Who else feels disconnected from the "superheroes" of old?

[cruggero]

I've often found myself completely dissuaded from interest in any of the contemporary "superheroes". I am a firm believer that "There is nothing super required in a hero. Nothing human in superpower." What do you think?

 

[Vladd67]

I must admit to preferring heroes in the Batman mould, people who are only what they are due to training not some superpower such as the Superman type heroes.

 

[cruggero]

I strongly agree, that's honestly the only character I could point out among the group. I'm looking to create just that type of character, but with a slight alteration. Say a sensory organ like the eyes, in connection with essential cortices within the brain, were conditionally improved. Not by super power, but by a theoretical science with a fairly plausible premise to enhance the human visual and motor functions. For example, have you ever seen a man named Bob Munden on youtube? He can quick draw and fire a pistol in two hundredths of a second.

 

[cruggero]

Would you consider this a "superhero" quality, if so what would make it more "human"?

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

I've seen something similar.

However, in the good old days it wasn't always the fastest draw that walked away.

I seem to recall the people I saw (ages ago) would always be shooting at a target no more than eight feet away. The target never shot back and never dived to the side.

Whereas in a real situation, there's a 'fear factor' to consider. Plus if the fast bloke drew first there was a chance it could be ruled murder in court I believe.

They also seem to have very short barreled guns that could clear the holster quickly.

These would be 'couldn't hit a barn door' accurate at any distance and really only good from one side of a poker table to the other. I suspect most poker gunfights were settled 'under the table' so a fast draw would be of no use there either.

All just opinions of course. Quick Draw McTein I ain't.

 

[cruggero]

This is what makes my work "original". I'm trying to bring a sci-fi western type genre with a eastwood-isk character who's quick draw or really just ridiculously quick reflexes allow him to become a lawman of sorts within a lawless futuristic setting.

 

[Mladen]

I don't know if its the characters themselves, or the fact that they only work in very simplistic worlds of 'good' and 'evil'. That kind of thing is very dull to me, and when they attempt to transplant these characters into OUR world they cease to function and they come off as ridiculous.

I don't even think its the power or how they acquire it, its the shift from 'having a power' to 'using it for heroics' which always seems contrived to me. Doing the occasional good deed is one thing, dedicating your life to crime fighting (and not as a police officer, so you're ONLY answerable to your own moral code, not to the ethics and laws of the state) seems like a dangerous obsession and completely unheroic to me.

I like Batman well enough, but ever since Grant Morrison mentioned that the character is inherently classist (a wealthy white male crusades to beat up criminals, the desperate lower class, who he openly disdains from his very first appearance in comics), I have trouble with enjoying his stories now. Its unfair to say he has no powers, since his super power is that he's incredibly rich, which allows him the freedom and money to pursue his hobby. Without his billions of dollars, Batman is just Charles Bronson in Death Wish.

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

I don't know if its the characters themselves, or the fact that they only work in very simplistic worlds of 'good' and 'evil'. That kind of thing is very dull to me, and when they attempt to transplant these characters into OUR world they cease to function and they come off as ridiculous.

I don't even think its the power or how they acquire it, its the shift from 'having a power' to 'using it for heroics' which always seems contrived to me. Doing the occasional good deed is one thing, dedicating your life to crime fighting (and not as a police officer, so you're ONLY answerable to your own moral code, not to the ethics and laws of the state) seems like a dangerous obsession and completely unheroic to me.

I like Batman well enough, but ever since Grant Morrison mentioned that the character is inherently classist (a wealthy white male crusades to beat up criminals, the desperate lower class, who he openly disdains from his very first appearance in comics), I have trouble with enjoying his stories now. Its unfair to say he has no powers, since his super power is that he's incredibly rich, which allows him the freedom and money to pursue his hobby. Without his billions of dollars, Batman is just Charles Bronson in Death Wish.

Harsh stuff Mladen. I can agree to some extent although you have to accept he is a product of the society that spawned him, where being poor and therefore inclined toward the criminal (just to survive: product of the depression and all) would put you in the communist camp and therefore , in the US, fair game for a good kicking; any time day or night.

I myself prefer the hard working stiffs like spiderman who have to grin and bear what fate has dealt them (aging relatives, sad appearance leading to failure in love and zero sex life) and just get on with it.

Also his character allows for him getting a good kicking from the baddies which is always a good thing for a hero to suffer.

