tag:theconversation.com,2011:/es/topics/marvel-superheroes-31352/articles
Marvel superheroes – The Conversation
2024-01-16T17:48:05Z
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/221148
2024-01-16T17:48:05Z
2024-01-16T17:48:05Z
Marvel’s Echo is a one-of-a-kind superhero – and an inspiration to the Deaf community
<p><em>Warning: this article contains spoilers for Echo season one.</em> </p>
<p>Marvel’s latest superhero series, Echo, is now streaming on Disney+. Deaf actress Alaqua Cox plays the eponymous superhero, a character she already portrayed in the Hawkeye series in 2021. Echo, real name Maya Lopez, who is Deaf, is a vengeful and bitter Native American hero with a distinctive fighting ability that allows her to copy her opponent’s moves.</p>
<p>The uppercase “Deaf” refers to deaf people who share a language, identity and culture. It therefore describes Maya Lopez, as she uses ASL (American Sign Language) all the time and hardly speaks.</p>
<p>Historically, Deaf roles in TV have been given to hearing actors and actresses. This is a typical example of ableism – discrimination in favour of able-bodied people. It is important that Deaf actors play Deaf characters in TV and film so that audiences engage with authentic depictions of disability.</p>
<p>In the first episode of Echo, Maya and her hearing cousin Bonnie (Devery Jacobs) are shown to have been raised by their loving parents, William and Taloa Lopez (Zahn McClarnon and Katarina Ziervogel) in Tamaha, Oklahoma. Maya uses ASL to communicate with Bonnie as they argue with each other to decide whether they are cousins or sisters. A beautiful closeup scene shows the silhouettes of young Echo and Bonnie using lively ASL inside a glowing tent.</p>
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<p>Maya’s parents speak in ASL, spoken English and their Native American Choctaw language, as do her grandparents, on her mother’s side, Chula (Tantoo Cardinal) and Skully (Graham Greene). Most Deaf people are <a href="https://www.nidcd.nih.gov/health/statistics/quick-statistics-hearing#:%7E:text=About%202%20to%203%20out,in%20one%20or%20both%20ears.&text=More%20than%2090%20percent%20of%20deaf%20children%20are%20born%20to%20hearing%20parents.&text=Approximately%2015%25%20of%20American%20adults,over%20report%20some%20trouble%20hearing.">born to hearing parents</a>. They learn ASL at school or college or through Deaf friends, because visual communication is important for Deaf people’s cognitive and social development.</p>
<p>At one point, Maya asks her mother for hot chocolate. Her mother tells her that it is finished, but if Maya comes to the shops with her, she will buy her more. Maya agrees. As Taloa drives toward a junction, she hits the brakes, but one of her husband’s enemies has tampered with them.</p>
<p>A car crashes into them, killing Taloa instantly. Fortunately, Maya survives, although, as a result of the accident, she has damage to her right leg.</p>
<p>When Maya is taken to the hospital to get her leg amputated, her grandmother blames her father’s criminal background for Taloa’s death. Ashamed, her father takes a job in New York and leaves Oklahoma and Maya’s family, taking Maya with him.</p>
<p>The sequence that follows shows that Maya no longer needs her wheelchair and has become proficient with her prosthetic leg. She has been through a lot of rehabilitation to practice her walking pace. This is a positive example of her fiery independence and determination. Losing her leg in the accident upsets Maya greatly, but it doesn’t damage her strong self-belief.</p>
<p>Once she arrives in New York, Maya is sent to a special school for Deaf pupils. There, she enrols in martial arts classes and begins developing some of the skills that will define her as a superhero. </p>
<p>Moving to New York is a significant turning point in Maya’s story, as here she will become embroiled in the city’s criminal underworld. She joins a gang as an enforcer working for Marvel super villain, Kingpin (Vincent D'Onofrio).</p>
<h2>Nuanced characters</h2>
<p>The character of Echo first appeared in the 1998 Marvel comic Daredevil. Daredevil (who has a Marvel television series of his own) is a blind lawyer and superhero with super-human senses due to an accident involving radioactive chemicals.</p>
<p>In the series, Maya is at one point called on to fight against a rival gang. Unexpectedly, Daredevil (Charlie Cox) intervenes and gets into a fight with Maya. The two are on opposing sides thanks to her connection with Kingpin. The battle is a formidable challenge between two opponents who are equally matched. Deaf hero versus blind hero. Superheroes with a disability are rarely portrayed in comic books and this scene in the series marks a positive step towards inclusive representation. </p>
<p>There are other interesting choices in the show. Although Kingpin is the main antagonist of the show, he has also been Maya’s benefactor and once employed a mysterious and cryptic ASL interpreter to help him communicate with Maya. Quite an unusual niche – an interpreter who works for a crime boss.</p>
<p>Deaf and disabled people are often treated like charity cases because they are patronised, mocked and pitied by an ableist and ignorant society. Echo is important because it positions a Deaf character as a positive and versatile role model. She is an inspiration to the Deaf and disabled community.</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kevin Buckle does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
It is important that Deaf actors play Deaf characters in TV and film, so that audiences engage with authentic depictions of disability.
Kevin Buckle, Graduate Research Fellow for BSL, Deaf Studies and Linguistics, York St John University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/219232
2023-12-28T06:02:31Z
2023-12-28T06:02:31Z
Black Panther, Wakanda Forever and the problem with Hollywood – an African perspective
<p><em><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825683/">Black Panther</a> and <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9114286/">Black Panther: Wakanda Forever</a> were global hits that played out in an imaginary African kingdom and feature a universe of black creative talent. What’s not to love about the franchise? <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17533171.2023.2256514?casa_token=_9fDNeT6IQMAAAAA%3AJeGd5d6nr3wYao8GUbCBWBr-O3mg6KdYOjxOpPqSMABFfKkZpfJWI4oPpI-Q9_W-1lUSoFPBL7KKI7w">Quite a lot</a>, <a href="https://find.library.unisa.edu.au/discovery/fulldisplay/alma9916619232601831/61USOUTHAUS_INST:ROR">reckons</a> cultural and literary studies <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=Jeanne-Marie+Viljoen&btnG=">scholar</a> Jeanne-Marie Viljoen. We asked her to explain.</em></p>
<h2>What are Black Panther’s limitations when it comes to diversity?</h2>
<p>Even though the Black Panther films didn’t represent Africans on their own complex terms, they’re still a major cultural phenomenon. They bring issues of racial representation into the spotlight for Hollywood’s still largely white audiences. They do so through the use of Black talent, both in front of and behind the camera. </p>
<p>In the first film, the black superhero, T'Challa, is crowned king of Wakanda, a mythical African kingdom with advanced technological prowess. Drama ensues when he is challenged by Killmonger, who plans to use the kingdom’s power to begin a global revolution. In the sequel, the leaders of Wakanda fight to protect their nation and its valuable resources in the wake of King T'Challa’s death as his sister Shuri becomes the new Black Panther. </p>
<p>The first film was a phenomenal box office success, with over half of its sales coming from the US market. The sequel, although not quite as successful, was most successful in global markets. It’s my view that Hollywood’s investment in these films is driven by a narrow western definition of spectacle. US audiences marvel at the visual spectacle that entertains and sells. This has the effect of distancing them from the actual content of what they are viewing (Africa and diversity).</p>
<p>It is not so much because of the films themselves, but because of how they have been received by Hollywood audiences who understand spectacle in a very particular way. So films like Black Panther have in some ways been counterproductive. They’ve made Hollywood audiences believe that enough has been done about diversity. The 2019 Hollywood Diversity <a href="https://socialsciences.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/UCLA-Hollywood-Diversity-Report-2019-2-21-2019.pdf">report</a> singles out Black Panther as a good example of how the power of diverse images has convinced a significant number of American film spectators (42%) that <a href="https://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_abstract&pid=S1021-14972022000100002">enough has been done</a> about diversity in Hollywood. So it’s making matters worse, instead of helping to increase diversity and ultimately decolonise the US mainstream imagination. </p>
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<p>This suggests that Hollywood spectators are lulled by such films and their spectacle. They don’t feel there’s further reason to find out any more about Africa and African film-making or audiences. This means Hollywood audiences are not invested in a more nuanced understanding of the kind of spectacle we see from Nollywood audiences in Nigeria, for example. This not only limits the understanding of diversity but also limits the way that films about such topics are made.</p>
<h2>What can Hollywood learn from how the films have been received in Africa?</h2>
<p>While the <a href="https://qz.com/africa/1210704/black-panthers-african-cultures-and-influences">costumes</a> of Black Panther draw from various authentic African cultures, this is just an appropriation of some of the most popular visual aspects of some African cultures (such as lip plates and neck rings). In the sequel, critics <a href="https://theconversation.com/black-panther-wakanda-forever-reclaims-the-myth-of-an-african-utopia-195157">point out</a> that the average (presumably American) viewer won’t know that the language being spoken in the film is isiXhosa, a South African language, or that some of the garments are made with Ghanaian Kente cloth and designs. Since Africa is a continent of over 50 countries that are diverse culturally and geographically, this “borrowing” could suggest that their cultural markers are shared and interchangeable. Real empowerment only <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/341195304_Black_Panther_and_Blaxploitation_Intersections">comes about</a> with more “direct engagement with African political and social issues” and less emphasis on profit. </p>
<p>Yet, despite these inaccurate and inauthentic displays of Africa, in Nigeria, Wakanda Forever performed better than it did in the Hollywood domestic market, relatively speaking. It became the biggest grossing film ever at the Nigerian box office, the <a href="https://deadline.com/2023/04/black-panther-wakanda-forever-box-office-profits-1235320190/">first film</a> to earn one billion naira. This is because Nollywood audiences have a more nuanced reading of spectacle and how politics and entertainment come together than Hollywood audiences do. </p>
<p>Nollywood has developed its own conventions around cinematic spectacle which Hollywood largely neglects. According to these conventions the audience engages with socio-cultural and socio-economic issues in a way that exceeds merely visual displays. So, a Nollywood blockbuster includes both visual spectacle and a reflection of the lived conditions and social issues that Nigerian people face. Some academics <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17533171.2019.1551739">argue</a> that for African audiences, Afro-superheroes are not just visual spectacles but are also embedded in political and social issues. They offer ways of understanding the world today. This explains why, in African criticism, Wakanda has become a potential resource for imaginative transformation, rather than merely escapism. </p>
<p>This may explain why, despite its unrealistic portrayal of Africans, in Nigeria the film has been popular. It has been interpreted through the sophisticated lens of Nollywood spectacle. Wakanda Forever tackles political issues, even though it does so in a limited way. For Hollywood audiences the spectacle stops deeper engagement with politics. In Nollywood this engagement with politics is something people are comfortable with and want to make more of. They use this to build knowledge about African futurism and engage in political knowledge building.</p>
<h2>Why should Hollywood look to Africa for a better future?</h2>
<p>Hollywood should <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17533171.2023.2256514">look to Africa</a> in order to expand and decolonise what Hollywood envisions cinema can do in relation to building knowledge about diversity and film-making. In focusing mainly on a Hollywood audience and largely ignoring African audiences, Hollywood not only makes its audience believe that the limited headway that this film makes with inclusion and diversity is enough. It also fails to exploit African audiences both for their appetite for films but also for what can be learnt about inclusion and film-making from their more complex understanding of diversity politics and cinematic spectacle. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/black-people-beware-dont-let-black-panther-joy-mask-hollywoods-racism-93095">Black people beware: don't let Black Panther joy mask Hollywood's racism</a>
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<p>This limits the kinds of social problems Hollywood audiences can solve and also the films that Hollywood can make. This is unfortunate when one <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/43821507">considers</a> Africa’s global authority in the arts and when one observes that Africa boasts several robust cinema industries of its own. If African audiences were taken into account by Hollywood then Hollywood could do more for diversity and inclusion instead of repeating the same old, tired spectacle we are used to seeing in Hollywood superhero films.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219232/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeanne-Marie Viljoen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
There’s a big difference between how Hollywood audiences view Black Panther and how African audiences do.
Jeanne-Marie Viljoen, Lecturer, Creative Unit, UniSA, University of South Australia
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/219227
2023-12-22T07:34:29Z
2023-12-22T07:34:29Z
Hollywood’s first major Black female superhero: how Wakanda Forever broke the mould
<p><em><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9114286/">Black Panther: Wakanda Forever</a> rewrote Hollywood’s script for superhero movies. English professor Diana Adesola Mafe was involved in an academic <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17533171.2023.2256530">roundtable</a> that offers a critical conversation about it and another film set in an African kingdom, <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8093700/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">The Woman King</a>. She <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17533171.2023.2256529?casa_token=Hxo2L9mLZYYAAAAA%3Al0YdqYcIXaZ2KaqNoW6m_IRfDzeozewbbNeKxZ-xUsHgM_JeVmJ8ez59GdUTlp1jz2SDvZgzM5OEFbk">argues</a> that Wakanda Forever is a breakthrough film. We asked her why.</em></p>
<h2>Why are these two films such talking points?</h2>
<p>As big budget productions with Black female heroes, The Woman King and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever invite discussion and debate about Hollywood representations of Africa and the kinds of roles that women and girls can and should play. They lend themselves to discussing topics ranging from the importance of historical accuracy to the power of imagining alternative histories and fantastical futures.</p>
<h2>Why is Wakanda Forever important to you?</h2>
<p>One of my primary <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=Diana+Adesola+Mafe&oq=diana">research areas</a> is the representation of Black women in literature and popular culture. My 2018 <a href="https://utpress.utexas.edu/9781477315231/">book</a> Where No Black Woman Has Gone Before: Subversive Portrayals in Speculative Film and TV is precisely about Black women in science fiction and fantasy roles. I am always on the look-out for films that push boundaries, challenge stereotypes, and put Black women at the centre of the story.</p>
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<p>Wakanda Forever does that by presenting a superhero action flick headlined by Black women. The film is set in the fictional African kingdom of Wakanda, where the people are mourning the death of their king and fighting to defend their land and resources, especially the powerful metal vibranium, from world powers.</p>
<p>It’s the first Hollywood film to showcase Black female superheroes on such an epic scale, backed by a US$250 million budget and the global reach of a juggernaut like Marvel Studios. The <a href="https://thedirect.com/article/disney-black-panther-wakanda-forever-posters-official">posters</a> alone tell viewers that this film is doing something different. </p>
<p>Of course the film is not perfect, and director <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3363032/">Ryan Coogler</a> has been <a href="https://theplaylist.net/wakanda-forever-ryan-coogler-original-script-featured-father-son-dynamic-post-thanos-snap-20221223/">open</a> about the fact that he originally set out to make a completely different and male-centered film. The <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53955912">untimely death</a> of the original Black Panther star Chadwick Boseman called for an overhaul of the script and the reveal of Shuri, played by <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4004793/">Letitia Wright</a>, as the new Black Panther. But the film’s production history does not change its status as a pioneer for Black female representation, especially in the genre of superhero cinema.</p>
<h2>You discuss “the act of looking” in your paper. Tell us about that.</h2>
<p>One of the lasting presumptions of early Hollywood movies was that the audience was white. To put this another way, few film-makers were catering to Black viewers and fewer still imagined Black women as a primary audience. This has changed over time, but the notion of a default white male gaze both on and off screen often remains implicit in western cinema. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/black-panther-wakanda-forever-continues-the-series-quest-to-recover-and-celebrate-lost-cultures-193508">'Black Panther: Wakanda Forever' continues the series' quest to recover and celebrate lost cultures</a>
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<p>A film like Wakanda Forever is intentional about inviting Black spectatorship and showcasing Black women as active players who drive the plot and whose gazes are bold, instead of averted or downplayed. The Black female characters in the film constantly look back at the viewer by way of the camera, as well as at one another, defying a western cinematic tradition of marginalising and objectifying Black women.</p>
<h2>Is Hollywood’s diversity problem getting better or not really?</h2>
<p>The short answer is yes and no. If you consider that the US film industry goes back over a century, then yes, we’re seeing more diversity in front of and behind the camera, not just in terms of race and gender but also ethnicity, sexuality, age, and so on. Wakanda Forever would have been an unlikely blockbuster or Oscar contender 20 or even 10 years ago. Thanks to the first <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825683/">Black Panther</a> film, Hollywood is now aware that an all-Black superhero movie can gross over a billion dollars and win Academy Awards. </p>
<p>But the success of a single film or even a handful of films does not mean a wider shift in the industry. For example, Marvel just released <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10676048/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">The Marvels</a>, its first film by a Black female director, <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4804442/">Nia DaCosta</a>, but that does not change the fact that Black women are underrepresented in the industry. </p>
<p>Organisations such the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences have <a href="https://www.oscars.org/news/academy-establishes-representation-and-inclusion-standards-oscarsr-eligibility">offered</a> new (and controversial) strategies and standards in terms of equity and access. Starting in 2024, films must meet diversity targets in areas like “on-screen representation, themes and narratives” and “audience development” to be eligible for a Best Picture Oscar. And hashtags like <a href="https://www.britannica.com/story/what-is-the-significance-of-the-oscarssowhite-hashtag#:%7E:text=Twitter%20user%20and%20activist%20April,being%20given%20to%20white%20actors.">#OscarsSoWhite</a>, as well as academic studies like the UCLA <a href="https://socialsciences.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/UCLA-Hollywood-Diversity-Report-2022-Film-3-24-2022.pdf">Hollywood Diversity Report</a>, continue to track progress but also ongoing challenges where Hollywood’s diversity problem is concerned.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219227/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Diana Adesola Mafe does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Few film-makers imagined Black women as a primary audience. This has changed over time.
Diana Adesola Mafe, Professor of English, Denison University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/211934
2023-08-30T15:27:34Z
2023-08-30T15:27:34Z
Jewish creators are a fundamental part of comic book history, from Superman to Maus – expert explains
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/544021/original/file-20230822-25-qglktb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=40%2C8%2C5422%2C3628&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/8SeJUmfahu0">Erik Mclean/Unsplash</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Jewish writers and artists have been <a href="https://www.jewishbookcouncil.org/pb-daily/comic-books-are-jewish-literature">a fundamental part of</a> comic book creation since the early days of the industry. </p>
<p>Comic books used to be formatted like books or newspapers, but in 1934 Max Gaines, a Jewish New Yorker, and his colleague Harry Wildenberg, created the first half tabloid-sized comic book – the format that became the standard.</p>
<p>Their Famous Funnies comic book sold 90% of the 200,000 printed copies. This led to numerous imitators, including New Fun Comics from National Allied Publications (<a href="https://culturefly.com/blogs/culture-blog/dc-comics-history">later renamed DC Comics</a>), which published its first issue in 1935.</p>
<p>Gaines was a former schoolteacher and channelled this into his work. He <a href="https://www.jewage.org/wiki/en/Article:Max_Gaines_-_Biography">named his company Educational Comics</a>, with such titles as Picture Stories from the Bible. However, when his son <a href="https://eccomics.fandom.com/wiki/Bill_Gaines">William took over E.C. Comics</a> in the 1940s it became notorious as a publisher of horror comics and <a href="https://library.missouri.edu/news/special-collections/banned-books-week-comics-and-controversy">these were banned</a> in the following decade. </p>
<p>In the 1930s, comic books reprinted comic strips that had previously appeared in newspaper humour sections. Famous Funnies, for example, <a href="https://majorspoilers.com/2020/11/08/retro-review-famous-funnies-1-july-1934/">included the popular serial Mutt and Jeff</a>. But by the end of the decade, they featured entirely new content in a variety of genres, including <a href="https://comicalopinions.com/birth-of-superheroes-golden-age-of-comics/">superheroes</a>. </p>
<p>The first, and most famous, of these was <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/superman-jewish-origins-film-adaptations-curse-jerry-siegel-christopher-reeve-henry-cavill-a8344461.html">Superman</a>. The character was created by <a href="https://ohdannyboy.blogspot.com/2012/06/1933s-reign-of-superman-first-superman.html">Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster in 1933</a> in a self-published comic. They tried to find a professional publisher to take on their character and – <a href="https://www.comicconnect.com/item/1009847?tzf=1">after Gaines took too long to reply to them</a> – found a home for <a href="https://nerdist.com/article/history-legacy-characters-dc-comics-action-comics-first-superman-comic-introduces-zatara-national-comics/">Superman at National in 1938</a>. </p>
<p>Siegel and Shuster were sons of Jewish European immigrants, leading some modern comic book writers to compare Superman’s alien immigrant identity to <a href="https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/09/21/superman-ultimate-immigrant-may-have-been-eligible-daca/688590001/">other émigrés in America</a>. The <a href="https://www.rescue.org/article/superman-refugees-success-story">International Rescue Committee noted</a> the importance of the character for the antisemitic era of the 1930s: “Superman’s story is the ultimate example of an immigrant who makes his new home better.”</p>
<p>Some researchers believe that Siegel and Shuster were specifically inspired by a famous Polish bodybuilder called <a href="https://jewishchronicle.timesofisrael.com/the-jewish-muscleman-who-likely-inspired-the-creators-of-superman/">“the Jewish Superman”</a>, who toured America in the 1920s. Writer Roy Schwartz also sees elements of Jewish mythology in the character, as noted in his 2021 book <a href="https://forward.com/culture/470859/its-a-bird-its-a-plane-its-a-book-about-superman-jewish-history/">Is Superman Circumcised?</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A superman comic and badge." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545524/original/file-20230830-15-et4sy5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545524/original/file-20230830-15-et4sy5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545524/original/file-20230830-15-et4sy5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545524/original/file-20230830-15-et4sy5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545524/original/file-20230830-15-et4sy5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545524/original/file-20230830-15-et4sy5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545524/original/file-20230830-15-et4sy5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Superman was created by Jewish comic book writers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/QJlg2KSl0fU">Daniel Álvasd/Unsplash</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A year later, another iconic DC character, Batman, was created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger. They were also children of immigrants and were half of a quartet of famous <a href="https://forward.com/culture/483808/batman-jewish-bob-kane-bill-finger-dc-comics-robin-superman/">Jewish comic creators</a> who went to the same school in the south Bronx, including <a href="https://www.comic-con.org/awards/will-eisner">Will Eisner</a> and Marvel’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/100-years-of-stan-lee-how-the-comic-book-king-challenged-prejudice-196761">Stan Lee</a>. </p>
<p>While Batman doesn’t have any obvious Jewish characteristics, Bruce Wayne’s cousin, Kate Kane (aka Batwoman) was later depicted as <a href="https://www.jpost.com/j-spot/dc-comics-batwoman-receives-jewish-funeral-in-latest-episode-663697">a Jewish woman</a>.</p>
<p>Known for working with Stan Lee, another Jewish creator is considered the <a href="https://www.denofgeek.com/comics/jack-kirby-comics-greatest-storyteller/">“greatest storyteller”</a> of superhero comics. Artist Jack Kirby was responsible for co-creating not only some of the most memorable Marvel characters – including The Avengers and The X-Men – but also had an acclaimed run as a solo creator in the 1970s, first on <a href="https://www.marvel.com/articles/comics/10-most-kirby-pages-in-jack-kirby-eternals">Marvel’s Eternals</a> and then on DC Comics’ <a href="https://www.cbr.com/jack-kirby-fourth-world-new-gods-movie-new-chance-dcu/">Fourth World titles</a>.</p>
<h2>Other genres</h2>
<p>Alongside superheroes, Kirby was renowned for his work on comics written by Sandman’s Joe Simon. Together, they brought <a href="https://kirbymuseum.org/blogs/simonandkirby/archives/41">romance to the medium in 1947</a> and made <a href="https://www.cbr.com/monsters-unleashed-jack-kirbys-15-craziest-marvel-monsters/#x-the-thing-that-lived">memorable monster comics in the 1960s</a>. Another popular genre was mystery comics. Will Eisner’s <a href="https://comicvine.gamespot.com/the-spirit/4005-33297">The Spirit</a> (1940) included elements of superheroes and horror. The <a href="https://www.cosmicteams.com/quality/profiles/spirit.html">main character</a> was an undead private detective who wore a mask.</p>
<p>Eisner was also the <a href="https://jmof.fiu.edu/exhibitions-events/exhibitions/will-eisner-comic-creator,-illustrator-and-innovator/">child of Jewish immigrants</a> and towards the end of his career, turned his upbringing into <a href="https://blogs.loc.gov/picturethis/2020/03/cartoonists-comment-on-the-lasting-impact-of-will-eisner-1917-2005/">semi-autobiographical comics</a> that depicted the downtrodden existence of people in poor Hassidic communities in New York. </p>
<p>Eisner’s works, including <a href="https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/ComicBook/AContractWithGod">A Contract with God</a> (1978) and several <a href="https://libraryguides.mdc.edu/GraphicNovels/WillEisner">follow-ups in the 1980s</a>, not only popularised the term <a href="https://theportalist.com/history-of-graphic-novels">“graphic novel”</a>, but also added to the increasing trend of turning Jewish lives in comics.</p>
<p>In the 1970s, a number of notable female Jewish creators first had their work published in <a href="https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/comics-and-graphic-narratives">Underground Comix</a>, including <a href="https://womenincomics.fandom.com/wiki/Trina_Robbins">Trina Robbins</a>, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/11/arts/diane-noomin-dead.html">Diane Noomin</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/03/arts/aline-kominsky-crumb-dead.html">Aline Kominsky-Crumb</a>.</p>
<p>The only graphic novel to win a Pulitzer prize – <a href="https://okcomics.co.uk/products/maus-complete-collection-by-art-spiegelman">Maus</a> – tells the story of author <a href="https://libraries.mit.edu/150books/2011/05/12/1986/">Art Spiegelman’s</a> father’s experience in a concentration camp, and started to be serialised in 1980.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="The cover of Maus" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545528/original/file-20230830-23-e4sj79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/545528/original/file-20230830-23-e4sj79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545528/original/file-20230830-23-e4sj79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545528/original/file-20230830-23-e4sj79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545528/original/file-20230830-23-e4sj79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545528/original/file-20230830-23-e4sj79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/545528/original/file-20230830-23-e4sj79.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Maus is the only graphic novel to have won a Pulitzer Prize.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/lviv-ukraine-april-11-2023-art-2289174103">marhus/Shutterstock</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Modern Jewish comics</h2>
<p>Today, many Jewish creators are making graphic novels and cartoons. Comics editor Corinne Pearlman drew a popular strip <a href="https://jwa.org/blog/graphic-details-opens-in-toronto">Playing the Jewish Card</a> in the 1990s and now <a href="https://www.brokenfrontier.com/corinne-pearlman-myriad-editions-gareth-brookes-jade-sarson-ottilie-hainsworth/">edits graphic novels</a>. She and other creators were featured in the 2011 exhibition and book <a href="https://www.thejc.com/culture/features/is-it-a-bird-is-it-a-plane-no-it-s-the-real-life-superheroine-1.30661">Graphic Details: Confessional Comics by Jewish Women</a>, curated by graphic novelist <a href="https://www.royaldrawingschool.org/artists/faculty/sarah-lightman/">Sarah Lightman</a>. </p>
<p>Lightman is one of the editors of a new follow-up anthology, <a href="https://press.syr.edu/supressbooks/5160/jewish-women-in-comics/">Jewish Women in Comics: Borders and Bodies</a>. Other British female creators include <a href="https://positivenegatives.org/artist/karrie-fransman/">Karrie Fransman</a>, who makes comics about refugees and victims of gender-based violence, and musician and cartoonist <a href="https://dannyskagal.wixsite.com/mysite">Danny Noble</a> who has illustrated children’s books by Adrian Edmondson.</p>
<p>Until September 3, <a href="https://www.jw3.org.uk/zoom">The Jewish Community Centre London</a> in Hampstead has a solo exhibition of caricatures of Jewish celebrities such as Nigella Lawson and Daniel Radcliffe by <a href="https://www.islingtontribune.co.uk/article/zoom-meeting">Zoom Rockman</a>. Rockman started his career as one of the youngest published cartoonists in the UK, with his own self-published comic, before going on to draw strips for The Beano and Private Eye.</p>
<p>Other creators have had their autobiographical comics animated, such as cartoonist and musician Carol Isaacs’ <a href="https://www.jpost.com/must/article-713390">The Wolf of Baghdad</a> and the life of Charlotte Saloman, author of proto-graphic novel <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2022/dec/07/charlotte-review-salomon-keira-knightley-german-jewish-painter-grandfather">Life? or Theatre?</a>.</p>
<p>With attention being brought to the work of numerous Jewish comic creators through film adaptations, books and exhibitions like these, it seems that their contribution to the medium is <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/aug/17/art-spiegelman-golden-age-superheroes-were-shaped-by-the-rise-of-fascism">finally being recognised</a>.</p>
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<p><em>Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/something-good-156">Sign up here</a>.</em></p>
<hr><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211934/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alex Fitch receives funding from UKRI Centre for Doctoral Training, Design Star. </span></em></p>
The history of comics is closely tied to the involvement of Jewish creators, who have had an enormous impact on the medium over the last 90 years.
