhero detective would be a good choice for that, right? It mostly moved her out of Gotham to fight crimes all over as she traveled. The hero Ex Machina is a complex case; the writer had things to say, but mileage varies as to how meaningful it was. Just because someone wants to serve the community, that's sometimes not enough to lead effectively. Luke Cage's tenure as mayor primarily served as a chance to make it clear that the Kingpin, Norman Osborn, and others like them were going to be out of the mayor's office for a few years, just giving Marvel some time to clean up the horrific mess NYC had become over years of event miniseries.
So, can superheroes be politicians? They have been. Can it be done meaningfully? Eh, maybe. I can't claim it's been done yet.
Am I wrong or were Norman Osborn and Lex Luthor even President at one time ?
@@achimdemus-holzhaeuser1233 Amazingly, Lex Luthor was the U.S. president for a term, and Superman had to work with him to get things done -- alien invasion, don'tcha know.
Norman Osborn was elected president only in an alternate future timeline. However, he was put in charge of SHIELD at one point, which is how he wound up in charge of the Thunderbolts and was able to create the "Dark Avengers."
This kind of irresponsibility in the United States -- voters putting the man who stands against Superman in the Oval Office, and politicians letting a resurrected former supervillain take leadership over a powerful super-science law enforcement/spy organization -- used to feel a lot less plausible than it sounds now.
The creator of _The Boys_ hated superheroes. He felt like they take away from real life heroes.
I want to throw my hat in the ring, despite firmly being in the camp of Superheroes are good and cool actually.
The "Great Man" critique of superheroes is broadly true, but reductive. Bear with me.
Generally, yes. The premise of Superheroes implies that only a select few are capable of solving the world's problems. Mostly, by punching them. And the stagnant status quo and the evergrowing roster of villains (because comics) imply that whatever they're doing is only a bandage to cover a crack on a dam. No matter how many villains the MCU kill off, like a hydra, they only multiply.
From this angle, they have a point and raise valid questions. Should all problems rely on waiting for someone more powerful than yourself to step up to solve it? Should they be solved with violence? Should we protect, rewind, progress or attack the status quo?
But from another, let's read these comics more closely.
For every villain Superman, Batman, Flash or Spider-Man punch, how many times do they sincerely try to talk them down? The world's greatest detective calls his mentally ill villains by their names, puts them into a mental hospital which he's trying to reform. Some of these villains actually reform. Flash's rogues stopped killing. Superman is a boy scout. And Spider-Man has risked his life to save his villains.
On the topic of Spider-Man, check out his movies. Spidey wasn't a leader. He was just a friendly, inspirational guy. The people of New York returned the favor on the bridge, in the train, with the cranes. Because more importantly than "With great power...", there's "Anyone can be Spider-Man".
Sometimes, superhero stories can teach that you don't always need to wait for the "Great Man" to save you. Rather: that if you have the opportunity to help somebody, powers or not, you should take it.
Very fascinating essay, though I think this video would’ve been a lot better if you had the images line up with what you were saying rather than cycling through them on a loop.
Yeah... takes a lot longer though - I try to release weekly on Wednesdays, and when you're editing at 8pm on a Wednesday night you try to focus more on the audio and essay portion, the part with the real substance, with your limited time.
@@PennedLionsPen That’s very fair, and usually I’d have videos like this play in the background and wouldn’t notice. I just paid attention this time whenever you alluded to a certain superhero.
Keep up the great writing!
I've been trying to imagine new superheroes whose powers are limited only by all of their internal virtues and survival instincts and heroes who have powers based on an ideal classic hero and an anti-hero at the same time.
I think The Watchmen works
I think “The boys” doesn’t
I can’t articulate why, but i really like this video for being so educational
If I had the kind of power that would elevate me to the status of "superhero", I would use it to make a world in which everyone would feel safe giving up their super powers forever.
People who believe in the narrative that greed and corruption are "human nature" don't understand the first thing about how much material conditions and propaganda can alter human behavior. If you teach people that greed and corruption is "natural" and you establish a system that rewards that behavior, that is what you will get. If it persists for long enough, no one is left who has seen humans behave otherwise. Thus, they assume greed and corruption are "human nature", blindly believing it's axiomatic while only making the most superficial of observations.
Then you have people who have fallen for the trap that direct democracy is just chaos. They take the behavior of those already in power and project that behavior onto how people would behave in a direct democracy. The problem with that is, the people in power now are doing what they do, because they never have to experience what it's like to be on the receiving end of their policies. Under a direct democracy, everyone directly faces the fallout of their policy choices. Just like the kid who sticks a key in an outlet, people in a direct democracy will figure out that acting like the elites of capitalism is self-mutilating.
261st sub, keep going homie
*"Do the poweful fear those who are categorically anti-power?"*
*"And when everyone's super... no one will be" - Syndrome*
Maybe they do after all.
In short, I do agree that the superhero trope can be inspiring, that deconstruction and cynicism without any positive vision can be demoralizing, and that the notion that having "power" (meaning ability, including exceptional ability, being able to impact the world) is in principle good and doesn't imply becoming a monster (In fact, to say that "anyone with the powers of Superman would become evil" would be to essentially say that everyone is already evil and to think otherwise is confusing their weakness for kindness, or *worse* that even if someone is good, that's the result of naivety, a coping mechanism for being weak, and gaining power would reveal the "truth" that might makes right).
