Affects Of Superheroes To Chil Essay, Research

Affects Of Superheroes To Chil Essay, Research Paper

Since the publishing date of the first illustrated books, the hero characters have taken their places in
the daily life of the people. In fact, many hero characters had existed for centuries through the history.
They had been living in tales and epic stories and being spread by the word of mouth between people
but they were not as effective as the visual ones.

Especially after the rapid increases in the film technology, the film industry started to create new
superheroes. After a while, film makers became aware of the profitability of series films for the
superheroes. Many of the films of specific superheroes are produced by a sequential name. The best
examples for these type of films are superman or the Indiana Jones series. There are sequential
names like superman I, II, III and so on.

Addition to these films, the strength of the image of the superheroes are supported by some items that
help these heroes to be more familiar by the public. These items have a broad spectrum of types from
signed photos to coffee cups and from balloons to t-shirts with a picture of hero printed on. These
promotion facilities have reached to their peak point by the advertising campaigns with these
superheroes. Hollywood became one of the biggest production place for these heroes since the early
years of the American film industry and it s effects are still on the whole film industry.

At the beginning. These heroes , they are either cartoon characters or a film character from TV or
cinema, used to give messages to direct people to good behaviors and they were good nominees to
be presented as a sample of right personality. A good example for this trend can be found in the life
story of Arnold Schwarzenneger who is the founder and the actor of terminator series. At the days of
the early superheroes, when Arnold applied to Hollywood producers for its terminator film projects, he
was refused by thoughts that his films will not be successful but the public values have changed very
rapidly and people, especially children liked these films very much in which many people are being
killed by a superhero who do not obey the orders. The trend towards these type of films have
increased by in a huge amount. Today we can see that at least a dozen of people, no matter rather
they are good or bad guys , are being killed. At the beginning of a new century, the statistics are trying
to find the average people being killed in the films.

The cartoon films, which are mainly produced to address the children, have even many scenes with
violence. Only superiority over Hollywood films is the immortal characters even they have been in
many bomb explosions or fell down from the skyscrapers but this does not help to decrease the
amount of violence being transferred from the films to children.

When we talk about children, especially the psychologists categorize them into several groups like
infant stage, early childhood and pre-school stage. In this report the term child will be used for all the
children from approximately 6 years old to the early years of youth stage. As the results of certain
effects in the early childhood can be observed in the older stages, even in the maturity stage, the
negative effects of superheroes on children that will be mentioned in the next sections is something
should be observed by all psychologists.

Children starts to show a meaningful interest to characters on the pictures or TV at the age of 6 or 7.
In these years, child can identify that these characters are not real. As the time passes, the boys gain
interest towards characters acting adventure and war. Girls are towards dance, song, animals and
comics. Also in the forward stages boys have more tendency to man heroes and girls to women
heroes.

Superheroes are make-believe TV or film characters with imaginary powers. Sometimes they fly or
have extraordinary strength. They are superhuman, beyond human limits. These heroes are not
always characters like superman. Sometimes an ordinary police cop with higher capabilities than
his/her colleagues can be named as a superhero.(Papalia 30)

Using their super powers, they fight imaginary and real life problems like crime, greed and drugs.
Superheroes entertain with excitement and adventure. They can have fun even in very dangerous
situations. They can overcome all the difficulties and obstacles. They fight for the freedom, welfare or
the goodness of other people.

At the last decade, some of the films which are putting the bad guys into the stage of superheroes can
be seen. They are rare but in an increasing trend. When these type of films increase in number and
receive acceptance from the public and especially from the children, higher trends in the criminal
cases can be observed in the future. These type of heroes do not give out even the messages given
out by good heroes as honesty or resistance to badness.

The superheroes are being created mainly by media. TV and cinema films are at the first place. The
books, cartoons, magazines and computers by internet and computer games can create superheroes.
Any superhero created by any of the resources below can also be used and improved by another
resource. Mario brothers created by Nintendo company for a computer game then become movie
stars for a Hollywood production. This is a good example how a superhero can be re-created or
supported by other resources. (http://www.media.wareness.ca/eng)

Addition to all these, some of the other sectors can promote superheroes in order to increase their
sales or fame. Some might use these heroes in their logo or some might serve them as a gift to
customers like happy meal menu in Mc Donald s restaurants for children. Different toys of
superheroes can be presented to the consumers of this menu. The important point in this case is the
potential consumers of this product is completely children. This shows how the other sectors can
improve the image of a superheroes and as a result of this improvement, they enhance the effects of
the superheroes over other people and especially over children