Alex Fitch, Lecturer and PhD Candidate in Comics and Architecture, University of Brighton
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/195307
2022-12-01T16:00:38Z
2022-12-01T16:00:38Z
Black Panther 2: why the death of someone young can be harder to handle
<p>The Marvel Studios’ film Black Panther: Wakanda Forever addresses themes of grief and the injustice of dying young, connected to the death of the lead actor, Chadwick Boseman, in 2020. Boseman died from colorectal cancer at the age of 43, throwing the original trajectory of his character’s script off the rails, forcing Marvel to revise the film’s plot. </p>
<p>As Boseman’s character, T’Challa, is dying, his sister Shuri is in her lab, desperately trying to save his life. She refuses to give up and misses his passing. Without an outlet for her grief, she delves deeper into technology, rejecting her mother’s Wakandan rituals and the process of mourning. </p>
<p>The death of T’Challa at the beginning of the film is heart-breaking, both on- and off-screen. In the book <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Superhero-Grief-The-Transformative-Power-of-Loss/Harrington-Neimeyer/p/book/9780367145590">Superhero Grief</a>, psychologists Jill Harrington and Robert Niemeyer acknowledge that “Chadwick embodied the superhero – personifying the beauty, the character, and the strength of the Black Panther.” The grief associated with the death of such youthful virtues can be particularly challenging.</p>
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<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Quarter life, a series by The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><strong><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/quarter-life-117947?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">This article is part of Quarter Life</a></strong>, a series about issues affecting those of us in our twenties and thirties. From the challenges of beginning a career and taking care of our mental health, to the excitement of starting a family, adopting a pet or just making friends as an adult. The articles in this series explore the questions and bring answers as we navigate this turbulent period of life.</em></p>
<p><em>You may be interested in:</em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/moving-back-home-doesnt-mean-youve-failed-in-life-heres-why-187300?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">Moving back home doesn’t mean you’ve failed in life – here’s why</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/five-things-to-do-in-your-20s-and-30s-to-reduce-your-risk-of-preventable-cancer-191283?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">Five things to do in your 20s and 30s to reduce your risk of preventable cancer</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/stroke-young-people-can-have-them-too-heres-how-to-know-if-youre-at-risk-and-what-to-look-out-for-189272?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">Stroke: young people can have them too – here’s how to know if you’re at risk and what to look out for</a></em></p>
<hr>
<h2>A dream of the future lost</h2>
<p>The death of a younger person, like T'Challa, is often experienced differently to the death of an older person. Medical ethicists <a href="https://academic.oup.com/gerontologist/article-abstract/34/1/66/597172?login=false">Nancy Jecker and Lawrence Schneiderman</a> have argued that there is often an increased intensity of injustice, sorrow, anger and despair in the grief associated with the death of the young. They point to common descriptors that are more often used to describe younger people’s deaths, such as “senseless” or “tragic”.</p>
<p>The American philosopher <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Setting_Limits.html?id=NH1T-sVvEw4C&redir_esc=y">Daniel Callahan</a> pointed out that we often believe that those who die in old age “have lived a full life, done what they could, and are not victims of the malevolence of divinity or nature”. </p>
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<p>In contrast, a younger person’s death means that they forgo parts of life that a future promises, such as falling in love, fulfilling ambition and making contributions to society. <a href="https://academic.oup.com/gerontologist/article-abstract/34/1/66/597172?login=false">There is a perception</a> that death has been greedier and taken more from us, giving rise to intensified feelings of cruelty, brutality and senselessness.</p>
<p>Psychiatrist <a href="https://www.yalom.com/loves-executioner">Irvin Yalom</a> noted that the particular “sting” in the loss of the young is connected to projection. The lives of our younger relatives and loved ones are intimately connected to the future we project for ourselves. </p>
<p>In losing someone young, we often lose a life that imbued our own with meaning. Yalom argues that it’s not the same when we lose an elderly parent. In such circumstances, although we grieve, the idea we have for our future remains viable and in some cases is even enlivened – our grief is typically more about the past than the future. </p>
<p>In Black Panther, there is a sense that experiences of grief around King T'Challa’s death are significantly associated with such “unfinished business” and an “incomplete mission”. The grief is most palpable in those who saw their futures including him the most, like his sister and mother.</p>
<h2>Grieving the young</h2>
<p>The unique injustices associated with dying young can complicate patterns of grief. <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953613001044">Research</a> has suggested that some of the most common experiences young people report following the death of a young friend are emptiness and disbelief at the senselessness of the loss and anger at the perceived injustice. It is particularly difficult for young people to make sense of the harsh reality that life can be so brutally unkind.</p>
<p>Symptoms of <a href="https://www.cruse.org.uk/understanding-grief/effects-of-grief/complicated-grief/">complicated grief</a> have been considered in relation to the diagnosis of mental disorders by the <a href="https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/practice/dsm">American Psychiatric Association</a>. The complexities of such grief include feelings of persistent yearning and longing, a preoccupation with the circumstances of the death, severe difficulty accepting it and exaggerated and prolonged feelings of anger and bitterness. Its prolonged and intensified nature distinguishes it from more typical patterns of grief.</p>
<p>Psychiatrist <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/da.22068">Holly Herberman and her colleagues</a> have identified a high prevalence (21%) of complicated grief responses in young adults grieving the loss of a close young friend or sibling. Almost 40% of the young adults reported symptoms of depression that persisted up to three years after the loss of their friend or sibling. </p>
<p>One of the challenges facing grieving young adults is the painful realisation that close others will not be around in the future. The effect of such grief can persist. Psychologists <a href="https://bmcpsychology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40359-022-00717-8">Iren Johnsen and Ane Tømmeraas</a> argued that adolescence and young adulthood is a period of significant identity formation, “with increased responsibility, maturity, independence, separation, autonomy and freedom”. When young people experience loss during this critical period, they are often profoundly affected, and “their lives may change forever”.</p>
<p>Grieving the young is challenging, and so too is facing grief at a young age. Given the enduring disruptions that grief can create for young adults, it is important to support them in coping with their grief. Unlike Shuri, who stubbornly refuses the passing of T’Challa, young adults need an outlet to voice their feelings and make sense of such losses.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/195307/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
When someone dies young, the grieving process can be more complicated.
Sam Carr, Reader in Education with Psychology and Centre for Death and Society, University of Bath
Chao Fang, Research Fellow, Centre for Death and Society, University of Bath
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/186639
2022-07-12T01:44:16Z
2022-07-12T01:44:16Z
For the love of Thor! Why it’s so hard for Marvel to get its female superheroes right
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473300/original/file-20220711-26-sq97xn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=9%2C9%2C6029%2C3992&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">©Marvel Studios 2022. All Rights Reserved</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>When it was first revealed that Natalie Portman was to become the “female Thor” in Marvel’s latest superhero instalment, Thor: Love and Thunder, fans were quick to <a href="https://www.igi-global.com/chapter/if-she-be-worthy/259582">condemn the decision</a> on social media. </p>
<p>Portman was lambasted as not “<a href="https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Swole">swole</a>” enough, too petite, and generally not what people imagined the character to be. Ten months of <a href="https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/movies/new-movies/natalie-portmans-trainer-reveals-how-the-star-got-so-ripped-for-thor/news-story/f068c4080ebb18716dcd25855905611b">intensive workouts and a high-protein diet</a> later, and Portman is being <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/women/natalie-portman-thor-arms-madonna-b2117769.html">applauded</a> for arms that “could actually throw giant hammers at baddies’ heads”. </p>
<p>Yet that early reaction to Portman’s casting attests to how the representation of female superheroes can be difficult for movie-makers when the established audience is often perceived to be young, white, cisgender and male. </p>
<p>It seemingly doesn’t matter that the number of women consuming superhero content has <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09540253.2019.1633460?journalCode=cgee20">increased</a>. Offering feminist depictions of characters that could challenge the defining masculinity of the genre remains a problem.</p>
<p>What does this mean for Portman and the female superheroes who have come before (and will follow) her? The answer seems to be that the makers of superhero movies inevitably <a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781793624598/The-Superhero-Multiverse-Readapting-Comic-Book-Icons-in-Twenty-First-Century-Film-and-Popular-Media">subvert some gender stereotypes</a> while maintaining others. </p>
<p>In short, they offer token female representation so as not to ostracise audiences. So while she might now be more muscular, Portman is still subordinated to Chris Hemsworth’s Thor by highlighting that she is first and foremost his love interest.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473303/original/file-20220711-12-cwnqgg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473303/original/file-20220711-12-cwnqgg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473303/original/file-20220711-12-cwnqgg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473303/original/file-20220711-12-cwnqgg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473303/original/file-20220711-12-cwnqgg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473303/original/file-20220711-12-cwnqgg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473303/original/file-20220711-12-cwnqgg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">More muscles but still mainly the love interest: Natalie Portman and Chris Hemsworth in Thor: Love and Thunder.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">©Marvel Studios 2022. All Rights Reserved</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Too few female superheroes</h2>
<p>Granted, the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) franchise has at least attempted to cast female leads and to advocate for women’s issues. For example, Black Widow’s standalone film was in part <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/scarlett-johansson-black-widow-feminist-me-too-times-up-empire-a9704806.html">intended to contribute</a> to the dialogue around the #Timesup and #MeToo movements. </p>
<p>And the latest Thor offering explores the value of female friendships, with co-star <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/movies/2022/06/22/thor-love-and-thunder-natalie-portman-building-mighty-physique/7687523001/">Tessa Thompson attesting</a> to her character Valkyrie being “happy to have found a new sister”.</p>
<p>There’s no doubt female viewers can identify with these powerful women and their stories and as a result form positive attitudes to the superhero genre in general. But that means more superhero films need to be made with the female viewer in mind.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-witch-treatment-what-dr-stranges-wanda-tells-us-about-representations-of-female-anger-184509">The witch treatment: What Dr. Strange's Wanda tells us about representations of female anger</a>
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</p>
<hr>
<p>Such offerings are few and far between, however. Let’s not forget it took Marvel ten years to give Black Widow her own film after her original introduction to the franchise (in 2010’s Iron Man 2). </p>
<p>In many ways, Marvel’s films continue to depict women as auxiliaries – damsels in distress, love interests, or subordinate in some way to their male counterparts. In fact, actress <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-57524423">Scarlett Johansson criticised</a> the earlier “hyper-sexualisation” of her Black Widow character. </p>
<p>Similarly, Scarlet Witch, one of the most powerful of the Avengers characters, is often defined by the male relationships in her life. In the recent Dr Strange: The Multiverse of Madness, she typifies many <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-witch-treatment-what-dr-stranges-wanda-tells-us-about-representations-of-female-anger-184509">unfavourable female tropes</a>, including the “hysterical woman” and “monstrous mother”.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473309/original/file-20220711-23-gukdpa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/473309/original/file-20220711-23-gukdpa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473309/original/file-20220711-23-gukdpa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473309/original/file-20220711-23-gukdpa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473309/original/file-20220711-23-gukdpa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473309/original/file-20220711-23-gukdpa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/473309/original/file-20220711-23-gukdpa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A billboard advertising Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow: ‘hyper-sexualised’ stereotypes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The hyper-sexualised stereotype</h2>
<p>Treating even powerful female characters as <a href="https://www.panicdiscourse.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/5-19-Holding-Out-for-a-Heroine.pdf">subordinate or dependent</a> might reassure male fans that superheroines aren’t a threat to the masculine undertones of the genre, but it does a disservice to the female audience. </p>
<p>Asked to assess superhero graphic novels and films, most women in <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1045159514546214">one study</a> said they disliked and avoided the DC Comics character of Catwoman because she was presented as manipulative and emotional. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/captain-marvel-why-female-superheroes-are-not-just-for-international-womens-day-113083">Captain Marvel: why female superheroes are not just for International Women's Day</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Other <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/car.1094">research has found</a> that exposure to messages of powerlessness can lead girls to feel demoralised and dissatisfied with their own identities, and the overly sexualised depiction of female superheroes can result in <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11199-015-0455-3">lower body esteem</a> in women.</p>
<p>On the other hand, some also rebel against the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21504857.2014.916327">stereotypes</a>. <a href="https://thehawkeyeinitiative.tumblr.com/">The Hawkeye Initiative</a>, for example, parodies the male gaze within the comic book genre by depicting men in the same absurd costumes and poses normally reserved for female characters.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"751795774900543488"}"></div></p>
<h2>Male backlash and box office risk</h2>
<p>The real issue, though, is whether women should even have to challenge such depictions. If more films and comics were made by women for women, perhaps there would be fewer tokenistic portrayals to begin with.</p>
<p>Marvel has rejected criticism of its female characters, with its <a href="https://www.thewrap.com/marvels-kevin-feige-calls-black-widow-backlash-a-little-strange-boasts-his-movies-are-full-of-smart-intelligent-powerful-women/">president saying</a> the studio has always “gone for the powerful woman versus the damsel in distress” and pointing to the recent release of female-led superhero films and TV programs such as She-Hulk and Ms Marvel.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/supermans-not-the-first-hero-to-be-portrayed-as-bisexual-but-hell-bring-hope-to-lgbtq-fans-169898">Superman's not the first hero to be portrayed as bisexual, but he'll bring hope to LGBTQ+ fans</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Trouble is, it’s hard to keep everyone happy. Marvel has felt the backlash from die-hard male fans to a supposed feminist agenda underpinning the studio’s direction. 2019’s Captain Marvel, for example, was touted as <a href="https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-ca-mn-captain-marvel-directors-20190228-story.html">bringing feminism</a> to the Marvel universe, but <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/13/movies/captain-marvel-brie-larson-rotten-tomatoes.html">poor reviews and audience ratings</a> were attributed in part to perceived political correctness and a narrative based on female agency. </p>
<p>Researchers such as <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21504857.2016.1219958?casa_token=DXr8QHcO8nUAAAAA%3AHBBbBqJoe6-VxG-a1kak5O-52rNPUXySYFwJRKjh9ALcXyO9KpYTQLcRL0j-7Q6AVIdGp6Kq7pVibA">Stephanie Orme</a> have contended that the dominance of men in the superhero genre leaves many female fans feeling alienated and unable to change the gender stereotypes, precisely because they’re not seen as the target audience.</p>
<p>It seems that without more and better film and comic female superheroes telling women’s stories, these male-centric genres will continue to alienate female audiences – and to fall short of their creative and commercial potential.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/186639/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Angelique Nairn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Director Taika Waititi’s new Thor: Love and Thunder features a female superhero, but again struggles to transcend the stereotypes of a genre where the male fan base still decides the rules.
Angelique Nairn, Senior Lecturer in Communication Studies, Auckland University of Technology
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/163629
2021-07-12T12:29:31Z
2021-07-12T12:29:31Z
How Latin America’s protest superheroes fight injustice and climate change – and sometimes crime, too
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/410644/original/file-20210709-13-1a9nnzj.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=110%2C0%2C820%2C390&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">An Argentine justice crusader who calls himself Menganno has been patrolling the streets of the city of Lanus since 2010. Netflix has now picked up his character.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS21WlJupSs">Netflix Latinoamérica (screenshot)</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Not all heroes wear capes. In Latin America, some real-life icons wear Mexican wrestling masks or arm themselves with shields and herbicide to lead demonstrations and strong-arm government officials into protecting the people. </p>
<p>These superheroes aren’t <a href="https://www.marvel.com/characters/iron-man-tony-stark">traumatized billionaires</a> like Ironman or <a href="https://www.dccomics.com/characters/superman">aliens with modest alter egos</a> like Superman. They are regular people from Mexico, Argentina and beyond who, with outlandish costumes – and, sometimes, social media accounts – galvanize their communities to defend themselves against everything from police brutality to corporate greed. </p>
<p>Mass demonstrations in the United States have yet to spawn this kind of real-life superhero. But as <a href="https://vt.academia.edu/VinodhVenkatesh/CurriculumVitae">my research on Latin American cultural studies and history</a> demonstrates, common citizens there regularly don outlandish outfits and adopt comic book-inspired personas to promote social change.</p>
<h2>Mexico’s Superbarrio</h2>
<p>Perhaps the best-known character of this sort is Mexico’s Superbarrio, who in the late 1980s <a href="https://daily.jstor.org/superbarrio-the-peoples-superhero/">advocated for housing reform</a> in Mexico City. The character was created by Marco Rascón, a social activist and <a href="https://www.infobae.com/america/mexico/2021/02/10/marco-rascon-sera-candidato-a-la-alcaldia-cuauhtemoc-por-movimiento-ciudadano/">occasional political candidate</a>, who never actually wore the mask but who coordinated the character’s public appearances. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409376/original/file-20210701-25-l6co8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man holding a soccer ball stands next to a man wearing a red full-face mask with a cape and an 'SB' emblem on his shirt." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409376/original/file-20210701-25-l6co8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409376/original/file-20210701-25-l6co8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409376/original/file-20210701-25-l6co8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409376/original/file-20210701-25-l6co8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409376/original/file-20210701-25-l6co8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409376/original/file-20210701-25-l6co8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409376/original/file-20210701-25-l6co8w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Superbarrio, seen here in 1998, was an early real-life Mexican superhero who became popular across Latin America.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/mexican-superbarrio-gomez-and-a-french-unemployed-pose-for-news-photo/1193446923">Eric Cabanis/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In addition to organizing rallies for affordable housing and tenant protection programs, <a href="https://elpais.com/internacional/2018/02/27/mexico/1519752156_150172.html">Superbarrio routinely met with politicians and housing officials</a> as an advocate for the needs of the city’s poor, many of whom were rural migrants who came to the capital during Mexico’s <a href="https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190699192.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780190699192-e-32">mid-20th-century boom years</a>. </p>
<p>In the 1990s, Superbarrio supported the Zapatistas – an Indigenous protest movement based in the southern state of Chiapas – in their grassroots challenge of the Mexican government and global capitalism. </p>
<p>The costume Rascón helped design for Superbarrio combined some elements of Mexican masked wrestlers like El Santo – a justice-seeking “luchador” who became a folk hero and movie character – with others recalling El Chapulín Colorado, perhaps the Spanish-speaking world’s best-known superhero. Superbarrio combined these influences with the stylized “S” chest <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Superbarrio.jpg">emblem of Superman</a>.</p>
<p>Superbarrio inspired <a href="https://read.dukeupress.edu/books/book/1333/The-World-of-Lucha-LibreSecrets-Revelations-and">other real-life superhero protesters in Mexico</a>, including the environmental activist Ecologista Universal and the LGBTQ rights advocate Super Gay.</p>
<h2>Newer figures join in</h2>
<figure>
<iframe src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/113329391" width="500" height="281" frameborder="0" webkitallowfullscreen="" mozallowfullscreen="" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A video showcases Menganno.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>More citizen-superheroes have since emerged in other Latin American countries.</p>
<p>One is <a href="https://www.npr.org/transcripts/519414187">Menganno</a>, a middle-aged Argentine crime fighter who patrols the streets of the city of Lanús on a motorbike, dressed in a full costume with mask and shield. Menganno alerts authorities and city residents whenever he comes upon petty crime, from robberies to drug deals. He also helps aid agencies in identifying people who need food or shelter. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.clarin.com/zonales/superheroe-conurbano-llega-cine-filman-pelicula-capitan-menganno-puma-goity-protagonista_0_ry0sadL3z.html">2018 Menganno movie</a> has languished in post-production due to the COVID-19 crisis, but Netflix Latin America may be picking <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS21WlJupSs">up his story</a>. </p>
<p>Like Menganno, the Honduran masked figure Súper H – born Elmer Ramos – informs his neighbors about such issues as <a href="https://www.radiohouse.hn/2016/07/11/super-h-el-superheroe-sampedrano-que-esta-cambiando-honduras/">homelessness, gang violence and corruption</a>. He has plenty of problems to identify: Súper H works in <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2013/03/27/world/americas/honduras-murder-capital/index.html">San Pedro Sula</a> – once infamously known as the murder capital of the world. </p>
<p>Active on social media and in the streets since 2016, Super H wears a Mexican-style luchador mask and the jersey of the Honduran national soccer team. </p>
<p>Increasing pesticide use is one of his targets. Another is Honduras’ semi-authoritarian president, Juan Orlando Hernández. Several Hernández administration officials have been convicted in U.S. courts for drug trafficking; in their trials Hernández himself was <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/23/world/americas/honduras-juan-orlando-hernandez-drug-trial.html">accused of participating in those operations</a>.</p>
<h2>Chilean characters</h2>
<p>Back in South America, Chile has seen several iconic figures arise from <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-50191746">recent national protests there</a> against a <a href="https://theconversation.com/chile-puts-its-constitution-on-the-ballot-after-year-of-civil-unrest-147832">public transit fare hike and a starkly unequal economy</a>.</p>
<p>Some of them are accidental heroes, like <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-chile-protests-heroes/looking-for-a-hero-shirtless-chilean-protester-police-hating-dog-rise-to-fame-idUKKBN1XH2S3">Pareman</a> or “Stopman” – a protester who was captured by journalists holding a stop sign while being hosed down by the police in October 2019.</p>
<p>Other notable homegrown Chilean protest heroes include the <a href="https://www.ecuadortimes.net/the-story-of-the-ecuadorian-spiderman-that-reached-the-heart-of-the-chilean-people/">Stupid and Sensual Spiderman</a>, a street performer in a Spiderman costume who twerks in front of police while chanting protest slogans, and a climate activist dressed as <a href="https://elcomercio.pe/mundo/latinoamerica/protestas-en-chile-la-primera-linea-heroes-o-vandalos-de-la-dura-batalla-urbana-en-chile-sebastian-pinera-noticia/">Mexico’s Chapulín Colorado</a> but armed with a gas mask and a sprayer of Round-Up herbicide.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/B5LgFj0h9uH","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>Chile’s modern-day protest heroes follow in the footsteps of <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-a-chilean-dog-ended-up-as-a-face-of-the-new-york-city-subway-protests-129167">Negro Matapacos</a>, a street dog wearing a red bandanna who electrified protesters almost a decade ago. Though he died in 2017, Negro Matapacos is still depicted as a sort of super sidekick in Chilean graffiti and print.</p>
<h2>Capitán Colombia</h2>
<p>Dressed in black gym clothes, ski goggles and a gas mask, Capitán Colombia is a visible figure on the front lines of his country’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-colombians-are-taking-to-the-streets-to-protest-state-violence-161963">ongoing protests</a> against political corruption, economic difficulties and <a href="https://www.axios.com/colombia-lawmakers-health-care-protesters-a7b52d3c-01ce-4ad4-85f4-49331eca1b76.html">health care privatization</a>. </p>
<p>Capitán Colombia, who carries a tri-colored shield in the colors of the Colombian flag, adorned with a drawn heart, is a comic book-like muscular superhero. His toned arms and expansive chest are an exception to generally rounded physiques of Latin America’s other real-life icons.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409375/original/file-20210701-25-1f7foev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A muscular man in a gas mask, ski goggles, and a tank top, holding a metal shield painted like the Colombian flag" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409375/original/file-20210701-25-1f7foev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409375/original/file-20210701-25-1f7foev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409375/original/file-20210701-25-1f7foev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409375/original/file-20210701-25-1f7foev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409375/original/file-20210701-25-1f7foev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409375/original/file-20210701-25-1f7foev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409375/original/file-20210701-25-1f7foev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Capitán Colombia has a comic book hero’s physique and an activist’s social critique.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://twitter.com/capitncolombia?lang=en">Capitan Colombia via Twitter</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Like his Latin American peers, though, Capitán Colombia has no actual superpower. Still, his participation in marches draws local and international attention to the demands of his fellow protesters. So does his <a href="https://www.instagram.com/capitancolombia.oficial/?hl=en">Instagram account</a>, which has 11,000 followers.</p>
<p>[<em>Understand new developments in science, health and technology, each week.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/science-editors-picks-71/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=science-understand">Subscribe to The Conversation’s science newsletter</a>.]</p>
<h2>An all-male cast</h2>
<p>While Latin America’s mass demonstrations draw all genders – and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/06/chile-womens-day-protest">some are women-led</a> – nearly all its citizen-superhero protesters are male. In Chile, <a href="https://elpais.com/sociedad/2020-03-07/cubrirse-el-rostro-para-ser-legion-el-icono-de-la-lucha-feminista-en-chile.html">women activists have donned creative masks and outfits</a>, sometimes going topless at protests against gender violence and police abuse. They have not, however, adopted a superhero persona.</p>
<p>The all-male street superhero cast may reflect Latin America’s broader issues with gender inequity, and it mirrors the sparsity of women superheroes in both Latin American and U.S. comic franchises. Only recently have Marvel and DC put out <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2020/12/13/box-office-how-hollywood-sets-female-led-superhero-movies-like-wonder-woman-supergirl-catwoman-and-elektra-up-to-fail/?sh=37ad5d617fac">female-led films</a>. </p>
<p>In Mexico – which has seen several recent <a href="https://theconversation.com/mexican-women-are-angry-about-rape-murder-and-government-neglect-and-they-want-the-world-to-know-122156">feminist uprisings against rape and other forms of gender violence</a> – the government recently created a coronavirus-fighting superheroine named <a href="https://coronavirus.gob.mx/susana-distancia/">Susana Distancia</a>. Perhaps officials consciously sought to add a female-identified character into the mix of national superheroes. But their choice may have to do more with the rhyme of “distancia” – distance, as in social distancing.</p>
<p>Latin America’s activist superheroes skip the big screen to fight not aliens or supervillains but real world injustices. Might gender equality be a future target?</p>
<p><em>This story has been updated to correct an error, introduced during editing, about the Mexican state in which the Zapatista movement originated.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/163629/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vinodh Venkatesh does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
In Latin America, common citizens have often donned outlandish outfits and comic book-inspired personas to lead demonstrations and promote social change.
