Superman

As promised, today I bring you post wherein I prove that not only do I not like Superman but also that he is the lamest superhero ever created…until somebody comes out with “The Adventures of Captain Douchebag.”

Problem number 1 with Superman is that he’s deathless. This sucks all of the fun tension from any one of the Superman stories. Even when they killed him they couldn’t kill him. In the original television series we could watch a guy who was bullet proof beat up a bunch of guys for whom the latest technology was the Thompson Submachine gun (The old “Chicago Piano”), and I am supposed to be worried that he won’t survive? Before you object: yes I get it, he’s got powers making him superhuman. However, we have many superheroes with powers that can still give us a thrill because they do have a weakness, which brings me to

Problem 2: The deus ex machina also known as Kryptonite. Whenever the writers need to put some thrill into one of the Superman stories they bring out kryptonite. The rock exists as a remnant from his home planet and the radiation that it emits nullifies his powers causing him pain. It’s unclear to me if it will kill him, but that is why it’s a lame weakness. In the first movie Gene Hackman places a chain of Kryptonite around Superman’s neck and throws him in a pool where he almost drowns. Why not throw the chain around him and shoot him in the head? The slow agonizing death allows us to get the tired plot device where we regular folk can help out the godlike character.

Problem number three for him is that he is essentially incorruptable which I guess means that he is going to have to quit his job in the press. He can’t go over to the dark side and use his powers for selfish reasons. When I was 13, hell, even now that X-Ray vision would come i handy. There is no physical tension resulting from his invulnerability, and there is no psychological tension because he is too good thus alienating.

You can’t kill him, and you can always count on him to do the right thing. Which gives us our fourth problem, moral absolutism. He fights for truth, justice, and the American way. We can always rely on him for that, but what exactly are these concepts? Wikipedia says that he learned his values from his Midwestern Upbringing in the creatively named “Smallville.” What are those values? Going by the last elections I would have to say xenophobia and homophobia. I suppose from the exit polls in the primary season I could also add racism. Justice is great, but maybe Superman should whirl the earth around again and explain it to Plato, so I don’t have to read him.

In addition to that he is also pretty apathetic to his victims. If the guy can punch through a train locomotive then what happens to the criminal he just right crossed? The guy’s head should have spun off. In the early comics he beats up a wife abuser, which is fitting punishment except that the beating he tosses the guy would have killed him.

Awhile ago Spiderman fought Superman and after awhile they figured that Lex Luthor and the Green Goblin (I think) set them up. A lot of people were wondering why it was that Superman didn’t wipe the floor since he can fly and is un-killable. The thing about Spiderman is that he is smart, maybe not as smart as Batman, but definitely smarter than Superman. Superman is like Brett Favre: strong, good looking, literate; but I somehow doubt that he’s doing the Sudoku puzzle in the paper. If you give Superman a problem that isn’t physical he won’t be able to stop it. The complicated webs of Lex Luthor and Braniac generally center around a sort of fight in which we have no doubt of the victor. However that merely exposes the problems of the villains which is their vanity. Take a villain like Professor Moriarty and Superman would be powerless to stop him even though he is an aging Science professor.

Batman actually has to solve crimes, Sherlock Holmes actually has to pay attention to little details, all Superman has to do is punch a guy through a building.