The trouble with Batman in my opinion was his inane lack of intelligence and his 'Holier than thou' attitude and his lack of any empathy with the baddies, given his privileged background.

However by far the most stupid part of his biography was the fact he always ended up in a near death situation and was only saved because the baddies couldn't afford the price of a bullet, that would've ended all our misery.

 

[HareBrain]

A bit off-topic, but although I've never had any interest in superheroes, I have been riotously entertained over the last few days by Grant Morrison's book Supergods, which made me wish I knew more about what he was talking about. I'd really recommend it.

 

[J Riff]

DC comics were old news by the time Marvel took off in the sixties. SuperBatMan and the Justice League were already hundreds of issues old, not very interesting.
The last comic I read with enthusiasm was SpiderMan ? vs. Juggernaut, first appearance, and then Marvel wandered away too.
We got robbed I tell ya - robbed. Bleedin McCarthy era and the comics code... the pre-code stuff was wild, pulps were too. Then later it got crazy again when graphic novels appeared.
But no, we got cheesy caped superheroes who hardly ever killed anyone or swore or smoked or drank or anything interesting.
Batman vs. Little Lulu. Tough call.
And whatever happened to Alley Oop?

 

[Perpetual Man]

I feel that the superheores have suffered since the early 1990's and much of what made them so entertaining bled out of them with the expansion of companies like Image. This does not mean to say that it was the fault of any individual company rather the sudden expansion across the board as comic companies became more corporate.

As JRiff says, DC were old when Marvel came into being, and they were left behind by the 'realism' that the House of Idea brought into the stories. Characters were not near gods, they were real human beings with problems and lives that the readers could identify with.

While Superman became virtually unstoppable, developing from a man who could leap tall buildings in a single bound, to a demi-god who could fly, was invulnerable and had an array of powers like visions of all descriptions and Batman had more money than he knew what to do with, Peter Parker was worrying about his aunt and struggling to pay the rent, while crushing over Gwen Stacy..

DC have through the years tried to come back with various reboots, and universe wide alterations - the latest is coming this year, but while the characters seems larger than life it is harder to connect with them.

Marvel on the other hand have problems of their own. In one word 'expansion'. There was a time when the company based a title around character, but now there are multiple titles for various characters and groups, all written by different writers, all trying to appeal to the largest common denominator. Strong characters become watered down as they try and match them to the same characters appearing elsewhere. Characters become over used, contradictory and too powerful. Is it any wonder the readers are failing to connect with the characters?

Back when I started reading the X-Men (see my history of the X-Men threads) they were felt like real people, and the 'silly' powers seemed extraneous, now the costumes and powers dominate all - often changed from what had been previously stated to suit the modern market of all flash no depth.

Hard to believe that Wolverine was once a simple character with a healing factor that could deal with little wounds quickly, but bigger injuries took time to heal, and death was always a possibility. Now, retroactively he has apparently died and come back a few times, and the healing factor can take care of near total bodily destruction. In minutes. There was a time he appeared in just the X-Men and now... a minimum of eight regular titles a month and that does not include limited series and guest appearances.

Ahh, familiarity breeds contempt and all in the name of the might dollar

 

[Jade44]

I strongly agree, that's honestly the only character I could point out among the group. I'm looking to create just that type of character, but with a slight alteration. Say a sensory organ like the eyes, in connection with essential cortices within the brain, were conditionally improved. Not by super power, but by a theoretical science with a fairly plausible premise to enhance the human visual and motor functions. For example, have you ever seen a man named Bob Munden on youtube? He can quick draw and fire a pistol in two hundredths of a second.

I would wonder a bit about Mr. Munden. That speed would mean that he is moving almost as fast as a nerve impulse. Given the fact that the world quick draw record is listed as only 0.2 of a second I suspect the YouTube video may have been faked. That said, I have no problem with the old style comic heroes, after all I was raised on them and the old gunslinger westerns. It is the new ones that I have no familarity with that I can't identify with.

 

[cruggero]

A hero to me is selfless, foremost, but selflessness doesn't have the same impact when there's no risk involved with the hero's life. My protagonist is mortal, bleeds like every man, and has a tragedy propelled story. There's a very real emotion the comes from a father/child relationship, not to mention family. I took that and put a spin on it. Instead of revenge for those who killed his family/child, he's actually the one more responsible than any. He falls asleep at the wheel with his son in the passenger seat which results in a wreck, claiming his child's life.