Vinodh Venkatesh, Professor of Hispanic Studies, Virginia Tech
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/161064
2021-05-27T12:06:08Z
2021-05-27T12:06:08Z
‘WandaVision’ echoes myths of Isis, Orpheus and Kisa Gotami to explain how grief and love persevere
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402879/original/file-20210526-15-v4yroz.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3834%2C2155&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">What is Marvel if not mythology persevering?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://dmedmedia.disney.com/disney-plus/wandavision/images">WandaVision Images/Disney Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>During a flashback scene in Marvel’s Disney Plus show “<a href="https://www.disneyplus.com/series/wandavision/4SrN28ZjDLwH">WandaVision</a>,” the <a href="https://marvelcinematicuniverse.fandom.com/wiki/Vision">superpowered android Vision</a> comforts his wife, Wanda Maximoff, after the death of her twin brother. “But what is grief,” he tells her, “if not love persevering?” </p>
<p>The line has become famous among Marvel fans and inspired <a href="https://junkee.com/wandavision-vision-grief-meme/289488">an internet meme</a>. But it also neatly summarizes the events of the show. Later, distraught over Vision’s death after battling the <a href="https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Thanos_(Earth-616)">villain Thanos</a>, Wanda uses her magic powers to bring a version of him back to life. He becomes her husband in a sitcom fantasy world of her own creation. In order to establish this dream world, Wanda pulls an entire town of people into her magic bubble to play roles of her choosing.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://variety.com/vip/wandavision-audience-bigger-than-netflixs-bridgerton-in-january-data-suggests-1234913691/">success of “WandaVision”</a> continues <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/31/the-13-highest-grossing-film-franchises-at-the-box-office.html">Marvel’s impressive record</a>. But besides extending the studio’s string of box office hits into television, “WandaVision” also continues another familiar pattern from Marvel: echoing much older stories from world mythologies.</p>
<h2>Marvel and mythology</h2>
<p>As I show in my recent book, “<a href="https://mcfarlandbooks.com/product/religion-and-myth-in-the-marvel-cinematic-universe/">Religion and Myth in the Marvel Cinematic Universe</a>,” examples of that pattern are not hard to find. </p>
<p>The origin stories where Marvel heroes discover their powers often resemble initiation rituals found around the world. In those rituals, the hero often dies – literally or symbolically – and achieves a new status upon coming back to life.</p>
<p>For instance, it shows up frequently in stories of shamans from around the globe, where individuals grow very sick or even briefly die, then return with supernatural powers. Similarly, Iron Man, Thor, Captain America and Black Panther all gain their powers after near-death experiences.</p>
<p>In some cases, as when the Avengers battle one another – such as in 2016’s “<a href="https://www.marvel.com/movies/captain-america-civil-war">Captain America: Civil War</a>” – the tragic battle between heroes resembles the scale and savagery of Achilles fighting Hector in the Greek “<a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-homers-iliad-80968">Iliad</a>” or Arjuna battling Karna in the Hindu “<a href="https://aeon.co/essays/the-indian-epic-mahabharata-imparts-a-dark-nuanced-moral-vision">Mahabharata</a>.” Among the Avengers, when it is revealed that Captain America hid knowledge of who killed Iron Man’s parents, it results in a similarly vicious battle between the two heroes. </p>
<p>And when the Avengers battle monsters and villains, those antagonists often mirror the giants, dragons and beasts of much older stories. Think, for instance, of the <a href="https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Emil_Blonsky_(Earth-616)">Abomination</a> and <a href="https://marvelcinematicuniverse.fandom.com/wiki/Red_Skull">Red Skull</a>, who resemble ogres found in stories like the <a href="http://www.mythencyclopedia.com/Ar-Be/Beowulf.html">Norse myth “Beowulf”</a> or the Chinese folk tale “<a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-39728636">Journey to the West</a>.”</p>
<p>The primary villains also have mythic connections. <a href="https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Thanos_(Earth-616)">Thanos</a>, whose name means “death” in Greek, has similarities to mythic figures of death from around the world. Like the Greek god <a href="https://www.greekmythology.com/Olympians/Hades/hades.html">Hades</a>, at times he appears regal, surrounded by servants and followers, sitting in a throne while wearing armor and a crown. Other times he is like <a href="https://www.learnreligions.com/the-demon-mara-449981">Mara</a>, the god of death in Buddhism, who assumes monstrous forms and commands an army of frightening and misshapen creatures. </p>
<p>The Avengers’ final attempt to defeat Thanos also parallels quests to overcome death found in stories like the <a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-the-epic-of-gilgamesh-73444">Mesopotamian epic “Gilgamesh</a>” or the <a href="https://1baikal.ru/en/istoriya/bezzhalostnye-dukhi-buryatskogo-shamanizma">tales of Siberian shamans</a>. Like those ancient heroes, the Avengers undertake a great journey to acquire magical objects – in their case, the Infinity Stones – to overcome death.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402888/original/file-20210526-15-1vu5xn0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="The android superhero Vision and Wanda Maximoff in the Marvel TV series 'WandaVision'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402888/original/file-20210526-15-1vu5xn0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/402888/original/file-20210526-15-1vu5xn0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402888/original/file-20210526-15-1vu5xn0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402888/original/file-20210526-15-1vu5xn0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402888/original/file-20210526-15-1vu5xn0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402888/original/file-20210526-15-1vu5xn0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/402888/original/file-20210526-15-1vu5xn0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The suburban newlyweds share similarities with Isis and Osiris from Egyptian mythology.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://dmedmedia.disney.com/disney-plus/wandavision/images">WandaVision Images/Disney Plus</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Wanda’s grief</h2>
<p>In the case of “WandaVision,” its portrayal of grief and loss brings to mind many famous world myths. In Egyptian mythology, the goddess Isis searches for the dismembered body parts of <a href="https://www.laits.utexas.edu/cairo/teachers/osiris.pdf">her murdered husband Osiris</a>. After Isis reassembles Osiris, the couple have a son, Horus. Similarly, when Wanda cannot put Vision’s destroyed body back together, she recreates it out of magic and goes on to have twins with him.</p>
<p>Wanda’s actions also bring to mind <a href="https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/thig/thig.10.01.than.html">a famous tale</a> from the Buddhist tradition. In that story, a woman named Kisa Gotami is heartbroken when her only child dies. She begs the Buddha to bring the child back to life. The Buddha tells her to bring him a mustard seed from a house where no one has died. Going from house to house, Kisa Gotami discovers there is no family that has not experienced death, grief and loss. In the end, she comes to terms with her sorrow and joins the Buddhist path.</p>
<p>Interestingly, “WandaVision” arrives at a similar ending. For most of the series, Wanda clings to the idea that she can keep Vision alive and live happily ever after with him. But she eventually realizes it is wrong to keep her fantasy family alive at the cost of imprisoning an entire town. Like Kisa Gotami, she ultimately acknowledges the reality of death and lets Vision and their children go by ending the spell that animates them. </p>
<p>As Wanda watches Vision slowly vanish before her eyes, viewers may be reminded of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/orpheus-and-eurydice-review-a-bold-reimagining-through-circus-and-opera-124004">myth of Orpheus</a>, a Greek hero, and his wife, Eurydice. After Eurydice dies from a snakebite, Orpheus persuades Hades to release her from the underworld. Unfortunately, on the journey back, Orpheus breaks the one rule Hades gave him: Do not look at her before reaching the surface. When he does, he watches Eurydice disappear all over again.</p>
<h2>Timeless lessons</h2>
<p>It’s possible that these parallels between the Marvel stories and ancient myths are part of their ongoing popularity. Both genres tap into fundamental questions that people have been trying to answer for thousands of years. What is worth fighting for? How do I live my best life? Why do we have to die?</p>
<p>“WandaVision,” meanwhile, is all about grief, but – like many myths before it – there is a sprinkle of hope. As Vision begins to disappear, he tells Wanda, “I have been a voice with no body, a body but not human, and now, a memory made real. Who knows what I might be next? We have said goodbye before, so it stands to reason, we’ll say hello again.”</p>
<p>Those words capture the same ache felt by Isis, Orpheus, Kisa Gotami and any person – ancient or modern – who has ever lost a loved one. The mythological tales remain relevant across time and across cultures, reappearing in these Marvel stories. That fact makes me wonder if we can alter Vision’s famous words just a bit: “What is Marvel, if not mythology persevering?”</p>
<p>[<em>Explore the intersection of faith, politics, arts and culture.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/this-week-in-religion-76/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=religion-explore">Sign up for This Week in Religion.</a>]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/161064/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Nichols does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
‘WandaVision’ reimagines stories from Egyptian and Greek mythology, as well as Buddhist tradition.
Michael Nichols, Professor of Religious Studies, Martin University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/125771
2019-10-24T13:41:46Z
2019-10-24T13:41:46Z
Martin Scorsese says superhero movies are ‘not cinema’: two experts debate
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/298519/original/file-20191024-170475-9zkfcb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2044%2C1076&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Jeremy Renner and Robert Downey Jr in Avengers: Endgame.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">©Marvel Studios 2019</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola and Ken Loach have all recently expressed scorn at the growing dominance of superhero movies in the commercial cinema, with Scorsese saying that the Marvel film universe is “not cinema”. We asked two academics: an expert in cinema and an expert in comics to debate the question.</em></p>
<p><strong>Julian Lawrence: senior lecturer in comics and graphic novels, Teesside University</strong></p>
<p>Marvel movies aren’t cinema. So what are they? Martin Scorsese <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2482391/martin-scorsese-clarifies-controversial-comments-about-marvel-movies">recently labelled them</a> “<a href="https://variety.com/2019/film/news/martin-scorsese-marvel-theme-parks-1203360075/">theme parks</a>” but I suggest they function primarily as commercials. I agree with British filmmaker <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/ken-loach-marvel-superhero-films-boring-and-nothing-to-do-with-art-of-cinema-11841486">Ken Loach’s comment</a> that Marvel movies are “a commodity which will make a profit for a big corporation – they’re a cynical exercise”. </p>
<p>Fellow film great Francis Ford Coppola <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/oct/21/francis-ford-coppola-scorsese-was-being-kind-marvel-movies-are-despicable">agrees with them both</a> – except he doesn’t think they went far enough, labelling superhero films “despicable”. </p>
<p>They are not the first to take aim at superhero movies. In 2014, director/screenwriter <a href="https://www.nme.com/news/film/birdman-director-alejandro-gonz-lez-i-rritu-c-868003">Alejandro G. Iñárritu</a> (Birdman) condemned superhero blockbusters saying “… they purport to be profound, based on some Greek mythological kind of thing. And they are honestly very right-wing … Philosophically, I just don’t like them.”</p>
<p>He could be on to something about the right-wing propaganda aspect. Superhero movies tend to set up situations where the world is in grave danger – and sell superheroes as the solution. The message here is that might makes right and that the end always justifies the means: a classic fascist trope. You can see why someone like Loach might not like this narrative trend. His stark new film, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysjwg-MnZao">Sorry We Missed You</a>, makes it clear there are no superheroes to save us, just ordinary people in real situations living lives of quiet desperation.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/bread-and-circuses">bread and circus</a> commodities, Marvel movies also function as self-advertisements – not just for the countless prequels and sequels, but also for merchandising, which is the real cash cow. Licensing revenue for toys, games, clothing, even breakfast cereal far <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/superhero-earns-13-billion-a-748281">eclipses box office receipts</a>. </p>
<p>Selling a commodity as art has become so normalised that we consumers gladly invest our money and time to collectively participate. I <a href="https://time.com/3630878/binge-watch-tv-shows/">invested a great deal of time</a> watching the TV series Mad Men, only to discover in the final episode that it was a <a href="https://variety.com/2015/tv/news/mad-men-finale-coca-cola-hilltop-ad-1201499510/">seven-year-long Coke commercial</a>. Since then, I’ve refused to spend any more of my life on episodic television and had to laugh when I read abut the inadvertent <a href="https://fortune.com/2019/05/06/game-of-thrones-starbucks-cup-advertising/">Starbucks product placement</a> in the final series of Game of Thrones.</p>
<h2>The ninth and seventh arts</h2>
<p>Franco-Belgian scholars <a href="https://www.tempslibre.ch/actualites/la-classification-des-10-arts-que-personne-ne-connait-vraiment-146">classify cinema</a> as the “seventh art”, with comics being the ninth. But if we are to distinguish cinema from a murky mash-up of all media, then some protocols are needed. First, how about a moratorium on custom-made scenes that pander to international audiences? Iron Man 3 was <a href="https://kotaku.com/why-many-in-china-hate-iron-man-3s-chinese-version-486840429">cut for the Chinese market</a> by upping the screen time for a minor character and adding foreign product placement that are not included in the original version. This is not done for art’s sake, but to generate increased revenue.</p>
<p>The backlash to Loach, Scorsese and Coppola is not surprising, since <a href="https://www.the-numbers.com/movies/franchise/Marvel-Cinematic-Universe#tab=technical">almost everyone in Hollywood</a> (and beyond) is in on this game. For instance, Marvel movies accounted for 48.2% of Samuel L. Jackson’s <a href="https://comicbook.com/marvel/2019/04/28/samuel-l-jackson-films-13-billion-dollar-box-office-gross-worldw/">entire career box office take</a>, and a whopping <a href="https://www.the-numbers.com/movies/franchise/Marvel-Cinematic-Universe#tab=acting">82.6% of Robert Downey Jr’s</a>. Over in the DC Extended Universe in 2017, feminist icon Wonder Woman earned millions for her investors, which included oil tycoons <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/conservative-koch-brothers-are-secret-investors-wonder-woman-1027376">Charles G. Koch, David H. Koch</a> and Donald Trump’s treasury secretary, <a href="https://variety.com/2019/politics/news/mnuchn-ratpac-dune-jackie-speier-1203125377/">Steve Mnuchin</a>.</p>
<p>It isn’t the genre that is the problem, it’s that mainstream superhero movies are created primarily to sell more mainstream superhero movies. The claim that Disney/Marvel innovated “narratives that are dispersed across its extended network of movies” is more evidence for their being capitalist commodities rather than cinema. Dispersing narratives across a network is a marketing ploy used by Marvel and DC for decades (known as <a href="https://www.marvel.com/comics/events_crossovers">crossovers</a>) to boost sales of failing titles– readers are lured into buying issues of comics they don’t normally follow in order to continue reading a storyline or get closure. The films are essentially doing the same thing.</p>
<p>The best superhero film I’ve seen all year is <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2v3_jHrvBQ">Woman at War</a> by <a href="https://www.screendaily.com/news/woman-at-war-director-benedikt-erlingsson-blasts-film-industrys-carbon-farting-crisis-in-karlovy-vary/5140851.article">Icelandic director Benedikt Erlingsson</a>. It tells the story of one woman’s battle against planetary annihilation. Go see it if you get the chance.</p>
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<hr>
<p><strong>Neil Archer: senior lecturer in film studies, Keele University</strong></p>
<p>For the record, I’m ambivalent about much of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe (MCU) – yet I was still struck by <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2481615/martin-scorsese-has-some-blunt-thoughts-on-marvel-movies-and-james-gunn-is-sad-about-it">what Scorsese had to say</a> about Marvel movies being more theme park than cinema. </p>
<p>That Scorsese should take this line, in some respects, is apt. <a href="https://www.rogerebert.com/interviews/interview-peter-biskind-revisits-easy-riders-raging-bulls">Peter Biskind’s 1998 book</a>, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, evokes Scorsese as one of the great filmmakers of the “New Hollywood”, the decade or so from 1968 when it seemed that film-literate, adventurous directors and writers would re-imagine Hollywood.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/298521/original/file-20191024-170458-17ob0ca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/298521/original/file-20191024-170458-17ob0ca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298521/original/file-20191024-170458-17ob0ca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298521/original/file-20191024-170458-17ob0ca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298521/original/file-20191024-170458-17ob0ca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298521/original/file-20191024-170458-17ob0ca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298521/original/file-20191024-170458-17ob0ca.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Josh Brolin as Thanos in Avengers: Endgame.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">©Marvel Studios 2019</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The end of this period, in Biskind’s view, was down to the infantilism of films such as Jaws and Star Wars. These were films which were often viewed more as amusement-park rides than cinematic art – what Robin Wood critically dismissed as the childish, commercially-driven “<a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lM-rx7S2ijoC&pg=PA350&lpg=PA350&dq=robin+wood+spielberg+lucas+syndrome&source=bl&ots=7EcDUK5f7c&sig=ACfU3U0RIq_THBU4qFm0caG9sGG9yl2x5w&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj6ht3m4LTlAhVAShUIHYOlA7AQ6AEwB3oECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q=robin%20wood%20spielberg%20lucas%20syndrome&f=false">Spielberg-Lucas syndrome</a>” dominating mainstream film.</p>
<p>But if you want to look at the economical, expressive storytelling possibilities of film, just watch Spielberg’s Jaws, or even better, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLiRnvppAaM">Close Encounters of the Third Kind</a>. Don’t take my word for it – <a href="https://www.empireonline.com/movies/news/martin-scorsese-jj-abrams-christopher-nolan-pay-tribute-steven-spielberg/">Scorsese, ironically, said so himself</a> in a 2018 interview with Empire magazine, describing Spielberg as “a pioneer of visual storytelling … reinventing our art form with each new picture”. </p>
<p>Since he so strongly supports Spielberg, sometimes associated with the demise of grown-up cinema, it’s surprising that Scorsese should come out against the most current examples of popular film.</p>
<p>So what’s the problem with Marvel? As I <a href="https://filmkeele.wordpress.com/2019/03/05/hooray-for-hollywood/">explored in a recent book</a>, the MCU’s most significant contribution to modern cinema – like it or not – has been to rethink the idea of the “standalone feature”, favouring narratives that are dispersed across an extended network of movies. From one perspective, the superhero franchises have simply expanded “classical” narrative form across a series of films.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/298522/original/file-20191024-170489-18vkz6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/298522/original/file-20191024-170489-18vkz6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298522/original/file-20191024-170489-18vkz6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298522/original/file-20191024-170489-18vkz6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298522/original/file-20191024-170489-18vkz6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298522/original/file-20191024-170489-18vkz6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/298522/original/file-20191024-170489-18vkz6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Comic book hero: Zade Rosenthal as Iron Man.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">© 2012 MVLFFLLC. TM & © 2012 Marvel.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Has this been at the expense, in Scorsese’s terms, of the “<a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2481615/martin-scorsese-has-some-blunt-thoughts-on-marvel-movies-and-james-gunn-is-sad-about-it">emotional, psychological experience</a>” and the emphasis on “human beings” that is his preferred view of cinema? Well, Hulk is not Hamlet – and nor is Iron Man, despite the absurdly regal send off that character gets at the end of Avengers: Endgame. </p>
<p>But for all its self-congratulation, <a href="https://youtu.be/ooAsQ7Z5d2A">Endgame</a> still offers much of the experience Scorsese demands – and which he might recognise. There are meditations on loss, on family, as well as debates on responsibility and moral choice, reflections on time and the impact of life decisions. And while we’re at it, were there many more films made in 2018 as refreshing, and politically engaging, as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-i-marvelled-at-black-panthers-reimagining-of-africa-91703">Black Panther</a>?</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-i-marvelled-at-black-panthers-reimagining-of-africa-91703">How I marvelled at Black Panther’s reimagining of Africa</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Corporate enterprise</h2>
<p>But isn’t Loach right about Marvel being <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/oct/22/superhero-films-are-cynical-exercise-to-make-profits-for-corporations-ken-loach">a corporate enterprise</a>, designed to take our money? Of course he is – these are Hollywood movies after all (I believe Scorsese makes these too). Do we then disqualify every major studio production in history as an advert for itself?</p>
<p>But the bigger issue here is that, because they are linked to broader practices of commercialisation, the films themselves are – mistakenly – deemed guilty by association. The political critique of the films also reduces the sizeable audience to an undifferentiated, uncritical mass. Loach, like most critics of the films – who also admit to not watching them – doesn’t seem to credit Marvel’s viewers with any discernment or intelligence. But marketing and merchandising - as plenty of Disney flops have shown - can’t alone guarantee audience devotion.</p>
<p>Indeed, as <a href="https://nyupress.org/9780814743485/media-franchising/">media scholar Derek Johnson reminded us</a>, within “corporate” Hollywood, filmmaking and merchandising divisions are often separate – even in conflict with each other. The skill of Marvel’s filmmakers, in fact, has been both to create and sustain an audience that wants to follow its characters over ten years and more. This is an achievement in narrative – not in flogging toys or pillowcases.</p>
<p>To be clear: I get why people don’t like Marvel. But why can’t filmmaking like theirs, and like Loach’s, coexist? As <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=xPGPXu2MokkC&printsec=frontcover&dq=tom+shone+blockbuster&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiTtrb_8a_lAhWCThUIHUnvAPkQ6AEIKDAA#v=snippet&q=biskind&f=false">Tom Shone wittily asks</a> in his book Blockbuster, the demonising of modern movies tends to be all one-way traffic. Film connoisseurs tear into Star Wars for failing to be The Godfather, but nobody rips up Coppola’s family saga for missing a few space battles. Why need cinema be just one thing? Why not both? Isn’t cinema, in the end, something for everyone?</p>
<p>The elephant in this particular room, I suspect, is neither art, nor commercialism. And probably not “right-wing neoliberal propaganda” either. It’s exhibition. For the likes of Scorsese, the popularity and distribution muscle behind such films make it harder both to make and screen non-franchise or lower-budget movies. And he has a point. </p>
<p>But while there is clearly an imbalance problem within the contemporary cinema landscape, that doesn’t mean the films themselves are “not cinema”. Maybe they are just the cinema you’d rather not see.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/125771/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Martin Scorsese believes superhero movies are ‘not cinema’. What do the experts think?
Julian Lawrence, Senior Lecturer in Comics and Graphic Novels, Teesside University
Neil Archer, Senior Lecturer in Film Studies, Keele University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/115132
2019-05-26T19:32:06Z
2019-05-26T19:32:06Z
A long time ago… why prequels are taking us back to the future in popular film
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/275314/original/file-20190520-69209-hnakud.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">An upcoming film will explore the origins of the Joker, last seen in the Batman franchise. But prequels are often poorly received – perhaps with good reason.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7286456/mediaviewer/rm1076453632">DC Comics/IMDB</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Last month, audiences got their first glimpse of the trailer for the upcoming film, <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7286456/">Joker</a>, which explores the origins of its iconic title character, last seen in the Batman franchise. The trailer came just weeks after <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4154664/">Captain Marvel</a> was released to cinemas, detailing the back story of Carol Danvers, a superhero who suffers from amnesia and struggles to find out about her past. </p>
<p>Joker is not the only prequel in the works. DC entertainment (also behind Joker) will follow up with <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1877830/">The Batman</a>, a 2021 film set to focus on a younger Bruce Wayne. The <a href="https://consequenceofsound.net/2018/09/die-hard-6-mcclane/">sixth instalment of Die Hard</a>, titled McClane, will also be an origin story focusing on John McClane in his 20s. </p>
<p>And after the critically acclaimed <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3032476/">Better Call Saul</a> – a prequel to <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0903747/">Breaking Bad</a> – it was recently announced that classic TV show <a href="https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/9kpvmy/sopranos-prequel-movie-release-date-new-title-what-happened-to-the-many-saints-of-newark-vgtrn">The Sopranos</a> would be followed up with a prequel movie. Even <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikawsmith/2019/01/14/game-of-thrones-prequel/">Game of Thrones</a> will be filming a prequel series.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-_DJEzZk2pc?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Prequels and origin texts focus on the back story of our favourite characters. Traditionally much rarer than sequels, they are fast becoming a popular mode of storytelling, alongside the recent boom of 90s remakes. Prequels allow filmmakers to stay in familiar territory while also developing new storylines for old (and even dead) characters.</p>
<p>While prequels present a unique opportunity for storytelling, they are often poorly received, from <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0329028/">Dumb & Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd</a>, to <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0204313/">Exorcist: The Beginning</a>. On the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_prequels">list of film prequels</a> on Wikipedia, 36 were direct-to-video. Prequels like <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071562/">Godfather Part II </a>and Better Call Saul appear to be the exceptions to the rule. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/its-happening-again-our-love-affair-with-tv-reboots-78454">It's happening again ... our love affair with TV reboots</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Why the appeal?</h2>
<p>Society loves origins. Much like our obsession with the lives of celebrities “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXOk6VWlb9y1-wdnNbi_pqxS5EUG7_vYh">before they were famous</a>”, we’re naturally curious about the past of characters. The great attraction of the prequel and origin story is that we get to take a look into a character’s elusive past. </p>
<p>Film scholar <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books/about/Christopher_Nolan.html?id=Ty8GuAEACAAJ&redir_esc=y">Darren Mooney argues</a> origin stories offer what the late <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/marvel-comics-genius-stan-lee-outcasts-heroes/">Stan Lee called</a> the “illusion of change”, so that our understanding of the character can evolve, even when the character themselves remains more or less the same. </p>
<p>Prequels rely on this process of change, and if we can watch this unfold, it can make certain enigmatic characters more relatable – from the Joker to Tony Soprano. This might explain the popularity of <a href="https://bloody-disgusting.com/editorials/3438219/prequels-origin-stories-much-good-thing/">prequels in the horror genre</a>, where we see the early years of killers from Norman Bates to Hannibal Lecter. </p>
<p>Just like sequels, the prequel format is a particularly lucrative business model; <a href="https://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=marvel2018a.htm">Captain Marvel has grossed more than US$1 billion worldwide</a>, continuing Marvel’s blockbuster run. By taking advantage of the prequel angle, production companies can capitalise on their films without needing to be particularly original. This means the big film franchises will likely continue their cinematic reign under the guise of “novel” storytelling techniques. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/275319/original/file-20190520-69192-h9kdcj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/275319/original/file-20190520-69192-h9kdcj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/275319/original/file-20190520-69192-h9kdcj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275319/original/file-20190520-69192-h9kdcj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275319/original/file-20190520-69192-h9kdcj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275319/original/file-20190520-69192-h9kdcj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275319/original/file-20190520-69192-h9kdcj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275319/original/file-20190520-69192-h9kdcj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Brie Larson in Captain Marvel, a film that explored the origins of its title character.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4154664/mediaviewer/rm3956700416">Marvel Studios/IMDB</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As film studies scholar <a href="https://utpress.utexas.edu/books/klein-palmer-cycles-sequels-spin-offs-remakes-and-reboots">Andrew Scahill puts it</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>the prequel offers the pleasure of familiar characters and settings while further exploring the narrative world of the existing text and possibly deepening the audience’s connection with central characters.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Yet he also acknowledges that “as an industrial mode, the prequel provides the financial safety of a tested storyline with a built-in audience”. This means popular culture, once a thriving field of experimental storytelling, risks becoming ever more derivative as it heads into the next decade.</p>
<h2>When prequels go wrong</h2>
<p>Prequels are more difficult to pull off than a sequel, because we already know how the story ends. As <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/better-call-saul-season-5-release-date-delay-breaking-bad-a8861261.html">AMC President Sarah Barnett said</a> of Better Call Saul: “We know clearly the end was already written before the beginning began.” Filmmakers must also contend with the natural process of time, since actors inevitably age. The task is to make the back story both engaging and authentic to the original narrative.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/275320/original/file-20190520-69199-huyqtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/275320/original/file-20190520-69199-huyqtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/275320/original/file-20190520-69199-huyqtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275320/original/file-20190520-69199-huyqtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275320/original/file-20190520-69199-huyqtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275320/original/file-20190520-69199-huyqtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275320/original/file-20190520-69199-huyqtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/275320/original/file-20190520-69199-huyqtr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Bob Odenkirk in Better Call Saul, a prequel series to the critically acclaimed Breaking Bad.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3032476/mediaviewer/rm1012214016">IMDB</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Star Wars prequels illustrate how easy it is to do a bad job. The first two films in particular were poorly received and accused of bad writing, equally terrible acting, and falling well short of the original trilogy in regards to storytelling. When prequels are weak, it often seems as though they are simply there to make money for production companies.</p>
<p>While sequels and reboots defined the 2010s in popular culture, prequels are set to define the 2020s, which is not necessarily good news. Ironically, there is no longer anything particularly original about origin stories, as the format has already started to exhaust itself.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/115132/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Siobhan Lyons does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
From the Joker to a Game of Thrones prequel, origin stories are increasingly common in film and TV – perhaps at the expense of originality in popular culture.