Identification is the effort to be as anyone in the same group. In the first years of the childhood, the
child takes his/her father or mother as a model to resemble to. On the forward stages, usually teachers
takes the places of parents in the identification process of the child. As it can be the basic factor in
choosing a model for identification is to be in the same place or habitat. As the superheroes are
entering to daily life of the children more, in other words as the share of the superheroes in the daily
life of the children are being more dominant with respect to the other models like teachers or parents
with the help of technology, the children identify themselves with these heroes. They accept the
behaving of these heroes as the truths and reject the other ones. At the end of this period, most of the
behavings of superheroes are welcomed by the child into its personality.

Isolation is one of the basic reason for the increase of effects of superheroes over children. The
improvements in the technology and the life conditions in the cities are forcing people into an isolated
life. Children in these type of habitats are also sharing the same destiny. Children are turning their
faces to the superheroes to escape from this isolation and act as these heroes are their friends. This
effect is more obvious on children with working parents and if they are single child. A superhero from
the computer or TV is entering to the child s lonely life to share its isolated life.

Some of the basic needs of the children to be fulfilled are explained in the isolation and the
identification part above. The lack of fulfillment of a children s needs by normal ways makes a child
approaches to imaginary fulfillment s as superheroes. Except these there are some more needs of
children. Children need wisdom, guidance and authority. Also they feel need to be protected, wants
activity and excitement. In the routine daily life it is very hard to see observe these from people around
them. When they can not find what they required, they change their route to the superheroes which
can serve all these by an exceeding amount even they are imaginary .(Yavuzer.+ocuk Psikolojisi 66)

Not only children but everybody can be effected by the superheroes in TV, cinema or in any printed
material. The only difference of the effect of the superheroes over children is how intensively it is.
Children have potentials to be effected easily by an outer source because of lack of knowledge and life
experience. Also their brains are not well developed enough to process these type of effects under the
light of logical facts and come to a conclusion. This makes children easy targets to take under affect.
On the early ages of the childhood, the door of the brain of a child is completely open to learn. This
potential for learning should be used in right way. The high potential to learn on these ages might be
used in a useless way because of the effects of superheroes.

The general overview about the effects of superheroes on the children are presented above. There are
many effects of superheroes on children. Some of them might be good if the superhero is used in a
good way by the creator. This creation might be done sometimes by a scenario writer or an author,
sometimes film director. Although superheroes have positive effects, they usually have negative
effects especially on children. Below are listed some of these negative effects of superheroes on
children.

Today s superheroes are being represented as they are good guys except some marginal ones which
are in the bad guys sections. Freddy from the Elm street is a good example for this. While all these
heroes are performing good work, they kill many murderers, thieves or outlaws. They are clapped
while they are doing these and people think that they are doing well and food examples by their
courage or skills, but some points are being missed meanwhile especially about the psychological and
social effects of these scenes on children.

Many people agree that the superheroes are killing to protect the justice or to provide the security of
the innocent people but while they are doing all these, the spectators or the readers see many crimes
from murder to rape. In our times, even these type of crimes are more familiar to adults than before
and if we evaluate the child psychology under the light of these facts, we can see how much poor the
condition is. (Yavuzer. +ocuk ve Su 88)

Raising Children in a Socially Toxic Environment states that the children, who can see a lot of crimes
while watching their favorite superhero are being effected in a bad manner, even though the superhero
has superiority over all those bad guys who caused this crimes, this does not to provide children to be
kept away from the crime in the film or the book. When a child witnesses this much crime everyday,
they are becoming familiar with all these crimes. The crimes are not so frightening actions for them.
They look like a routine daily action. According to some surveys, in the primetime period on TV, on the
times at which millions of children between the age two and seven have possibility of being in front of
the TV screen, there could be observed a crime at each 16,3 minutes. This period is getting smaller
and smaller every day which means more crimes. According to another survey, a child can witness to
approximately 11.000 crimes until he/she is fourteen years old. This amount is also in an constant
increase.

