Monday, February 11, 2008

Superman!

Is there an equal to Superman in Watchmen? As I finish my wiki page, I'm having a hard time find one totally analogous to the man of steel. This could be due to the ravenous copyright, sure, but I think it's just because he'd be boring. He doesn't have much of an edge. He's never really bad.
Granted, in the beginning he was much more gruff, but back then he didn't really fight general crime so much as social injustice. Way meatier subject matter.
I guess he's somewhat Dr. Manhattan-like, in that he possesses actual powers, but people don't immediately know that. Also, he has a day job and was born with his powers, so that's out.
He's definitely not the comic. There is very little affable Rambo in Superman that I can find. Or maybe it's just that we don't see his dark side. Maybe that's the point. I mean, there's Bizarro and cyborg Superman, but those don't really count. Both of those just set Superman's dark side up as an outside entity, not really a part of him. We don't want to see his inward struggle (unless it concerns his love with Lois). It's so much easier to avert our gaze while he's in the fortress of solitude kicking the walls or whatever, cursing Jimmy Olsen for being too damn nice. And you can't tell me you couldn't imagine that happening. He does disappear quite often, mostly to sulk and bemoan his loneliness, but that doesn't count. I want to see him punch new craters into the moon over his income taxes or something. Something to make him more human in an indefinable way that may just make him less super, but more relatable to the world we actually live in today.

No comments: