Monday, January 23, 2017
Guest Entry Civil War is all Supermans fault
Guest Entry Civil War is all Supermans fault
No, really. Marvels massive crossover that is going to cost me a ton of money is all the fault of DCs seminal superhero. Kal Els hands are covered with the blood of the New Warriors. And I can prove it.
If you havent been paying attention, the basic premise of "Civil War" is that the government wants to register and control the Marvel superheroes. This causes a schism between the heroes, and there will be much punching and hitting and zapping and snikting and minor characters dying and thwipping in an event that is an allegory for civil rights and will change the Marvel Universe forever!!! Or at least thats what the marketing copy says.
The fatal flaw in the story is that unlicensed, unsanctioned vigilantes should have never been legal to begin with. J. Jonah Jameson and Henry Gyrich were right all along. The Fantastic Four should have been arrested day one for stealing a rocket ship. While Im not a big city lawyer, I have no idea how any prosecutor got charges against a supervillain to stick, when the only real evidence against them was a note from your friendly neighborhood wallcrawler saying they did a bad, bad thing. I can only imagine the charges your average hood could level against Thor for beating them with a giant stone hammer. And thats not even counting the countless FAA violations whenever Iron Man flies. I dont think Ive ever seen Tony Stark file a flight plan.
Now, we could just blame Stan Lee for not planning on a bunch of cynical readers who probably should have stopped reading comics when they discovered girls figuring out the flaws in his sandbox some 40 years later. We could, but wed be wrong. Its all Supermans fault.
When Superman first appeared in 1938, he was something of a super-badass rebel. Whether it was tossing gangsters in front of bullets or beating the snot out of spousal abusers, early Superman was about as far from an establishment tool as you could get. The law didnt apply to him. He was Superman! What were you going to do to stop him? The guy psychologically tortured weapons manufacturers by forcing them into the trenches of WWII and hounding them to the point of near death! And the cops treated him like he was: a vigilante. They even shot at him in the early days.
Sadly, Supermans edge didnt last. It wasnt too long before he was wrapping up criminals for the police, when he wasnt psychologically and physically torturing Lois, Lana and Jimmy. He became a tool of the establishment, along with becoming a world class sadist. And somehow, the cops stopped caring that he was doing their job for them, and the courts stopped caring that Prankster and Toyman were victims of super-vigilantism.
And because Superman is Superman, every other hero followed suit. Dark, urban avengers started cooperating with the police and working with kids in short pants. Fish men bent on conquering the surface world stopped flooding Africa to drown flaming androids and started punching out Nazis. All of which leads to "Civil War."
So dont blame Millar, Bendis, or Quesada.
Blame Superman.
Jeremy Goldstones first real job was as an intern for Malibu Comics. Now, after a career of writing, editing and public relations, he needs a job. Hire him, damn it!!! Please contact him at stonegold@earthlink.net
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