Even the 94 % of the cartoon films have violence or crimes. When we have a look at a near past, it
was enough for a superhero to have a slap on the face of the bad guy to make the child laugh. Today
in order to create the same effect on a children, in other words in order to entertain the child, the
superhero in the cartoon film must put a bomb in to the mouth of the bad creature. Just a slap means
nothing. This trend makes some volunteers, who are spending great effort to establish child TVs, think
for a solution. Even the programs for prepared for children have a high amount of violence. (55-102)

Superheroes may be fighting for good ideas but a child has a very weak instincts for making any
distinction between the bad or good. If children are grow up familiar with the crime, in the future they
will not be aware of the crimes around them and they will not show any reaction against them.

In the media in which the superheroes act, this may be a film or a book, there are a lot of criminal
techniques presented. Sometimes these techniques can be seen while the enemies or the bad guys
using them and sometimes while superheroes using. When we have a look at the children around us,
it is not easy to find a children who do not know how to load a pistol or how to activate a hand bomb.

While a superhero loading his/her pistol to fight against the bad guys, he /she also teaches all these to
the children besides familiarizing them with the crime. When a child is effected psychologically by
familiarizing with the crime, he/she is a passive danger for the society. Although the social relations
are also corrupted, these children can still stay passive without ant activation but when they are given
the knowledge to be activated, hey became active potentials for the crime.
In many films, the superheroes are in the role of a thief. This character is being used to show the
amount of high intelligence of this superhero have while stealing something. As a result of watching
the right films and reading the right books, it is very easy to learn all the techniques about the science
of theft by the help of teachers known as superheroes. If a person who have grown up with the
superheroes since his/her early childhood, closes his/her eyes and think what he/she knows about
criminal activities, he/she will be identify how serious the social and the psychological effects of
superheroes to the children. If the increasing intensity of this type of hazardous info flow is taken into
consideration, the picture can be seen more easily.

Superheroes are usually work alone, live alone and gain all their success alone. They always fight for
the welfare of the public but the public rejects. When a child feels him/herself close to a superhero,
he/she perceive the public as an opposition in front of the superhero. As he identified him/herself with
that hero, the child also feels as the public against him/herself . (Papalia 38)

This causes the child to feel hate to the public and lost trust over public. He/she becomes suspicious
about all the interactions with the public and this takes the child into a social paranoia and increase the
amount of isolation from the public. According to the psychologists, the disconnection from the public
especially in the early childhood of a person, no matter what the reason for this disconnection is, has
negative effects over the social and psychological health of the child.

The superheroes exists because everybody needs them. They sometimes protects the innocence and
sometimes provide justice. When a child grows up in a imaginary world where justice is being provided
by superheroes instead of security forces and where the security is being provided by superheroes
instead of security forces. Most of the problems in this imaginary world is beyond the skills of security
forces so a superhero is needed to create a miracle and do what the others could not do although they
have to do.

As a result of this imaginary world build by superheroes, the children s subconscious is filled with a
feeling of lack of trust towards the security forces and the justice system because they were not
enough or even week when compared with his/her superhero. One step further the idea of the justice
and security forces against the superhero causes to grow up a hate towards the security forces and
justice system. In the future this hate will not allow the person to act freely about the security and the
justice problems. The lack of trust against these two important members of public life will be in front of
him/her and will be kept between the public and these two members of that public. (Keats 67)

The actions that superheroes are performing are mostly dangerous or sometimes these actions are
impossible. In many cases the some professionals are performing the role for the superhero for
dangerous parts of the films. This is the case in films, in cartoon films and the others the situation is
more conflicting. These type of cartoon characters or computer game characters can perform actions
as hard as the creator of that character wants. They can fly, become immortal, etc. The same actions
are sometimes also available in cinema or TV films in science fiction types.
As the perception of children is weak compared with the elder stages of humans, they can easily
perceive these actions as possible ones. If he/she attempts to do any of these, it may cause physical
harms and followed by them the child might have physical problems caused by the feeling of
unsuccessfulness. The children will normally try to behave like their superhero whenever possible.
They are choosing their costumes according to the appearance of the superhero or even wear directly
it s costumes. They try to walk in that way and they try to talk in the manner their hero is talking.

If these are normal, and if the families are allowing these, the dangerous actions of the superhero
might be also tried to copy by the children because children have a very weak sense and logic in
estimating the future outcomes of their behaving.

Superheroes carry the criminal characters with themselves because superheroes need them to be a
superhero. Although there is a general tendency in film industry towards the representation of these
type of characters as bad guys, many of these criminals have specialties to receive sympathy from the
public. If it is taken into consideration that the ethical values of the children are weaker with respect to
adults, it is not strange for a child to feel sympathy towards a criminal character in the film.

