Nerd Bling- The Love of Super-Heroes (Part 2)

When we last left, the question was posed: What's so bad about being a comic book fan? And what's so bad about super-heroes?

We'll start with the latter question first, as it seems that comic book fans are automatically assumed to love super-heroes with an unholy passion reserved only for the Super Bowl and/or sex; unfortunately, most people don't realize that comic books are a medium, not a message unto themselves, and there exists within this medium a variety of books from a variety of genres for a variety of readers. Now super-heroes are fine and dandy if they're brought to life on the big screen it seems and box office figures of the X-Men and Spider-Man films seem to support that, though small screen shows such as Justice League Unlimited and Smallville seem to not be as "acceptable" ways to experience super-heroes, even if thousands upon thousands of people more watch Smallville than will ever pick up a Superman comic book in this lifetime.

One can't forget that super-heroes are rooted in simplistic, child like fantasties of power and pleasure, action and adventure, even if some seem to have subtext, for example, the bondage subtext in Wonder Woman stories and the pro-immigration stance of the original Superman stories. This of course doesn't count to infamous "imaginary" subtext imagined by Dr. Wertham in the 50's, as chronicled in his Seduction Of The Innocent book, namely the theory that Batman and Robin were gay lovers. This was derived all from the way they stood with their legs apart and the lack of women in their life. That 60's Batman episode where Batman can't tell that a girl has dressed up like Robin to infiltrate the Bat-Cave adds layers to the discussion... but I'm wandering. Most people were introduced to super-heroes during their childhood and associate them with that part of their past, especially with the inherent simplicity of the characters at times. Clark Kent disguises himself with glasses. Batman breaks the law... to punish those who break the law, except his breaking the law is o.k. The X-Men are hated and feared even though they all look like super-models and on the outside seem to be normal people. Spider-Man is angsty because he's got a super model girlfriend, a maternal figure that loves him and solid work as a photographer (or whatever job they give him). I'll concede that it takes a lot of suspension of disbelief, but that's part of the fun of reading about super-heroes: they're incredible people in incredible situations who do good. Modern comic books have a lot more gray areas and philosophy integrated into their tales, but at the end of the day we're reading about good people overcoming tragedy to do what is right and improve the world.

I can dig that.

And because most people read comics during the 60's and 70's (a time of simpler stories, which isn't to disrespect the classic work, but a time of simpler stories) or the early 90's (the time of excess marketing and "speculation" gimmicks), there's a skewed view of comic books in general. I can understand that to a degree- it makes sense that you'd judge super-hero comic books based on your experience with them. But to extend that judgement to the whole medium and current storytelling- not to mention all the classic work from the last century- is pure folly. Let's say you saw the film Elektra and hated it- does that make all action movies bad? Or super-hero films? No, and I can't think of a single person who'd presume to make such a judgement. But people often flip through a comic, dismiss it as "crap" and then proceed to use that as evidence of the medium's worth, or lack thereof in this case.

It's utterly insane.

The other problem with super-hero comics is similar to any niche product- it can be hard to get into it all. Especially with any major character such as Spider-Man or Batman, you're looking at dozens of books just about that character every month, not to mention all the cameos or appearances in other books. You're also talking about an industry that can seem SO navel gazing and introverted that it turns away people, creating bitterness and resentment within those trying to learn about comics. "Genre" fiction, whether it be Buffy The Vampire Slayer or super-hero related tales have been a hard sell since the 90's, as an entire generation found super hero comics and related genre fiction to be vacuous- right or wrong, the emphasis was on "collectors' items" or "foil enhanced chromium cancer curing covers with artificial intelligence." Regardless of merits, X-Men #1 didn't sell 8.1 million copies (thus the best-selling comic of all time and most comics have a hard time breaking 100k these days) on the strength of the brand alone. It was seen as a new #1 issue, believed to have higher value and the 5 different covers didn't hurt sales at all for "completisits" and speculators who are no doubt sitting on hundreds of copies of this book at home. So we've had an entire generation miss out on comic books because they're parents or older siblings were "burned" on their purchases and concurrently, the video game market drove itself into the homes of many. Now the mainstream acceptance of video games has been very recent, but I can remember that even in my high school days, loving to play the new Madden game on Sega Genesis wasn't un-cool at all. But then again, there's the sports factor that we'll be addressing soon as well.