But that's the extent of my agreement. A reconstruction of superheroes that treated them as insurgent elites that wielded "power" (meaning sociopolitical control) for good, would essentially be importing to the genre the political themes common of fantasy, a fundamentally aristocratic vision (In the etymological sense of "rule by the best", which makes idealistically similar to meritocracy but with an emphasis on the exceptional). And I suppose you are fine with that, but it's this political vision I take issue with, you are right it's mostly (or seemingly) orthogonal to people becoming bankrupt by medical expenses, but it's nonetheless political *and* central to the video.
So... what's the issue? To counter the false dichotomy between tyranny and chaos you present the false tricotomy of those two + "True Nobility" or responsible good-aligned leadership. If the dichotomy erases the idea that someone could actually be robustly good and thus use power (in any sense) for good, then both also erase the possibility of *order without elites* as well as the strongest critiques of (political) power, which both explains how one ends with evil people there and also keeps being cutting even when assuming an actually good leader.
It's not necessary to be a leader in order to be an impactful force of good, but even when it is, to be a leader at core is just to give directions, leadership can arise spontaneously when there is a real imbalance in knowledge or when coordination needs to be above all quick, and it can sustain itself entirely on trust. The captain of a ship is always its leader, but when his position is sustained by the threat of violence he is also a *ruler.*
Talking about *elites* is talking about rulers, direct or indirect. You can't have elites without a stable power structure in which any specific member of the elite is trusted by default, as a blackbox, rather than the case of the circumstantial leader proped up by moment-to-moment trust.
Any system has checks and balances for rulers (even if it claims it doesn't, e.g. absolutism) but these are far slower, and when the power structure is a stack of rulers upon rulers upon rulers, there are many positions that provide a lot of insulation from consequences, a lot of room for inner circles and corruption to grow (and corruption is self-reinforcing, once you choose to tolerate *some* corruption, you can only prop up people *at least corrupt enough* to also tolerate that much, but maybe more, and any subsystem to check it is corruptible for the same reasons).
So one core anti-power critique is that even if your intentions are pure and your heart incorruptible, by *setting up a system for controlling others by default* you will attract mostly evil to operate it.
That superheroes rarely lead and never seize stable political power is something I consider a positive trait of the genre in contrast with e.g. many fantasy heroes. Superheroes mostly fight villains that, like them, are unconstrained by the normal rules of society (sometimes to a world-ending degree), and it's precisely *mostly the villains* who act like an insurgent elite, often explicitly seeking rulership.
Being a supervillain has an extremely high selfish payoff (if they win, that is) whereas being a superhero provides scarce benefit for the hero: It's an annonymous job, so doesn't improve their unmasked reputation, it often alienates them from their loved ones and robs them of opportunities in their personal life, there is no money to make only to spend, in many cases the legitimate authorities persecute them like they would any criminal, and of course it's extremely risky for them personally as well as their loved ones if their identities were ever revealed.
Being a superhero is not a particularly attractive job for an evil person, it requires honest and strong commitment to the greater good even when unrewarded. This is something deconstructions often miss, focusing as you said on the ways in which superheroes mirror elites, but ignoring the ways in which such a role selects for "insane" unilateralist altruists that change the world without ruling it, one could even call them *"Anti-Elites"* even if they don't explicitly rebel against established authorities, and mostly just bypass them.
But there is a critique in which (some of) the deconstructions, yourself and myself can agree: *No positive vision, no proactivity.* Superheroes are passive, they bypass established authority only to fight threats to it, only to fight what said authorities would fight, thus they are essentially agents of the status quo. Just like rulership is relegated to villains so is radical change in general, one gets the feeling (and in practice it's confirmed on average) that a superhero would fight to protect whatever system they currently live in, just because it's the default.
Deconstructions are almost always "What if superheroes were evil elites" but it's rare to see the opposite: What if they were unrestrained altruists with *actual moral stances* and they subjected established powers to the same standards they would a villain who did what they do? X-Men sort of approaches this in an incomplete way, the X-Men are mostly pasive even as they try to change the status quo, but when the status quo escalates violence they respond in kind, while Magneto is an unusually sympathetic villain.
A far less known example that I think approaches this more is *unOrdinary* where everyone is super but not equally so, and superheroes are systematically assasinated because the notion that the strong should protect the weak rather than just control them is utterly inimical to the established political system. If you don't know it, it might interest you, and till it ends it's a sort of schrodinger cat on whether heroes will be like insurgent elites as you prefer or more in line with what I said, both seem like plausible developments.
And one that combines a bit of the classic deconstruction ("superheroes as evil elites") with the less common variant ("superheroes as insurgents") is *Hero Killer* in which the superheroes literally rule the world, while the protagonist is a supervillain not in the sense of being evil but in the sense of hunting them down.
Regardless of this, and to summarize: I think the most positive vision superheroes offer, even in the most naive undeconstructed versions, isn't as inspiring leaders but the idea that *"You, personally, can make the world a better place, even without permission"*
This sounds absolutely true. When venturing into story-telling, I've found that I, PERSONALLY, can't tell the story with a point in mind. I don't sit down and say, most of the time, I'm going to right a story about this or that kind of hero. What I want to communicate is a viewpoint, well thought out, sometimes even grossly misunderstood. Which is what most of fiction is missing nowadays. Not everything needs levels, but if you're going to write something that's based on structure, and the many levels and variants of that structure, you can't do it halfway. You can't even do 90%, much like many shows that have been let downs at the finish line. You HAVE to think it all the way through. Which I think is what he's really saying, MAYBE, don't @ me on that. Break something, but don't just break it in the exact same place as others have, and only at the same level. At some point, all you leave is a permanently broken fixture. Nothing man-made is infallible, and, thus, to continue breaking and making it over and over again, you expose it to its very core, leaving any story you could tell hollow.
