On a Superhero’s Ideals and Their Reluctance to Change

by Gabriel Alejandro 

“[But] Are you the Superman that the 21st century needs? Why not use your power to ‘fix’ the world?”

-From Superman Vs. The Elite, 2012

     Superheroes have represented humankind’s limitations ever since their creation. Whether it be the power to fly, x-ray vision, or just super intelligence, their traits often reflect the frustration of a group facing a seemingly impossible challenge. For example, both Superman and Batman were born out of the Great Depression. The economic difficulties and usual questioning of immigrants that comes as a consequence of difficult times were embodied in a alien who arrived on earth seeking refuge and a billionaire (perhaps millionaire, at the time) who used his wealth to help the less fortunate. But super powers did not give them the permission to abuse them. In fact, it just meant that a larger sense of responsibility had to be administered. This came from an ideal perspective of responsibility that echoed American exceptionalism. Later, when Marvel arrived unto the scene, their heroes offered a fresh and optimistic perspective that the Sixties so desperately needed. They applied the same sense of responsibility to a decade marked by Cold War propaganda, Civil Rights movement protests, and Vietnam-conflict bloodshed. By doing so, they cemented countless unwritten superhero rules such as “no killing,” which stemmed from a particular ideal of justice. Now, more than fifty years have passed. Our innocence has faded along with our ideals of responsibility and justice, but superheroes still go by the same standards that they did back when they first arrived. Should they be brought up to modern policies or should they be kept as historic records of past mentalities?

  Next I will analyze recent Superman, Batman, and Captain America events that put into question their role and that of their ideals in modern society. I chose these heroes because they are the earliest examples of the superhero archetype and carried an ideal. I know that I left out excellent ones like Wonder Woman (feminist icon) and obvious ones like Spider-Man (“With great power comes great responsibility”) out of the article, but I needed it to be short and concise. If anyone is willing to write one about any other superhero’s adaptability, they are more than welcome to submit it. 

Superman 

  Superman Vs. The Elite (2012, cover picture) is an adaptation of a Joe Kelly story (by Kelly himself) titled What’s Funny About Truth, Justice & the American Way?, published in Action Comics #775 (March 2001). The story pits Superman against a new group of superheroes called The Elite, led by Manchester Black (a bit stereotypical for an English superhero, no?). But why would Superman go against another superhero team if they are, in fact, superheroes? The answer lies in a matter of principle. Unlike Superman, Manchester Black’s team, The Elite, does not mind getting its hands dirty when it comes to crime fighting. In fact, in the Action Comics version of the story, this is how they introduce themselves to the public: by killing everyone involved in a conflict before Superman could even get to the scene. This strikes a chord with one of Superman’s strongest mandates: thou shall not kill. But much to Kal-El’s surprise, the act is well received among the public opinion who take advantage of the situation to express a growing dislike towards the status quo. This causes Superman to question his place in the modern world: are his ideals still relevant? Is HE still relevant?

The disapproval of the status quo can be taken up outside Superman’s world and into the comic book reader’s world. For years now, big-hero comic book sales have been declining due to readers turning their attention into other no-so-super, grittier titles. This is due, in part I believe, to lack of adaptability. Today’s world is much more in tune with the reality of war and, thanks to social media, can even witness it first-hand from the comfort of their home. The growing cynicism that has come as a result demands its heroes to be more “real” and in par with what audiences see on a daily basis.

But the audience’s growing rejection of the status quo is not limited to the fiction they consume. Recent tragedies such as Charlie Hebdo and the Boko Haram kidnappings have stirred debate on how global entities such as the United Nations should deal with extremist opponents. The people who question the old, diplomatic ways favor a more hands-on approach like The Elite. Their argument is that modern, religious-driven “terrorists” do not act on reason and therefore we should not waste time trying to reason with them. They feel that governments are upholding a  moral value system that is outdated and will not work against this new threat. In a sense, we see how Superman’s convictions mirror those of our world order (Kelly correlates truth and justice to the “American way” which also happens to be “Superman’s way,” however problematic you may find it) and just as our real world leaders struggle to maintain relevance in the world power stage, Superman struggles to maintain himself relevant in the comic book sphere. It is important to note that the book was published just months before the September 11 attacks, leaving us to question if it would have been any different had it been published after the event.

Batman

  Perhaps the one who has had a better time aging has been Batman. His menacing presence and psychological trauma has allowed for writers to come up with darker storylines that live up to some modern standards. They even stopped calling him superhero in favor of a more believable “detective.” That being said, Batman has got to be one of the stronger maintainers of the status quo. He keeps his rogues gallery not too far (locked in Arkham Asylum) where they  are just a sneeze away from breaking out, running amok, and returning after being beaten senselessly. Like Superman, he has been questioned on many occasions about his decision not to kill when it would save him a lot of trouble and his answer always evokes an inmutable concept of justice.

  A memorable moment was presented in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight (2008) when our caped crusader saw himself crossing over boundaries even he feared. Beginning with the extradition of a Chinese bank accountant who fled the U.S. avoiding trial and then using a highly problematic sonar tracker on the citizens of Gotham, Batman’s actions were just a metaphor of the United States’ internal and external policies after September 11. Many do not remember how, after the attacks, the U.S. struggled to assess its new enemy. On the exterior, they had to justify military intervention in order to “prevent” future attacks and, in the interior, they proposed the highly controversial Patriot Act which included wiretapping the whole nation “for their own safety.” We see again how the nation’s supposed interests match those of our superhero, but this time the hero does not go all in. Even though Batman also struggles with his new enemies, he is fully aware that the means blur moral and ethical lines. Everything sort of ends up in hypocrisy after Batman does agree to do both things “just this once,” giving in to the notion that rules are meant to be broken in the time of war. Still, his questioning of the whole event can give us an idea of what 1939’s Batman would think of 2008’s Batman, as well as what would 1939’s United States would think of post-September 11 United States. The only difference being that Batman went on the record as saying that it was wrong, while we are still waiting for the other to even address it.

Captain America

  Time for a Marvel character to join the list. In my opinion, Captain America is one of the most misunderstood superheroes and it is largely due because of the name he bears. Many believe that the ideal he represents is that of the current U.S.A., when in fact, Captain America’s semiotic object never left the year/moment he was created in, thus making him the perfect emblem of an ideology whose nation has changed, but the character’s did not.

  To begin with a comic book history perspective, Captain America was created to fill the need for a more “physical” superhero during World War II. Previous comic book characters such as Superman and Batman not only did not kill, but they also avoided detailed physical confrontations (it is believed to be because of the artist’s inability to draw “real” fights). That is why on the cover of Captain America’s first issue we saw him punching Hitler square on the face. This was meant to appease the then-modern audience’s thirst for action during the war. Their hatred towards Hitler and the amounting anti-Nazi propaganda the U.S. served had rallied the people into a patriotic frenzy that had to be released. Luckily, Jack Kirby’s experience in the Suffolk Street Gang (Grant Morrison, Supergods 38) that he had been a part of when young served as a creative model for his illustrations and they were a hit (no pun intended).

But it would be only a matter of time before Captain America joined the rest of the “aged” superhero crew. His identity became more problematic as the years passed and the world’s perception of the U.S. changed. The Cap’s name would be forever linked to the nation’s foreign debacles even though Steve Rogers opposed their actions and philosophy in the comics. His return during the Sixties had made him socially aware: he believed Vietnam should end in a peace agreement and later, during the 70s, fought against a government association that was headed by president Nixon himself (Dominic Tierney, Did Captain America Really Sleep Through Vietnam?). He finally ended up hanging the suit in 1974 because of his dislike for the U.S. nation’s actions and distanced himself by becoming Nomad. But, since nothing in the comic book world lasts forever, he was meant to grab the shield once again, but as Tierney states in his article: “When he finally grasps the shield again, Cap decides he will fight for American ideals, and not for the administration in Washington. ‘I'm loyal to nothing ... except the [American] Dream.’” The “Dream” mentioned not being the applied version, but the idealized version of it.

During the past decade the Captain has had to endure the same world changes as Superman and Batman. He did not go after Islamist extremists and chase them off the map because, as we have seen, that is not his way. He has rather stayed inside and favored local policies in a time when politics have become extremely polarized and a second wind of the civil rights movement has emerged. I have praised Rick Remender’s Captain America (2012-) a number of times and this is one of the main reasons for doing so. By removing Rogers, sending him to Dimension Z for a number of years and then bringing him back to earth, Remender replayed the Captain’s 1963 return, but for today's standards. Since Remender knew the Captain would not submit the U.S.’ current ideals, he brought the whole media and public opinion against him. Unlike Superman, Captain America did not question his relevancy in modern times, but he did question the United States government decision-making during modern times. 

Steve Roger’s last bout came at the hands of Zola who drained him of his serum and left him an aged soldier (perfect analogy for this article). And, in a move that seemed logical to some of us, Sam Wilson, The Falcon, was chosen to be the new Captain America. The implications of the move were big. The change came at a time when gay rights are being debated in the political sphere in a way that reminded many of the 1960s civil rights movement. In addition, African Americans across the U.S. were marching on the streets seeking justice for Michael Brown and Eric Garner, two victims of police shootings whose perpetrators were not indicted. The argument of a new America can be established here with Sam Wilson as the face. Steve Rogers could question authority all he wanted, but if there was one thing he could never reflect, it was the diversity of the American people. Nevertheless, a costume or physical change does not suppose a change in ideal. Sam Wilson upholds the same concept of justice as Rogers before him. And even though it is still too early to say in the series with Wilson at the helm, it would be interesting to see if this becomes a point of discussion. 

Closing

I do realize that, at this point, both DC and Marvel establish limits for their characters when a new writer is hired. This certainly does prevent the creative team from moving away of what has already been established. The audience is also a key factor in accepting or rejecting new material. Zack Snyder’s heavily-derided Superman film Man of Steel showed him killing General Zod and the audience did not approve. Many other stories where our characters have bent or simply broken their rules have been written, but they are always discarded as “Elseworlds” or “What If?” This article centers around a canon that includes comic book storyline and the public acknowledgment of said canon. 

Still, it is interesting to trace a character’s immutability for more than five decades. Even more when the nation their ideals were based on has changed so much. Superman will always be the boy scout of America, upholding the chain of command for as long as it exists even though he may know that it is not completely right. His devotion to preserving order and a form of central power belong in his ideal. It is why Frank Miller easily wrote him as a government puppet in The Dark Knight Returns (1986). Batman will be Superman’s opposite in style of achieving things, but they will still share the same principles. Finally, Captain America has been the one to question things from early on. This has produced many changes in esthetic, but nothing at the core. You can say that the Captain is a symbol whose referent is stuck in time. But for the three, the ideal stays the same even though the times keep moving forward and the standard of what a superhero is moves along with it.   

Bibliography

Morrison, Grant. Supergods: What Masked Vigilantes, Miraculous Mutants, and a Sun God from Smallville Can Teach Us about Being Human. New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2011. 

Tierney, Dominic. Did Captain America Really Sleep Through Vietnam?. The Atlantic, 26 July. 2011. Web. Feb. 2015. <http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2011/07/did-captain-america-really-sleep-through-vietnam/242573/>

Captain America: The Winter Soldier- Endorsing Good Wars

By: Ricardo A. Serrano Denis

      Is World War II still the Good War? This was the title of an Adam Kirsch New York Times article exploring just that, the goodness of the Second World War. It came out in March 2011, when Iraq and Afghanistan had pushed Americans to question the extent of confidence a country could extended towards military might and strategy in the twenty first century. Militarism as a virtue, as a primary national value, seemed to be dwindling in representational prowess. The distance breached between morality on the home front and morality on the battlefield had broadened much to the disadvantage of war as an American ideal. Fighting in the Middle East made military conflict an impersonal experience, much detached from the cohesiveness of the American experience. More importantly, it became its own entity, with its own politics and its own history. In other words, it went opposite the Second World War’s route, that of war as the defining principle of American society. Kirsch will conclude that World War II will stay “good” so long as it stays living history. Living history, in turn, can instruct, it can still impart teachings of its own and tell people that there actually is a right way to conduct war. Of course, Kirsch explains that such histories need to take into account ambiguities and morally gray areas. But when memory is so highly elevated as to be considered near mythical, then, we have another thing entirely. War was “good” back then. Therefore, war can still be “good”. And Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) endorses just that idea.

      Captain America means many things, but most of them rely on his war to make sense. The Second World War lives through Steve Rogers the same way Steve Rogers lives through it. It might make the character unstuck in time and it might keep him from being a more universal metaphor for war in America, but it keeps the war’s memory fairly grounded in what Kirsch referred to as living history. The character’s many discourses have been touched upon before. He upholds conservative politics, endorses a continued state of war, exalts ultra-patriotism, and survives as a testament to the goodness of the Second World War. These things hold true in the movie. 

      Directed by Anthony and Joe Russo, Captain America: The Winter Soldier keeps with Captain America’s longstanding character conventions and gives us a fairly safe war movie. Rogers is now a part of SHIELD, just in time to watch it fall into the hands of HYDRA. In true sequel fashion, old enemies continue to haunt Rogers. HYDRA remains the Nazi stand-in par excellence (if HYDRA is not an offshoot of Nazism then nothing is), and is the main villain of the story. Captain America favorites such as Arnim Zola and obscure villains such as The Leaper pop up to keep true followers anxious for more. But it is the Winter Soldier that makes the movie stand above standard superhero fare. The character contrasts so starkly with Rogers that the whole HYDRA plot could have been scrapped so as to focus entirely on the Winter Soldier. In fact, the Winter Soldier is more a secondary story arc playing to the overarching plot that deals with war on a more general level. 

       The inclusion of the Winter Soldier could have been an interesting counterweight to the discourses of old residing in Rogers. The Winter Soldier, created by Ed Brubaker (who makes a blink-or-you’ll-miss-it cameo in the film) is revealed as Roger’s lost sidekick, Bucky. Brubaker broke one of the only rules Marvel comics resisted touching (only Bucky stays dead) to make Captain America face his war with an added sense of ambiguity that judges his sense of being as superficial and overtly simplistic. In the comics, when the long lost sidekick returns as a Soviet-trained super-soldier Rogers knows he not only faces Bucky but the war that turned him against America.

     Bucky’s Cold War turns history into a lesson that descends upon Rogers and lectures him on the darkness American history carried out of the Second World War. He distorts the idea of goodness in war by ridding himself of the conflict that grounded him in a bygone era that barely resonated later on. Captain America slept through the Cold War, conveniently frozen at the bottom of the ocean so as not to witness the United States fall into hysteria, anti-communist paranoia, and proxy wars that strayed farther still from the mythic principles of World War II. It was a time Rogers could very well find war to be at its most un-American. But the fact he slept through it meant his example, and that of the Second World War, did not shine bright enough to keep America from derailing into morally ambiguous territories. The Cold War could not be saved by the Good War because it was frozen in time, a memory that sought shelter rather than facing the realities of a world dictated by nuclear politics. So why not right that wrong with Captain America and a big silver screen production that pits him against a villain borne out of the Cold War?

     That Rogers faces the Winter Soldier can be seen as just that, an attempt to save the Cold War after the fact. Captain America, unfrozen, looks back into the history that pushes the Winter Soldier into the will of HYDRA and sees an opportunity to once again prove his war’s might can save all wars, turn them good. All throughout the movie the audience is subjected to scenes of Rogers visiting museum exhibits dedicated to himself, his old uniform in display. Once we see the old uniform standing above a display of the Howling Commandos, we know that, in the end, Captain America will revert to that uniform (not a suit) and go into battle as a World War II soldier first and a superhero second.

     It is never clear which war weighs more on the Winter Soldier throughout the movie. Arnim Zola is the Winter Soldier’s creator in the film, more a Nazi than a Soviet, but the movie does stress his secret Soviet assassin past. The fact Zola plays Winter Soldier’s Frankenstein keeps the character between wars. He is the darkness between. The thing war is capable of but should not be. Either way, it falls to Captain America to prove that his war, one no one questions as being his, can save both the day and the idea that war can still be a virtue if not a moral responsibility. And keeping to our expectations, the day and war is saved, and very convincingly. Captain America in his old uniform explodes on scene as a war god, the ultimate authority on militarism and how Americans should interact with its war powers. So, is World War II still the Good War? The answer is obvious if you are Captain America. Can War, in all its dimensions, be Good forevermore? Yes, but only if it follows in the footsteps of the Second World War.

Hero Making: A Quick Note on History and Captain America

Ricardo A. Serrano Denis

      Much of the history of the Second World War rests on the idea that goodness prevailed as its moral drive. It came naturally, part of the political package that guided American soldiers to the beaches of Normandy and the treacherous geography of Japan. Rooting out evil was the main objective—evil being the exact opposite of what America stood for. In a sense, the Second World War became a mirror through which Americans could see themselves reflected as the fairest nation of them all. Sure, historical accuracy calls for a reexamination of the Great Depression as the official instigator of intervention in foreign affairs (sometimes overriding Pearl Harbor as the obvious spark to that war), but pick any popular history book on World War II and you’ll be hard pressed to think of any other reason for America stepping up to the Germans other than pure goodness.

      It is of no wonder (and up to this point a meek point to think otherwise) that comic book readers became enamored with superheroes baptized in the fires of World War II as the supreme representatives of their fantastic alternate realities. Of the many that came, it was the one dressed in the colors of the American flag that captured the imagination of readers, Captain America. If we accept the Second World War as iconic in scope regarding World History then we must recognize that it also has the capacity to create icons and legends in its own right, both real and fictional.

     Captain America came out of that war as such an icon. He punched Hitler square in the jaw and might just have well sealed the victory for those who escaped to the pulpy pages of the comic book to find the endings they so intensely desired. Captain America’s war with the Germans was quick, clean, and righteous. But what really made a mark on comic book history was that Captain America set the standard on what heroism should actually be. Most importantly (and most dangerously), it made war experience the absolute standard on what makes a hero, well, a hero.

      It is perhaps in Jason Aaron’s Ultimate Captain America #2 that we get a true look at the psyche of the hero that made war the event that turned men into heroes. Deep inside the jungles of Vietnam, Captain America looks for Frank Simpson, the Captain America of the Vietnam War. Simpson was turned super-soldier for Vietnam in the absence of Steve Rogers (Captain America’s civilian name). But like many, he receded into the madness of his war. He deserts only to resurface as an enemy of the state in 21st century, carrying the full weight of his war to the present.

     The mission becomes an opportunity for introspection, for making sense of a war Rogers did not participate in. Contemplating the jungle and its complicity in keeping Americans away from victory, Captain America dwells on what his country should mean for the men that fight for it. He says:

Looking around this godforsaken place, I could almost understand if Simpson had just snapped. I saw plenty during the war. Good men who just reached their breaking point. I’ve been there myself. I’ve looked that fear in the face. I remember 1944, waking up one morning in the Ardennes forest, freezing cold, knowing we were surrounded on all sides by Nazi Tiger tanks, and I couldn’t move. It took me hours to get out of bed. I could’ve broken then. Like the men I saw eat bullets from their own guns. At the time, I felt like I could almost understand why they were doing it. But flipping sides…Frank Simpson betrayed his country. He said he wanted to show me what America really stands for. But he’s the one who’ll be getting the lesson. America doesn’t stand for cowards and turncoats. Not my America. The America I know’s always been worth fighting for. Even dying for. And sometimes killing for.