Siobhan Lyons, Scholar in Media and Cultural Studies, Macquarie University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/112617
2019-03-07T04:51:26Z
2019-03-07T04:51:26Z
Remember Blockbuster, Nirvana and pagers? The new Captain Marvel lives in the 1990s
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262308/original/file-20190306-48441-q4jaah.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Captain Marvel has fun taking us back to the 1990s.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Captain Marvel flies into movie theatres from today, and apart from introducing a great new hero who combines the righteousness of <a href="https://www.marvel.com/characters/captain-america-steve-rogers">Captain America</a> and the humour of <a href="https://theconversation.com/thor-ragnarok-pitches-superheroes-against-science-and-how-does-hulk-keep-his-pants-on-86211">Thor: Ragnarok</a>, it’s also a cultural reference bonanza for anyone who grew up as a child of the 1990s.</p>
<p>There are the obligatory references to the <a href="https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2019/03/theres-only-one-surviving-blockbuster-left-on-planet-earth/">now-declining</a> Blockbuster video store, a fantastic music soundtrack (Nirvana, Hole, TLC to name a few), and tech jokes galore.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/fingerprint-and-face-scanners-arent-as-secure-as-we-think-they-are-112414">Fingerprint and face scanners aren’t as secure as we think they are</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>We see the origin story of her character <a href="https://www.marvel.com/characters/captain-marvel-carol-danvers">Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel</a>, meet the Shield agents in the early days, and get set up with an interstellar conflict with some satisfying subversion of your typical expectations.</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/512/gif1.gif?1551831185" width="100%">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Blockbuster takes a beating, and perhaps a premonition of its future prospects.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>So let’s go back to the ‘90s (like the movie’s <a href="https://www.marvel.com/captainmarvel/">website</a> does) to some long-forgotten tech as well as some that has aged surprisingly well, and see how it all checks out, both scientifically and historically.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Z1BCujX3pw8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Don’t mess with this pilot.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Projecting holograms through a landline phone</h2>
<p>Upon landing on Earth, Danvers raids a Radioshack shop and with a few deft modifications manages to set up a <a href="https://theconversation.com/five-surprising-ways-holograms-are-revolutionising-the-world-77886">hologram</a> communicator from a conventional wired phone.</p>
<p>The projection side of this feat would take some pretty impressive tweaking of 1990s technology (she appears to set everything up in a few minutes), but the bandwidth side of things can be analysed – that’s the amount of data needed for a hologram communication.</p>
<p>The bandwidth required for holograms varies widely, but figures of about <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/254033574_3D_holographic_display_and_its_data_transmission_requirement">10Gbps</a> are mentioned in the literature. There are also <a href="https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/latest/media/media-releases/2015/6ghz">proposals to use 5G’s up to 10Gbps bandwidth to do holographic projections</a>.</p>
<p>So if Danvers’ modifications have upped the bandwidth to modern day 5G standards, it’s feasible she could receive sufficient data to get a hologram up and running. </p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> A plausible projection.</p>
<h2>Digital reading speed</h2>
<p>There are lots of nostalgic tech moments in the movie – an internet connection dropping out, and the whole crew waiting around for a computer to read data from a CD.</p>
<p>Although done for humorous reasons, this depiction is entirely accurate, as anyone who lived through the 1990s can attest.</p>
<p>CD read speeds <a href="https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/X-compact-disc-access-time">varied</a> from hundreds of kilobytes (kB) per second to 6 megabytes (MB) per second. Even with the fastest disc drives of the time, it could take many seconds to read even a moderate-sized file, and minutes to read an entire CD’s worth of data (about 700MB).</p>
<p>Compare that to today - we have <a href="https://www.techradar.com/au/news/best-usb-flash-drives">USB drives</a> with capacities up to 1 terabyte, and read speeds of more than 400 megabytes per second.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Painfully on point.</p>
<h2>Fighters – not much has changed</h2>
<p>In one of the secret hangar bases in the movie we get a shot of what looks remarkably like a <a href="https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/f-22.html">Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor</a> fighter aircraft.</p>
<figure>
<img src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/514/gif2.gif?1551833430" width="100%">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">We get a sneak peak at an F-22 Raptor.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With the movie set in 1995, it’s somewhat plausible there could be a prototype F-22 at a secret base – the plane flew for the <a href="https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/aviation/a28102/20-years-old-f-22/">first time in 1997</a>. Danvers is meanwhile seen to be <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/watch-captain-marvel-star-brie-larson-take-flight-in-an-air-force-f-16-2019-1/">flying F-16s</a> at a normal aircraft base.</p>
<p>What’s also interesting is while on-board electronics and related technology have changed significantly, the core airframe tech has not advanced much over the past nearly quarter of a century – the <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-went-wrong-with-the-f-35-lockheed-martins-joint-strike-fighter-60905">F-22 is still considered to be one of the best aircraft</a> around today.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Fighter is fair.</p>
<h2>Lifting fingerprints off sticky tape</h2>
<p>To escape a fingerprint-tagged room, Nick Fury grabs a piece of plastic tape and runs it over where a staff member grabbed his ID card. He uses the fingerprint on the tape on the reader to unlock the door.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262293/original/file-20190305-48447-1dqh20h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262293/original/file-20190305-48447-1dqh20h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262293/original/file-20190305-48447-1dqh20h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262293/original/file-20190305-48447-1dqh20h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262293/original/file-20190305-48447-1dqh20h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262293/original/file-20190305-48447-1dqh20h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262293/original/file-20190305-48447-1dqh20h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lifting fingerprints.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">microgen/123rf.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Grabbing fingerprints off a surface with tape <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/finding-fingerprints/">can be done</a> if the surface is prepared through a process called dusting. Dusting uses a fine powder to stick to the oily residue left by a fingerprint, which is then transferred to a piece of tape. </p>
<p>But Fury doesn’t appear to do any surface preparation, lifting the print directly off the ID card, which is pushing plausibility.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Fury’s fingerprinting fail.</p>
<h2>What do we know about non-carbon-based life?</h2>
<p>All life on Earth is <a href="https://www.scienceabc.com/humans/why-is-life-on-earth-carbon-based.html">based on the element carbon</a>. This is why when you burn either wood or meat, all you are left with is charcoal, which is mostly just pure carbon.</p>
<p>But when one of the alien Skrulls dies and the body examined, the doctor says it is definitely not carbon-based.</p>
<p>This is theoretically possible. We’ve known for a long time that life on other planets could also be based on other elements that are similar to carbon, <a href="https://bigpictureeducation.com/possibility-silicon-based-life">for example silicon</a>.</p>
<p>Even though carbon and silicon might look very different, chemically they are very similar regarding the kinds of chemical reactions that are needed to support life. This is because they are in the same column in the <a href="http://www.rsc.org/periodic-table">periodic table of elements</a>.</p>
<p>But then the doctor says something strange, whatever the alien is made of, it’s not from the periodic table. </p>
<p>This is highly unlikely. All known matter in the universe exists on the periodic table, and the alien doesn’t seem to be made of any strange unknown substance like dark matter, just <a href="https://www.seti.org/seti-institute/news/goodbye-little-green-men-0">rubbery green flesh</a>.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Off the planet.</p>
<h2>Paging the ‘90s</h2>
<p>Nick Fury’s pager features quite prominently in this movie. Paging technology was all the rage back in the late 1980s and '90s. </p>
<p>With today’s mobile and smart phones, texting (SMS and MMS), a huge range of messaging apps and always-on connectivity everywhere, you might think pagers would have gone the way of dial-up internet. But that’s not quite so.</p>
<p>Pagers have a much longer range than phones, are harder to hack, don’t store conversation histories (important for privacy and security), and are more reliable during natural disasters.</p>
<p>They are still used by many <a href="https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/xyw9zq/why-are-pagers-still-a-thing">emergency services</a> and <a href="https://www.rd.com/health/healthcare/hospital-pagers/">medical personnel</a> who need to be <a href="https://theconversation.com/nhs-to-banish-pagers-from-its-hospitals-but-is-this-a-rash-act-112647">contactable in extreme emergencies</a> even when all other power and communications might be down.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Retro tech still comes to the rescue.</p>
<h2>The verdict</h2>
<figure>
<img src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/515/gif3.gif?1551834918" width="100%">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">She gets knocked down … and she gets up again.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The movie is a fun chance to be reminded of all the technology and culture of a quarter-century ago, and to think how much (and how little) has changed. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/virtual-reality-adds-to-tourism-through-touch-smell-and-real-peoples-experiences-101528">Virtual reality adds to tourism through touch, smell and real people's experiences</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The movie’s depiction of the 1990s is generally pretty spot-on – a fun way for a younger audience to be introduced to what life was like before smartphones and ubiquitous high-speed internet. The pain of removable media, unreliable and slow internet connections, and having to go to the store to get a movie is all captured humorously on film. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262309/original/file-20190306-48450-1w0m6a1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262309/original/file-20190306-48450-1w0m6a1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=311&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262309/original/file-20190306-48450-1w0m6a1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=311&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262309/original/file-20190306-48450-1w0m6a1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=311&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262309/original/file-20190306-48450-1w0m6a1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262309/original/file-20190306-48450-1w0m6a1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262309/original/file-20190306-48450-1w0m6a1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112617/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Professor Michael Milford is a Chief Investigator at the Australian Centre for Robotic Vision, an Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Microsoft Research Faculty Fellow and Founding Director of the education startup Math Thrills Pty Ltd. He receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Queensland Government, Caterpillar Corporation, Mining3, Microsoft, the Asian Office of Aerospace Research and Development and AMP. He has board director and advisory roles at Motor Trades Association of Queensland and Queensland AI.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Stratton receives funding from the Queensland Brain Institute, the Asia-Pacific Centre for Neuromodulation and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is affiliated with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).</span></em></p>
The new Captain Marvel movie takes us back to the 1990s with a look at some of the technologies of the day. Do people still use pagers?
Michael Milford, Professor, Queensland University of Technology
Peter Stratton, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, The University of Queensland
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/112268
2019-02-21T19:01:31Z
2019-02-21T19:01:31Z
‘Black Panther’ and its science role models inspire more than just movie awards
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/260249/original/file-20190221-195873-1czfcxm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=122%2C77%2C1252%2C694&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">King of a technologically advanced country, Black Panther is a scientific genius.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825683/mediaviewer/rm2447322112">© 2017 – Disney/Marvel Studios</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>It has been said many times that the Marvel movie “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825683/">Black Panther</a>” is an important landmark. I’m not referring to its deserved critical and box office success worldwide, the many awards it has won, or the fact that it is the first film in the superhero genre to be <a href="https://oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/2019">nominated for best picture at the Academy Awards</a>.</p>
<p>Instead, I’m focusing on a key aspect of its cultural impact that is less frequently discussed. Finally a feature film starring a black superhero character became part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe – a successful run of intertwined movies that began with “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0371746/">Iron Man</a>” in 2008. While there have been other superhero movies with a black lead character – “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0448157/">Hancock</a>” (2008), “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120611/">Blade</a>” (1998), “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120177/">Spawn</a>” (1997) or even “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107563/">The Meteor Man</a>” (1993) – this film is significant because of the <a href="https://www.nyfa.edu/student-resources/the-rise-of-superhero-films/">recent remarkable rise of the superhero film</a> from the nerdish fringe to part of mainstream culture.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=marvel2017b.htm">Huge audiences</a> saw a black lead character – not a sidekick or part of a team – in a superhero movie by a major studio, with a black director (Ryan Coogler), black writers and a majority black cast. This is a significant step toward diversifying our culture by improving the <a href="http://annenberg.usc.edu/sites/default/files/Dr_Stacy_L_Smith-Inequality_in_900_Popular_Films.pdf">lackluster representation</a> of minorities in our major media. It’s also a <a href="http://annenberg.usc.edu/research/aii/research/raceethnicity">filmmaking landmark because black creators</a> have been given access to the resources and platforms needed to bring different storytelling perspectives into our mainstream culture.</p>
<p>2017’s “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0451279/">Wonder Woman</a>” forged a similar path. In that case, a major studio finally decided to commit resources to a superhero film headlined by a female character and directed by a woman, Patty Jenkins. Female directors are <a href="http://annenberg.usc.edu/inclusion-directors-chair">a minority in the movie industry</a>. Jenkins brought a new perspective to this kind of action movie, and there was a <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2017/05/31/why-women-are-crying-when-they-watch-wonder-woman-fight/102328772/">huge positive response from audiences</a> in theaters worldwide.</p>
<p>And beyond all this, “Black Panther” also broke additional ground in a way most people may not realize: In the comics, the character is actually a scientist and engineer. Moreover, in the inevitable (and somewhat ridiculous) ranking of scientific prowess that happens in the comic book world, he’s been portrayed as at least the equal of the two most famous “top scientists” in the Marvel universe: Tony Stark (Iron Man) and Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic). A black headlining superhero character written and directed by black artists is rare enough from a major studio. But making him – and his sister Shuri – successful scientists and engineers as well is another level of rarity.</p>
<h2>Scientists on screen</h2>
<p>I’m a scientist who cares about increased engagement with science by the general public. I’ve worked as <a href="http://www.laweekly.com/film/physicist-dr-clifford-v-johnson-is-a-consultant-on-superhero-movies-8232890">a science adviser on many film and TV projects</a> (though not “Black Panther”). When the opportunity arises, I’ve <a href="https://creativefuture.org/science-advisor-conversation-dr-clifford-johnson/">helped broaden the diversity of scientist characters</a> portrayed onscreen.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jason Wilkes is a black scientist on ‘Agent Carter,’ whose character emerged from the author’s talks with the show’s writers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ABC Television</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Panels from ‘The Dialogues,’ including a black female scientist.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">'The Dialogues,' by Clifford V. Johnson (MIT Press 2017)</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>I’ve also recently published a <a href="http://thedialoguesbook.com/">nonfiction graphic book</a> for general audiences called “<a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/dialogues-0">The Dialogues: Conversations about the Nature of the Universe</a>.” Its characters include male and female black scientists, discussing aspects of my own field of theoretical physics – where black scientists are <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2017/nsf17310/data.cfm">unfortunately very rare</a>. So the opportunity that the “Black Panther” movie presents to inform and inspire vast audiences is of great interest to me.</p>
<p>The history and evolution of the Black Panther character and his scientific back story is a fascinating example of turning a problematic past into a positive opportunity.</p>
<p>Created in 1966 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, he’s the first black superhero character in mainstream comics, <a href="https://comicvine.gamespot.com/fantastic-four-52-introducing-the-sensational-blac/4000-8666/">originally appearing as a guest</a> in a “Fantastic Four” Marvel comic. As a black character created and initially written by nonblack authors, guest-starring in the pages of a book headlined by white characters, he had many of the classic attributes of what is now sometimes controversially known as the “<a href="https://www.salon.com/2010/09/14/magical_negro_trope/">magical negro</a>” in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0021934707307831">American cultural criticism</a>: He ranked extremely highly in every sphere that mattered, to the point of being almost too unreal even for the comics of the time.</p>
<p>Black Panther is T’Challa, king of the fictional African country Wakanda, which is fathomlessly wealthy and remarkably advanced, scientifically and technologically. Even Marvel’s legendary master scientist – Reed Richards of the superhero team Fantastic Four – is befuddled by and full of admiration for Wakanda’s scientific capabilities. T’Challa himself is portrayed as an extraordinary “genius” in physics and other scientific fields, a peerless tactician, a remarkable athlete and a master of numerous forms of martial arts. And he is noble to a fault. Of course, he grows to become a powerful ally of the Fantastic Four and other Marvel superheroes over many adventures.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">While likening Black Panther to a ‘refugee from a Tarzan movie,’ the Fantastic Four marveled at his technological innovations in ‘Introducing the Sensational Black Panther.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Fantastic Four #52 (July 1966). [Marvel Comics]</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The key point here is that the superlative scientific ability of our hero, and that of his country, has its origins in the well-meaning, but problematic, practice of inventing near or beyond perfect black characters to support stories starring primarily white protagonists. But this is a lemons-to-lemonade story.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Fantastic Four were amazed by the scientific ingenuity of Wakanda in ‘Whosoever Finds The Evil Eye.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Fantastic Four #54 (September 1966). [Marvel Comics]</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Black Panther eventually got to star in his own series of comics. He was turned into a nuanced and complex character, moving well away from the tropes of his beginnings. Writer Don McGregor’s work started this development as early as 1973, but Black Panther’s journey to the multilayered character you see on screen was greatly advanced by the efforts of several writers with diverse perspectives. Perhaps most notably, in the context of the film, these include Christopher Priest (late 1990s) and Ta-Nehisi Coates (starting in 2016), along with Roxane Gay and Yona Harvey, writing in “World of Wakanda” (2016). Coates and Gay, already best-selling literary writers before coming to the character, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/23/books/black-panther-marvel-comics-roxane-gay-ta-nehisi-coates-wakanda.html?_r=0">helped bring him to wider attention</a> beyond normal comic book fandom, partly paving the way for the movie.</p>
<p>Through all of the improved writing of T'Challa and his world, his spectacular scientific ability has remained prominent. Wakanda continues to be a successful African nation with astonishing science and technology. Furthermore, and very importantly, T'Challa is not portrayed as an anomaly among his people in this regard. There are many great scientists and engineers in the Wakanda of the comics, including his sister Shuri. In some accounts, she (in the continued scientist-ranking business of comics) is an even greater intellect than he is. In the movie, T’Challa’s science and engineering abilities are referred to, but it is his sister Shuri who takes center stage in this role, having taken over to design the new tools and weapons he uses in the field. She also uses Wakandan science to heal wounds that would have been fatal elsewhere in the world.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Black Panther isn’t an isolated genius – his half-sister Shuri is a technological wiz herself.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://collider.com/black-panther-things-to-know/">Marvel Studios</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>If they can do it, then why not me?</h2>
<p>As a scientist who cares about inspiring more people – including underrepresented minorities and women – <a href="https://theconversation.com/new-ways-scientists-can-help-put-science-back-into-popular-culture-84955">to engage with science</a>, I think that showing a little of this scientific landscape in “Black Panther” potentially amplifies the movie’s cultural impact.</p>
<p>Vast audiences see black heroes – both men and women – using their scientific ability to solve problems and make their way in the world, at an unrivaled level. <a href="https://dornsife.usc.edu/daphna-oyserman/identity/">Research has shown</a> that such representation can have a positive effect on the interests, outlook and career trajectories of viewers.</p>
<p>Improving science education for all is a core endeavor in a nation’s competitiveness and overall health, but outcomes are limited if people aren’t inspired to take an interest in science in the first place. There simply are <a href="http://annenberg.usc.edu/research/aii/research/raceethnicity">not enough images of black scientists</a> – male or female – in our media and entertainment to help inspire. Many people from underrepresented groups end up genuinely believing that scientific investigation is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1949-8594.2002.tb18217.x">not a career path open to them</a>.</p>
<p>Moreover, many people still see the dedication and study needed to excel in science as “nerdy.” A cultural injection of Black Panther heroics helps continue to erode the crumbling tropes that science is <a href="https://theconversation.com/most-people-think-man-when-they-think-scientist-how-can-we-kill-the-stereotype-42393">only for white men</a> or reserved for <a href="https://theconversation.com/beliefs-about-innate-talent-may-dissuade-students-from-stem-42967">people with a special “science gene.”</a></p>
<p>The huge widespread success of the “Black Panther” movie, showcasing T'Challa, Shuri and other Wakandans as highly accomplished scientists, remains one of the most significant boosts for science engagement in recent times.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>This is an updated version of <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-hidden-superpower-of-black-panther-scientist-role-models-91042">an article originally published</a> on Feb. 8, 2018.</em></p>
<p>
<section class="inline-content">
<img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248895/original/file-20181204-133100-t34yqm.png?w=128&h=128">
<div>
<header>Clifford V. Johnson is the author of:</header>
<p><a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/dialogues-1">The Dialogues: Conversations about the Nature of the Universe</a></p>
<footer>MIT Press provides funding as a member of The Conversation US.</footer>
</div>
</section>
</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112268/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>MIT Press provides funding as a member of The Conversation US.</span></em></p>
The film wowed critics and fans. But its hidden power may be black lead characters who are accomplished scientists – just the thing to help inspire future generations to follow in their footsteps.
Clifford Johnson, Professor of Physics and Astronomy, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/106867
2018-11-13T17:04:39Z
2018-11-13T17:04:39Z
Like many Marvel characters, Stan Lee was a flawed hero
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245296/original/file-20181113-194503-17apsn8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Stan Lee (1922-2018).</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/gageskidmore/14408655493/in/photolist-nXf8hH-nVsGtH-nVntzq-nCYggy-2vE17k-2vJorA-vRF3JE-9NgGvQ-wRaWkv-9NdU84-vBnwtu-3uezW-DqH621-8JShUb-pMcTP-w7dpwp-UMH2Mn-cRS49N-muJqv6-muK336-muK3wc-7UB9GK-5fZHiE-5fZDoU-5fZJ7E-6RWC5g-7KF5qR-7KK4i9-7KK2YL-7KF5tB-G6dbqz-D1aXbf-7UBabi-ZnBvqW-ZdCcA9-Dk2cEu-Dk2ddo-ZnBvJm-Z9eo8G-21e4mCM-btnJwj-9NGttf-w7dxjP-8qHPfx-W24Raf-57BkEC-57Lv1M-dkZLvf-kiUV9T-kiVBCX">Gage Skidmore</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Stan Lee was <a href="http://www.spider-friends.com/BuenaVista/STANLEEnarrations/FRUMPopening.mp3">the voice</a> of my childhood. As I sat transfixed by Spider-Man cartoons on Saturday mornings, his energetic narration welcomed me into the story; made me feel part of the gang. Never mind that the animation wasn’t up to much; it looked like a comic, had a great theme tune, and Stan “The Man” Lee, my buddy, was giving it his personal seal of approval.</p>
<p>Famously, Lee originally honed this warm persona in print. The words “Stan Lee Presents” in the Marvel comics I was also feverishly devouring – black and white British reprints of the American originals – were a guarantee of quality. When he signed off a letters page or editorial with his trademark “Excelsior!” I never failed to smile. I was, and remain in many respects, a “True Believer”, as Lee called all dedicated Marvel readers. As we shall see, however, the man’s performance masked some uncomfortable truths.</p>
<p>Lee, born Stanley Martin Lieber, had been working in comics since 1939. He was first an office assistant for Timely, the company that went on to become Marvel, before becoming an editor and writer. He would eventually rise to editor-in-chief, chairman and publisher, but it was his work as a writer in the early 1960s that changed comics forever.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/1N9TIvIEnpA?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>At the time, superheroes had fallen out of favour, following the heyday of Superman and Batman in the 1930s and 1940s. Marvel now helped turn that around, with angsty rebellious heroes like The Fantastic Four (launched 1961), Spider-Man (1962), The Hulk (1962), The X-Men (1963) and so many more.</p>
<p>A huge part of the success was the fantastic artwork and storytelling of two other comics geniuses, Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko. But nobody wrote like Stan. Having written many romance and horror comics in the 1950s, his tone was over-the-top, bombastic and mock-Shakespearean – but always warm and inviting.</p>
<p>The mythos that Lee created also extended to the gang behind the scenes. In regular features “<a href="http://bullpenbulletins.blogspot.com">Bullpen Bulletins</a>” and “<a href="https://www.heroinitiative.org/shop/books/stans-soapbox-the-collection">Stan’s Soapbox</a>”, he wove tales of the Marvel Bullpen, the lively creative hub at the centre of the studio’s success, with characters like Jack “King” Kirby and “Sturdy” Steve Ditko. This human touch was Lee’s gift. He made these comics creators seem like friends, and made the readers feel like part of a gang or club.</p>
<h2>Bullpen blues</h2>
<p>When I learned about the history of Marvel Comics later in life, I realised that things were not always as they seemed. The angst in those Spider-Man and Hulk comics wasn’t all on the page; like any business, there were tensions and rivalries behind the scenes. Many of the artists who worked with Lee harboured deep resentments.</p>
<p>In the 1960s, Lee and the artists developed what became known as the “Marvel method” of creating comics. At rival DC Comics, home of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, the editor was king, and kept a firm grip on the factory-line production process of creating a comic. But at Marvel, Lee would come up with a story idea and pass it to the artist as a kind of pitch or brief.</p>
<p>This allowed for huge creative freedom and sped up the production process considerably – a real benefit for a small company with big ambitions. But the artists’ work was not always fully recognised. They were being credited purely for the art when they were often creating the characters and story, too – before Lee layered the dialogue and captions on top.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245336/original/file-20181113-194516-1953m9q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245336/original/file-20181113-194516-1953m9q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245336/original/file-20181113-194516-1953m9q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245336/original/file-20181113-194516-1953m9q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245336/original/file-20181113-194516-1953m9q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245336/original/file-20181113-194516-1953m9q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=947&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245336/original/file-20181113-194516-1953m9q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=947&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245336/original/file-20181113-194516-1953m9q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=947&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jack Kirby in 1992.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-44479535">Wikimedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Lee compounded this recognition problem in interviews and in books like <a href="https://www.biblio.com/origins-of-marvel-comics-by-lee-stan/work/946141">Origins of Marvel Comics (1974)</a>, where he talked enthusiastically about how he had created all the stories and characters. The artists knew different. Frustrated by creative differences, Ditko <a href="https://ohdannyboy.blogspot.com/2013/09/in-their-own-words-when-jack-kirby-left.html">left</a> in 1965 and Kirby went five years later.</p>
<p>To make matters worse, their original artwork often wasn’t returned to them – at a time when a community of comic collectors was coming together and a market was emerging for this artwork. Marvel made millions exploiting the rights to the characters and stories while the artists received very little.</p>
<p>Having risen to a position of power in the company, Lee could have shared more of the profits – and the limelight. But he was a showman, an impresario, and a businessman. He took the credit and protected the company he had worked so hard to build. As a salaried company man, he was not always as loyal to his collaborators – many of whom were freelancers.</p>
<p>Later in the 1970s and early 1980s, when young comics creators like Frank Millar were championing creator rights and lobbying for the return of artwork to Kirby and his family, Lee was sometimes cast as the villain. I am sure he wasn’t. But like the best Marvel heroes, he was certainly flawed. He could have been at the forefront of creator rights and made the “Marvel method” stand for something more. Instead, Marvel ended up echoing practices at DC Comics, where artists like Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, creators of Superman, <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/warner-bros-superman-rights-confirmed-864026">were made</a> to wait decades, often in crushing poverty, for a small share of the profits.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245288/original/file-20181113-194503-6n5plf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245288/original/file-20181113-194503-6n5plf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245288/original/file-20181113-194503-6n5plf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245288/original/file-20181113-194503-6n5plf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245288/original/file-20181113-194503-6n5plf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245288/original/file-20181113-194503-6n5plf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245288/original/file-20181113-194503-6n5plf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245288/original/file-20181113-194503-6n5plf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Citizen Stan.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/los-angeles-july-18-stan-lee-680798077?src=qQYOCkx8mugm3Vg5jrX_Ag-1-81">Kathy Hutchins</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The consequences of Lee’s silence were considerable, not just for those in the Bullpen but for following generations of comics creators. Even now, the relationship between publishers and creators over rights and profit-sharing has been rocky to say the least. Lee was courageous in other ways – his comics battled racism, for instance, and he wrote a <a href="https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/movies/a25022397/stan-lee-marvel-racism-1968-essay">landmark essay</a> on the subject in 1968. It also goes without saying that he helped create characters who continue to inspire millions. But had he taken a stand on creators’ rights, the industry and comics historians might not be <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/rip-stan-lee-the-man-who-sold-the-world">so divided</a> on his legacy today.