I differ on this point greatly, though, where you said that humans are not inherently evil. Chalk it up to me being a follower of Christ, but I've seen that most human interaction is shaded or overshadowed by the need of one individual over the other. A deep, pervasive need to satisfy one's self, even to the neglect of others.
Also, UnOrdinary is a delightful story, one I'd love to have finished.
@@xavierthomas5835 Not sure I'm interpreting you correctly but, if you mean deconstruction without any type of reconstruction leaves a hole in the story that can damage it through incoherence sooner or later, I agree.
And yeah I don't think humans are inherently evil but I think most are at the basic level: Prioritizing themselves over Justice and the greater good. Good people do exist, but one will rarely find them living "normal" lives, because there is too much wrong with the world for a good person to afford passivity.
Having great power won't change your morality, but will put it to test, I expect most to fail.
@@syoexpedius7424 as an expansion on this, having no power is a temptation. Going from orn extreme to the other is a temptation. Going from varying degrees of one to the other is a temptation. I recently read a story on great heroes, who, after saving their world from deranged and deadly people, were rewarded with great power and long lives by their goddess. They also, however, were made expressly aware of their day of death and subsequently were tempted and convinced to acquire more power for themselves through unsavory means through the fear of death. The Bible states that every man is tempted in and of himself. So temptation isn't a distortion, but rather an revelation of intent in one's own heart.
@@syoexpedius7424 also, that's kind of what I'm saying, hug not really. I can appreciate a deconstruction for a deconstruction's sake. You don't always have to write the end of something for viewers to understand the direction or enjoy it. Even less so with a deconstruction. Just don't be typical with it. If you're ONLY going to deconstruct, deconstruct everything, not just the idea that a being with lots of power isn't always or mostly or even half of the time good.
I feel like you're over emphasizing the interpretation of superheroes as stand-ins for the elite. It's not exactly wrong, but its a narrow view of them, especially when it comes to heroes like Spider-Man who's main characterization is a normal kid who just wants to do the right thing.
The irony of The Boys as an attempt to comment on the superhero genre is that the show uses darker grittier characters following the Punisher's example unironically. I have seen fans of the admit that it does not work a commentary on the genre for this very reason.
Because the show's creator associates the genre with fascism, we also have superheroes lumped in with alt-right politics when by and large the alt-right doesn't like traditional superheroes. Ironically, they did like the first two seasons of The Boys.
It’s honestly more the comic’s creator that hates superheroes. The show makes the distinction that there are indeed good supers, as they are just people with the same virtues and flaws as any regular human being, only the world they live in is so hyper-focused on status and money that it is far harder for real heroes to make lasting positive changes, but that also doesn’t stop them from trying despite adversity.
Which is hilarious because some of the most famous Superheroes ever created where conceived either by Jews (Superman) or to punch real life Fascists (Captain America).
Anyone who sees a Superhero and instantly compares them to Fascists is a moron.
I think the Boys is less of a deconstruction and more a example of "Why we can't have good things"
But I miss the true heroes which inspire as well and we need a healthy dose of both.
I understand WHY, some would like it. But I honestly hate, stories about “Super-Hero Deconstruction” that it starting to make me sick. 😣
Edgy, Realism, Inspirational, and Fun ... The 4 nations lived in peace... until the Edgelords attacked!
It happened right after Stan Lee died .. what a coincidence. ..
Now we have to wait for the Master of Reality Bending to be reborn.
easier to destroy than to create.
Just subscribed notifications bell on!!!
BRILLIANT
Good content 😎
Earned a subscriper because damn that's good. Curious how you don’t have more.
A sort of Counter argument but not really,
Lets look at this on different approach, if the unfortunate wants "power" how can we know they are worthy of that said "power" is it through means of doing good, means of survival, means of circumstance or means for the sake of means.
Also who's to say that we are in the right to take away "power" from those who already have them just because society disagrees, doesn't that mean that society just don't like it, so it means that we don't agree on something that a few agrees on to be the better option, what is the better option? but also who are we to dictate who's going to have those "power"? If we are already influential enough to take "power" doesn't it mean that we already have it?
Here's an example that fits this deconstruction, The French people collectively killed Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette via Guillotine because they are conspiring with foreign powers as France at the time is on a brink of collapse due to the actions of the previous monarch's, Marie Antoinette was deemed by the people unworthy as she doesn't dress like the people, and Louis XVI as unfit to rule them as he didn't have a very powerful influence, both were killed because of treason, on top of that they inherited the previous monarch's problems which led to their demise. Of course because of this event France collapsed
If "power" belongs to the unfortunate are they worthy of it? If "power" belongs to those who already have it, why are they unfit to wield it?
Genuinely curious to discuss
It is indeed hard to determine what anti-elitism is just your whims versus corresponding to an underlying reality. The French Revolution was, as near as I can tell, driven from directionless spite and contempt for the ruling class. There wasn't all that much to actually complain about besides the abstract ideal of a "republic" - or arguably that the king was too weak?
While I acknowledge the potential for this to come from a place of pride, I dare say that our elite are not fulfilling the basic function of any elite throughout all societal history. In the times of nobility, times we like to consider "backward," we had an understanding that elite status involved giving back to your society. No elite today lives this out - least of all those in positions of political power - and I think that denying this obvious reality requires willful ignorance.
