Super hero comics and films fill our culture. From the 1930s to the present super heroes and villains have become a mainstay in the cultural development of our society. Numerous popular and academic works have explored the role of the super hero in our lives. Graphic novels and high tech films are continuing this process at an accelerating clip. Batman, Superman, Spiderman, the Punisher, the Joker, etc. are ubiquitous.
Super heroes and super villains are a modern pantheon. They are a collection of figures that express deep and abiding characteristics of human culture and of the human psyche. The pantheon of heroes and villains mimics archaic religious belief. The Greeks, the Romans and many other ancient societies worshiped a plethora of divinities. Our monotheistic belief system, although dominant for nearly two thousand years, has lived side by side with more ancient polytheistic forms of religious experience. It is my contention that contemporary super hero genres are the expression of polytheistic cultural and psychic forms long thought extinct. They are the living expression of pre-modern religious tendencies that may be an inherent and necessary component of human religious practice. Even the saints of the Catholic Church are reminiscent of this tendency.
In future blogs I will explore the connections between the super hero/villain and polytheism in its modern or postmodern forms. Polytheism in this context will be explored as a psychic component of human experience and as a sub-narrative informing our social and cultural development. My interest is not in posing polytheism as an alternative to monotheism. Rather, I am offering polytheism as a psychological and sociological phenomenon that presently finds expression in the films and comic books of our age and provides a vessel for the religious longings of a secular society.
Robert M. Oliva, ND, LMSW, MA
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3 comments:
DC Comics is notoriously known for its "Trinity" of top characters: Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. Superman is the first great superhero with at least a dozen superpowers which makes many see him as a "God". He's easily the most powerful character ever created. There are other superheroes out there but none have all the abilities that Superman has.
DC Comics have characters that are god-like; Superman being the main example. Batman, due to his dark gritty persona can come across as the devil or from Hades.
Unlike Marvel Comics which have characters that are grouned within science. Iron Man has his abilities because of his technology. Spiderman was bitten by a radioactive spider. The X-Men are human abnormalities. And finally the Hulk is a gamma radiation charged hero.
There is much more to be said about how many see superheroes as dieties, as gods. This is just a sample of how I see DC Comics as being the prime example of this.
Mike, I definitely have to agree with you. DC uses more religion in their writings. Marvel uses more science in their characters. There is also a comic called Trinity now by DC. The characters are Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. This makes me want to read more of Gog.
Mike D from Palm Coast Florida writes..."I like the blog. It is from within the human psyche throughout history that senses and knows of one greater than ourselves. The story of "The Day The Earth Stood Still" ... Here is the tale of an alien coming to earth to tell us we need to change our ways or else we will have to pay the consequences. Or "Superman" another alien comes to earth to use his powers to help us, in some cases helps us from ourselves. The old Greek and Roman and even Egyptian gods did not necessarily want to help humans they wanted us to serve them or else. I wonder if that is why Christianity may be so misunderstood because some people I think have a hard time believing that God would really want to help us instead of us serving him "or else". Thanks Mike.
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