</p><hr>
<strong>Postscript: Stan’s last act</strong><p></p>
<p>Stan Lee’s later years seemed tumultuous. He would make appearances at huge comic cons looking tired, and taking photos with huge numbers of fans who paid for the privilege of meeting him. This prompted suspicions that those in charge of Lee’s business affairs didn’t always have his best interests at heart. Earlier this year, his lawyer <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-44479535">brought a suit</a> against his handlers accusing them of elder abuse.</p>
<p>A couple of years back, I had a chance to meet my hero at a New York Comic Con. I watched as others had their photos taken with this frail old man, and wondered how I’d condense all I wanted to say, about what he meant to me, what he’d contributed to the world. And to ask about his proudest moments, his deepest regrets. But all that was on offer were a few seconds of The Man’s time, and a weak smile.</p>
<p>So I decided not to get my photo with him. I don’t know if I made the right decision, but on hearing of Lee’s death I asked an artist friend, <a href="https://www.artstation.com/ellbalson">Elliot Balson</a>, to draw a picture of me meeting him (below). I know it’s self-indulgent, but I’m finally meeting this man who gave me so much, where I’ve always met him – in the comics.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245335/original/file-20181113-194485-nfqbfy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245335/original/file-20181113-194485-nfqbfy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/245335/original/file-20181113-194485-nfqbfy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=849&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245335/original/file-20181113-194485-nfqbfy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=849&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245335/original/file-20181113-194485-nfqbfy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=849&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245335/original/file-20181113-194485-nfqbfy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1066&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245335/original/file-20181113-194485-nfqbfy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1066&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/245335/original/file-20181113-194485-nfqbfy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1066&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">‘Chris meets Stan’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.artstation.com/ellbalson">Elliot Balson</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/106867/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher Murray does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Remembering the co-creator of Spider-Man, The Hulk, Fantastic Four and all the rest.
Christopher Murray, Professor of Comics Studies, University of Dundee
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/102125
2018-10-12T14:12:31Z
2018-10-12T14:12:31Z
This is the toxic myth at the heart of female movie reboots
<p>All-female reboots of classic all-male films have been coming thick and fast over the past few years, and there are more to come. At the same time, the comic mills of Marvel and D.C. have begun to translate some of the female superheroes that started life in the comic books into the mass-pop-cultural forms of film and television.</p>
<p>At their best, these films and shows offer a kind of revisionist thinking. They reclaim pop-cultural history for young female audiences. At their worst, they demonstrate the film and television industry’s cynical profiteering from contemporary feminist ideals.</p>
<p>The seemingly empowering message of these all-female remakes and superhero productions is that women can do anything men can do. However, just because the films and TV shows feature predominantly women, or a female lead protagonist, it does not mean that they are feminist.</p>
<p>Despite, or maybe because of, the misogynistic vitriol surrounding the run-up to the release of 2016’s all-female <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2016/jul/12/ghostbusters-reboot-reviews-critics-female-cast">Ghostbusters remake</a>, Hollywood is lining up a succession of women-led blockbusters that mostly take the form of reboots. Ocean’s 8, released in June 2018, brought a glittering array of stars (Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, Helena Bonham Carter and Rhianna) to the classic crime caper previously headed up by George Clooney and, before that, in 1960, by the Rat Pack.</p>
<p>Disney is planning to remake the 1991 action film The Rocketeer, based on a comic-book series, with a female lead. Talks are even underway about an all-female remake of William Golding’s classic novel <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/08/31/all-female-lord-flies-remake-faces-backlash-misses-point-women/">The Lord of the Flies</a>. The 1988 film Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, starring Michael Caine and Steve Martin, is being remade with Rebel Wilson in one of the lead roles. And Splash, the 1984 Tom Hanks and Daryl Hannah mermaid romance, is in the process of being gender-swapped for a 2018 release with Channing Tatum playing the role of the merman.</p>
<p>Captain Marvel, a.k.a. Carol Danvers, is due for cinema release in 2019. Danvers, a US Air Force pilot, becomes superhero Captain Marvel when her DNA becomes fused with an alien’s during a crash. Jessica Jones, Marvel’s tough-nut private detective with super-human strength, has been captivating Netflix audiences and critics alike since 2015. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/may/15/ms-marvel-first-muslim-american-superhero-kamala-khan">Ms Marvel</a> (a.k.a. Kamala Khan), who is Marvel’s first teenage Muslim superhero, is rumoured to be the next candidate for big-screen release. At the same time, D.C. comics successfully relaunched Wonder Woman to popular acclaim in 2017 and Superman’s cousin, Supergirl, has been heading up her own television series since 2015.</p>
<h2>Every woman for herself?</h2>
<p>These reboots and superheroes have been seen as a bold step towards equality in an attempt to feminize traditionally masculine roles. “See”, the trailers imply, “women can fight baddies/aliens/ghosts too!” In the case of Lord of the Flies and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, they will no doubt revel in the “novelty” of women being barbaric or roguish. In the case of Splash, won’t it be hilarious to see Jillian Bell sexually objectifying Channing Tatum?</p>
<p>Women’s visibility, it seems, comes at a cost. Instead of feminising masculinity, we’re seeing an attempt to masculinise femininity, apparently because male role-types are what studios think audiences want. These films pay lip service to feminism by featuring more women, while continuing to tell the same old lucrative stories with the same values.</p>
<p>Superhero films and all-female reboots are part of the myth-making machinery of contemporary neoliberal feminism. Gender inequality is acknowledged, but responsibility for addressing the problem lies with individual women. We turn a blind eye to the social structures that uphold inequalities.</p>
<p>Take, for example, the structural issue of how few women are writing, directing and producing our films and TV shows. Traditionally risk-averse studios shy away from new stories created by women. Among the <a href="https://womenandhollywood.com/resources/statistics/">top 100</a> grossing films of 2017, women represented only 8% of directors, 10% of writers, 2% of cinematographers, 24% of producers and 14% of editors. The female ghostbusters, scoundrels and superheroes urge young female audiences to self-empowerment, but, at the same time, they often mask the value systems underpinning the stories themselves, as well as the politics of their production.</p>
<p>The first set of values emerges in the remakes: women can be more visible in front of the camera, as long as they stick to stories written by men and originally played by men. They just have to be better at it – as the criticism around the new <a href="http://fortune.com/2016/07/12/critics-ghostbusters-reviews/">Ghostbusters</a> film demonstrated. This is the type of <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-neoliberalism-colonised-feminism-and-what-you-can-do-about-it-94856">neoliberal feminism</a> expounded by Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg in her bestselling book <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/mar/13/lean-in-sheryl-sandberg-review">Lean In</a>.</p>
<p>The second set of values, underlying the superhero genre, in particular, pertains to individual exceptionalism. Superheroes represent our imagined best selves. Contemporary female superheroes dazzle us with their ability to do and be everything, and if we were only to fully optimise and empower ourselves, we might be like them. The radical individualism of the most popular superheroes – culminating in the moment in every film or show when the hero must stand alone to face the enemy – reflects the <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/pop-feminist-narratives-9780198820871?cc=us&lang=en&">narrative</a> that neoliberal feminism pushes every day: you are responsible for your own success, and, if you fail, you have nobody to blame but yourself.</p>
<p>The #MeToo movement shows that collective action and solidarity among women can still effect large-scale social change. Yet a great deal of our popular entertainment continues to promote individual self-reliance and strength as the only option for truly “super” women. Without the possibility of aspiration being a shared social and collective capacity, rather than an exclusively individual undertaking, terms like “empowerment” become meaningless. Let’s leave the remakes and superheroes behind and take seriously the opportunity to tell some new stories.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/102125/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Emily Spiers' new book, Pop-Feminist Narratives: The Female Subject under Neoliberalism in North America, Britain, and Germany, was published in April 2018 by Oxford University Press.</span></em></p>
There are so many opportunities for women in Hollywood these days, as long as they play roles that were originally intended for men.
Emily Spiers, Lecturer in Creative Futures, Lancaster University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/95721
2018-05-23T11:21:17Z
2018-05-23T11:21:17Z
Simply putting women on screen won’t be enough to sustain Marvel post-Avengers
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219730/original/file-20180521-14960-u1khww.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow/Natasha Romanoff in Avengers: Infinity War.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">©Marvel Studios 2018</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>From the <a href="https://humanitiesny.org/our-work/programs/scholars-catalog/giving-women-a-voice-in-silent-film-the-new-woman-and-the-politics-of-the-silent-american-serial/">New Woman</a> of the silent movie era – an archetype of bravery and beauty in the very first action and adventure films – to the more recent summer of the “<a href="https://www.thestar.com/entertainment/2015/05/08/charlize-theron-in-mad-max-fury-road-embodies-the-new-alpha-female.html">Alpha Female</a>” in 2015 (think <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=woHTUsl66BY">Charlize Theron in Mad Max: Fury Road</a>) the female action hero has never failed to excite and challenge. Proving to be a commercially lucrative success in her own right, she has broken social convention and been dynamic and powerful for more than 100 years. </p>
<p>For today’s action fan, few other film series have held as much potential as the movies of the Marvel cinematic universe (MCU). But with great power comes great responsibility, especially when it comes to diversity. This year, Black Panther offered <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-i-marvelled-at-black-panthers-reimagining-of-africa-91703">groundbreaking race representations</a> and did not disappoint when it came to its <a href="https://theconversation.com/search/result?sg=cc1eada9-46b6-4b89-baa1-9553b9e01d47&sp=1&sr=3&url=%2Fwomen-scientists-are-more-than-capable-of-leading-blockbuster-storylines-93779">portrayal of women</a> either. Now, as the initial Avengers-led saga starts to wind down, and with the anticipated release of both <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/jan/17/black-widow-scarlett-johansson-marvel-superhero-movie">Black Widow</a> and <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4154664/">Captain Marvel</a> solo films (the latter of which will be the MCU’s first female-led movie), it seems only right to ask, what can the future hold for the women of Marvel?</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219728/original/file-20180521-14987-ro5as8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219728/original/file-20180521-14987-ro5as8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219728/original/file-20180521-14987-ro5as8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219728/original/file-20180521-14987-ro5as8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219728/original/file-20180521-14987-ro5as8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219728/original/file-20180521-14987-ro5as8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219728/original/file-20180521-14987-ro5as8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219728/original/file-20180521-14987-ro5as8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The MCU class of 2008-2018.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">MARCO GROB/Hasselblad H5D</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The first 10 years</h2>
<p>Over the last decade, the films which brought Marvel comic books to life have been applauded for making a difference in true representations of diversity. That’s not to say filmmakers weren’t <a href="https://www.cinemablend.com/news/1668250/why-marvel-hasnt-given-more-diverse-characters-movies-yet">criticised at the beginning</a>, but in the latest instalment – <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4154756/">Avengers: Infinity War</a> – characters and hybrid stories are quite literally brought together from the far reaches of the film galaxy. Heroes and sidekicks from all walks of life offer representations of enhanced mortals, celestial gods and intergalactic in-betweens.</p>
<p>However, looking to the female characters, any future opportunities will depend on Marvel’s willingness to acknowledge and not be limited by their own history. From the first MCU films, examples of pervasive, everyday sexism have been overlooked or dismissed in the name of history. Take, for example, the moment <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OT2b5KzMoC0">Tony Stark meets an undercover Black Widow</a> in Iron Man 2, stating “I want one” after their <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyzU50vOofo">almost Weinstein-esque introduction</a>. </p>
<p>Even more recent films are occasionally marred with a sense of humour that tends toward displays of toxic masculinity and casual misogyny, denoting an air of sexism the films can no longer afford. From the way the women are spoken to, to the way they are spoken of, the men of the cohort consistently undermine the female action heroes. In <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3498820/">Captain America: Civil War</a>, Black Panther’s female security chief warns Black Widow to “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAxc4Dk7Vzg">move or you will be moved</a>”. The interaction is abated by Black Panther with the line “As entertaining as that would be…” – an all too common inference of woman on woman action to fulfil male fantasy. </p>
<p>In the case of 2015’s <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2395427/">Avengers: Age of Ultron</a>, a scene when the male Avengers each attempt to lift Thor’s hammer – an exercise in worthiness and not strength – Iron Man’s offhanded joke about reinstating prima nocta presents rape humour as permissible, in an age when it is anything but. The time is up for cheap efforts in entertainment of this nature. </p>
<figure>
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<h2>Unnecessary romance</h2>
<p>Female Avengers are still constrained by emotional or romantic responsibility to their colleagues, too. Why is it Black Widow’s responsibility to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQDKTz9Rrqw">sooth the savage Hulk</a> when it’s time for him to return to the form of Bruce Banner? How convenient the two characters are also <a href="https://www.cbr.com/hulk-black-widow-mcu-relationship-bad/">possible love interests</a>, a role Black Widow has been written to play <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZY5O9b0e0g">in a number</a> of Marvel films.</p>
<p>The women are also pandered to, in contrived attempts to address the uncomfortable awareness the men are expected to have of the female action hero’s power. In <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3501632/">Thor: Ragnarok</a> the hero-god fumbles for words upon acknowledging Valkyrie as a member of his home planet’s royal military force. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>There’s nothing wrong with women of course, I love women, sometimes a little too much. Not in a creepy way, just more of a respectful appreciation, I think it’s great, there’s an elite force of women warriors. It’s about time. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The awkwardness expressed followed by a patronising thumbs up can be easily read as Thor’s attempt to backtrack from saying the wrong thing. But it is indicative of the awkwardness often expressed when addressing women of independent authority, too.</p>
<p>Yet there is hope on the horizon for the MCU. Female action heroes have already successfully led other superhero films (DC Comic’s <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0451279/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Wonder Woman</a> was a smash hit in 2017) so it won’t be hard for Marvel to replicate this success – but they can’t rely on tired old formulas. </p>
<p>Hollywood is changing – just look at recent calls for celebrity power to <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/susancheng/california-salary-history-ban-equal-pay-hollywood-actors?utm_term=.bj52wlpwBQ#.nyjzdEKd43">push for equal pay</a> for colleagues, or contractual <a href="https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/evm944/inclusion-rider-frances-mcdormand-oscars">inclusion riders for greater equality and diversity</a>. One hopes that the MCU does not miss the mark in recognising the power in these possibilities. Representations of female action heroes can be more than a reflection of our culture, they must be a vision of how we view each other and our place in the universe, cinematic or otherwise.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/95721/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebecca Wright does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Marvel will need to look deeper than basic representation for its future success.
Rebecca Wright, PhD Researcher, Cardiff University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/95864
2018-05-03T05:56:20Z
2018-05-03T05:56:20Z
Why superhero films such as Infinity War aren’t ruining cinema (or our minds)
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217400/original/file-20180503-153873-1hbiheg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Avengers: Infinity War is more than empty spectacle, particularly due to its complex villain Thanos. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">IMDB</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4154756/">Avengers: Infinity War</a> has burst into cinemas, bringing together a vast array of Marvel characters. It has had a <a href="http://ew.com/movies/2018/04/30/avengers-infinity-war-opening-weekend-box-office/">record opening weekend</a> at the US box office, and is expected to be one of the highest grossing films of all time. Indeed fantasy and science fiction films feature prominently on the list of <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com.au/highest-grossing-movies-all-time-worldwide-box-office-2018-4?r=US&IR=T">all-time biggest blockbusters</a>, with the two previous Avengers’ movies, and Black Panther, sitting in the top 10. </p>
<p>Yet, not all are happy with this trend. In January, Jodie Foster, <a href="http://deadline.com/2018/01/jodie-foster-black-mirror-superhero-movies-marvel-studios-dc-1202234126/">said of superhero films</a> such as those made by Marvel and DC: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Studios making bad content in order to appeal to the masses and shareholders is like fracking — you get the best return right now but you wreck the earth…. It’s ruining the viewing habits of the American population and then ultimately the rest of the world.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>I have written previously about the <a href="https://theconversation.com/star-wars-offers-enduring-themes-that-appeal-to-our-deepest-selves-40386">power of science fiction, especially Star Wars</a>, to offer audiences a sense of transcendence and mystery, a moral compass and even hope for some kind of “salvation”. Like Star Wars, superhero films such as the Avengers franchise offer an integrated mythology that engages the viewer imaginatively, cathartically and transcendentally. They even do so with humour.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217401/original/file-20180503-153869-m9ecrz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217401/original/file-20180503-153869-m9ecrz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217401/original/file-20180503-153869-m9ecrz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217401/original/file-20180503-153869-m9ecrz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217401/original/file-20180503-153869-m9ecrz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217401/original/file-20180503-153869-m9ecrz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217401/original/file-20180503-153869-m9ecrz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217401/original/file-20180503-153869-m9ecrz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Black Panther, Captain America, and Black Widow in Avengers: Infinity War.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">IMDB</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The literary-critic René Girard <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren%C3%A9_Girard">has argued</a> that it is possible to read great literature, such as Shakespeare, on two levels. On one, there is action and violent spectacle. On the other, there are more complex themes, which include an implicit critique and exposure of the dynamics underlying the violent spectacle. Likewise, many of the best films appeal to multiple audiences at the same time. While I am not equating the superhero genre to Shakespeare’s works, Girard’s schema can be helpful to analysing these films’ appeal.</p>
<h2>Deep themes</h2>
<p>In Infinity War, the 19th film produced by Marvel Studios, dozens of Marvel superheros are united to fight a galactic enemy, Thanos. They include Captain America, Iron Man, Spiderman, Black Panther and many others. Marvel’s competitor DC has also made its own superhero films such as Batman v Superman, Wonder Woman and Justice League. The competition for superhero supremacy is intense, and involves a lot of money.</p>
<p>In Infinity War, Thanos wants ultimate power to restore balance to the universe. This involves killing half of the universe’s living population. On the surface, the tale can be viewed as a simple one of goodies-and-baddies, complete with an inter-galactic spectacle.</p>
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</figure>
<p>But there are deeper themes. Through Thanos, the film explores ideas such as the value of life, what’s morally permissible, utilitarianism, environmental ideology, and sacrifice. In a sense, Thanos is selfless – he is seeking a higher good for the universe, not himself - and offering a systematic answer to the problem of sustainability. </p>
<p>The question is: what do the Avengers offer? Hence the film flips the good-bad dichotomy, challenging the heroics of the Avengers by asking if their “good violence” is enough to save the universe. </p>
<p>The superhero genre also offers insight into human relationships and the transcendent mysteries of hope, friendship, goodness and love that bind people together and give them purpose. </p>
<p>For example, in Infinity War, the theme of sacrifice looms large: will friends or family be sacrificed to gain power or stop Thanos? Even the good guys have to choose whether they’ll sacrifice others (even when requested to do so by one person). </p>
<p>For Girard, sacrifice is the key to revealing the type of person one is and community one lives in. Do we sacrifice others for security or power (a form of scapegoating) or do we offer ourselves in service to others (self-giving love)? The most complex superhero films entail an exploration of the hero who suffers or must sacrifice themselves, like Thor in <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3501632/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Thor: Ragnarok</a>, Batman in the <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0372784/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Dark Knight trilogy</a> or Superman in <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0348150/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Superman Returns</a> and <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2975590/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Batman v Superman</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217441/original/file-20180503-153873-1hax4hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217441/original/file-20180503-153873-1hax4hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/217441/original/file-20180503-153873-1hax4hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217441/original/file-20180503-153873-1hax4hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217441/original/file-20180503-153873-1hax4hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217441/original/file-20180503-153873-1hax4hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217441/original/file-20180503-153873-1hax4hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/217441/original/file-20180503-153873-1hax4hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chris Hemsworth in Thor Ragnarok: the most complex superhero films entail an exploration of the hero who suffers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In Infinity War, Thanos shows clearly and brutally where he stands in this debate. He puts power and his vision of order and sustainability above his most intimate love. In performing a heart-wrenching act of sacrifice, he also shows that both the means and ends of a moral act matter. </p>
<p>Despite such themes, some criticise fantasy and science fiction films as mere escapism for a consumerist, affluent society. Their plots, they say, neglect the real problems faced by modern people, distracting us from consideration of wider systemic injustices.</p>
<p>While there is a clear escapist element to superhero films, they do deal with many of the problems of modern life, especially the rise of heinous forms of evil. Thanos might be seen as a brutal dictator who believes his utilitarian vision of life is best. </p>
<p>Moreover, we should not regard viewers of these films as merely naïve or gullible. After I saw Infinity Wars, I heard someone remark: “They played us hard.” Viewers are aware of the filmmakers’ tricks of the trade and enjoy (or criticise) the journey.</p>
<h2>What about all that redemptive violence?</h2>
<p>Superhero and sci-fi films can give the false impression that “good” or vigilante violence will always - or effectively - solve our problems.</p>
<p>Still, superhero movies are aware of this issue and grapple with it. Infinity War confronts the failures of heroes and their violence. Moreover, in earlier Marvel films, there was a split amongst the Avengers about the legal apparatus for authorising superhero action (centring on whether they would accept international oversight).</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/yQ5U8suTUw0?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Of course, the “hero” category itself can become clichéd and unhealthy, projecting a range of qualities onto one person in a way that divorces him or her from the rest of us. For instance, Captain America can appear one dimensional in his unshakeable courage and wooden one-liners (though his character has been explored in more depth in recent films). </p>
<p>While the films’ portrayal of heroism can be uncritical, recent Marvel TV series, such as <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2357547/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Jessica Jones</a> and <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3322312/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Daredevil</a>, do grapple in complex ways with the “hero” label. They explore the humanity of each character, with his or her faults, traumas and difficult relationships, as they try (often against their will) to make the world better.</p>
<p>Because they offer us powerful mythologies, superhero and science fiction films can become all-consuming for some. They can act as a replacement for or replication of religion. However, if their significance is not exaggerated, they can inspire and challenge - both emotionally and existentially.</p>
<p>The reaction of the audience when I watched Infinity Wars attested to this – they gasped at the arrival of Captain America and applauded the heroics of Iron Man. At that most basic level, these heroes inspire, making us want to be better. But as the film shows, more than heroics alone are needed to face complex problems.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/95864/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joel Hodge does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
To some, superhero films are the equivalent of fracking. But they offer audiences transcendence, mystery, a moral compass, and even the hope of salvation.
Joel Hodge, Senior Lecturer in Theology, Australian Catholic University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/95421
2018-04-25T02:18:16Z
2018-04-25T02:18:16Z
The biggest clash of heroes and villains in Avengers: Infinity War - but can science survive?
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216078/original/file-20180424-94149-kmsm3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The biggest collection of Marvel heroes ever to hit the cinema screen (so far).</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ten years of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (<a href="https://marvel.com/movies/all">MCU</a>) comes to a head with the release of <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4154756/">Avengers: Infinity War</a>, the 19th Marvel Studios film to date.</p>
<p>The biggest Marvel movie ever brings with it the largest cast of superheroes (and villains) ever and the biggest stakes ever to be fought over. So far. </p>
<p>The movie also pushes our boundaries on what you think could happen in a Marvel movie - with set pieces and some pretty good pathos mixed with humour. The Iron Man and Spider-Man suit technology is cooler than we’ve seen before. It also has, by a fair margin, the most fulfilling Marvel villain so far in Thanos, played by Josh Brolin.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/QwievZ1Tx-8?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Avengers: Infinity War - Official Trailer.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>My <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/juxi-leitner-153132">colleague</a> and I had a great time reviewing the science in Marvel movies such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/thor-ragnarok-pitches-superheroes-against-science-and-how-does-hulk-keep-his-pants-on-86211">Thor: Ragnarok</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/guardians-of-the-galaxy-volume-2-a-scientists-review-76511">Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/spider-man-homecoming-spins-a-web-of-fact-and-fantasy-79900">Spider-Man: Homecoming</a>, but I think we can resolve some unfinished scientific enquiry with Infinity War.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/thor-ragnarok-pitches-superheroes-against-science-and-how-does-hulk-keep-his-pants-on-86211">Thor: Ragnarok pitches superheroes against science (and how does Hulk keep his pants on?)</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p><strong>Obligatory warning:</strong> some minor spoilers follow, with one incredibly big plot revealing spoiler at the end of this review.</p>
<h2>Iron Man’s poor brain</h2>
<p><img src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/86/gif1.gif?1524551214" width="100%"></p>
<h4>Iron Man best protect his brainy asset. (Marvel)</h4>
<p>There’s a lot of flying in Infinity War, and Iron Man’s flying was one of the coolest things about the original <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0371746/">Iron Man</a> movie where the MCU began in 2008. </p>
<p>Now if the physics of propulsion and fuel can be solved, then parts of Iron Man’s suit abilities are plausible. But one challenge that has no immediately obvious solution is sustaining the G forces required to accelerate like Iron Man is shown to do in the movies, especially when he has his suit’s turbo propulsion mode activated.</p>
<p>Remember that Iron Man is a very fit but otherwise normal human, apart from the generator in his chest. His suit can probably stop his legs from buckling under the acceleration, but his brain is another matter.</p>
<p>Under ideal conditions, fighter pilots <a href="https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2014/10/why-the-human-body-cant-handle-heavy-acceleration/">can stay conscious up to about 10Gs</a>. But what is Tony’s acceleration?</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216085/original/file-20180424-94154-1nuav1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216085/original/file-20180424-94154-1nuav1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216085/original/file-20180424-94154-1nuav1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216085/original/file-20180424-94154-1nuav1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216085/original/file-20180424-94154-1nuav1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216085/original/file-20180424-94154-1nuav1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216085/original/file-20180424-94154-1nuav1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216085/original/file-20180424-94154-1nuav1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Up up and away!</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The still frames above were taken about 0.21 seconds apart, and Tony has accelerated from a standing start to be about 5 body lengths away (we can say a body length is 2 metres).</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Distance = 0.5 × a × t<sup>2</sup></p>
</blockquote>
<p>Where a = acceleration and t = time. So rearranging the equation gives: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>acceleration = 2 × distance / t<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>= 2 × 5 × 2 / 0.21<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>= 453.5m/s<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>acceleration in g forces = 453.5m/s<sup>2</sup> / 9.81m/s<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>= 46.23gs</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This is a substantial amount more than the maximum normally sustainable by a human!</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Tony Stark’s huge ego must prevent him blacking out!</p>
<h2>Throw a moon at someone</h2>
<p>I thought <a href="https://theconversation.com/thor-ragnarok-pitches-superheroes-against-science-and-how-does-hulk-keep-his-pants-on-86211">Thor:Ragnarok</a> was pushing the boundaries on physics with Thor’s hammer, but Infinity War takes it to an extreme. </p>
<p>In one scene, Thanos pulls a moon (yes a moon) out of orbit and throws it at Iron Man. We’ve had cars, trucks, even chunks of continents thrown around before, but never a moon in a Marvel movie. What exactly would it take to pull this off?</p>
<p>One way to do this would be to instantaneously stop the moon dead in its tracks.</p>
<p>The kinetic energy of (our) Moon is given by:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>E = G × earth mass × moon mass / (2 × r)</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Where G = the gravitational constant and r = the radius of the Moon’s orbit around the Earth.</p>
<p>So rearranging the equation gives: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>E = 6.67 × 10<sup>-11</sup> × 5.8 × 10<sup>24</sup> × 7.4 × 10<sup>22</sup> / (2 × 3.85 × 10<sup>8)</sup></p>
<p>= 3.72 × 10<sup>28</sup> Joules</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The largest nuclear bomb ever, the <a href="http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2015/ph241/narayanan2/">Tsar Bomba</a>, released about 209,000 trillion joules of energy, or 2.09 × 10<sup>17</sup> J - not even close to enough, even if all the energy could be used to slow down the moon.</p>
<p>You might be able to do it over many millions of years with thrusters attached to the moon… but Thanos does it in seconds.</p>
<p><img src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/89/gif3.gif?1524553056" width="100%"></p>
<h4>Ripping a moon out of orbit to throw at someone - easy. Squashing an individual very strong human - no easy feat. (Marvel)</h4>
<p>We can assume that Thanos is sufficiently powerful to do so, but then I guess we need to allow some dramatic license for that same Thanos struggling to put down Captain America, who is just an amped up normal human, later in the movie.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Thanos – titan one moment, terribly weak the next.</p>
<h2>What are the chances? (MAJOR SPOILER)</h2>
<p>You have been warned, so do not read on if you don’t want to know.</p>
<p>The massive, incredibly dramatic ending of the movie involves Thanos enacting his promise to kill one half of the universe’s population, completely at random. And boy, do the closing scenes of the movie pack a punch. I’ve rarely seen or heard an audience reaction like that at the end of a movie, as character after character dies.</p>
<p>While no-one can fault the screenwriters for an unprecedented move, a cynic might wonder what the chances were of the original big name (and presumably big box office draws) Avenger actors surviving the cull (although the <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825683/">Black Panther</a> movie <a href="https://theconversation.com/black-panther-roars-are-we-listening-91468">put a pretty compelling case</a> for a new set of actors).</p>
<p>It also seems like waaaay more than 50% of the on screen characters still alive at the climax of the movie meet a tragic fate in Thanos’s purge (including in an end credits scene not to be missed). </p>
<p>So to help you make up your own mind, here is a handy Thanos 50% genocide chart:</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216153/original/file-20180424-57578-1xqz1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216153/original/file-20180424-57578-1xqz1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216153/original/file-20180424-57578-1xqz1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=376&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216153/original/file-20180424-57578-1xqz1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=376&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216153/original/file-20180424-57578-1xqz1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=376&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216153/original/file-20180424-57578-1xqz1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216153/original/file-20180424-57578-1xqz1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216153/original/file-20180424-57578-1xqz1y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An outcome likelihood graph for the percentage of 20 characters dying in a 50% random purge.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Michael Milford.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It shows the distribution of likelihoods for a percentage of characters dying, under a 50% purge (based on a count of 20 on screen characters at the end of the movie).</p>
<p>The most likely outcome is about 50% of the characters dying, as shown in the centre of the graph. But if you move to the left you can see that although the odds drop, there’s still some chance of as small a fraction as 25% dying, and at the other side of the graph of up to 75% dying.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Plausible enough, although contracts could be revealing.</p>
<h2>Verdict</h2>
<p>Avengers: Infinity War is Marvel’s biggest movie to date and in many ways its most dramatic. Long story and character arcs have all led to this point, meaning the movie’s (frankly incredible) events are all the more powerful for the viewer.</p>
<p>The action scenes are bigger and better than ever before, and we’re treated to an ending and super villain like no Marvel movie before it. Upping the stakes, action and epic scenes means an expected further departure from “conventional” scientific reality, but that can be forgiven for the sake of an incredibly entertaining and engaging film.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216087/original/file-20180424-94115-15mbblp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216087/original/file-20180424-94115-15mbblp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/216087/original/file-20180424-94115-15mbblp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216087/original/file-20180424-94115-15mbblp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216087/original/file-20180424-94115-15mbblp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216087/original/file-20180424-94115-15mbblp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216087/original/file-20180424-94115-15mbblp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/216087/original/file-20180424-94115-15mbblp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Infinity War unites the biggest cast of superheroes ever.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/95421/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Professor Michael Milford is a Chief Investigator at the Australian Centre for Robotic Vision, an Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Microsoft Research Faculty Fellow and Founding Director of the education startup Math Thrills Pty Ltd. He receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Queensland Government, Caterpillar Corporation, Mining3, Microsoft, the Asian Office of Aerospace Research and Development and AMP.</span></em></p>
Avengers: Infinity War is the biggest Marvel movie ever with largest cast of superheroes (and villains). So far. But how does the science stack up?