I deem our elite insufficient because they have all of the status and none of the responsibility of an old elite. They don't even build pretty buildings anymore! It's a disgrace. None but God can lay claim to personal judgement of each person moral character - but we can make enough educated guesses, in cases like this, to say "Maybe you shouldn't have this power any more."
Excel at mediocrity or excel at the mundane? Wouldn't excelling at any of the typical domains itself be the antithesis of mediocrity? How are certain domains necessarily the embodiment of mediocrity?
Also, if you did actually mean the mundane instead of mediocrity, what makes combat any less mundane?
Also, are you referring to anything additional to 'being a good leader who sacrifices for others' as well when you say "true nobility"? What exactly do you mean by "true nobility"?
Great video man
I don't think you've understood the complaint about the "Great Man" paradigm.
You seem to think you've overcome it by pointing out that obviously powerful and influential people exist and have existed.
But no one ever suggested otherwise.
Deconstruction is usually not that good but sometimes it’s really fun to watch I guess.
Superhero deconstructions began in the 1980s by cartoonists and fans tired of the Golden Age's problematic war propaganda and the Silver Age's censorship, sentimentality, and marketing to children. It borrowed psychology from '80s psychological thrillers, graphic violence from '70s and '80s action and horror movies, and sexuality from the '80s erotic thrillers, and began as social satire of 1970s and '80s politics. Where it went wrong was the superhero corruption in "The Watchmen," Batman's suicidal tendencies in "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns," Lobo's mass murder of his homeworld, and Batman's and Superman's weaker or more psychopathic successors in The "Knightfall" and "Death of Superman" arcs, Spider-Man's continuity confusion, and depression in the "Maximum Clonage" arc, to the currently overmatched Invincibile's high injury rate, and "The Boys" overmatched protagonists vs. the narcissistic and overpowered Homelander. These negative depictions of superheroes ignore the reality of the real-life first responders they assist and are partly based on. They also ignore the good deeds of historical figures as a basis for fictional characters, such as superheroes. The Silver Age Charles Xavier and Magneto were based on Martin Luther King and Malcolm X.
Batman was based on Theodore Roosevelt in Nolan’s version
Watchmen gets it. That’s nite owl and silk Spectre’s arc where the kind of come to terms with superheroes being dumb and useless but they’re fun and that’s ok
Chris Claremont stated that both prof x and magneto weren’t based on the two civil right figure people widely associated them with. Neither Stan lee, it’s just one of those thing float in the internet with no sources.
who gives a shit about the message its bad ass
There’s a lot of begging the question in this…
Super heroes don’t represent an elite. They represent the fact that anyone of us can do extraordinary things. This is why the concept of the secret identity is so important that an everyday person can reveal that underneath they are a force of good. And they typically fight characters villains who represent this idea that we should fall in line. Darkseid and Lex Luthor are great examples.
And revolutionary action throughout history has come from groups working together and community. The great man idea is a myth. The civil rights movement was a well coordinated team effort. The Haitian revolution, French Revolution. Movement toward leftist policy has always been a team effort to the extent that the idea that there is any one leader is silly. Youre mixing up figure head with leader.
Anyone who’s an actual fan of Superman knows that multiple of his villains basically are deconstructions already. Lex Luthor is a completely self absorbed billionaire who thinks he’s the only image of true competence and is the only one who is actually using his power the way it should be. Zod is literally a misguided Great Man who is driven by an inability to let go of his lost homeworld and obsessed with remaking it.
hero does not describe your charakter, but one action. i have been a hero many times, moments where i just did what i thought was right without considering my own well being. just thinking about others and act accordingly. but that does not mean, that i am a good person. give me power and time and u will see me mess up. dont trust anybody to be your hero. instead, fight for a system that does not rely on one person, but encourages all to behave well.
Superhero deconstructions serve as a powerful lens through which we can examine and critique the very foundations of heroism. These narratives delve into the ethics, sense of duty, and humanity of heroes, moving beyond surface-level heroics to explore deeper, more resonant themes. They challenge the traditional tropes and conventions that have long defined the superhero genre, offering a more nuanced and reflective portrayal of what it means to be a hero.
At the core of these deconstructions is the exploration of a hero's ethical dilemmas. Traditional superhero stories often depict a clear dichotomy between good and evil, with heroes embodying an unwavering moral compass. However, deconstructed narratives complicate this simplicity by presenting heroes who grapple with the ambiguity of right and wrong. These stories ask whether a hero's actions truly benefit humanity or if their interventions inadvertently cause harm. By doing so, they force both the characters and the audience to confront the moral complexities and unintended consequences of their actions.
Moreover, these deconstructions scrutinize the hero's sense of duty. In classic tales, a hero's duty is often depicted as an inherent and unquestionable obligation to protect the innocent and uphold justice. Yet, deconstructed narratives question the origins and legitimacy of this duty. Is it self-imposed, socially constructed, or manipulated by external forces? By examining the motivations and pressures behind a hero's sense of duty, these stories reveal the potential conflicts between personal desires and societal expectations. This tension highlights the sacrifices and burdens that come with heroism, often leading heroes to question their purpose and effectiveness.
Another significant aspect of superhero deconstructions is their focus on the hero's humanity. Traditional superheroes are frequently portrayed as paragons of virtue and strength, almost infallible in their resolve. Deconstructed heroes, however, are shown to possess vulnerabilities, doubts, and flaws. These stories humanize heroes by depicting their struggles with personal identity, emotional turmoil, and the weight of their responsibilities. This portrayal underscores the idea that true heroism is not about being perfect, but about persevering despite imperfections. It challenges the audience to reconsider what makes someone a hero-not their superhuman abilities, but their resilience, empathy, and humanity.