Sometimes the criminal characters might be a superhero or an actor who acts as a superhero in the
film might have some crimes in his daily life. These type of events can be fallowed from the press by a
child and because of lack of identification between the real and the fiction world, the children can feel
sympathy towards the criminals because of this superhero character in the film. (Yavuzer 93)

The aggressive behaving of the hero, like inability at keeping their temper, their rude and aggressive
ways to cope with the situations and their enemies characters reflects an aggressive behavior to the
viewer or to the reader. The most effect is received by the children and at the development stage ,
they directly absorb those type of behaving in their personality.

It is a fact that children grew up in an aggressive atmosphere are most probably having aggressive
persons in the future. This shows that children can be effected from the behaving around them. This
rule does not change even it is created by imaginary characters like superheroes. Aggressive
behaviors are very hard to cope with when they placed into the personality of a child in the early days
of the childhood. After this stage, this aggressive personality controls the development of the persons
psychological health.(Gleitman 57)

The negative effects of superheroes are getting heavier as the technological improvements occur in all
areas. The new technologies are helping to create superheroes with better specialties. Better
appearance, more strength. More intelligence and higher skills are the gifts of new technologies to
superheroes. The film technology is making the superheroes more real to the viewers, TV technology
is insisting on not allowing the children to be without the superheroes. The computer technology and
internet is putting the superheroes in front of the children also in digital world. So the world is getting
harder and harder for living without superheroes especially for the children.
Through out the report, the hazardous negative effects of the superheroes on the children are
explained. These are mostly the problems effecting the personality of the person. As the personality
starts to take its shape from the childhood stage, some of the negative effects from the superhero
characters can directly influence the personality.

Starting from 7 years old children, the negative effects of the superheroes are being seen. The
superheroes are everywhere in the life of us. As the new generations are being educated by
superheroes instead of teachers or parents, it is getting harder to identify the negative effects of the
superheroes because it is getting harder to find anybody grown up away from the superheroes to
make objective comments. As we can not ask a fish to describe what the water is, we can not also ask
the negative effects of superheroes to a person grown up under the negative effects of superheroes.

Children are tasting the violence by the superheroes. A child used to take his parents or teachers as a
model in his/her growing up stage but today, from the very early years, parents and teachers are
replaced by superheroes. The promotion campaigns in different sectors ,from food to textile, are
enhancing this trend. The superheroes are with the children even in their meal.

Children are very familiar with the violence and crime. While superheroes were killing their enemies,
the children had learned all the type of crimes, how can a successful crime be, which weapons are
needed and how they are used.

The superheroes also took the place of the security forces and the justice system. The superheroes
who are above the low and fighting for the rights of people created an understanding against the
security forces and the justice system inside the subconscious of the children. New generations are
loosing their trusts for these members of the public. Also the public had received a share from this lack
of trust.

Superheroes are harmful to the psychological and the social development of the child. These heroes
can be in a Hollywood film or in a cartoon. It does not change anything.

Superheroes are not Mythology
This was originally to be a blog post, then an article, and now its back to a (rather long) blog
post. I hope it stimulates some good conversation. Enjoy!

I'd like to address a common thread among comic analysis/scholarship: the belief that superheroes
are modern myths. While I usually refrain from discussing "interpretive" issues like this, I can
confidently say that superheroes are notmodern myths in any real sense comparable to the cultural
functions that myths serve. 

First off, myths provide an understanding of the world for people. They can be spiritually oriented,
and can give insight to daily living. This is true as much for the myths followed by people practicing
the dominating religions today as it was for ancient civilizations. 

Often times, people think of myths as something in contrast to the belief systems we currently
have, forgetting that myths are just as much a part of modern life as they ever were. At present,
we have a variety of myths that have been popular for several millennia, featuring such memorable
cast members as Moses, Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, Krishna, Laozi, and many other figures. These
myths inform and instruct their followers (and non-followers sometimes) on how to live good lives
through the stories they tell.

Granted, superheroes might inform people's lives with moralistic advice, such as Spider-Man's "With
great power comes great responsibility." However, the ethics they impart are not unique to the
superhero genre, and don't do so any more than other forms of literature. 

The second reason that this belief is troublesome relates back to my ever pervasive interest
in language. Beyond a system of beliefs, myths also provided much more for many ancient cultures,
where the stories began as oral traditions and only later became written down. For these cultures,
myths created a memorization system to record and pass on knowledge. 