At that point, who do you blame but yourself? Subsequently his marriage dissolves and any contemporary life he had, is lost.

The sci-fi/western genre serves second hand to this cataclysmic event. His life crumbles, he abuses alcohol, and becomes utterly depressed. All that remains is his job as a firefighter. One night after being told of his removal from "active duty" a call for a chemical fire at a cryonics lab interrupts his conversation with the crew chief. Later, after rescuing a scientist who's a leading researcher in the field of nanotechnology, he's blinded by a burst chemical valve. The scientist feels indebted, offers to give him his sight back, but there's a catch. He'll have to undergo hundreds of years of cryonic stasis till the time when this nanotechnology is ready. Again, with nothing tying him to his current life, he accepts and is "happy" to do so.

Then I create the setting as a postwar Sol system 300 years later. A powerful company had been subsidized by the U.N. Resource Committee which privatizes space exploration. They'd set up colonies on terraformed planets, space stations, hollowed asteroids, you get the picture. Meanwhile, Earth's consumed by a global civil war and a resource crisis. There's not enough food, water, or energy to go around. The planets "overpopulated". This "Company" tries to take over Earth, sends it into a modern dark age with NNEMP weapons and destroys every governmental and economic entity making the them sole might over humanity. A resistance pushes them back, but the damage is done. Billions make up the death totals, everything's war torn, and futuristic items have been absent knowledgeable people to maintain them and have rotted to decay.

I tired to create a future that's a "survival of the fittest". There's no law, no government, basically no infrastructure. Now, my protagonist is set to enter the story once again. Gains his eyesight back, but it's much more advanced. Allow me to explain.

There's a time-lapse between what you see, ear, ect; and what your brain does with that sensory information "interacts". Likewise, your eyes see in frame-rates of milliseconds. Ever watched a speeding car go by like a blur? Well, it wasn't that the car was too fast for you to see. It was blurred because your eyes couldn't keep up with how fast it was going. It was "skipping frames". Imagine what it would be/feel like if a nanotechnology refurbished your cell tissue, along with essential cortices in your brain, and quickened what would take milliseconds to nanoseconds. You'd be able to see that car go by as if it were parked in front of you.

This is all of course a rough outline. I'm currently working on the 2nd draft of the first book. There's four total in the series. I've got the rough and 1st drafts of the second book finished as well, and have conceptualized the third and forth.

 

[cruggero]

What about a hero that was made good by the interactions he has with people, subtle deeds that seem frivolous but none the less convey a human compassion, and stands up for those who are downtrodden or bullied? My story is very stringent on moral philosophy. The protagonists moral thinking operates on a level six post-conventional stage as Lawrence Kohlberg would classify it. It entails a selflessness, a "see from others shoes" understanding. Namely a understanding of how interaction impacts human frailty, and how fallible we can be. Now, this is a dynamic trait of the character that develops over time. It is a process.

I was especially inspired by a concept known as the Bodhisattva and the Jataka tales. As odd as that may sound.

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

Have you read the western series :-

"Edge"

Warning they contain graphic violence.

An anti-hero character. Does what's best for him and only what's best. Usually his selfishness ends up doing someone a good deed on the way - kind of thing.




Just something to feed the grey matter etc.

 

[cruggero]

Thank you, it'd be a little anti what i'm portraying but I need to imbue shades of grey into the story structure for balance. Much obliged.

 

[Mladen]

I had a read of your quick synopsis, a couple of parts which confuse me:

How does he get the implants in the future, if its become a cesspit? Why/how would anybody in the future bother to 1: Resuscitate a dead frozen dude from the past and 2: Give him new eyes, particularly if knowledge of technology is gone?

Why does he have such a strict moral code? Where does it come from? Is he just making it up as he goes along, or is it drawn from something? And what is his motivation to suddenly live under a strict moral code just because he has super vision?

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

I had a read of your quick synopsis, a couple of parts which confuse me:

How does he get the implants in the future, if its become a cesspit? Why/how would anybody in the future bother to 1: Resuscitate a dead frozen dude from the past and 2: Give him new eyes, particularly if knowledge of technology is gone?

Why does he have such a strict moral code? Where does it come from? Is he just making it up as he goes along, or is it drawn from something? And what is his motivation to suddenly live under a strict moral code just because he has super vision?