By addressing these themes, superhero deconstructions breathe new life into a genre often dominated by formulaic narratives. They move beyond political critiques and historical allegories, instead providing a profound examination of the human condition through the lens of heroism. These stories invite readers to engage with the ethical, psychological, and existential questions that define a hero's journey. They challenge us to think critically about the nature of heroism, the complexities of moral choices, and the importance of maintaining one's humanity in the face of extraordinary challenges.
Superhero deconstruction do offer a solution: absolute power should not be highly concentrated nor remain unchecked; that those in power should never remain above the law. This especially should apply to seemingly benevolent figures.
And on top of that, powerful figures that have a simpler, less nuanced perspective on the world and see their power and status as a means to change a world they don't fully understand can also be a worthy topic for destructionist stories as the lack of critique suggests that supposed heroes can never be wrong about something simply due to their power and status.
Take Falcon And The Winter Soldier's discussion regarding terrorism, where the Sam Wilson publicly berates government officials for not properly handling the issue of property and resources in the wake of half the planet's population being erased from existence for five years, a crisis any government would struggle greatly to handle.
Sam is given the authority by the narrative to judge these officials yet he himself seems to grossly misunderstand their position and capabilities, believing they can make drastic changes in the complex world they live in, with various factors interacting with and at times negating each other, with just a few phone calls.
Sam's experience is as a soldier with the primary objective of violently eliminating threats to his public and the planet with martial arts skills, firearms and a jetpack with wings, yet he is treated as being correct in his belief that the world is so simple as these politicians being entirely to blame for individuals like Karli Morgenthau, a radicalized super who's primary solution to solving global crises was similarly reductive, assassinating a few officials as if they simply wouldn't be replaced with ones that would take even harsher stances on individuals like her, viewing them as the kind of powered supremacists that Zemo describes.
While it can be beneficial to have such commentary on morality, philosophy and politics, especially with characters like superheroes, who can be used as embodiments of such ideologies, doing so with a lack of nuance or delicacy as such topics deserve is detrimental to any story and creates unintentionally poor messages.
The unintended message something like Falcon And The Winter Soldier suggests is superheroes should be an unchecked moral authority that disregards the complexities of the world while simultaneously judging those charged with a burden arguably just as important, if not moreso, than their own, the burden of maintaining peace and order in an often chaotic and amoral system, even if doing so comes at the cost of making questionable decisions or not always being able to afford making the most ideal choices, something made even worse by the presence of the supernatural, with random phenomena simply appearing out of nowhere from the perspective of the public and causing untold catastrophe (like say, an alien cult leader and his army ravaging cities and making half the population vanish for five years while the champions of the planet were too disorganized and bogged down by infighting and laws meant to regulate their activities to properly stop it).
Just because someone has power to exercise their will, benevolent or otherwise, it does not and should not make them out to be some ultimate authority on what is right or wrong, as they risk denying the reality of what it is like for average people of varying classes to have to live in this world without such power or status, making them far too disconnected from the people they supposedly wish to protect to do so effectively.
Discussion points such as this is why deconstructionist stories shouldn't be disregarded or seen as inherently misguided, as they offer a necessary point of critique when handled with tact and nuance, like with any subject matter in any story.
How do you stop someone who has power in and of themself? THIS, the rather, is the problem. As long as individuals are individuals, they have their OWN power, one that cannot be checked but by cruelty or ignorance. You can't check and balance even someone as benign as Spider-Man because he doesn't need nor desire the power of public opinion. It certainly is a large part of his character, but in arcs where he must by all means go without it, he is all the better for it. Being a friend is not always received well by friends, being a hero is not always received well by the downtrodden and oppressed, etc. Yet, those who remain faithful to their cause, despite opinion, are depicted as having made the right choice. And critical thinking makes this even more obvious. Why should a man who, though not an island, certainly a well designed building among buildings, can do such great good bow the knee to intrinsically flawed ideas? Government doesn't seek justice, but control and subsistence. They want to exist and keep existing, and that often means that not everything is judged fairly or accordingly, even by the most altruistic of officials. If pre-established rules are molded, bent, or broken so that things come out to equal, government breaks down. You can't raid the corrupt corporations, you can't prevent the crime before it happens, you can't stick with your gut on someone proven innocent in a court, etc. Superheroes exist expressly BECAUSE there is a need for a greater good that canmot be checked.
It's a vicious cycle, for sure, but in what scenario does the government or any governing body have the wherewithal to decide the actions of someone who has inherently different rights than other beings under the same government? A question posed in the x-men stories often.
@@xavierthomas5835 Ultimately no one man or institution is more powerful than the collective masses. Beings as powerful as say Superman don't exist and even Spider-Man would be kept in check by the combined might of the US government. Another benefit of deconstruction is that it critiques the idea of concentrating power in one man's hands and instead encourages greater engagement from the general public.
@@xavierthomas5835 The government is (supposed to be) an extension of its citizens and thus integration between citizens will foster greater sympathy for the other eventually leading to calls from the people for greater equality. We see this in real life in advances in the rights of BIPOC and the LGBTQ+ community; the main groups that the X-Men act as stands in for.
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And basically even the 'galactic federation' is being torn up. They tortured the wrong kid for life. Now they die. :) ohhh galactic feds save us... That's hilarious. Breaking legs.
"You can't build down, you can only build up." Have you never heard of the concept of underground cities or depthscrapers?
True, but who would want to live underground?
Its a just metaphor.
Most of it is just generic edgelord garbage. Just give us the heroes we know and love.