From talking to comic book "skeptics," it's also clear that many feel there's something inherently immature about super-heroes and based on the visuals, it's understandable. From women in thongs fighting crime to men who'd put Adonis to shame, there's a definite male power trip aspect to super-heroes that hasn't been addressed. There's a reason that Elektra shows more skin that Captain America. Can you imagine him dressed in the Wonder Woman costume?

It's interesting that people can gather in bars with alcohol to celebrate the end of Sex In The City and while some catty comments will be made about those gathering, it isn't socially inacceptable- after all, it's being done in a large public area and no one's really walking by to ridicule them. Or what about the large parties people had on Thursdays to celebrate new episodes of Friends? Regardless of the merits of the show, one can't deny that the series hinged on coincidence, hyperbole and entirely unrealistic lifestyles, but it managed to become a cultural phenomenon and net the involved parties more money that any of us reading this will ever see. Was it the lack of costumes or powers that made it more acceptable? Or was it the pretty people? As with many comics, the focus of the series was the relationships between the main characters and how they worked to achieve their goals. Much like super-hero comics. Look at how people can watch re-runs of Seinfeld day after day after day without overt ridicule (generally), but if you're caught reading a comic book, you're meant to feel like the 10 year old whose mother just caught him spanking the monkey to a new issue of Playboy (which really does have good articles by the way).

I'm not going to pretend to be some expert on human psychology or provide an answer to why super-heroes are viewed so poorly. I'd like to think we all make decisions for ourselves and somewhere along the line, the masses have decided that super-heroes on the printed page or small screen are not as cool as seeing them on the big screen. Maybe it's the event mentality of seeing a film or that in some minds, a concept as a film has added legitimacey.

Or maybe we just need to give people some good comic books and by golly, there are lots of them.

Tomorrow: What's so wrong about comic book fans? And what's a good list of comics for the new reader?

Coming Soon: A day by day spotlight on some of my favorite super-heroes and explaining why they resonate with me so deeply.

Nerd Bling- The Love of Super-Heroes

When you think of comic books and the "fan boys" who love them (because we don't associate girls with comics in North America), a very distinct image and reaction comes to mind- the "Comic Book Guy" from The Simpsons in the case of the former and likely some sarcastic, condescending comment in the case of the latter. Comic book fans are losers, right? People so unable to connect with the rest of society that they spend days watching Lord Of The Rings movie marathons and debating the merits of various females in various superheroine costumes. If you go to the Comic-Con International in San Diego every year, you're likely to find a lot of people who fit that mold- that fact cannot be contested. The smell of the convention hall is something to marvel at, though it is much like tear gas at first- survive the initial gagging and vomit reflex before moving forward.

But if you look closely, really closely, you'll see that there's a whole segment of comic book fans not driven crazy by minutae and living their life for fictional characters. Actually, it's no more worse (relatively speaking) than NFL fans in the American heartland or those in Oakland who feel the need to urinate on those cheering for the opposing team. Is one better than the other? You could go back and forth on the merits, but the easy comparison to sports fanatics- who are admittedly far more violent than comic fans (did you see towns set on fire when Superman "died?")- begs a more serious question: why are comic book fans so reviled and loathed by the masses?

To examine this issue, one needs to examine the roots of most comic book fans and when they first encounter comic books: Childhood (and yes, for simplicty's sake, I'll be focusing on super-heroes). There's an innocence in how a child views life and fiction in general, so superheroes seem to fit that mold just fine- they're often characters built upon black & white concepts of morality, so a child can use them to develop their own sense of right and wrong, as well as see these big, bold fantastic images they won't find anywhere else, except perhaps done in a low budget version on Power Rangers. I remember getting hooked on almost every comic I read a child simply because it all looked so "cool" (mostly comics from the 70's-80's) and it was a way to see the hero win using their brains and their brawn. It gave me something to aspire to and think about till Transformers came on at 16:00, at which point I desperately wished to be a boom box that transformed into a robot (aka the Autobot known as Blaster). Anyway... the point is that super-heroes were and always have been the way to see the really cool, the really fun and really exciting good vs evil battles enacted on the printed page. While other mediums are of course wonderful, there's something wonderfully unique about picking up a super-hero comic because of the language used to tell the stories and the sheer amount of genres & topics that one can address subversively with these comics. Plus, it's reading and if you're reading something you like, your mom can't make you read one of those books without pictures, as that seems to be torture for any kid, unless the books are Hardy Boys books. Ah, Chet and the Jalopy. Those were the days.