Seems it was a very quick read :-

The sci-fi/western genre serves second hand to this cataclysmic event. His life crumbles, he abuses alcohol, and becomes utterly depressed. All that remains is his job as a firefighter. One night after being told of his removal from "active duty" a call for a chemical fire at a cryonics lab interrupts his conversation with the crew chief. Later, after rescuing a scientist who's a leading researcher in the field of nanotechnology, he's blinded by a burst chemical valve. The scientist feels indebted, offers to give him his sight back, but there's a catch. He'll have to undergo hundreds of years of cryonic stasis till the time when this nanotechnology is ready. Again, with nothing tying him to his current life, he accepts and is "happy" to do so.

I'm not defending the plot you understand. I can be as picky as the next guy in that respect.

 

[cruggero]

Good questions. Let me break the generalized version up a bit.

The "Company" that was mentioned gains prominence over a long duration of time which is explained in a monologue. During this time they acquiesce similar entities within the fields of engineering physics, aerospace research, theoretical studies, and nanotechnology to grow their scientific enterprise. That said, the firm who the protagonist is originally "frozen" by is among these satellite endeavors the "Company" buys up.

The reason the scientist whom he saves does research within a cryonics lab is due to its medical applications. He's researching what's known as molecular nanotechnology meant for nano-medical aims, where "nano-cells" are inserted into damaged or diseased cell tissues in purpose to "repair" them. Since its only theoretical during the story's contemporary time its done in a cryonics lab, because cryonics can neurologically sustain a human body for a prolonged duration. This allows the scientist to preserve willing participants until his research's completed and can be successfully applied.

Now, the "Company" owns this cryonics firm who had a lead researcher in the aforementioned fields of nanotechnology. The research's found to be pivotal in Cotter's terraformation processes. Realizing the awe inspiring potentials of the technology's further advancements, they re-adapt the project goals. Added on top of its restorative qualities, they begin delving into enhancing human cell structure instead of just simply fixing it. This eventually takes a militant outlook. Further explanation on that subject is completely standalone.

As for the "Company's" defeat at the hands of a resistance, its not so much of a defeat as it was a treatise that ended the war. Cotter still exists, but are disbarred from the Sol system and only allowed commercial trade with whomever can afford it. They even have their own society, cities, planets, and whatnot. As a peace offering Cotter wished to build a medical post orbiting Mars which was agreed upon by affluent members of Sol in order to lend medical aid to a devastated area. The station ends up being a kind of Trojan horse. The post's outfitted as both a medical and research station and houses their leading researchers who continue working on the nano-cellular enhancement concept. Their databases of "applicants" held in cryonic stasis they've obtained over the years is also housed there, my protagonist included.

Onto the lack of maintenance personal. Understand when I say many or most of the people able to maintain the current technology are dead, that out of the billions of people alive its understandable a respectable number still live. Their numbers simply aren't high or concentrated enough to maintain the whole system. This gives me an opening for different options as far as creating nice to cruddy settings throughout the story.

The protagonist is no saint, but keep in mind he was a firefighter from our times when people weren't living in a constant state of survival. Our society holds a lot more pleasantries versus the futuristic setting that's regressed to a state of "survival of the fittest" for most, so by comparison he seem's much nobler. Firefighter's also exhibit a people oriented disposition as a byproduct their occupation entails, as does my protagonist. Along the lines of his "moral progression". He goes from hating himself, because of guilt he feels towards his involvement in his son's death which translates over to a more standoffish attitude towards others. And evolves to a more loving manner as he slowly forgives himself, and by extension becomes more compassionate when interacting with others. Its a behavioral theory that our interactions stem from an internal state reflected upon the external world. (e.g.) If I'm happy, I'll be prone to pleasant social interaction. If I'm unhappy, I'll be prone to unpleasant social interaction.

Did I get everything?

 

[Parson]

To return to the original question: I do not feel disconnected from the "Superhero" but I've read very few comic books and no graphic novels. I find the idea of a Superhero exciting and interesting.

As to the question of Super powers, it seems to me that this is a given. I would not consider "Batman" a superhero because he has no super-human powers. He is more like Indiana Jones than Superman. But I would consider Spiderman a Superhero because he does have super-human powers.

I love heroes like Spiderman who explore what it is to live in the real world all the while being very different, and not universally liked. What I really do not like are the all to prevalent anti-heroes. They seem to perpetuate the myth that there is nothing which is completely good, nor completely evil. I think the noblest impulses in human being are those which are selfless. Jesus had it right when he said "there is no greater love than that a man should lay down his life for his friends."