Have you read "The Life Eaters" graphic novel by David Brin? It is a sequel to his novella "Thor Meets Captain America". Brin ideologically distrusts superhero stories as power fantasies that encourage a fascist mindset like the romantic medieval stories of Sir Walter Scott encourage the Confederate mindset Southerners who wanted a war. In that alternate history, the Nazi killed people in the Holocaust to summon the Norse gods to defeat the Allies in the invasion of Normandy. The Nazis have superheroes with magical powers. The Allies have heroic common people who use courage, reason and science to resist a superhuman pantheon. It is superhero deconstruction with hope that common people in a democracy can win.
Hm... It's an interesting argument, but for me my disagreement is that I don't believe any genre should be required to say any single theme. Often times, the same thing can be used for a variety of metaphors -- just look at everything a vampire has been used to symbolize (queerness, drug addiction, anti-semitism, terminal illness, S.A., religious fanatacism, etc). While it's true that superheroes are traditionally used to inspire hope in a greater good, I don't believe that's inherent to the story or the only one that should exist. I think it's okay to have a cynical superhero story, and that can be done well or it can be done poorly.
Now, there is a more reasonable argument to be made, imo, when it's a straight-up adaptation. Man of Steel's cynicism frustrates me, but Brightburn's does not (despite other issues I have with Brightburn). I still don't necessarily agree with this -- I do believe adaptation allows a fresh start and the themes can be altered, or even the same with just an ongoing series. After all, Superman himself has had his themes change quite radically, starting as a socialist extremist and gradually moving into "truth, justice, and the American way." Heck, we wouldn't have our modern iterations of Joker or Lex Luthor if writers hadn't been interested in deconstructing their villainy.
Anyway... I guess I like deconstruction quite a bit. Like any tool, it can be done poorly, but I don't think it's bad in itself, or that superheroes should not be deconstructed. Honestly, most of my favorite superhero comics, movies, and shows are deconstructing the idea in some way.
I agree that this genre, any genre, shouldn’t be tied to any one message, as one commenter here alluded to the idea that stories all the same thing would make them indistinguishable from each other. The main issue you could say is that on one hand, there’s silly or poorly written corporate products like various current Marvel “content” and on the other, there’s these explicit and graphic, yet often more interestingly written media like The Boys or Invincible.
What flaws those series may have, there’s a sense the people behind it care more about quality (or are allowed to by their corporate bosses), as they have more freedom with the material they’re working with to adapt it well and make good stories out of it, which arguably is the main appeal of such media beyond the superficial charm of it featuring explicit elements.
Superhero deconstruction works, it just to be done right. The Snyderverse/DCEU didn't work because that's not Superman, he wasn't hopeful & optimistic. Then on the other hand you have iconic stories such as What's So Funny About Truth, Justice, & The American Way & All Star Superman that does it perfectly.
Actually shows like The Boys and The Watchmen isn’t deconstruction of superheroes but reimagining of superheroes.
We could go back to meritocracy. Of course we never had a perfectly meritocratic system, there have always been elites, but year after year we've been moving away from it more. The American dream is dead because our institutions were invaded and corrupted with a harmful ideology
I am not inclined to "go back" to a system whose insufficiency has led directly to our present state. Meritocracy, as construed in the popular imagination, is a myth. Elite status, in our present age, is far from direct correlated to any merits.
Even if talent can be effectively equated to merit (and I can't think of many easy mechanisms to ensure this), do you earn your talent? By what standard do you then *earn* your status?
Elite status is a gift which you must become worthy of by noble action. You don't *earn* it by being economically efficient; it is ultimately an unearned gift which demands the cultivation of virtue. This has always been the understanding, in virtually all effective, stable societies. It is this standard which has held firm and brought stability, while fleeting, "Enlightened" notions of meritocracy have collapsed under their own weight.
@@PennedLionsPen For 10s of thousands of years, humans had to worry every day just about surviving the next day. We live in the lap of luxury compared to what our ancestors had to live in. By what metric has it failed? The fact that you see others doing better than yourself? Envy is not a good basis for restructuring a society.
What we need to do is go back to a system where we progress forward, rather than going backwards.
Meritocracy is hardly a myth. It may feel that way because our education system has failed us and been feeding its students propaganda for generations at this point. It seems like you would require that everything be perfectly meritocratic for meritocracy not to exist. I hate to break it to you, but nothing will ever work perfectly. You will always find examples where something didn't work as intended in anything you try to implement in a society. The fact is that people need to be rewarded for their efforts if you want them to get anything done, and I very much doubt you can think of anything better when we take human nature into account. I'm sure you can theorize some idealistic concept that would never work, but sounds really nice. It's probably even been tried before and failed spectacularly. But we need something we can implement in the real world.
Every good system can lead to a bad system if there are bad actors who try to fundamentally change it. So if it's your position that a system is bad if a bad system can emerge over time, then you might as well accept there will never be a system that meets your standards.
@@MagiKez I do not cede that "meritocracy" has given us the technological progress that you so acclaim. If anything, the causal arrow is reversed - entrenched luxury and the universalization of "Elite" status makes us hunger for some narrative, like "meritocracy," to justify a wealthy elite who do not meaningfully contribute as an elite class ought. That, if anything, parasitize the rest of society - the opposite of contribution.
I agree that perfect meritocracy is impossible. There are some ideas that work decently despite imperfection, and some that work only in perfect theory. Whether or not an idea fails in practice helps you discern which case you have.