      It is brilliantly simple and easy to digest. Captain America lays the blueprint for heroism in pure black and white. It is devotion, with honor, to one’s country and the disposition to kill and die for its safety that makes men heroes. Stray from these guidelines and you will most probably end up being an enemy, a lost citizen fallen from the grace of his country’s innate disposition for goodness. This is but a simple metaphor for how the history of war is digested in popular culture.

     In History, we fight and debate over the origins of war, on the degrees of justness and righteousness in them. We forget that the men that fight them, the ones that become heroes, sacrifice so much that only outsiders get to enjoy the excitement of their heroics in the aftermath. Tom Brokaw’s oral history The Greatest Generation, for example, proves this by going to such lengths as too delve straight into hero making. Brokaw will say the Second World War bred the greatest generation of Americans the history of the country had ever seen. And probably will see, if Brokaw is concerned. The sacrifices of the soldier are secondary to the story because, in the end, they were heroes. Spielberg adds his line with Saving Private Ryan and many other directors, authors, comic book writers and artists followed suit.

 
     And so it goes with history. We seem to unconsciously regard war and its heroics as if they were mythical feats of greatness. They become innocent rites of passage that turn men into Captain Americas. Scars are expected while ugliness and extreme violence are accepted as realities that make men heroes. History, then, becomes the notary. An entity with the authority to make official the transformation of men into heroes. But it also becomes the thing men at war strive to. There is no force as powerful as a people’s expectations. There may be warnings on the dangers of history repeating itself, but that is precisely what people seem to want most of the time. We want more wars because we want more heroes. We want to imagine a world of Captain Americas because without them, well, what’s the point of history?

Because It's Fun: Comics, History, and Knowledge

By: Ricardo A. Serrano Denis

      Imagine you are writing your Master’s dissertation on comic book superheroes and how they uphold the righteousness of the current war against terrorism. You argue that superheroes like Captain America and Nick Fury (apparently his superpower is never growing old) return to their war metaphors, the ones they upheld as heroes of the Second World War and the Cold War respectively, to ask readers to view the present, the contemporary, through their wars. You would say post-9/11 America is too much a grey area of contention and meaning and that superheroes could ease that shade of thought into a simpler yet more dangerous vision of an America still defined by the idea that war is good, fair, and necessary…just like World War II.

      In the process you read comics, a couple of books on historical theory, and actual history books on the wars your superheroes act through. All throughout you constantly feel like an innovator and you realize that in writing history through comic books you are actually having fun! You connect the popular to the academic and it feels like the topic can really resonate within a discipline that holds too dear to traditional primary sources. The kind of history that is being produced cannot be so specifically defined, if anything it might resemble something close to a history of mentalities rooted in the world of 9/11, but it is still an analytical record of what comic book creators and people could have thought on upon reading the comics of that era. Who said old documents and newspapers were the only ways one could reconstruct the past? Aren’t comic books, film, literature, and other works of art representative of their time periods and the things that were contemplated in them?

      So, the dissertation written, you prepare to present your investigation and in comes another realization: what if the academic universe accepts your findings as anything but history? You panic and reread. It comes down to double checking you punched the academic ticket by establishing historiographical precedence, gave your shout out to the classics in cultural theory and discourse and ideology, and included the ever necessary justification on comic books being an actual historical source. Neglecting one of these points can land you in a tough spot when presenting the dissertation, leaving yourself wide open for criticisms that can derail the discussion into areas more traditional than you expected, and sometimes unrelated to the nature of your work. Then you go back to square one and that sense that you created something necessary and spectacular dives into frustration. It becomes an insisting needle in the eye that keeps the investigation outside of academia’s limelight while also questioning its degree of accessibility to a more general public. You wrote this for a university, remember? 