In today's literate societies, when we want to know information, we can reference a book or the
Internet. In a literate society, recording of events can be done with writing, so it can be looked up
at a later date. Oral cultures lack this sort of permanent and fixed record, and in its stead myths
can fill the same roles.

For example, some plants are poisonous. In our society, we can record which ones are dangerous
in writing to reference and pass that information on to other people. Instead, an oral tradition
might use a story of some god or spirit becoming that plant -- with some aspect of the story giving
the reason for why the plant is shaped as it is.

Let me make up a myth to illustrate this: 

A particularly stand-off-ish woman breaks the heart of a spirit because of her "poisonous" and
"sharp" tongue. Out of despondency, the spirit transforms her into a plant with pointy leaves. Thus
the plant is called a "heartbreaker," and is avoided at all cost. 

Myths like this are found across the globe. It not only gives a name and reason that the plant is
poisonous, but also offers a way to remember the plant through a purpose for its identifying
features. 

This is a practical function of mythology. These stories can then be passed on orally in a package
that people can remember. It is far easier to remember a series of stories than to remember a
catalog of encyclopedia entries. 

Superheroes do none of these things. 

Sure, superheroes may be a genre with fictional reflections of our culture. But saying that they are
"myths" implies that the term means just "stories" of a fantastical nature. People have often
emphasized how modern narratives follow the same structures as myths, like Luke Skywalker in
the Hero role popularized by Joseph Campbell. However, this only means that these modern stories
draw on the same "raw materials" as myths (or the myths themselves). It doesn't mean that
they are myths. Literature and myth differ to the extant that they affect people's lives.

Of course, most myths are just stories -- but the cultural context of their use makes the difference
in what distinguishes them. In many ways, I think equating modern comic book superheroes to
mythology denigrates the belief systems and cultures of people whose lives are or were infused with
mythology. If, and only if, superheroes can serve an equal function in modern society can they be
thought of as mythological.
Once you consider the practical roles myths can play to a cultural system, superheroes carte
blanche do not fulfill any of the same sorts of functions. Nor should they need to. Superheroes can
do just fine as a literary genre reflecting the culture we currently live in, without needlessly
attempting to be legitimized through unsubstantiated comparison to other inappropriate contexts.

Labels: comics, definitions, linguistics

posted by Neil @ 2:10 AM  27 comments links to this post 

27 Comments:

At April 17, 2006 3:03 AM,   Neil said...

I should add that my citation for the linguistic basis of myths comes from the ever-
intruiging:

Abram, David. 1996. The Spell of the Sensuous: Perceptions and Language in a More-
Than-Human World. New York, NY: Vintage Books

At April 17, 2006 11:49 AM,   AlexanderD said...

On a technical level, I see nothing to disagree with here -- you're absolutely right that
modern superhero stories aren't myths.

Still, by disproving the argument on a semantic level, I feel you’re not quite addressing
the point that’s actually being made. For instance, you’re correct in pointing out that
true mythology is still active in the modern world. But while it’s true that the term
“myth” can be applied just as accurately to stories of Buddha as to stories of Hercules,
it’s equally true that the people who make the argument that superheroes are modern
myths clearly have in mind stories of Hercules and not stories of Buddha. Yes, they ought
to be more specific, but it’s not useful to debate what was said when what was meant is
clearly discernible. It prevents you from getting at why the argument was made in the
first place.

Looking at the kinds of myths specifically being referred to—those of the ancient Greeks,
Romans, and Norse—we see a lot of exciting adventure tales, featuring men and women
possessed of superhuman powers, sometimes battling evil creatures to save innocent
lives, sometimes just battling each other in pointless tests of power. And while many of
these stories do serve some allegorical purpose—whether to revere one of the Gods, or to
instill practical information about poisonous plants—just as many are simply ripping yarns
told to entertain in a world without television. Many were episodic, many left the
featured heroes with conflicting histories, many tossed their heroes together with heroes
from other regions, creating all sorts of jumbled continuities. The similarities to modern
superhero comics are numerous and worth exploring.

Now, as you said, “this only means that these modern stories draw on the same "raw
materials" as myths.” And I agree with you on this point. The argument that superheroes
are myths makes the same mistake that McCloud makes when he calls cave paintings
comics—conflating common structural elements with common identity. But just because
the conclusion of common identity is mistaken doesn’t mean that the common structural
elements aren’t worth exploring. That the heroes of modern comics bear such a striking
 resemblance to the heroes of ancient mythology may not actually say anything about
modern comics—but it certainly says something about the people who make them and
enjoy them, linking us to a civilization thousands of years gone. It’s intriguing that the
desire for these sorts of stories is still with us, despite how much the world has changed—
in other words, it’s notable that we’re still drawing on the same raw material.