Michael Milford, Professor, Queensland University of Technology
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/91703
2018-02-15T11:40:02Z
2018-02-15T11:40:02Z
How I marvelled at Black Panther’s reimagining of Africa
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206538/original/file-20180215-131024-1qx38ss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios' BLACK PANTHER</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Watching Marvel’s highly anticipated comic-book film adaptation, Black Panther, was no ordinary tried and tested cinematic experience. Much like the unapologetic showmanship, flamboyance and atmospheric idiosyncrasies of Sunday service black congregational worship, the cinema metamorphosised beyond its remnants of unswept popcorn kernels and sticky milkshake residue into an augmented space. It became a “mega-church” sanctuary of spiritual catharsis –with all the impassioned and melodic trimmings of Afro-Pentecostalism. </p>
<p>But, make no mistake, this was not the time nor place for solemn contemplation or confessing past transgressions – but an opportunity for continental Africans and diaspora to offload socially sanctioned climactic expressions of individual and collective excitement and expectations, as well as lip-bitten anxieties about a fictionalised Africa. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/xjDjIWPwcPU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>If this was an Afro-baptism in filmic spirit, I sought – and submitted to – full-bodied immersion. </p>
<p>Let’s be clear, the fervour over Black Panther among the Ankra-wearing, close-cropped Afro-crowned cinemagoers is incredibly warranted for several reasons. Not least for its reimagining, its re-presentation of Africa and communities therein – with magical realism – that makes it an intriguing anomaly among the slew of other questionable Western cinematic attempts to deliver “Africa” on screen.</p>
<p>Die-hard Marvel fans and those newly christened have waited with baited breath to secure a one-way ticket to Wakanda – the wondrous Afro-futuristic utopia and homeland of the titular character Black Panther (played by Chadwick Boseman). But this is by no means Hollywood’s first foray into fictionalised African kingdoms. Before Wakanda, there was the similarly named and seemingly “African-sounding” Zumunda in Eddie Murphy’s 1998 blockbuster <a href="http://www.ebony.com/news-views/coming-to-america-offensive-to-africans-981">Coming to America</a>.</p>
<p>But Zumunda presented as nothing more than a visual repository of African clichés and normative assumptions, where wild animals, as domesticated pets, cohabit “as they do” nonchalantly with humans. So too, where royalty enrobe in lion’s fur. As the Nigerian literary darling <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9Ihs241zeg">Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie</a> put it: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>If all I knew about Africa were from popular images, I too would think that Africa was a place of beautiful landscapes, animals and incomprehensible people, fighting senseless wars, dying of poverty and Aids, unable to speak for themselves.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>If only I could speculate on what may have informed such a proclamation … dare I venture towards films such as <a href="http://www.filmsite.org/afri.html">The African Queen</a>, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/africa/kenya/articles/Out-of-Africa-The-film-that-made-us-fall-in-love-with-Kenya/">Out of Africa</a>, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2005/04/the-movie-review-hotel-rwanda/69612/">Hotel Rwanda</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2009/jun/10/last-king-of-scotland-history">The Last King of Scotland</a>, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/08/movies/08diam.html">Blood Diamond</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/sep/02/beasts-of-no-nation-review-brutal-epic-opens-awards-season-in-style">Beasts of No Nation</a> – to name a handful. </p>
<h2>Africa’s burden</h2>
<p>Those cinematic offerings were the colonial-era mythmakers and extenders whose white lensed romanticisms have determined the space within which Africa is defined and knowable. It is also within this space that the complexities and pluralities of African representation have been lost in simplification and concealment. </p>
<p>Surely these films must have affixed the “Afro” in the unmistaken and riotous Afro-futurism of Black Panther. But its the “futurism” aspect that makes Black Panther stand head and shoulders above the rest. Showcasing an iteration of Africa that is more imaginatively radical than merely culturally palatable for audiences who are used to being spoon-fed – better yet, force-fed – microwavable doses of an Africa that is melancholic, benighted and savage, to satisfy their visually myopic cravings.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206544/original/file-20180215-131000-1o4hwsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206544/original/file-20180215-131000-1o4hwsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=317&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206544/original/file-20180215-131000-1o4hwsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=317&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206544/original/file-20180215-131000-1o4hwsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=317&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206544/original/file-20180215-131000-1o4hwsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206544/original/file-20180215-131000-1o4hwsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206544/original/file-20180215-131000-1o4hwsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Afro-futuristic: Winston Duke as M'Baku.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://image.net/xads/actions/layout/preview.do?asset=566930781&fromPage=product">Marvel Studios' BLACK PANTHER</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Unlike its predecessors, Black Panther’s Afro-futuristic elements challenge stereotypes by readjusting the barometer of African imagination. Where Africa and black-Africanness is equated with discourses of futurism, cybernetics, sci-fi fantasy and mysticism.</p>
<h2>New African century</h2>
<p>This is a far cry from previous film interpretations of Africa, and especially of Africa’s future – or lack thereof. It has too often been represented as provisional and ephemeral – or arbitrated by the technocratic and philanthropic efforts of white do-gooders. Instead, Black Panther provides a prophetic reimagining of Africa with its postmodern gravity-defying vehicles and supersonic technology that far exceed human comprehension. </p>
<p>This has important implications for how we see Africa, through films which have long anchored it in a “forever-more” state that is seemingly unenlightened, backward-leaning and perceived as a prolongation of the past. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206542/original/file-20180215-131029-1pa40h9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206542/original/file-20180215-131029-1pa40h9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206542/original/file-20180215-131029-1pa40h9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206542/original/file-20180215-131029-1pa40h9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206542/original/file-20180215-131029-1pa40h9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206542/original/file-20180215-131029-1pa40h9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206542/original/file-20180215-131029-1pa40h9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Letitia Wright as Shuri.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://image.net/xads/actions/layout/preview.do?asset=535907517&fromPage=product">Marvel Studios' BLACK PANTHER</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>So, too, the film speaks volumes about how young and old black African “selves” can infiltrate otherworldly spheres. Its Afro-futurism allows black folk to apply self-iterations and augment alternate realities that transcend the limitations of the “here and now” towards the “what ifs” and “could bes”, through their own melanin-infused, ethno-cultural lens. </p>
<p>Equally, with its vestiges of the past and nods to the future, Black Panther presents a certain “contemporary ordinariness” within Africa that is discernible in all its parts. Where streets of African cities, for example, are littered with mother-tongue speaking, iPhone-clutching youth, dressed in dashiki-patterned bomber jackets, skinny jeans and with basket-woven braided hairstyles. </p>
<p>Moreover, the portrayal of Wakanda as resource-rich, unsoiled by European colonialism and the paraphernalia of international development, challenges cinematic presumptions of an Africa that is deficient, agentless and lacking internal diplomacies for sovereignty.</p>
<h2>Africa upgraded</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206539/original/file-20180215-131006-3syii7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/206539/original/file-20180215-131006-3syii7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206539/original/file-20180215-131006-3syii7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206539/original/file-20180215-131006-3syii7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206539/original/file-20180215-131006-3syii7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206539/original/file-20180215-131006-3syii7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/206539/original/file-20180215-131006-3syii7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Role models: the women of Wakanda.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://image.net/xads/actions/layout/preview.do?asset=568875306&fromPage=product">Marvel Studios' BLACK PANTHER</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is further reinforced by the central staging and representation of steely-eyed, intelligent African women – as Beyoncé avows in her feminist-imbued record <a href="http://blackyouthproject.com/upgrade-u-what-we-can-learn-from-beyonce/">Upgrade U</a>, if the men are “the block” the women are “the lights that keep the streets on”. We see this in the female Wakandans, the unyielding pillars of the film, who demystify allusions and illusions of Africa – through its female proxies – as infantilised, subordinate and devoid of individual articulation of unique intent. </p>
<p>As a Marvel trailblazer, Black Panther is stunning in its redefining of Africa’s aesthetic within the cultural zeitgeist of cinematic consciousness. It trades cinema’s historical blueprint for Africa, for its own set of black paws. Suffice to say, representation (in all its shades) matters.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/91703/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr Edward Ademolu PhD, FHEA does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
This new Afro-celebratory sci-fi trendsetter sets out to unsettle and subvert film stereotypes about Africa – and succeeds brilliantly.
Dr Edward Ademolu PhD, FHEA, PhD Researcher at the Global Development Institute, University of Manchester
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/91042
2018-02-08T14:41:44Z
2018-02-08T14:41:44Z
The hidden superpower of ‘Black Panther’: Scientist role models
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205384/original/file-20180207-74473-zbs0ny.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=435%2C4%2C2290%2C1679&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">King of a technologically advanced country, Black Panther is a scientific genius.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://hdqwalls.com/download/3840x2400/black-panther-2018-4k">Marvel Studios</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>I’m not the first to say that the upcoming Marvel movie “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1825683/">Black Panther</a>” will be an important landmark. Finally a feature film starring a black superhero character will be part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe – a successful run of intertwined movies that began with “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0371746/">Iron Man</a>” in 2008. While there have been other superhero movies with a black lead character – “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0448157/">Hancock</a>” (2008), “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120611/">Blade</a>” (1998), “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120177/">Spawn</a>” (1997) or even “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107563/">The Meteor Man</a>” (1993) – this film is significant because of the <a href="https://www.nyfa.edu/student-resources/the-rise-of-superhero-films/">recent remarkable rise of the superhero film</a> from the nerdish fringe to part of mainstream culture. </p>
<p>Huge audiences will see a black lead character – not a sidekick or part of a team – in a superhero movie by a major studio, with a black director (Ryan Coogler), black writers and a majority black cast. This is a significant step toward diversifying our culture by improving the <a href="http://annenberg.usc.edu/sites/default/files/Dr_Stacy_L_Smith-Inequality_in_900_Popular_Films.pdf">lackluster representation</a> of minorities in our major media. It’s also a <a href="http://annenberg.usc.edu/research/aii/research/raceethnicity">filmmaking landmark because black creators</a> have been given access to the resources and platforms needed to bring different storytelling perspectives into our mainstream culture.</p>
<p>Last year’s “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0451279/">Wonder Woman</a>” forged a similar path. In that case, a major studio finally decided to commit resources to a superhero film headlined by a female character and directed by a woman, Patty Jenkins. Female directors are <a href="http://annenberg.usc.edu/inclusion-directors-chair">a minority in the movie industry</a>. Jenkins brought a new perspective to this kind of action movie, and there was a <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2017/05/31/why-women-are-crying-when-they-watch-wonder-woman-fight/102328772/">huge positive response from audiences</a> in theaters worldwide. </p>
<p>Above and beyond all this, “Black Panther” also has the potential to break additional ground in a way most people may not realize: In the comics, the character is actually a scientist. Moreover, in the inevitable (and somewhat ridiculous) ranking of scientific prowess that happens in the comic book world, he’s been portrayed as at least the equal of the two most famous “top scientists” in the Marvel universe: Tony Stark (Iron Man) and Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic). A black headlining superhero character written and directed by black artists is rare enough from a major studio, but having him be a successful scientist as well is another level of rarity.</p>
<h2>Scientists on screen</h2>
<p>I’m a scientist who cares about increased engagement with science by the general public. I’ve worked as <a href="http://www.laweekly.com/film/physicist-dr-clifford-v-johnson-is-a-consultant-on-superhero-movies-8232890">a science adviser on many film and TV projects</a> (though not “Black Panther”). When the opportunity arises, I’ve <a href="https://creativefuture.org/science-advisor-conversation-dr-clifford-johnson/">helped broaden the diversity of scientist characters</a> portrayed onscreen.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205377/original/file-20180207-74512-hw1u6u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jason Wilkes is a black scientist on ‘Agent Carter,’ whose character emerged from the author’s talks with the show’s writers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ABC Television</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205375/original/file-20180207-74512-zdpjdm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=527&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Panels from ‘The Dialogues,’ including a black female scientist.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">'The Dialogues,' by Clifford V. Johnson (MIT Press 2017)</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>I’ve also recently published a <a href="http://thedialoguesbook.com">nonfiction graphic book</a> for general audiences called “<a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/dialogues-0">The Dialogues: Conversations about the Nature of the Universe</a>.” Its characters include male and female black scientists, discussing aspects of my own field of theoretical physics – where black scientists are <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/2017/nsf17310/data.cfm">unfortunately very rare</a>. So the opportunity that the “Black Panther” movie presents to inform and inspire vast audiences is of great interest to me.</p>
<p>The history and evolution of the Black Panther character and his scientific back story is a fascinating example of turning a problematic past into a positive opportunity.</p>
<p>Created in 1966 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, he’s the first black superhero character in mainstream comics, <a href="https://comicvine.gamespot.com/fantastic-four-52-introducing-the-sensational-blac/4000-8666/">originally appearing as a guest</a> in a “Fantastic Four” Marvel comic. As a black character created and initially written by nonblack authors, guest-starring in the pages of a book headlined by white characters, he had many of the classic attributes of what is now sometimes controversially known as the “<a href="https://www.salon.com/2010/09/14/magical_negro_trope/">magical negro</a>” in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0021934707307831">American cultural criticism</a>: He ranked extremely highly in every sphere that mattered, to the point of being almost too unreal even for the comics of the time.</p>
<p>Black Panther is T’Challa, king of the fictional African country Wakanda, which is fathomlessly wealthy and remarkably advanced, scientifically and technologically. Even Marvel’s legendary master scientist - Reed Richards of the superhero team Fantastic Four - is befuddled by and full of admiration for Wakanda’s scientific capabilities. T’Challa himself is portrayed as an extraordinary “genius” in physics and other scientific fields, a peerless tactician, a remarkable athlete and a master of numerous forms of martial arts. And he is noble to a fault. Of course, he grows to become a powerful ally of the Fantastic Four and other Marvel superheroes over many adventures.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205406/original/file-20180207-74473-hjn59z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">While likening Black Panther to a ‘refugee from a Tarzan movie,’ the Fantastic Four marveled at his technological innovations in ‘Introducing the Sensational Black Panther.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Fantastic Four #52 (July 1966). [Marvel Comics]</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The key point here is that the superlative scientific ability of our hero, and that of his country, has its origins in the well-meaning, but problematic, practice of inventing near or beyond perfect black characters to support stories starring primarily white protagonists. But this is a lemons-to-lemonade story.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=280&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205407/original/file-20180207-74476-yuoi9u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Fantastic Four were amazed by the scientific ingenuity of Wakanda in ‘Whosoever Finds The Evil Eye.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Fantastic Four #54 (September 1966). [Marvel Comics]</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Black Panther (T’Challa) eventually gets to star in his own series of comics. He is turned into a nuanced and complex character, moving well away from the tropes of his beginnings. Writer Don McGregor’s work started this development as early as 1973, but Black Panther’s journey to the multilayered character we’ll see on screen was greatly advanced by the efforts of several writers with diverse perspectives. Perhaps most notably, in the context of the film, these include Christopher Priest (late 1990s) and Ta-Nehisi Coates (starting in 2016), along with Roxane Gay and Yona Harvey, writing in “World of Wakanda” (2016). Coates and Gay, already best-selling literary writers before coming to the character, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/23/books/black-panther-marvel-comics-roxane-gay-ta-nehisi-coates-wakanda.html?_r=0">helped bring him to wider attention</a> beyond normal comic book fandom, partly paving the way for the movie.</p>
<p>Through all of the improved writing of T'Challa and his world, his spectacular scientific ability has remained prominent. Wakanda continues to be a successful African nation with astonishing science and technology. Furthermore, and very importantly, T'Challa is not portrayed as an anomaly among his people in this regard. There are many great scientists and engineers in Wakanda, including his half-sister Shuri. In some accounts, she (in the continued scientist-ranking business of comics) is an even greater intellect than he is.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/205385/original/file-20180207-74506-voxz8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Black Panther isn’t an isolated genius – his half-sister Shuri is a technological wiz herself.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://collider.com/black-panther-things-to-know/">Marvel Studios</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>If they can do it, then why not me?</h2>
<p>As a scientist who cares about inspiring more people – including underrepresented minorities and women – <a href="https://theconversation.com/new-ways-scientists-can-help-put-science-back-into-popular-culture-84955">to engage with science</a>, I think that if a significant portion of this scientific landscape appears in “Black Panther” it could amplify the movie’s cultural impact.</p>
<p>Vast audiences will see black heroes of both genders using their scientific ability to solve problems and make their way in the world, at an unrivaled level. <a href="https://dornsife.usc.edu/daphna-oyserman/identity/">Research has shown</a> that such representation can have a positive effect on the interests, outlook and career trajectories of viewers.</p>
<p>Improving science education for all is a core endeavor in a nation’s competitiveness and overall health, but outcomes are limited if people aren’t inspired to take an interest in science in the first place. There simply are <a href="http://annenberg.usc.edu/research/aii/research/raceethnicity">not enough images of black scientists</a> – male or female – in our media and entertainment to help inspire. Many people from underrepresented groups end up genuinely believing that scientific investigation is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1949-8594.2002.tb18217.x">not a career path open to them</a>.</p>
<p>Moreover, many people still see the dedication and study needed to excel in science as “nerdy.” A cultural injection of Black Panther heroics could help continue to erode the crumbling tropes that science is <a href="https://theconversation.com/most-people-think-man-when-they-think-scientist-how-can-we-kill-the-stereotype-42393">only for white men</a> or reserved for <a href="https://theconversation.com/beliefs-about-innate-talent-may-dissuade-students-from-stem-42967">people with a special “science gene.”</a></p>
<p>Given the widespread anticipation for the upcoming “Black Panther” movie, if it showcases T'Challa and other Wakandans as highly accomplished scientists, it should give science engagement a significant boost worldwide.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/91042/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clifford Johnson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Seeing black lead characters who are accomplished scientists could be just the thing to help inspire future generations to follow in their footsteps.
Clifford Johnson, Professor of Physics and Astronomy, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/86211
2017-10-25T19:05:16Z
2017-10-25T19:05:16Z
Thor: Ragnarok pitches superheroes against science (and how does Hulk keep his pants on?)
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191505/original/file-20171024-1695-abr34n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Thor: Ragnarok sees Thor do battle with Hulk.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3501632/">Thor: Ragnarok</a> is the latest Marvel movie <a href="https://www.flicks.com.au/movie/thor-ragnarok/">out today</a> that sees Australian Chris Hemsworth back as Thor, but he’s not on friendly home turf. </p>
<p>Instead he finds himself imprisoned on the opposite side of the universe from his beloved Asgard, and out of his depth in a gladiatorial contest with the Incredible Hulk (Mark Ruffalo).</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/yoCVTzldHz0?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Thor’s back!</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But Hulk isn’t his only problem. Ragnarok (the end of his homeland of Asgard) is looming and Thor has new villains to deal with, including the warlike Hela, played by Australian Cate Blanchett.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/science-fiction-helps-us-deal-with-science-fact-a-lesson-from-terminators-killer-robots-50249">Science fiction helps us deal with science fact: a lesson from Terminator's killer robots</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Other new characters include the eccentric Grandmaster (Jeff Goldblum), the fallen warrior Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson), the conflicted Asgardian Skurge (Karl Urban) and the hilarious Korg (played in motion capture by the director Taika Waititi himself).</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191744/original/file-20171024-13971-6aw4tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191744/original/file-20171024-13971-6aw4tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191744/original/file-20171024-13971-6aw4tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191744/original/file-20171024-13971-6aw4tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191744/original/file-20171024-13971-6aw4tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191744/original/file-20171024-13971-6aw4tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191744/original/file-20171024-13971-6aw4tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191744/original/file-20171024-13971-6aw4tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Thor with new friends and enemies.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Given the light-hearted tone of the movie, we’re going to have some fun looking at the “science” of Thor: Ragnarok. </p>
<p>We’ll take it as a given that there are superheroes with magical capabilities, and look instead at the numbers behind some of the characters and events. As usual, there are some minor spoilers ahead.</p>
<h2>How do Hulk’s pants stay on?</h2>
<p>Hulk is infamous for his pants staying on through his transformations, both from Bruce Banner to Hulk and back again. Given that these are normal pants, is this possible?</p>
<p>First we can calculate how much they need to stretch. In the movie, Hulk is about 259cm (8ft 6ins) tall and very solidly built, as explained by VFX supervisor Jake Morrison. Banner, according to <a href="http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/Bruce_Banner_(Earth-616)">some sources</a>, is about 178cm (5ft 10ins) tall, and actor Mark Ruffalo says <a href="https://twitter.com/MarkRuffalo/status/784526464213540864">he’s around 175cm</a>. He has similar stature to me (Michael) and my waist measures about 40cm across at the front. </p>
<p>So in transitioning from Banner to Hulk, his height goes up by a factor of 1.46, while his waist circumference goes up by about 1.75 times - more than his height because in Hulk form he’s more bulky.</p>
<p>So his pants would need to stretch by about 75%.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191755/original/file-20171024-13423-gw4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191755/original/file-20171024-13423-gw4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191755/original/file-20171024-13423-gw4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=614&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191755/original/file-20171024-13423-gw4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=614&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191755/original/file-20171024-13423-gw4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=614&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191755/original/file-20171024-13423-gw4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191755/original/file-20171024-13423-gw4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191755/original/file-20171024-13423-gw4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Maintaining decency means no high fashion for Hulk.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios/Michael Milford</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Finding stretchiness factors for jeans is challenging. <a href="https://www.liveabout.com/stretch-jeans-guide-2040386">Fashion websites</a> quote figures up to 4% for stretch jeans. A <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17543260903302329">scientific study</a> found “stretchability” of up to 34% (after a few washes). So conventional jeans are probably out.</p>
<p>Pure spandex pants, on the other hand, are viable - <a href="http://www.npr.org/2011/12/11/143003539/spandex-has-stretched-with-u-s-waistlines">they can stretch by more than 100%</a> and then return to their original size. So if Banner is willing to accept certain fashion choices, he can maintain decency while morphing both ways.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> It’s stretching science a bit, but plausible.</p>
<h2>Calling Mjölnir</h2>
<p>Thor’s hammer, also known as Mjölnir, has an unpleasant run-in with Hela in the movie. With some abuse of physics, we can examine how Thor might be able to call his hammer back at high speed.</p>
<p><img src="https://i.imgur.com/jHG8CmR.gif" width="100%">
<em>Source: Marvel Studios</em></p>
<p>If Thor is using and abusing normal physics, he might call the hammer back by playing with masses. The hammer looks to accelerate back to Thor faster than normal Earth gravity (9.81m/s<sup>2</sup>) would make it fall - so let’s say it accelerates back twice as fast – about 20m/s<sup>2</sup> – and he calls it back from 100 metres away.</p>
<p>There are at least two possibilities here: Thor increases his mass magically in a way that only affects the hammer, or the hammer increases its mass in a way that only interacts with a (magically unmoveable) Thor. </p>
<p>Either way, one of them has to temporarily have a much greater mass:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>acceleration = gravitational constant × mass of large body / distance<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>mass of large body = acceleration × distance<sup>2</sup> / gravitational constant</p>
<p>= ( 20 × 100<sup>2</sup> ) / ( 6.673 × 10<sup>-11</sup> )</p>
<p>= 3 × 10<sup>15</sup>kg (or 3,000,000,000,000,000kg)</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This is quite close to the weight of the Mediterranean sea (but concentrated in one extremely dense superhero) - so there would definitely have to be some way for the increased mass to only gravitationally affect Thor and the hammer - otherwise the environment around them would get ripped to shreds as well.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Real-world physics takes a bit of a hammering.</p>
<h2>Thor versus Hulk: Who would win in a fight?</h2>
<p><img src="https://i.imgur.com/aM4g1Zz.gif" width="100%">
<em>Source: Marvel Studios</em></p>
<p>The movie addresses this controversial and <a href="https://comicvine.gamespot.com/forums/thor-153/my-blog-on-thor-vs-hulk-who-should-win-638534/">much-debated question</a> in one way. Fans have disagreed on it forever. They draw upon reference material from the comics and movies, and arguments around Thor being a deity and Hulk being capable of near-infinite strength based on his rage.</p>
<p>What we can look at is what sort of strength it would take for Thor to throw the much bigger Hulk around in a gladiatorial fight.</p>
<p>Hulk probably has a specific weight. We can calculate it by scaling up the weight of a bulky human bodybuilder to Hulk’s height. Weight will scale up with the <a href="https://www.physicsforums.com/insights/scaling-laws-speed-animals/">cube law</a>.</p>
<p>One of the biggest bodybuilders in the world right now is Mamdouh Elssbiay, who is 178cm tall and weighs in at about <a href="http://www.flexonline.com/ifbb/mamdouh-elssbiay">144kg in the offseason</a>. We can scale his weight up:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Hulk weight = bodybuilder weight × height ratio<sup>3</sup></p>
<p>= 144 × (259 / 178)<sup>3</sup></p>
<p>= 444kg</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This weight is in the range that <a href="http://marvel.com/characters/25/hulk">Marvel provides</a> of 408-635kg for Hulk.</p>
<p>Thor seems to knock him straight through the air about 50 metres along a fairly flat trajectory, let’s say accelerating him up to a speed of 300km/h (83.33m/s).</p>
<p>Assuming perfect energy transfer (in reality there would be loss), Thor would have imparted the following energy to Hulk:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Hulk kinetic energy = 0.5 × mass × v<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>= 0.5 × 444 × 83.33<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>= 1,540,000 joules</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The energy in a human punch depends on the sport, the intention of the punch, and the size and training level of the human, but it appears to be in the <a href="http://www.science.ca/askascientist/viewquestion.php?qID=821">range of a few hundred joules</a>.</p>
<p>So Thor’s punches would have to impart about 10,000 times more energy than a human punch to toss Hulk around like he does. </p>
<p>From a momentum perspective, for Thor to not shoot backwards when he punches Hulk, he would either have to temporarily have a great mass or have some other magical power that defies conservation of momentum laws.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Lucky Thor’s a god.</p>
<h2>Super superheroes or wretched Ragnarok?</h2>
<p>Thor: Ragnarok is a fantastically funny movie, the best in the Thor series, and one that finally addresses some unanswered questions that comic fans have long debated.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/thor-ragnarok-a-joyous-trashy-retro-nostalgic-comedy-is-the-best-of-the-marvel-films-85743">Thor: Ragnarok, a joyous, trashy, retro-nostalgic comedy, is the best of the Marvel films</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The movie mixes elements that stay somewhat true to real-world physics (Hulk’s weight) and others that require blatant violations of them (Thor’s hammer; fighting).</p>
<p>Most importantly, we have calculated that it’s plausible for Hulk’s pants to stay on, maintaining decency through Banner to Hulk transitions and back again. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191747/original/file-20171024-13536-yilsk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191747/original/file-20171024-13536-yilsk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/191747/original/file-20171024-13536-yilsk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191747/original/file-20171024-13536-yilsk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191747/original/file-20171024-13536-yilsk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191747/original/file-20171024-13536-yilsk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191747/original/file-20171024-13536-yilsk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/191747/original/file-20171024-13536-yilsk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The bromance between Thor and Hulk continues to grow.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86211/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Professor Michael Milford is a Chief Investigator at the Australian Centre for Robotic Vision, an Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Microsoft Research Faculty Fellow and Founding Director of the education startup Math Thrills Pty Ltd. He receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Queensland Government, Caterpillar Corporation, Mining3, Microsoft, the Asian Office of Aerospace Research and Development and AMP.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Juxi Leitner is a Research Fellow in the Australian Research Council funded Centre of Excellence in Robotic Vision. Juxi is founder of the Brisbane.AI and robotics interest groups, two not-for-profit organisations aiming to raise awareness about robotics and AI research in the general public and creating opportunities for communities to interact with local researchers.</span></em></p>
The new Thor: Ragnarok movie out today tackles some of the superhero issues fans have long questioned. But how does the science stack up?