The problem is that, in practice, "total meritocracy" fails. We end up with an elite class whose "merits" are more likely to be the result of skilled social climbing than any redeeming virtue. Those who pretend that "true merit" wins the day (whatever that means) cannot hope to stand a chance before such a state.
Trying to create total meritocracy is like creating a perpetual motion machine that only works if you assume friction doesn't exist. A little bit of nepotism, a little bit of collusion, can make the whole cookie crumble - because the sociopaths win. We don't have a few bad actors in politics - we have a system which actively selects against people of basic moral character.
I don't disagree that, in theory, it would be nice if good people had more power than bad people. But, in trying to create better incentive systems, we have to first acknowledge that the skills we reward today, those things we call "merit," should not be rewarded. There's a reason that superheroes are chiefly valued for their moral character and combat prowess - because these are genuine, deeply human merits that could earn someone a knighthood in the past. I don't want a world-class accountant to be my king.
In deifying some vague, technocratic ideal of meritocracy, trying to force it, we create truly awful systems. When we had inherited nobility, we knew power to be an unearned gift - one which you had to strive to become worthy of. It is this understanding that the rule of Total Merit precludes, and which is responsible for a great many problems today.
Actually, the American Dream is a myth created by business monopolies, unsafe factories, false advertising, and Cold War propaganda.
The comparaison with real world elits dosn't work. Most elits optained their privilages through ineritence, cunning or both. Superheroes are usualy everyday-men who knows the struggle of the people around them, with the occasional rich guy who had a change of heart after getting a taste of the real world.
I also disagree with the notion that people of power are evil by default. They are disconected from the people because of their priviledges, sure, but that makes them blind not bad. Plus, not all of them are that out of touch. Take Mr beast for instance. He is rich and famous yet he uses his priviledges to heal the sick, shelter the poor and all around doing good deeds.
Some will say that people like him are the exeption, but empathy is part of human nature. One that nearly all of us share to various degrees. If superpowers were thing in real life, I believe that most poeple would just keep living their lives while some would use them to help others.
I don't see what the superhero is meant to represent except power, and novel elite status. It's different from how elites are in the real world, as all fiction necessarily is, but there's no other lens I can think to look at superheroes through. And the parallels, specifically with the development of a new elite status, are striking.
And note that my point about elites, and their obvious failures, refers specifically to political elites. Those in government have very clearly failed, if not betrayed, us. Also, I never said that elites were evil by default - in fact, my point about heroes was that power can, and indeed must, be exercised well. Are you disagreeing or agreeing with me? I can't really tell.
And I won't comment on the wealthy broadly, because I think that wealth is a relatively poor marker to use for "elite" status.
@@PennedLionsPen In that case, I misunderstood your point. My apologies.
Personaly, I see superheroes the way I see police officers firefighters or humanitarians. People who dedicated their lives to help and protect those they can while indirectly inspiring others to do the same.
It may be worth keeping in mind that Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster (Superman's creators) were both jewish living in a time of largely unoposed antisemitism. That's why they created the first modern superhero, why they gave him all those powers and why they turned him into a symbol of hope. They made him to be a simple solution to overwhelming problems.
Maybe the best way to see superheroes isn't as people but as ideals to aspire to. To believe that we may grow into the best people we can be regardless of our conditions. That personal growth may be what superpowers are meant to represent.
@@yoannbelleville7763The view of superheroes (at least some of them) as narrative embodiments of ideals is rather fitting.
Batman and Joker for example are often read as representing order and chaos respectively, neither being fully willing or able to permanently destroy the other and each of their battles being a smaller scale version of the battle between crime and the law in Gotham City (and by extension the virtue of everyday people and the vices that threaten to destroy them).
On the subject of superheroes (or simply supers and powered beings in general) representing “elites” and wether they are inherently wrong, The Incredibles touches on this idea of being “special” or “better” with its proposed notion that if everyone were considered the same, individuality could potentially become lost in a sea of mediocrity (in other words, ‘if everyone’s super, no one is special’).
The film’s main antagonist ultimately endeavors to erase the concept of “supers” by ensuring everyone can become supers through technology.
In any other story, equality would be championed rather than being seen as a gateway towards conformity and stagnation (as the various supers were forced to neglect their abilities and become average citizens by law), but in the world of The Incredibles, what makes these characters different and, in some ways, “better” than others is what is seen as correct.
This sentiment can be applied to various abilities and limitations people have in the real world, how those attributes compare to that of others, how with the failings of one, the strengths of another become more apparent and vice versa.
And it’s the kind of discussion that arises from such a story that the real value of superhero fiction presents itself beyond the simpler allure of its power fantasy.
In this sense, superheroes (along with other protagonists in action and adventure related fiction) can represent more than just power fantasies, but vehicles to explore moral, philosophical and political issues in a more fantastical setting.
@@callmev3531 Dangit I should have talked about the Incredibles in the video. Good points btw.
@@PennedLionsPen Thank you. It’s definitely a worthy inclusion in a discussion like this, not just on how it frames supers in a favorable yet critical lens (Bob notably being portrayed as more concerned with the glory and the purpose his superhero career gave him than with actually caring about people and helping them, in fact, much of the heroics of the film isn’t even centered on helping people).
But in doing so, both The Incredibles and its sequel end up making villains of normal people that are portrayed as either feeling slighted by them in Syndrome’s case or feeling as if supers make normal people inadequate, lazy and overly reliant on them in Evelyn Deavor’s case, which is a fair critique that isn’t refuted by the actions of the protagonists by story’s end.
