Re:Alan Moore on superhero culture
by tompccs on Tuesday November 19, 2019 @11:47AM
(#21575044)
Great quote. I'd add to that (or perhaps supplant) Tom Holland's observation that our collective cultural points of reference are all steeped in christianity, even when not explicity christian. The superhero trope has strong overtones of christian morality and usually follows the new testament surprisingly closely: man, from humble origins, is bestowed supernatural powers, performs miracles, struggles with his own nature, saves humanity, etc..
[ Parent
| on HN ]
> man, from humble origins, is bestowed supernatural powers, performs miracles, struggles with his own nature, saves humanity, etc..
That's very common even outside of Christianity, greek/egyptian/nordic myths. It's more of a "human" thing than a "christian" thing.
Agreed
What made me realise this too was seeing Endgame. Thanos with his population control, cosmic agenda could have been satire from an angry christian conservative who wanted to rant about climate change liberals and the club of rome or something.
It's really funny if you pay attention to villains in super-hero movies how often they're foreign or alien in origin with some environmental or grand agenda. Ra's al ghul is no different, and Bane of course who in Nolan's movie is the villian for bringing wall street down.
It's funny how loved these movies are usually by stereotypically 'woke' audiences when the moral of the story so often seems like something that could have come straight out of the 1950s.
Not just superheroes. Middle-Eastern/Russian/British bad guys are de rigeur in action movies.
Been a long time since I've seen a Chinese bad guy in an action movie. Funny, that.
You are forgetting (at the very least) Homer.