During the teen years, people start to find themselves and you can probably remember how your love of comic books went from being something you could talk with everyone about to something shared less and less by your friends. The simplicity of most comic books- at least at the core, from the morality to things like Clark Kent's "disguise"- causes the passion to fall by the wayside as fanboys discover girls, drugs, alcohol and sports, and sometimes in that order too. At this point comic book fans, because of the immaturity at that age, often feel like they have to hold on tighter to their passion for the medium (or perhaps just Wolverine) and we see the disconnect that causes the "cool" kids and the nerds to have much wider gaps between them. For better or worse, this is the time when people either swear allegiance to comic books or leave them. I could go into a whole rant about why the industry doesn't welcome new readers, but that is for a later time.

So at the end of this, many fans feel rejected by society and become the kind of people you see on message boards, endlessly debating the most insignificant things ("Batman would never drink coffee! He's a self made creature of the night with no need for caffeine!") or feeling closer to Spider-Man, for example, than they do to others... or themselves.

But like I said, there's a large part of the comic reading population that's more level headed about men in spandex and/or just loves the medium for the storytelling languages found within the pages of a variety of work, from Slow News Day to Blankets to Astonishing X-Men. For these fans, they grew up loving comic books as children but instead of clutching on to their childhood perceptions and reasons for loving these characters, they integrated those into their now mature worldviews to create a true passion for the medium. So what's so bad about them? And what's so bad about super-heroes?

More To Come Later Today...

A taste of what's to come concerning AMC

I've had a few people asking me what I'd be covering regarding soap operas, so I'll provide a brief overview. I'll tackle this by Tuesday, though I may present my essay on fictional characters first- it's all a matter of how I use my time and my mood.

All My Children- The good & The bad: the title explains it all. I'll be looking at the show from my perspective and explaining why it's all worth watching, despite some major shortcomings. I also want to address the social issues explored by the show and how the presentation of the show- on a daily basis- affects the viewing experience.

This will come in the next week or two depending on real life circumstances permitting said ruminations.

Thoughts?

Why We Fight (Part 2)

I've decided to keep this "Why We Fight" title as the name of the posts where I address more "philosophical" aspects of my life and my own experiences as I try to find my way. I'll have a new post at least every week or so.

"Heroes don't accept the world the way it is. They fight it"- Lindsey McDonald, Angel S5 (thanks to City Of Angel for the picture).

I find this to be an interesting point of view, especially with the thoughts running through my head of late- at what point is the reality of our lives so solid and unmoving that we must accept- tolerate?- our current climate, whether speaking in the broad sense or a more personal POV. After all, if we did not push the boundaries and try to grasp the unknown, we'd have not the successes of mankind. Which limits are life are the most acceptable and which must be challenged?

And at what point does challenging the system become an exercise in futility and necessitate moving one's view back to the, at the risk of being cliched, "big picture?"

At what point must dreams be tempered by reality?

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

Feel free to comment in style!

Upcoming Posts on Arune.Com's Blog

To give you all a preview of what's to come:



I'll be looking at Soap Operas, why they get a bad rap and why I feel that "All My Children" is a show deserving of a lot of respect. For those long time viewers, I'll ignore the whole "Santa Claus" fiasco and I will praise the "acting" of Zen Gesner, who played "Braeden Lavery" on the show. The show is probably the first piece of television I remember from my childhood and there are many a cherished a memory of my mother and I watching AMC while I was home on sick days. The trials and tribulations of actor Cameron Mathison have been a source of huge inspiration to me and the show has become my 1 hour refuge every day. I turn it on while I run on the treadmill and suddenly everything else fades away. I'm entertained. Isn' t that one of the big, important aspects of all creativity? To entertain?

People have always loved soaps as long as they weren't daytime affairs. Look at the success of the X-Men comics under Chris Claremont's tenure. Or the whole 90210/ Melrose Place/ O.C/ Desperate Housewives phenomenons. We all love soap.



There'll also be a retrospective on the "Angel" television series and why, to this day, it has impacted me more than almost any other work of fiction to which I've been introduced. The fifth season came out on DVD and it's a great ending to the show. If nothing else, "Smile Time" is absolute comedy genius and "Not Fade Away" is the best ending you could hope for from a television show. The sick part of me always hoped Angel (vampire cursed w/a soul) would finally become human again only to get run over by a random bus, just to show the screwed up side of life, but I loved this ending.

Oh, and BUY "Firefly" dammit!



Finally, I'll be focusing on my favorite superheroes and explaining why some characters resonate so much with me beyond my own nostalgic memories and how I think these characters could reach a larger audience.

I'll also follow it up with a little essay on the merits of looking to superheroes for inspiration and guidance, from how it affects a child to how an adult can interpret these colorful characters and apply lessons to their lives. There'll of course be comments as to how people are viewed when they're so fascinated with these fictional characters- expect this "essay" to be the sum of many posts.

Why We Fight

Due to circumstances of late, I'm wondering- at what point are we forced to compromise our goals, whether it be due to tempering our dreams with reality or fate knocking us down?

If one has a goal that they hold onto, that is entirely realistic and encompasses the sum of all one's ambition, what does one do if that dream is extinguished from reality? It's rare that we ever get a chance to truly embrace the fires bruning inside us and when we do... I doubt we ever have enough time to revel in the sweet embrace of destiny. Or at least that moment where everything feels right.

The happiest memory of my life is when I did my firefighter test years ago. At the risk of being arrogant, I aced it, but that wasn't what made the experience so special- it was the fact I was part of something larger and that every moment I was in the class, being trained or working on aspects of my test, I was working towards the greater good of this world. I was living my dream with every breath. I've worked to recapture that ever since. And why not? I achieved that moment of happiness we all long for and I'd be silly to not aspire to make every moment of my life like that.

The fates have conspired to keep my latest plans from coming to fruition and the thing is, those plans felt perfect- there was no doubt in my mind. The rest of my life was planned. As I prepared myself for my service in the coming future, I could feel the person inside of me waking up from too long a slumber and feeling the sun shine down on him for the very first time. Now it feels like a dream of something that can never be, something that will always be the "that is where I should be" kind of moment that carries with me.


If I'm right and that path was encompassing everything I wanted from life- the physical, spiritual and altruistic aspects- then how will I be happy with whatever I do now? Perhaps I'm being a tad bratty or unrealistic, but there's a high purpose for us all and I believe I'm acutely aware of mine, though my every attempt to embrace those goals on a larger scale seems to fail.

No matter how I move forward in my life, I won't be doing what I truly want to be doing- it'll be second place. I think of a career like marriage- you gotta wait for the perfect woman or when she comes along, you'll realize your marriage is nothing but a consolation prize.

I want to make a difference. I want to fight the good fight. But if I can't do that the way I want, then what's left for me to do? Am I living my life then, if I'm "settling" for a career that I can't love with all my heart?

Now this latest venture didn't fail because of me per se- I scored 99% or higher on every test I took. I was ready for all the future training, even better physically and mentally than is expected. But things just happened and now I can't pursue that path. That big life plan of mine is no longer viable.

Ironically enough, I've never had more career options in front of me then now and many of them offer excellent pay in a short while. But I'm not able to grasp those opportunities because I know I just stared my destiny, my path to happiness, straight in the face and it turned its back on me. I am lucky, I am blessed and have two of the best friends I could ask for in the form of my friends Jamie & Arthur. I'm not meaning to complain about my life- I've got a good one- but I'm trying to understand the intense anger inside me everything I take that leap and try to be something more.

There's a line in the "Batman Begins" trailer where Liam Neeson's character says something to the effect of, "If you want to become more than a man... if you embrace an ideal... you become something else entirely" and I do believe that. I believe it doesn't require us all to be Superman to embrace our ideals. But I do believe that for me, I need to be in the service of the public, fighting the good fight every moment of my day and working on the largest scale I can.

There are a lot of ways to make a difference in the world. From simply being a good boss who provides a great working environment to the doctor working her butt off in the ER, goodness and greatness come together in many unique combinations. But my problem isn't that I don't know how to most effectively give back to this world or that I don't know why I'm fighting.

My problem is that nothing in this world seems to want me to be that man.

Getting Up Early.

Getting up early and/or not sleeping much is actually quite manageable after the first ten minutes of agony that occur after you "wake up." Get a glass of water, check your e-mail and you're almost ready to take on the day.

Try it some time. You'll be surprised how far you get after those first few moments.

Expect massive Arune.Com updates next week. It's going to look as good as it can without more advanced Java or image editing skills- I still write all my html in notepad. Old school, yo.