Although, this issue isn’t surprising considering various stories with sympathetically motivated antagonists often have protagonists there only to maintain peace without striving for meaningful positive changes or progress, the notion being that a maintained peace is the only alternative to the chaos the antagonist’s actions would unleash. Notably, even highly advanced societies, supposedly utopian societies, in fiction like the ones in Star Trek are depicted as primarily thriving due to their abundance, the fact they can afford to be a utopian because resources aren’t scarce and their leaders and neighboring species are united by common struggles, but are also depicted as never being capable of fully erasing the vices of individuals, especially when they are threatened or removed from their abundance, or ensuring abuses of power by the greedy or egotistical to be impossible. Even if there is peace and prosperity, there is still room for conflict, stagnation and strife that can sometimes destroy that peace. Even still, advancement and unity are often treated as the best solution to this strife, but it’s still a messy process that doesn’t offer true perfection, which is also true in many ways in the real world.
However, as good as something like The Incredibles is, having exclusively regular people as criminals and supervillains introduces the idea that only “good people”, people who deserve the power to express their goodness, are the ones that get power, while regular people have little to contribute to the plot beyond helping superheroes out legally, ensuring they’re anonymity is protected or that the laws that forced their conformity be repealed with the story making it a point to reference why those laws were put into place, the slew of lawsuits against superheroes apparently mishandling situations and causing collateral damage.
In comparison, works like the original Spiderman trilogy, the Daredevil series, Superman And Lois and Invincible not only have bad people that become supers through various means but also put heavy emphasis on the important of normal people, portraying them as just as potentially capable of the same virtues as the best of heroes, only they limited in the reach of their virtue by their lack of power, people that the heroes of the story should be invested in as much as the audience is meant to be invested in them.
The objective truth is that 99% of the time if someone got superpowers, they wouldn't use it for selfish gain or do evil, neither would they use it to save cats from trees and fight crime. Most people would be somewhere in the middle. Using their power for good sometimes, and for selfish gain other times.
I don't believe the optimists are correct that Superman if he existed would be a good heroic person all the time never doing wrong and never makes bad decisions or mistakes, nor do I believe the nihilists are correct that he'd be a tyrant or a monster like Homelander who only uses his powers to hurt others for his own benefit. He'd be a human being. The good and the bad.
Perfectly true. I do, however, think we miss the full scope of consequence in this point. A wise man once said that the evil a man does outlast all his good deeds. And it's true. The evil you do will always go much farther in the minds of people than the good. Is this explicitly wrong? No, because it gives you a warning and an understanding of who you are dealing with. But, quote frankly, I'm convinced that most people don't even really know or care about what true forgiveness is. That's definitely a story I want to see written, a highly acclaimed hero forgiven by the public. You'd have to make people altruistically kind and imaginary for it to work because 7/10 people, even if they don't always judge you harshly for failures, never forget about them either. It just stays in the back of their mind for when or if you fail again or make arguments. Always ready to remind that you failed, and that all the great stuff you did amounts to nothing because you failed ONCE. Not to mention failing more than once in the same area. Then you become KNOWN as a screw up, no matter how much good you do after.
This leads to another problem, much the same but deeper and more problematic: evil leads to entropy while well doing and good deeds only leads to "subsistence", or a kind of stagnation. In people, in their hearts, doing good amounts to more of a point value than a special bent, character quality. Superman is not a good person, Superman is a person with good ideals. Batman is not a good person, but a person with good ideals, etc. Whereas a Superman with any kind of inadequacies or unheroic traits is a being who is destined to fail. Human beings aren't just imperfect, but constantly acquiring more evil to themselves that further taints their experience, perspective, and focus.
Except for the fact that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
@Rengokuo4o6 I'd disagree, honestly. People are corrupt and having power doesn't make that condition any better.
@@xavierthomas5835 yeah, it makes it worse.
I just going to say the following. Superhero deconstructions are nothing new and are a dime a dozen. They've been since nearly the beginning. And a problem I often have with them is that they're made by people who either outright hate or don't understand them. Such as Marshall Law or The Boys are prime examples. And that not counting when they're just being plain grotesque. Furthermore, there's already a term for a corrupt or evil hero it's called a villain. And for those who say superheroes are just childish fantasy so what there's nothing wrong with that. And don't get me wrong there some good ones such as the Watchmen which I have a love/hate thing for, Kingdom Come, and Squadron Supreme to name a few. And then you have reconstructions like My Hero Academia which shows how well they can be. But this just what I think.
Surely this new ruling class will be inexplicably more moral by the pure strength of their ideas alone 😂😂😂😂😂😂 no structural changes to the mode of production are required 😂😂😂😂😂😂
Superheroes are honestly childish
"When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up."
- C.S. Lewis
@@PennedLionsPen Who said anything about fear. Superheroes are just a childish concept that you eventually grow out of. 🤷🏽♂️ Especially after expanding your taste.
@@matthewtartt9422 that's so true, I'm proud of you for becoming such a big boy! pretty soon you won't have to hold mommy's hand on the way to school
@@tysonwhitman3303 Bet you wouldn’t be talking shit face to face. Go play in traffic.
@@matthewtartt9422 hey now, what did we say about strong words? I don't want to have to revoke your ice cream privileges!
Of course deconstruction of Superheroes work because the stories are better and are layered.
Outside of Watchmen no they aren’t lol. The Boys was good in its first season but that’s it
@@MILDMONSTER1234 Never like the Boys but I am taking about stories like Identity Crisis really shows the Superhero community are mores than just costumes and a mask.
You've earned my respect and a Sub. Keep up the Fantastic work. 🫡