   All of a sudden everything seems far away from fun. Instead the feeling is more akin to being stuck in a sort of limbo that keeps you far from actually contributing to the creation of knowledge, much less it being useful and helpful in understanding the contemporary. Relentlessly, the following question arises: why did you write this? But the answer is simple. Because it was fun.

      The answer is valid. It is also deceiving. Fun is necessary for keeping interest alive in producing any kind of work, but it must be met with the assurance that knowledge can be extracted from the endeavor fun is to reside in. Comic books can balance this necessity just fine. They keep us enthralled in the fantasy that goes with reading about gods and super beings fending off alien invasions, especially if they do so with the force of American history backing them up. In their simplicity we find ideologies that seem innocent but that dig deeper in creating ideas that keep war a rational and often just and necessary action.  And it seems to come casually, not imbued in the seriousness of academic writing. This, evidently, should be studied.

      Matthew Pustz, in his anthology Comic Books and American Cultural History, argues that casual learning (meaning that knowledge can be extracted from more popular productions of fiction given a wider exposure of the product and its appeal) can bring about something we cannot lose sight of: “that the past is worth knowing about and that doing history can be fun.” This is where academic history has trouble keeping up. Somewhere along the road, academic historians lost touch with the possibility of knowledge being popular and common (in the best possible way). And it comes down to a matter of accessibility, something the academic culture is short on. 

     Consider the following situation: the current price for a Captain America or Nick Fury comic book stands between $2.99 and $3.99, much less than the $19.99 and up price range set upon books and academic journals and magazines. The American Historical Review journal, for example, requires paid membership to the American Historical Association which costs $40.00 if you are a student. If you are not a student then prices go up. The journal, as it stands, is published five times a year while comic books publish their continuing stories either biweekly or monthly (almost never outside that timeframe). Accessibility is key in terms of relevance and interest and it seems that comic books here have the upper hand. Academic historians cannot compete in attractiveness and persuasion with beings draped in the colors of the American flag wielding unbreakable shields or beings camouflaged in military fatigues aiming down sights trained on Third World dictators (labeled as such by the characters themselves).

     This is one of those ‘for better and worse’ scenarios. On the one hand we have academic journals too detached from the common reader to become appealing or even be considered as necessary readings in a more general and popular sense. On the other we have comics that too freely justify war (in the cases of Captain America and Nick Fury more intently) and do so in spectacular fashion. The good here is that both are capable of shedding much light on our current military and political predicament. Now, they can do better to up accessibility for a wider range of readers or to be more mindful of the symbols their stories uphold. It can be argued that fiction is not bound to the responsibility of being either pedagogical or informative on the history it uses. And yet readers expect certain degrees of faithfulness to the past and are quite eager to accept it at face value. And writers know this all too well. If anything, it should be noted that with much fun comes great responsibility. 

     In the end it is all a matter of balance, something the academic world is severely lacking. Comic books might use history too loosely, but academic history is too serious about it. And that takes away from its appeal and the possibility of being integrated into the popular arena of the common reader. Academic history cannot remain within the consensus of its tradition in terms of sources and methodology. It will lose readers and remain a thing restricted to the college world, whereas comics are rising in popularity. Superhero stories often become gateways to history much like war movies and historical dramas do. Movies such as Saving Private Ryan became for the history of the Second World War what Gangs of New York became for the history of the city of New York, gateways to common knowledge. Forrest Gump, a favorite amongst history teachers, became the equivalent of a general American history book, over in 142 minutes. The reason why they stay within popular culture and cycle through repeat viewings? Because they are fun to watch. Because, whether we like it or not, we learn from them, casual though the knowledge in them may be. Comic books do the same thing. They introduce readers to history, become gateways to the past. And they let us know that history, while important, can also be fun.