3 ms·
I get the idea of having some sort of shared cultural touchstones. But there are plenty of candidates for that role. Not to belabor the point, but why the guys
by samirillian 9y ago
I get the idea of having some sort of shared cultural touchstones. But there are plenty of candidates for that role.
Not to belabor the point, but why the guys in tights and not, say, the characters from the Abrahamic faiths? Well, you say, it's dangerous to mix faith with fantasy. But that's exactly what the old myths did and what Tolkien could do by implicitly associating his stories with Christianity, and exactly what Batman will never be. So much for the structural similarities between the Superman and Hercules.
But, again, this is all beside the point. The devil is in the details. There might be nothing inherently wrong with making superheroes the source of a shared cultural vocabulary about "spiritual" questions: what is right, what is wrong, what is bravery, etc. But how has it actually unfolded, in the world, right now? Again, Moore argues that, in the concrete, it has led to a kind of infantilism.
You bring up the Dark Knight. I don't personally like what I took away as the message of the Dark Knight, but I understand if you do. But can you name a single other example with actual critical value? Or do the vast majority just serve to make unhappy people, sleepwalking through life, continue unhappily sleepwalking?