Michael Milford, Professor, Queensland University of Technology
Juxi Leitner, Research Fellow, Robotics & AI, Queensland University of Technology
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/85743
2017-10-19T19:04:13Z
2017-10-19T19:04:13Z
Thor: Ragnarok, a joyous, trashy, retro-nostalgic comedy, is the best of the Marvel films
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190762/original/file-20171018-32370-9ghkke.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Chris Hemsworth as Thor: he plays the part of the hunky God with disarming humour.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Thor: Ragnarok - the latest addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe – is the best of the Marvel films. The third in the Thor series, directed by New Zealand wunderkind Taika Waititi, its narrative follows the battle between Thor (Chris Hemsworth), the brawny god of thunder, and his sister Hela (Cate Blanchett), goddess of death. </p>
<p>Hela makes a push to claim the throne of the kingdom of Asgard; she wants to use this power to conquer the rest of the universe, which, she believes, rightfully belongs to the Asgardians. Thor, assisted by a diverse group of allies, including his shifty brother and occasional enemy Loki (Tom Hiddleston), undergoes various trials and tribulations, before coming up against his evil sister in a final epic battle, waged over the fate of the cosmos.</p>
<p>Though the story does connect with and extend elements from the earlier Thor films, Thor: Ragnarok feels like a different beast entirely, and I can understand why diehard Marvel fans (I’m not one) might be disappointed.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190767/original/file-20171018-32367-lizzre.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190767/original/file-20171018-32367-lizzre.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190767/original/file-20171018-32367-lizzre.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190767/original/file-20171018-32367-lizzre.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190767/original/file-20171018-32367-lizzre.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=251&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190767/original/file-20171018-32367-lizzre.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190767/original/file-20171018-32367-lizzre.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190767/original/file-20171018-32367-lizzre.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">From left, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Tessa Thompson and Tom Hiddleston.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures </span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Whereas the earlier Thor films featured numerous pompous, posturing monologues about heroism, virtue, and fate, the spirit of Waititi’s film is diametrically opposite to this. It offers a joyous kaleidoscope of colour and swirling psychedelic imagery, underscored by a crisp, retro-synth soundtrack. The flamboyantly designed action sequences, including one where the Hulk battles a giant wolf, are frequently punctuated by moments of genuinely hilarious dialogue.</p>
<p>Hemsworth is in his element as the hunky God, appropriately shirtless for at least one scene, albeit a short one. He plays the part with a disarming humour, as though sending up his public persona as Hollywood heartthrob, mimbo of the moment. Jeff Goldblum’s performance as Grandmaster, the blue-eye-liner wearing DJ and megalomaniacal ruler of the planet Sakaar (basically an intergalactic waste dump), is comically delirious. Mark Ruffalo is equally a pleasure to watch as Bruce Banner (aka the Incredible Hulk), even if his stint in the film in human form feels short.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190763/original/file-20171018-32370-fyy1r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190763/original/file-20171018-32370-fyy1r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190763/original/file-20171018-32370-fyy1r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190763/original/file-20171018-32370-fyy1r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190763/original/file-20171018-32370-fyy1r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190763/original/file-20171018-32370-fyy1r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190763/original/file-20171018-32370-fyy1r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190763/original/file-20171018-32370-fyy1r4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jeff Goldblum as Grandmaster: comically delicious.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>I will be eternally suspicious of Cate Blanchett playing a super-villain after her painfully hammy turn as Irina Spalko in <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0367882/?ref_=nv_sr_3">Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull</a> (2008), but she is surprisingly restrained, here, as the malevolent Goddess, keeping the character grounded with her superb physical presence.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190760/original/file-20171018-32361-14r1fsa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190760/original/file-20171018-32361-14r1fsa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190760/original/file-20171018-32361-14r1fsa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190760/original/file-20171018-32361-14r1fsa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190760/original/file-20171018-32361-14r1fsa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190760/original/file-20171018-32361-14r1fsa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190760/original/file-20171018-32361-14r1fsa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190760/original/file-20171018-32361-14r1fsa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cate Blanchett as Hela is surprisingly restrained.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>None of the actors offer poor performances – an incredible feat in itself, given how much of the film would have been shot in front of green screen. Tessa Thompson is appealing as a Valkyrie warrior, Hiddleston is fine reprising his role as Loki, and Anthony Hopkins as Odin, playing the sage, greybeard type he seems destined to repeat for the rest of his career, thankfully, only appears in a couple of scenes. Perhaps Idris Elba is wasted. As Heimdall, a warrior-guide on Asgard, Elba has a thankless, inconspicuous part for an actor of his stature and magnetism.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190761/original/file-20171018-32341-izails.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190761/original/file-20171018-32341-izails.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190761/original/file-20171018-32341-izails.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190761/original/file-20171018-32341-izails.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190761/original/file-20171018-32341-izails.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190761/original/file-20171018-32341-izails.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190761/original/file-20171018-32341-izails.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190761/original/file-20171018-32341-izails.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Idris Elba as Heimdall has a thankless part.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In contrast to <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1856101/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Blade Runner 2049</a>, the other mega blockbuster recently released, the cast and crew here look like they’re having fun. This is, after all, one of the primary motivations for these ritual stagings we call cinema – and it lends an infectious vitality to material that could otherwise seem tawdry and trite, demanding that viewers, too, participate in the party.</p>
<p>The brilliance of the film, indeed, resides in its audiovisual qualities. Its look is magnificent, especially the segment on Sakaar, and the brilliant synth score by Mark Mothersbaugh is alternately spritely and hypnotic, a perfect homage to the scores of the electro-infused, smoky-neon-lit VHS fare upon which the film’s makers clearly grew up.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190764/original/file-20171018-32348-cnp1x9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190764/original/file-20171018-32348-cnp1x9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190764/original/file-20171018-32348-cnp1x9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190764/original/file-20171018-32348-cnp1x9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190764/original/file-20171018-32348-cnp1x9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=249&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190764/original/file-20171018-32348-cnp1x9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190764/original/file-20171018-32348-cnp1x9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190764/original/file-20171018-32348-cnp1x9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=313&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The look of the film is magnificent.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Astonishingly, Thor: Ragnarok does not shy away from a thoughtful, though conventional, depiction of what are probably the two biggest political crises of our time. In the depiction of the planet Sakaar, the film cleverly situates problems of waste management within the broader ecological discourse of global warming – isn’t it the ultimate dream of the big polluters to have another planet on which to dump Earth’s waste? </p>
<p>And it has a few things to say on the ways in which forced migration and asylum seekers act upon, test and strengthen the tenacity of identity, culture and kinship.</p>
<p>The whole thing is perhaps a little opportunistic in its trashy, post-<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4574334/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Stranger Things</a> retro-nostalgia trip. And perhaps this is more evidence of the cynicism of Hollywood producers, willing to modify their output to fit whatever is “trending”. But it is just so well done that I challenge any viewer who came of age as a cinema-goer in the 1980s not to embrace it. This is like the live-action Masters of the Universe film that never got made (including teleportation design that recalls the saturated prismatic colours of MOTU).</p>
<p>In addition, this is one of the best comedies I’ve seen recently – it is a comedy in superhero guise – but its humour is far from the sentimental, saccharine gags of other films from Marvel, like <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2250912/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Spider-Man: Homecoming</a> (2017) or <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0848228/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">The Avengers</a> (2012).</p>
<p>The well-conceived situational humour of Eric Pearson’s sharply written screenplay is brought to life by brilliant comedic performances from the actors, including Waititi himself, who plays Korg, a Kiwi-bro made of rock. His first line to Thor is: “I’m made of rock – you don’t need to be afraid, unless you’re made of scissors.”</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190766/original/file-20171018-32367-7ok4zm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190766/original/file-20171018-32367-7ok4zm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190766/original/file-20171018-32367-7ok4zm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=245&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190766/original/file-20171018-32367-7ok4zm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=245&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190766/original/file-20171018-32367-7ok4zm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=245&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190766/original/file-20171018-32367-7ok4zm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190766/original/file-20171018-32367-7ok4zm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190766/original/file-20171018-32367-7ok4zm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Taika Waititi as a Kiwi bro made of rock.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Thor: Ragnarok is one of the best films I’ve seen this year – which is something I never thought I’d say about a Marvel film. We can put this down, I suspect, largely to the direction of Waititi, a master of low-key humour, who shot to fame with his second feature film, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1560139/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Boy</a> (2010) and followed it up with New Zealand hits <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3416742/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">What We Do in the Shadows</a> (2014) and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4698684/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Hunt for the Wilderpeople</a> (2016). If this one is anything to go by, Waititi will be making Hollywood films for a long time to come.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85743/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ari Mattes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
The third in the Thor series, directed by New Zealand wunderkind Taika Waititi, is thoughtful, hilarious and looks magnificent.
Ari Mattes, Lecturer in Media Studies, University of Notre Dame Australia
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/82919
2017-09-21T19:42:19Z
2017-09-21T19:42:19Z
Friday essay: journeys to the underworld – Greek myth, film and American anxiety
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186913/original/file-20170920-16414-pqyki1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Gil Birmingham (Cory) and Jeremy Renner (Martin) in Wind River: grieving fathers who come together in the realm of the dead.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Production Co: Acacia Filmed Entertainment, Film 44, Ingenious Media</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The success of Patty Jenkins’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0451279/">Wonder Woman</a>, depicting warring Olympians and Amazons, continues to stoke moviegoer interest in Greek mythology. Wonder Woman is the first foray of D.C. movies into classical mythology, a path well trodden by the Marvel cinematic universe. But is Greek myth simply a favoured and enduring wellspring for heroic sagas full of supermen and monsters or are there deeper forces at play?</p>
<p>To the Greeks, the underworld journey was an ideal vehicle for the hero to display his exceptional qualities, often involving the rescue of a soul trapped there. A central convention of Greek mythological narratives is <em>katabasis</em>, the hero’s journey to the underworld or land of the dead. At Circe’s urging, <a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-homers-odyssey-82911">Odysseus</a> consults the seer Tiresias in the land of the dead, where many departed souls (including Achilles) appear to him. Similar journeys are made by <a href="http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/Herakles/labors.html">Heracles</a> who rescues Theseus during his twelfth labor; <a href="http://www.ancient.eu/Hermes/">Hermes</a>, who rescues Persephone from Hades; and <a href="http://www.maicar.com/GML/Aeneas.html">Aeneas</a> who is reunited briefly with his dead father.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186757/original/file-20170920-938-1gq39rz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186757/original/file-20170920-938-1gq39rz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186757/original/file-20170920-938-1gq39rz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186757/original/file-20170920-938-1gq39rz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186757/original/file-20170920-938-1gq39rz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186757/original/file-20170920-938-1gq39rz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186757/original/file-20170920-938-1gq39rz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186757/original/file-20170920-938-1gq39rz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Alessandro Allori (1580) Odysseus questions the seer Tiresias.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Descents into and ascents from the underworld are themes incorporated repeatedly into modern cinema. Film developed from theatre, which in its earliest form was a way of animating mythical sagas. The <em>katabasis</em> has endured in cinema because it can be applied to most characters, times and settings. Often eschewing a literal journey to the underworld, a cinematic <em>katabasis</em> may follow a quest into a type of hell, whether a physical or psychological space. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Further reading: <a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-homers-odyssey-82911">Guide to the classics: Homer’s Odyssey</a></em> </p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186954/original/file-20170921-10588-16u32of.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186954/original/file-20170921-10588-16u32of.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186954/original/file-20170921-10588-16u32of.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=704&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186954/original/file-20170921-10588-16u32of.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=704&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186954/original/file-20170921-10588-16u32of.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=704&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186954/original/file-20170921-10588-16u32of.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=885&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186954/original/file-20170921-10588-16u32of.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=885&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186954/original/file-20170921-10588-16u32of.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=885&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Christian Gottlieb Kratzenstein Orpheus and Eurydice, 1806.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>One particularly celebrated underworld myth recounts <a href="http://www.ancient.eu/Orpheus/">Orpheus’s</a> retrieval of his wife Eurydice. Against the warnings of Hades and Persephone, Orpheus looked back at her - only for his wife to disappear, this time permanently. Roman Polanski’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071315/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Chinatown</a> (1974), drew directly on this myth by sending its hero, like Orpheus, into the realm of the dead to retrieve an imperilled soul trapped there. </p>
<p>Polanski and screenwriter Robert Towne created a bleak vision of 1938 Los Angeles, parched by drought and corrupted by a shadowy cabal of oligarchs. Private investigator Jake Gittes, investigating the death of city water commissioner Hollis Mulwray, uncovers a web of corruption and murder. His attempts to rescue Mulwray’s wife, Evelyn, from the violence enveloping her results in her brutal death. In its shocking conclusion, Polanski rooted Chinatown more firmly in its <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1907987.Classical_Myth_Culture_in_the_Cinema">mythological ancestry</a>, pivoting the plot towards an incest revelation. Like <a href="https://www.greekmythology.com/Myths/Mortals/Oedipus/oedipus.html">Oedipus</a>, redress comes through putting out eyes. Having failed to save his former love years before, Jake grieves over her death a second time with Evelyn.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wnrdetFAo1o?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Chinatown is broadly accepted as a response to Watergate. Like many films of its time, it responded to Nixon’s subversion of US political institutions by depicting a world where shadowy underworld denizens win and the hero fails to rescue his Eurydice from Hades. </p>
<p>In this response, Chinatown demonstrates how the influence of Greek mythological conventions on American filmmakers appears strongest during times of heightened political stress. When many perceived America as attacked from within by communism during the 1950s, for instance, Hollywood responded by reimagining Homer’s <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Achilles-Greek-mythology">perfect warrior Achilles</a> through the towering figure of John Wayne (through no coincidence, the most virulently anti-communist actor of all). In John Ford’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049730/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">The Searchers</a> (1956), Wayne’s embittered Confederate veteran Ethan Edwards mutilates the body of Comanche war chief Scar to avenge Ethan’s defiled nieces. Like Achilles mutilating Hector in <a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-homers-iliad-80968">Homer’s Iliad</a>, Ethan hates his enemies beyond death.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Further reading: <a href="https://theconversation.com/guide-to-the-classics-homers-iliad-80968">Guide to the classics: Homer’s Iliad</a></em></p>
<hr>
<p>In the 1970s, a younger cadre of filmmakers and audiences saw the enemy sitting in seats of power. Underworld quests found more subversive avenues for expression, like Francis Ford Coppola’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078788/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Apocalypse Now</a> (1979), which conveyed the horrors of the Vietnam war through a nightmarish journey up the river Styx.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ES7dzIXMCrs?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Underworld narratives also formed part of Hollywood’s response to widespread moral panic around <a href="https://www.vox.com/2016/10/30/13413864/satanic-panic-ritual-abuse-history-explained">ritual abuse and child murder</a> that spread throughout America in the 1980s and 1990s. The horrific sprees of society’s new apex predators like Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy, linked to hysterical rumours of organised child sacrifice, inspired a film cycle fuelled by pervasive anxiety that children could be snatched up and borne away to horrible fates in hidden lairs. When Jonathan Demme’s <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102926/?ref_=nv_sr_1">The Silence of the Lambs</a> swept the 1992 Oscars it was our neighbours or the corner grocer - not the government - preying on our fears.</p>
<p>Demme’s film deftly refashioned the myth of <a href="http://www.ancient.eu/Minotaur/">Theseus and the minotaur</a> into a race-against-time manhunt. Cadet FBI agent Clarice Starling pursues a serial murderer who has abducted a Senator’s daughter. To track the beast, Clarice must descend into the den of captured cannibal monster Hannibal Lecter for clues to slay the monster at large, Buffalo Bill. For this underworld quest, Lecter is the pedagogue, not the monster. His role isn’t to eat Clarice (he passes up that opportunity when she ventures within striking distance) but to prepare her for her journey. Lecter provides the ball of string enabling Clarice to venture into the minotaur’s labyrinth and return.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/183618/original/file-20170828-1590-ifxefk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/183618/original/file-20170828-1590-ifxefk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/183618/original/file-20170828-1590-ifxefk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183618/original/file-20170828-1590-ifxefk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183618/original/file-20170828-1590-ifxefk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=316&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183618/original/file-20170828-1590-ifxefk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183618/original/file-20170828-1590-ifxefk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/183618/original/file-20170828-1590-ifxefk.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Jody Foster as Clarice Stirling in The Silence of the Lambs.</span>
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<p>Why does American cinema reflect Ancient Greek narrative conventions most strongly at times of profound social anxiety? The answer may lie in part in political similarities between Americans and ancient Athenians and the perceived vulnerability of their constitutional foundations. </p>
<p>Traditionalists interpret Greek art as an expression of soaring confidence in the triumph of humans over the old gods. But the Athenians were obsessed by the ephemerality of their achievement and how it rested on foundations that could collapse at any time. The late critic Robert Hughes once asserted that “ancient Greek sculpture is used to advance a specious political argument” of man being the measure of all things. Yet Greek art, he argued, was just as focussed on warding off monsters (representing political threats). </p>
<p>Ancient mythological themes are employed most unmistakably in American movies during times of “witch hunts” to expose hidden enemies: communist saboteurs in the 1950s, corrupt political burghers of the 1970s and the “satanic panic” of the 1980s. In response to 9/11, Hollywood was oddly reticent, as if the seismic scale of the event meant <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2011/sep/08/9-11-films-hollywood-handle?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other">translating 9/11 to the screen</a> was unimaginable. But television responded forcefully, particularly through the <a href="http://www.avclub.com/all-our-9-11-anxieties-ended-up-on-hbo-1802751805">great HBO crime dramas</a> - The Sopranos, The Wire, Deadwood - all of which at various times employed underworld sagas in confronting the scarring and resounding effects of violence. </p>
<h2>Ancient myth and cinema in a time of Trump</h2>
<p>What can we expect to see next as the rise of “Trumpism” promotes internal American division possibly unmatched since the civil war? Certainly, taking at face value Trump’s identified public enemy the “liberal media” (which includes filmmakers), US political institutions are under attack in a manner not seen since 1974. Like Nixon, Trump accuses his critics of witch hunts aimed at sabotaging the will of the people and uprooting American values.</p>
<p>We are yet to see reactions to the President reflected in cinema. Trump was elected ten months ago and has held office for only eight, so films responding to his Presidency are still in production. But the social trauma that saw the ascendancy of Trump’s base – the impoverishment of the “rust belt”, paranoia over Mexican gang culture, the erosion of the natural environment in the face of rapine corporations – are already part of the cinematic landscape. </p>
<p>And we are already seeing key political battlegrounds - the migration of drug crime across the southern border and the violation of the natural world at other frontiers - framed as underworld quests in film.</p>
<p>Director/screenwriter Taylor Sheridan recently explored issues of American decline in his unofficial “frontier trilogy”, using Greek mythological conventions to do so. The middle film, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2582782/?ref_=nv_sr_1">Hell or High Water</a> (2016) is a relatively straightforward backwoods heist saga pitting bank-robbing brothers against a Texas ranger nearing retirement. The script reflects the financial angst of Trump voters, largely sympathising with their perceived disenfranchisement. But the first film, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3397884/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Sicario</a> (2015) and the most recent, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt5362988/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">Wind River</a> (2017) are dramatic bookends, using mythology to explore the social anxieties that saw Trump elected.</p>
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<p>Directed by Canadian Denis Villeneuve, Sicario depicts an idealistic FBI agent, Kate Macer, recruited by a government taskforce to combat drug cartels at the Mexican border. Overseen by a shadowy operative, Alejandro, Kate descends into a moral and literal abyss to track her quarry, eventually rejecting her handlers’ demands that she become a monster to fight monsters. In Wind River, the discovery of a young Arapaho woman’s body on a snowbound Wyoming reservation teams hunter Cory Lambert with another rookie FBI agent, Jane Banner, to track down her killer.</p>
<p>Wind River and Sicario are violent, electrifying films, which embrace Greek mythic conventions by sending their heroes to the realm of the dead both in pursuit of monsters and in embrace of loved ones. </p>
<p>In Sicario, Kate and Alejandro pursue the drug lord, Alarcon, across a Mexican landscape made hellish through darkness and night vision technology. Whereas Kate emerges from the underworld with her moral compass intact, Alejandro maddened by the murders of his wife and daughter now resides there permanently. As he tells Kate, “You will not survive here. You are not a wolf and this is a land of wolves now.”</p>
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<p>In Wind River the murdered girl, Natalie, was a friend of Cory’s daughter - who had died in similar circumstances three years earlier. Like Orpheus, Cory experiences the loss of his beloved twice, heightening his corrosive need to have her back. But the land of the dead is not always hostile. In the film’s final scene, Cory and Natalie’s father Martin sit together in silence, mentally visiting their lost daughters in the spirit realm.</p>
<p>Both films are sprinkled with references to mythological deathscapes: frozen Wyoming mountains and darkened Mexican foothills become landscapes of dread. Cory, like the hero Heracles, is a hunter of lions; and wolves, traditional guardians of dead souls, embody links between living and dead.</p>
<p>Greek mythological conventions will likely again be used to critique what many see as a uniquely lawless US administration. It will pay to watch the output of Joss Whedon, for one, whose <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0848228/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1">The Avengers</a> (2012) depicted an Homeric world where spectacular battle scenes framed an exploration of the transformative effect of violence, the weight of heroic expectations and the toll both take on men and women who deal in warfare. </p>
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<p>Few directors working today are as familiar with Greek heroic archetypes as Whedon. In his signature television production, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Whedon reimagined the doomed <a href="http://www.ancient.eu/achilles/">Achilles</a> as a teenage girl who at one point returned from a literal journey to the realm of the dead. Given Trump’s treatment of and standing with women, it will be interesting to see the nature of the heroine’s quest, and the monsters she encounters along the way, in Whedon’s upcoming project Batgirl.</p>
<p>We may not yet know what kinds of underworlds will need to be negotiated in years ahead. But American filmmakers are uniquely experienced in passing through landscapes of dread, emerging stronger and more enlightened.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/82919/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Salmond does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
American cinema mines Greek myth most strongly at times of profound social anxiety. In the age of Trump, we are already seeing key political battlegrounds framed as underworld quests in film.
