Unpopular Opinion: Superman is already a subversion.
Feb 26, 2023 5:27:01 GMT 1
AQUA JAR!™, taylorfirst1, and 2 more like this
Post by AQUA RAPTOR! on Feb 26, 2023 5:27:01 GMT 1
Everyone likes to complain about how Superman is boring, because it's unrealistic that someone gifted such godlike strength would be so good, honest, noble, and decent when there'd be very little in the way of accountability.
Many think to themselves, "Yeah, if I were as powerful as Superman, I'd abuse my powers in like a second."
Then they project what they think they'd do onto the character and assume he's "lame" and "boring". They think they're being clever, but they're not. That's not a clever trope subversion. That's just playing into an old hat phrase, "Power corrupts. Absolutely power corrupts absolutely."
That's just the thing played straight. A godlike being acting like a jagoff straight from the Greek or Nordic god pantheons is how you expect it to go down. I mean, I just listed two whole ancient civilizations who agreed that's how it'd go down. Superman being evil is just a villain origin story. It's not that complicated. It's not groundbreaking. In fact, there are countless old myths about heroes of the old crop who are considered heroes just because they're strong, not because of any inherently noble traits they possess. So Superman performing great deeds just to establish his reign or whatever just plays into the expectations.
Superman being Superman is the subversion. Now, I don't know if this is true, but I wouldn't be surprised at all if Superman was intentionally designed as a huge middle finger to the Nazi's appropriation of Nietzsche's Übermensch. Like with Captain America, Superman's creators were Jewish right around the time of World War II. That is important.
The Nazis got REALLY attached to the idea of the "superior human" and literally tried to create the "Aryan Superior Race". Meanwhile in America, Marvel created the literal Aryan Ideal in Post-Serum Steve Rogers, but the joke is he's a swell guy who hates everything the Nazis stand for and fights them to protect all the "inferior humans". And Superman is a literal Übermensch as well... who also is a swell guy who hates everything the Nazis stand for and fights to protect all those "inferior humans".
In Superman, Siegel, Shuster, and Finger created a mythic Übermensch, who instead of acting like Zeus or Odin who use everyone to their own ends, uses his strengths to humbly be of service to the common good of those around him. Superman rejects "Might makes right." Instead of trying to reign over inferior humans, he's a newspaper reporter in his day job, and only breaks out the tights and cape when he detects evil afoot. And then he normally does not play judge, jury, and executioner. He just catches the bad guys and hands them over to the law-appointed authorities of the land.
It's probably easy to lose sight of this, since Superman's been around for 80s years, truthing, justicing, and the America waying it up, but he really does stand in opposition to the Nihilistic idea that you don't need to care about people who are weaker than you. The dude is altruism and humility personified. He represents the optimistic worldview that, yes, there are some people out there who are good enough to be given power and not abuse it, and not lose sight of what's really important. And that's far more interesting than all the Evil Supermen who have taken over pop culture over the last 10-15 years.
Many think to themselves, "Yeah, if I were as powerful as Superman, I'd abuse my powers in like a second."
Then they project what they think they'd do onto the character and assume he's "lame" and "boring". They think they're being clever, but they're not. That's not a clever trope subversion. That's just playing into an old hat phrase, "Power corrupts. Absolutely power corrupts absolutely."
That's just the thing played straight. A godlike being acting like a jagoff straight from the Greek or Nordic god pantheons is how you expect it to go down. I mean, I just listed two whole ancient civilizations who agreed that's how it'd go down. Superman being evil is just a villain origin story. It's not that complicated. It's not groundbreaking. In fact, there are countless old myths about heroes of the old crop who are considered heroes just because they're strong, not because of any inherently noble traits they possess. So Superman performing great deeds just to establish his reign or whatever just plays into the expectations.
Superman being Superman is the subversion. Now, I don't know if this is true, but I wouldn't be surprised at all if Superman was intentionally designed as a huge middle finger to the Nazi's appropriation of Nietzsche's Übermensch. Like with Captain America, Superman's creators were Jewish right around the time of World War II. That is important.
The Nazis got REALLY attached to the idea of the "superior human" and literally tried to create the "Aryan Superior Race". Meanwhile in America, Marvel created the literal Aryan Ideal in Post-Serum Steve Rogers, but the joke is he's a swell guy who hates everything the Nazis stand for and fights them to protect all the "inferior humans". And Superman is a literal Übermensch as well... who also is a swell guy who hates everything the Nazis stand for and fights to protect all those "inferior humans".
In Superman, Siegel, Shuster, and Finger created a mythic Übermensch, who instead of acting like Zeus or Odin who use everyone to their own ends, uses his strengths to humbly be of service to the common good of those around him. Superman rejects "Might makes right." Instead of trying to reign over inferior humans, he's a newspaper reporter in his day job, and only breaks out the tights and cape when he detects evil afoot. And then he normally does not play judge, jury, and executioner. He just catches the bad guys and hands them over to the law-appointed authorities of the land.
It's probably easy to lose sight of this, since Superman's been around for 80s years, truthing, justicing, and the America waying it up, but he really does stand in opposition to the Nihilistic idea that you don't need to care about people who are weaker than you. The dude is altruism and humility personified. He represents the optimistic worldview that, yes, there are some people out there who are good enough to be given power and not abuse it, and not lose sight of what's really important. And that's far more interesting than all the Evil Supermen who have taken over pop culture over the last 10-15 years.