Superman is scheduled to make a comeback in 2006. In the wake of the recent “back-story” Spiderman and Batman movies some critics are asking if there is room for an Übermensch “overman” (Superman). It certainly will be interesting to see how the character of the Man of Steel will be developed. In the last few years Superman’s cultural currency has been in recession. He’s too perfect. Too strong. Sometimes we even get the sense that he is acting when he is Clark
Kent.
While Superman was in recession, Batman and Spiderman have held greater cultural currency. The most recent Batman and Spiderman films both offered glimpses into what and who shaped them; the struggles of their lives, etc. In a class I was teaching recently we spent a few minutes contrasting Batman with Spiderman.
Emerging culture seems to be exploring the tension between these two cultural icons.
Batman is self-made. And his power comes from acquiring tools and mastering skills. His bat-belt is loaded, the bat-mobile is unrivaled on the road. He is a glorious example of the integration of the human being with technology, making him virtually indestructible. He may be the ultimate “modern man.”
Spiderman is an accident. He didn’t seek out his role it just happened. And the question before him is what does it mean for me to live fully into who I am. What is this Spider-sense, can I learn to trust myself in community.
One of the great questions of postmodern culture revolves around our understanding of the “self”. Who am I? Where does my identity come from? Does identity come from the belt about my waste, does it come from living into my spider sense, is it socially constructed? How does God revealed in Jesus Christ and in the power of the holy Spirit participate in the co-creation of human identity? Can Batman and Spiderman learn to dance together and take off their masks? How and where does Superman fit in?
Peace, dwight
BTW – it was Si Johnston who got me thinking about Spidey and Batman.
Interesting…I had a similar discussion with my wife yesterday. My wife and I were able to steal away from the kids for a few hours to see "The Constant Gardener". This movie drew something out that I’ve been slowly realizing. Movie characters are more complex these days. There are no longer stereo types of the the hero who fights against injustice who is also morally above reproach, as Tessa’s character showed in The Constant Gardener. Even the TV show Lost doesn’t seem to have any main protagonists or antagonists. We see the good and bad through the actions and history of all the characters. It’s as if the writers intend for us to choose our own protagonist(s).
I am forever wrestling with how to be seen as one who is qualified to lead spiritually and be a broken human at the same time. It is a continuous challenge to find the proper balance of both.
Hey Dwight,
I think that Batman is less a product of modernity than Superman. Heidegger talks about the use of tools (especially in the discussion about a hammer) such that they become extensions of the body. One of the feminist epistemology books I’m reading by Lorraine Code entitled, "What Can She Know?: Feminist Theory and the Construction of Knowledge" talks about this. She says of Heidegger’s thought, "Dasein’s most authentic modes of being in the material world, then, involve an intimate, hands-on knowledge of particulars, which are so closely connected with him that they virtually become, in their usage, parts or extensions of his body" (1991, 146). Batman is not necessarily self-made either, as he inherits his fortune from his murdered parents, and must then make the best of what he has been given in a dangerous world. All of Batman’s advantages come from the loss of his parents and it is this loss that compel him to use his advantages as he does. But still, it is a sort of vendetta that motivates him, leaving plenty of room for the development of his demons and struggles.
Superman on the other hand is just as his name describes him. Whereas Batman and Spiderman both live their superhero lives behind masks, Superman’s normal life is lived behind the mask and the hero is who he really is. Thus while both Batman and Spiderman are adopting roles as heros, Superman essentially is a hero and adopts the role of frailty. I do not see much of a place for Superman in the current cultural landscape. Will his altruism really be believable? (If not, is it believable of God? Perhaps not.) Do we have hope in the all-powerful-ness of anything anymore? Our country, families, faiths, knowledges, and teachers have given us little reason to hope. Is Superman at all believable? (Even in Nietzsche’s thought the Ubermensch was not an existing person but rather a future ideal that was worth struggling for now. He talks of the person who becomes a bridge from now to the overman as being blessed. So superman was not a reality but rather a reason for our struggle now, the struggle that it seems both Batman and Spiderman are engaged in)
Superman is the holy spirit, alas the energy of a Batman and Spiderman dance. It’s a conspiracy to keep one tethered to passions thereby missing Essence.
Metal, not theft.
Phil (as Felix Tallon) co-wrote an essay on Supes recently published in _Superheroes and Philosophy_:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0812695739/104-9069733-8836717
nice thoughts Dwight! The celebrated conrad gempf got me thinking about it and in fact in talking to him yesterday I discovered there he’s going to play around with these thoughts in a video he’s working on for LST.
i can’t wait to see superman the movie… going to be cool
Indeed. Look for my Spiderman / Batman analogy to be drawn out on the small screen in my DVD "Christian Life & the Bible" — due to be released Feb or March. But in my original, the contrast is primarily between Batman’s equipment-on-the-outside mentality ‘seeking things of relevance’ in his utility belt and Spiderman who is changed on the inside (into something that looks irrelevant for crime-fighting). Batman’s challenge strikes me as old-style evangelical equipping oneself / augmenting oneself with the right and relevant answers, whereas Spiderman’s challenge is to just be who/what he has become and somehow make himself and his abilities relevant to whatever situation he finds himself in.