Paul Salmond, Honorary Associate, Classics and Ancient History, La Trobe University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/83756
2017-09-20T13:21:54Z
2017-09-20T13:21:54Z
Comics captured America’s growing ambivalence about the Vietnam War
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186627/original/file-20170919-22701-1axr4o8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A Panel from the Marvel Comics series 'The 'Nam.'</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/File:Nam.jpg">Marvel Comics</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In America’s imagination, the Vietnam War is not so much celebrated as it is assiduously contemplated. This inward-looking approach is reflected in films like “The Deer Hunter” and “Apocalypse Now,” best-selling novels and popular memoirs that dwell on the psychological impact of the war. </p>
<p>Was the war worth the cost, human and otherwise? Was it a winnable war or doomed from the outset? What are its lessons and legacies? </p>
<p>These questions also underpin Ken Burns’ Vietnam War documentary, which premiered September 17. But many forget that before the Vietnam War ended as a Cold War quagmire, it began as a clear-eyed anti-communist endeavor. </p>
<p>As a child, I was always fascinated by comics; now, as a cultural studies scholar, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=b2EfBQAAQBAJ&lpg=PA189&ots=ApACSAR_uQ&dq=cathy%20Schlund-vials%20comics%20vietnam&lr&pg=PA189#v=onepage&q&f=false">I’ve been able to fuse this passion</a> with an interest in war narratives. Comics – more than any medium – reflect the narrative trajectory of the war, and how <a href="http://news.gallup.com/vault/191828/gallup-vault-hawks-doves-vietnam.aspx">the American public evolved</a> from being generally supportive of the war to ambivalent about its purpose and prospects.</p>
<h2>The voice of the people</h2>
<p>Histories of war are often told through the major battles and the views of the generals and politicians in power.</p>
<p>American comics, on the other hand, tend to reflect the popular attitudes of the era in which they are produced. Due to serialization and mass production, they’re uniquely equipped to respond to changing dynamics and shifting politics.</p>
<p>During the Great Depression, Superman battled corrupt landlords. At the height of World War II, <a href="https://i.annihil.us/u/prod/marvel//universe3zx/images/b/ba/Redskull02.jpg">Captain America clashed with the fascist Red Skull</a>. Tony Stark’s transformation into Iron Man occurred alongside the growth of the military industrial complex during the Cold War. And the diverse team of X-Men first appeared during the civil rights movement. These storylines reflect the shifting attitudes of regular people, the target audience of these comics.</p>
<p>More recent plots have included <a href="http://www.timesnews.net/News/2010/02/12/Marvel-Comics-apologizes-for-Tea-Party-depiction-in-Captain-America">Tea Party rallies</a>, <a href="http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/18/superman-no-longer-an-american/comment-page-1/">failed peace missions</a> in Iran and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/post/green-lantern-comes-out-of-the-closet/2012/06/01/gJQAvoln7U_blog.html?utm_term=.1ac00e33f27f">coming-out stories</a> – all of which underscore the fact that comics continue to engage with current affairs and politics. </p>
<p>As modes of “modern memory,” comics – <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/2928520.pdf?acceptTC=true&coverpage=false&seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">to quote</a> French historian Pierre Nora – “confront us with the brutal realization of the difference of real memory…and history, which is how our hopelessly forgetful modern societies, propelled by change, organize the past.”</p>
<p>In other words, comics are a type of historical record; they’re a window into what people were thinking and how they were interpreting events – almost in real time.</p>
<h2>From hawks to doves</h2>
<p>The comics produced in the years during, after and leading up to the Vietnam War were no different.</p>
<p>The conflict, its soldiers and its returning veterans appear in mainstream comics franchises such as “The Amazing Spider Man,” “Iron Man,” “Punisher,” “Thor,” “The X-Men” and “Daredevil.” But the portrayal of soldiers – and the war – shifted considerably over the course of the conflict.</p>
<p>Prior to 1968 and the <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/vietnam-war/tet-offensive">Tet Offensive</a>, Marvel comics tended to feature pro-war plots that involved superhero battles involving U.S. compatriots and the South Vietnamese battling National Liberation Front operatives and Ho Chi Minh’s communist forces. These <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manichaeism">Manichean</a> plots were reminiscent of World War II comics, wherein the “good guys” were clearly distinguished from their evil counterparts. </p>
<p>But as the anti-war protest movement started to gain momentum – and as public opinion about the conflict turned – the focus of such works shifted from heroic campaigns to traumatic aftermaths. More often than not, these included storylines about returning Vietnam War veterans, who struggled to return to civilian life, who were haunted by the horrors of conflict and who often lamented those “left behind” (namely their South Vietnamese allies).</p>
<p>Such transformations – superhero hawks becoming everyday doves – actually foreshadowed a common trauma trope in the Hollywood films that would be made about the war. </p>
<h2>No ‘supermen’ in ‘The 'Nam’</h2>
<p>Marvel Comics’ “The ‘Nam” (1986-1993), written and edited by Vietnam War veterans Doug Murray and Larry Hama, reflects the medium’s ability to narrate the past while addressing the politics of the present. The plots, for example, balanced the early jingoism with a now familiar, post-conflict cynicism. </p>
<p>Each issue was chronological – spanning 1966 to 1972 – with many told from the point of view of a soldier named Ed Marks.</p>
<p><a href="http://ifanboy.com/botm/book-of-the-month-the-nam-vol-1/">As Hama wrote</a> in the introduction to Volume One, “Every time a month went by in the real world, a month went by in the comic… It had to be about the guys on the ground who got jungle rot, malaria, and dysentery. It had to be about people, not ideas, and the people had to be real, not cardboard heroes or super-men.”</p>
<p>The ’Nam’s 84 issues placed historical events such as the Tet Offensive alongside personal stories involving “search and destroy” campaigns, conflicts with commanding officers and love affairs. </p>
<p>The 'Nam’s initial success was critical and commercial: the inaugural December 1986 issue <a href="http://ifanboy.com/botm/book-of-the-month-the-nam-vol-1/">outsold</a> a concurrent installment of the widely popular X-Men series. </p>
<p>While Jan Scruggs, president of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial fund, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1986/09/10/vietnam-the-comic-book-war/0b6c7970-3733-4eb9-a8b0-24b706a416d0/?utm_term=.8e8177f53c45">questioned</a> whether the war should be the subject of a comic book, Newsweek editor William Broyles <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1986/09/10/vietnam-the-comic-book-war/0b6c7970-3733-4eb9-a8b0-24b706a416d0/?utm_term=.8e8177f53c45">praised the series</a>, noting its “gritty reality.”</p>
<p>The most telling praise came from Bravo Organization, a notable Vietnam veterans’ group. The ‘Nam <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=npIsZV7grboC&pg=PA66&lpg=PA66&dq=Bravo+Organization+hama+the+nam+platoon&source=bl&ots=Nb0c1pCQT_&sig=fSUArleWkctNcrVSdxEVVDbbuIc&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjm_ZLUprLWAhUK2WMKHWwfDLMQ6AEIOTAH#v=onepage&q=%22Bravo%20Organization%22&f=false">was recognized by the organization</a> as the “best media portrayal of the Vietnam War,” beating out Oliver Stone’s “<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091763/">Platoon</a>.”</p>
<p>As works of art, the Vietnam War comics are only one of many places the Vietnam War has been restaged, remembered and recollected. One of the war’s enduring legacies is the way it has inspired its veterans, its victims and its historians to try to piece together a portrait of what actually happened – an ongoing process that continues with Burns’ documentary. There has been no universal consensus, no final word. </p>
<p>As Pulitizer Prize-winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674979840">wrote</a>, “All wars are fought twice. The first time on the battlefield, the second time in memory.” </p>
<p><em>This article was updated on Sept. 21 to correct which forces Marvel characters fought in comics.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/83756/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Cathy Schlund-Vials does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Because they’re mass-produced and written in a serialized format, comics can be seen as historical documents that reflect the political moment.
Cathy Schlund-Vials, Professor of English and Asian American Studies, University of Connecticut
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/81097
2017-08-17T20:20:47Z
2017-08-17T20:20:47Z
Friday essay: Joan of Arc, our one true superhero
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181923/original/file-20170814-28481-uls9bz.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Joan of Arc depicted on horseback in an illustration from a 1505 manuscript.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>One need not be a parent of a young child, as I am, to be conscious of the full-blown resurgence of the superhero in contemporary popular culture. Beyond the dizzying proliferation of fetishised merchandise to do with Marvel and DC protagonists and the frankly obscene sights of middle-aged folk squeezed into uncomplaining lycra and leotards at Comic-Con gatherings, one may sense the spectral presence of the hero, that crucial cultural figure which has beguiled humanity since the epics of Homer and the demigods of ancient mythology. Yet there is more to the hero than a fanciful tale of courage and exceptional strength.</p>
<p>Heroes and heroines are the most explicit and visible manifestations of our aspirations as well as our limitations, poetic accounts of our capacity for transformation within the boundaries of human imagination. What, then, does the ceaseless preoccupation with a particular heroic icon tell us? And why is it that despite all our cynicism and exhaustion, we still find resonance and meaning in the images of those, fictional or factual, who embark on quests for the betterment of their conditions with an unflinching optimism and self-confidence?</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181921/original/file-20170814-28487-1fa67m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181921/original/file-20170814-28487-1fa67m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181921/original/file-20170814-28487-1fa67m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181921/original/file-20170814-28487-1fa67m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181921/original/file-20170814-28487-1fa67m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=907&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181921/original/file-20170814-28487-1fa67m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1140&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181921/original/file-20170814-28487-1fa67m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181921/original/file-20170814-28487-1fa67m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1140&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A miniature of Joan of Arc, circa 1450 and 1500.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
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<p>I want to address my own decision to write a novel about one of history’s most enduring heroic personae, the medieval Frenchwoman known to us as <a href="http://www.histoire-france.net/moyen/jeanne-darc">Jeanne d’Arc</a> (1412–1431), or <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Joan-of-Arc">Joan of Arc</a> in English. I also wish to assess her perseverance as a figure of global fascination despite her historical origins in a world that is very different to ours. </p>
<p>Jeanne’s world was one of conflict, tragedy and turmoil. She was born during one of the most brutal phases of history’s longest war, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Hundred-Years-War">the Hundred Years War</a>, which pitted an embattled French Kingdom against the forces of an intrepid England and an even more dynamic and rapacious medieval feudal duchy of Burgundy. Her native village and community were directly affected by the war’s ravages, and it was perhaps in response to the miseries of war, and perhaps also due to unique personal and psychological factors, that the young peasant woman, claiming to have been instructed by divine “voices”, left her village to end “the pity in the kingdom of France”. She was, much to the astonishment of future historians, received by the French king, armed and sent to fight the English as the “chief of war” of French forces. Her unexpected victories turned the tide of the war and made Jeanne into one of the most famous and most heroic figures of her epoch.</p>
<p>Has it been unsophisticated of me, a contemporary writer all too aware of the unheroic realities of our age, to devote so many years to researching and writing a book on the life of a woman who may be seen as an archetypal image of female heroism? Why is it that so many other writers and artists continue to write their own novels and songs and make films and musicals about this enigmatic icon of early European history?</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/medieval-women-can-teach-us-how-to-smash-gender-rules-and-the-glass-ceiling-68024">Medieval women can teach us how to smash gender rules and the glass ceiling</a>
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<p>I’ve been deeply fascinated with the story of Jeanne d’Arc since early childhood, when I came across an image of her – a horsed knight in an excessively shining armour, with an indisputably feminine face and hairdo – at a bookshop in Tehran in the early 1980s. But fascination alone does not result in an artistic project as complex and all-consuming as writing a modern literary novel.</p>
<p>So it is that I must admit that the tale of the young peasant woman who ran away from her village to become a knight, does not simply interest me. I find it exhilarating. Even though I have spent more than three decades reading and thinking about her, I’m still in awe of some of the basic elements and contradictions of her story.</p>
<p>How could an uneducated teenage girl lead armies to victory? How could a woman as highly attuned to the material conditions of her world – the topography of the battlefields, the byzantine milieu of late-medieval French politics – also sincerely believe in the metaphysical and believe that she heard the voices of saints and angels? </p>
<p>And why is it that this woman, so devoted to her political cause and to her vision of a united France, chose to be burnt at the stake at the age of 19 instead of acquiescing to her judges’ directives during her infamous trials of condemnation, and not live to see to the completion of her figurative crusade?</p>
<h2>Paradoxes and complexities</h2>
<p>There are many more paradoxes and complexities one may discern when it comes to the life of the so-called Maid of Orléans. For me, these are not entirely resolvable, nor are they reducible to one or more possible resolutions. In her I’ve found a potent paragon of the human subject at its most radical, most truthful embodiment.</p>
<p>She is one of the most extreme manifestations of the singularity of humanity, and a testament to our capacity to break with what reduces us to bare life. I will therefore offer this definition of the hero/ine for our time: s/he is one who, against the obsessions of bourgeois individualism and late-capitalist identity politics, fights to eradicate all impositions of individuality and identity to reach universal selfhood. S/he becomes a champion for all of us, and in her we find that most impossible and improbable phenomenon – genuine, irrefutable hope.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181927/original/file-20170814-28430-1fufnio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181927/original/file-20170814-28430-1fufnio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181927/original/file-20170814-28430-1fufnio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181927/original/file-20170814-28430-1fufnio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181927/original/file-20170814-28430-1fufnio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181927/original/file-20170814-28430-1fufnio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181927/original/file-20170814-28430-1fufnio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181927/original/file-20170814-28430-1fufnio.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Long before Che, Joan of Arc committed to changing the world from the bottom up.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In my view, Jeanne d’Arc, despite living a good 350 years before the advent of the modern revolution, is an exemplary materialisation of the figure of the revolutionary. Long before Robespierre, Marx, Lenin, Luxemburg and Guevara, Jeanne the Maid of Orléans committed herself to the cause of transforming the world from the bottom up. </p>
<p>She fought for justice in the direction of a universal collectivity – a very early, very nascent notion of a unified nation under the rule of one sovereign – and not in the interest of a particular <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identity_politics">identitarian</a> or sectarian grouping.</p>
<p>In the medieval, pre-modern heroine, we find a pre-emptive inversion of the mantras of the “progressive”, reformist, non-revolutionary bourgeois activists of postmodernity. For Jeanne the Maid, the public was the personal, and not merely the other way around. She made the world be the change that she wanted to see in herself. She thought local and acted global.</p>
<h2>Revolutionary rupture</h2>
<p>If Jeanne the Maid is a heroine, then, she is the heroine of the rare, luminous event of revolutionary rupture. This take is one which I’ve placed at the heart of my novel, <a href="http://giramondopublishing.com/product/the-last-days-of-jeanne-darc/">The Last Days of Jeanne d’Arc</a>. The novel is not only an articulation of her radical character as I understand her; it is also a story of forbidden amorous love and intense, heretical spirituality. But central to the novel’s fictionalised account of a historical figure’s life - and my depiction of her sexuality and unique psychology - is my view of her as a woman who was transformed by her drive to transform the world in which she lived. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Read more: <a href="https://theconversation.com/hearing-voices-is-more-common-than-you-might-think-66934">Hearing voices is more common than you might think</a></em> </p>
<hr>
<p>Other artists, ideologues and believers have had widely differing configurations of the famous Frenchwoman. For most, however, she too has been a heroine, a woman who, against the limitations and expectations situated in socio-personal contexts, fought, defeated and was martyred by formidable manifestations of those very socio-personal limits. Nevertheless, mine and my other contemporaries’ versions of Jeanne the Maid’s heroism perhaps dramatically differ in their content, if not in their basic, heroic discourse.</p>
<p>Unlike pop star Madonna – whose recent song, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uv40WdbfVw8">Joan of Arc</a>, depicts the Maid as metaphor for the multi-millionaire entertainer’s own discontent with fame and disagreeable pop culture journalists – I don’t see Jeanne as a symbol of my personal maladies.</p>
<p>Unlike former pop star David Byrne – in whose recent musical, <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/20/a-protest-musical-for-the-trump-era">Joan of Arc: Into the Fire</a>, Jeanne is an anti-Trump (pseudo) riot grrrl enraged by misogyny and binary gendered ideals – I can’t, despite my own overt political leanings, bring myself to ascribe to the medieval heroine the ethos of a contemporary ideological project. </p>
<p>And unlike the great Bruno Dumont – the maverick French philosopher-filmmaker, whose own musical, <a href="http://www.allocine.fr/video/player_gen_cmedia=19571470&cfilm=245585.html">Jeannette: l’enfance de Jeanne d’Arc</a>, aspires to gently mock and deconstruct the religio-ideological premise of the cult of the Maid – I have approached her life with seriousness and with fidelity to the truths of her narrative.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/G1sixA1vPPw?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Whatever one may conclude from considering the trajectories taken by the heroic image of Jeanne d’Arc since her brutal death in the hands of her Anglo-Burgundian enemies in 1431, one cannot but be stricken by the sheer variety of the Maid’s reincarnations. She’s been depicted as a national heroine and a nationalist symbol (and also, to my and many a leftists’ dismay, a popular mascot by French ultra-nationalists), a rebellious heretic and a goodly saint. A feminist role model and a belligerent military leader, an innocent mystic and a tortured victim. </p>
<p>However one may choose to view her, there can be no denying that she is, and will continue to be, one of the most singular and significant exemplars of our troubled species. Forget Wonder Woman and Batman – Jeanne d’Arc may be our one and only true superhero.</p>
<p><em>Ali Alizadeh will speak at the Melbourne Writer’s Festival on the topic of <a href="http://mwf.com.au/session/revolutionary-women-2/">Revolutionary Women</a> on Fri 1 Sep at 11.30am.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/81097/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ali Alizadeh does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Forget Wonder Woman and Batman. The Maid of Orléans - an uneducated, teenage girl who led armies to victory - is a hero for our times.
Ali Alizadeh, Senior Lecturer in Literary Studies and Creative Writing, Monash University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/79900
2017-07-04T20:12:08Z
2017-07-04T20:12:08Z
Spider-Man: Homecoming spins a web of fact and fantasy
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/175539/original/file-20170626-315-1h7k01d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Columbia PIctures/Marvel Studios/Sony Pictures</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>“Spider-Man, Spider-Man, does whatever a spider can”</em></p>
<p>Spider-Man: Homecoming is the <em>second</em> modern reboot of the Spider-Man film franchise, with the young Tom Holland following in the footsteps of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield. That’s three different film series in a 15-year period!</p>
<p>The movie takes a relative step back in scale from the universe-destroying plot elements of recent Marvel films, concentrating on a young Peter Parker’s struggle to balance school and being Spider-Man.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176220/original/file-20170629-16091-1sjr0gr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176220/original/file-20170629-16091-1sjr0gr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176220/original/file-20170629-16091-1sjr0gr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176220/original/file-20170629-16091-1sjr0gr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176220/original/file-20170629-16091-1sjr0gr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176220/original/file-20170629-16091-1sjr0gr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176220/original/file-20170629-16091-1sjr0gr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Vulture is a more human villain. Columbia Pictures/Marvel Studios/Sony Pictures.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The film is great - a very funny, teenage-focused take on Spider-Man. It also benefits from a more human, more interesting villain than recent Marvel films, in the form of Michael Keaton who plays Vulture.</p>
<p>Here we’ll get stuck into some of the science behind the scenes. There are minor spoilers ahead but nothing that you couldn’t get already from the trailer, which you can check out below:</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YPUASeS6qc0?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>Web shooting</h2>
<p>Spiderman moves through the city effortlessly (mostly) by shooting his web out to attach onto high points and swinging repeatedly.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176224/original/file-20170629-3435-1juncxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176224/original/file-20170629-3435-1juncxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176224/original/file-20170629-3435-1juncxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176224/original/file-20170629-3435-1juncxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176224/original/file-20170629-3435-1juncxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176224/original/file-20170629-3435-1juncxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176224/original/file-20170629-3435-1juncxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176224/original/file-20170629-3435-1juncxf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Swinging along. (Columbia Pictures/Marvel Studios/Sony Pictures/vitaliyvill/123rf.com/Michael Milford)</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>If we assume that the web is itself not powered (more like an unpowered projectile; a bullet rather than a rocket), we can calculate the initial shooting velocity required to reach the tops of buildings with his shots.</p>
<p>First let’s try ignoring air resistance to keep things simple. We’ll need the acceleration due to gravity, <em>g</em>, and the height of the shot, <em>h</em>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>v = sqrt(2 × g × h)</p>
<p>= sqrt(2 × 9.81 × 100)</p>
<p>= 44.29m/s</p>
<p>= 159.5km/hr</p>
</blockquote>
<p>That’s not very fast - a bullet from a .22 rifle exits the gun at a <a href="http://www.ruger1022.com/docs/22lrballistics.htm">speed of about 300 m/s</a>.</p>
<p>However, if air resistance was taken into account, it’s likely that the web firing speed would need to be significantly higher.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Plausible, given the apparent speed of the web shots on screen.</p>
<h2>Swinging off a web</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176228/original/file-20170629-16069-13shxf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176228/original/file-20170629-16069-13shxf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176228/original/file-20170629-16069-13shxf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176228/original/file-20170629-16069-13shxf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176228/original/file-20170629-16069-13shxf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176228/original/file-20170629-16069-13shxf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176228/original/file-20170629-16069-13shxf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176228/original/file-20170629-16069-13shxf2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Pool Party Crasher.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Columbia Pictures/Marvel Studios/Sony Pictures</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Most people have heard the common sayings about spider web being “stronger than steel”, even though <a href="https://theconversation.com/spider-silk-is-a-wonder-of-nature-but-its-not-stronger-than-steel-14879">that’s a myth</a>.</p>
<p>On screen, it looks like Spider-Man swings around on a pretty thin bundle of web. Is this realistic (assuming his web is like a normal spider’s web, not some Marvel universe “super” web)?</p>
<p>Spider web has a tensile strength of about 1,000 Megapascals (MPa). This means it can support 10<sup>9</sup> Newtons per square metre - 1 billion Newtons is the force required to hold a 100,000 tonne weight. The square metre refers to the <em>cross-sectional</em> area of the web.</p>
<p>Of course, he hangs off a web strand that is much thinner than 1 square metre - from the image it looks like the strand has a width of maybe 3 mm. If the strand is a cylinder, of radius <em>r</em> and knowing PI (𝝅) is 3.14, then we can calculate area (<em>A</em>):</p>
<blockquote>
<p>A = 𝝅 × r<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>= 𝝅 × 0.0015<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>= 0.000007069 m<sup>2</sup></p>
</blockquote>
<p>That means the web strand can hold a static force (<em>W</em>) of:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>W = A × tensile strength</p>
<p>= 0.000007069m<sup>2</sup> × 1,000MPa</p>
<p>= 7,069 Newtons</p>
</blockquote>
<p>That could support a static weight of about 720 kilograms (divide by gravity = 9.81 m/s/s).</p>
<p>Now when spider-man jumps off a building and falls, he exerts a dynamic loading on the web, increasing his effective weight from say 60 kg by several times. Even so, carrying his own weight is plausible.</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> Plausible for his own mode of personal transportation.</p>
<p>However, he takes on much heavier objects with his web…</p>
<h2>Holding a ship together with web</h2>
<p>During a fight between Vulture and Spider-Man, a malfunctioning Chitauri gun slices the Staten Island ferry in half, threatening to drown the passengers. Spider-Man intervenes with his web, endeavouring to hold the two halves of the ship together. </p>
<p><img src="http://i.imgur.com/mVwKZWc.gif" width="100%"></p>
<h4>Spider-Man doing his best to keep everything in one piece. Columbia Pictures/Marvel Studios/Sony Pictures</h4>
<p>Doing the calculation properly for the forces involved in holding a ship together like this would be very complex and involve modelling the interaction of the ship with the water.</p>
<p>We can do an approximation by ignoring any supportive force from the water, and considering the moment at which the ship is cut in half (before the two halves tilt outwards much).</p>
<p>A Staten Island ferry can <a href="http://www.siferry.com/currentvessels.html">weigh around 3,200 tonnes</a>. Each half will feel a gravity force of 9.81 × 3,200,000 = 31,392,000N.</p>
<p>The ferry is 21 metres wide, so each half is 10.5 metres wide. If we assume the ferry is a homogenous mass, then each gravity force will act at a distance halfway out from the centreline: 0.5 × 10.5 = 5.25 metres out from the centreline.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Moment = 2 × F × d</p>
<p>= 2 × 31,392,000N × 5.25m</p>
<p>= 329,616,000Nm</p>
</blockquote>
<p>To counteract this moment, Spider-Man positions himself between the two halves of the boat and shoots spider strands out to hold the halves together - what the steel structure was doing before it was cut in two. It’s not dissimilar to the Strongman “Hercules Hold” event:</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/d5qjY1cYdLM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>If we assume the ferry is about as tall as it is wide, we can say that Spider-Man’s webs are pulling the boat together at about half the height above the bottom of the ship - 0.5 × 21 = 10.5m. We can calculate the two forces he would have to pull together the boat with:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Moment = 2 × F × d</p>
<p>= Moment / 2 / d</p>
<p>= 329,616,000Nm / 2 / 10.5</p>
<p>= 15,696,000N</p>
</blockquote>
<p><img src="http://i.imgur.com/IO4Thst.gif" width="100%"></p>
<h4>A splitting headache for Spider-Man (DZIANIS RAKHUBA/123RF.COM/MICHAEL MILFORD)</h4>
<p>The web would be under a total tensile force from these forces combined - so about 31,392,000N. </p>
<p>We can calculate the cross-sectional area of spiderweb required to do that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Area = F / tensile strength</p>
<p>= 31,392,000N / 1,000MPa</p>
<p>= 0.03139 m<sup>2</sup></p>
</blockquote>
<p>And consequently the number of “normal” web shots (3mm-thick strands) he’d need to shoot:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Number of web shots = area required / web shot cross sectional area</p>
<p>= 0.03139m<sup>2</sup> / 0.000007069m<sup>2</sup></p>
<p>= 4,441 shots</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Even though he does go crazy with the web, it still doesn’t look like he gets off anywhere near that many shots…</p>
<p><strong>Verdict:</strong> It’s a nice touch that they show him targeting the strong points of the ship structure for his web reinforcement. Even with that, he was in big trouble though - so it’s pretty realistic that Ironman had to come save him and the ship. </p>
<h2>The verdict</h2>
<p>Spider-Man: Homecoming is great blockbuster entertainment, as fun as the <a href="https://theconversation.com/guardians-of-the-galaxy-volume-2-a-scientists-review-76511">Guardian of the Galaxy</a> movies in a more family-friendly way.</p>
<p>It’s regularly very funny, while managing to not veer into trying too hard. Tom Holland is fantastic as Peter Parker / Spider-Man and says he will continue with the role, which is great news for fans.</p>
<p>In terms of the science, the film does pretty well. Within the “rules” of the MCU universe, most of the big scenes are plausible.</p>
<p>There’s even a nice touch in a classroom scene, when Peter is quizzed by his science teacher on the formula for angular acceleration of a pendulum. </p>
<p>Peter’s answer of <em>angular acceleration = gravity * sin(theta)</em> is both <a href="https://www.khanacademy.org/computing/computer-programming/programming-natural-simulations/programming-oscillations/a/trig-and-forces-the-pendulum">correct</a> and also a sly reference to Spider-Man’s frequent mode of transport - swinging through the city streets on a web “pendulum”.</p>
<p>So - entertaining <em>and</em> accurate: we hope that the new Spider-Man sticks around for a while yet. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176221/original/file-20170629-16091-19s9mg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176221/original/file-20170629-16091-19s9mg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/176221/original/file-20170629-16091-19s9mg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176221/original/file-20170629-16091-19s9mg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176221/original/file-20170629-16091-19s9mg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176221/original/file-20170629-16091-19s9mg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176221/original/file-20170629-16091-19s9mg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/176221/original/file-20170629-16091-19s9mg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Good job on this one Tony.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Marvel Studios/Columbia Pictures/Sony Pictures Releasing</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/79900/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Milford is a Chief Investigator at the Australian Centre for Robotic Vision, an Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Microsoft Research Faculty Fellow and Founding Director of the education startup Math Thrills Pty Ltd. He receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Queensland Government, Caterpillar Corporation, Mining3, Microsoft, the Asian Office of Aerospace Research and Development and AMP.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Juxi Leitner is a Research Fellow in the Australian Research Council funded Centre of Excellence in Robotic Vision. Juxi is founder of the Brisbane.AI and robotics interest groups, two not-for-profit organisations aiming to raise awareness about robotics and AI research in the general public and creating opportunities for communities to interact with local researchers.</span></em></p>
Peter Parker knows the formula for angular acceleration of a pendulum, and applies his science knowledge with gusto in the latest Spider-Man movie.
Michael Milford, Professor, Queensland University of Technology
Juxi Leitner, Research Fellow, Robotics & AI, Queensland University of Technology
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