Of course, I also wouldn’t argue that this analogy somehow legitimizes superheroes—
linking modern culture to a culture that considered vomitoriums a good idea doesn’t
sound like automatic elevation to me.

At April 17, 2006 1:31 PM,   Daniel said...

I would agree completely with this, and on more than a "technical" level. And, just
because I've seen other posts you've made on the listserv and even perused some essays, I
think I understand what you addressing, and what others are saying you aren't. I think it
boils down to the same reason I completely disagree with the idea of trying to "define"
superhero as a genre, which I'm sure you've seen discussed. As a student of literature and
creative writing, it seems like the terms in both cases (myth, as in here, and genre in
terms of superhero) are basically setting themselves up in this semiotic realm that is
trying to create its own scholarly application, rather than operating by the same
functions and methods that they typically do in most literary scholarship. Which, to me,
is not a good thing; especially if the goal is to bring the medium fully into the "accepted"
material of academia. Perhaps it is similarly why I think superhero comics are far too
dominant as the subject of conversation on the listserv, and in comic scholarship as a
whole. It seems like there is certainly some distinction taking shape, or opposition,
between "the study of the comic book and its mainstream history in our mainstream
culture," and "the study of literature and art which includes comics." I mean, as a
literature student, you don't study the large majority of "mainstream" novels, grocery
store romance books, and so forth. You study rare exceptions to those. Anyway, don't get
me started.
My point is that I think these two approaches to the comic is a factor in where people
aren't quite getting your point. Perhaps this is over-simplifying it, but it seems like mis-
uses of the terms (mythology, genre). The idea that episodic stories of heroes and such
link us to an old culture seems to be implying that there was a "gap," so to speak,
between the two, which there wasn't. I think those associations between mythic stories
and superheroes are ignoring the rest of the entire human history of narrative where the
very same traits can be found. I think what they are really drawing from, albeit
unknowingly, has more to do with elements of narrative that are being mistaken for
elements of myth. Which is, in another way, exactly what you are pointing out. It would
be mythic if people believed that there was once a Kal-El, and that we as humans created
the stories of Clark Kent in an attempt to understand something about identity, or
whatever. There isn't that initial belief as once being true (or perhaps the belief that
there was once an initial belief of once being true) to the superhero, by any means. 
And as far as what it says about the people who make them - well, I would say all it
shows it that they are humans who make narratives like all the rest of storytellers in
human history. And of course, the superhero is currently the most popular, and has
remained so for a number of reasons that I would classify as anything but mythic. In fact,
I would even go so far to say that the reason the superhero has remained is similar to the
same reason Greek/Roman stories remained and continued to be made beyond their "life
of being believed as true;" the only difference is that in the latter, you got your head
chopped off by the Romans if you didn't, while in the former you simply didn't get any
work (and arguably because after the Comics Code there was little else one could use a
 narrative structure). It's the very same reason people like Shelley or Byron created
dramatic narratives NOT about the King or Queen - because it's the only way they could
get away with talking, subversely, about the King or Queen. The same reason why Pope
had to hide his identity for some narratives, and the same reason in the Victorian era you
did NOT talk about sex. Writers write, and writing is read; if that writer wants his/her
writing to be read, it has to be able to get to the reader. 
So, I guess I'm trying to say I completely agree with your final statement there - it seems
a misuse of terms in an attempt to form legitimization - which is only going to hinder it in
the long run. Either that, or it will ultimately get misused so much that the term myth
itself will change in its meaning, to have more to do with elements of narrative rather
than the actual meaning we have now. It just seems like it is going about it all wrong; I
mean, poetry and literature would have never gained "legitimate" academic status if all
we studied were nurse novels; photography and film would have never been considered
serious mediums of art if all we did was take the mainstream "content" of them and
studied the visual similarities to earlier types of images. Wouldn't it be easier to pick up
something other than a superhero book once in a while, rather than pervert and misuse
terms in order to avoid doing so? Don't get me wrong - fun is fun. I pick up and read just
as much garbage as the average fanboy. But I also venture to that dusty dark shelf in the
back where there is other stuff. Hell, sometimes superheroes are back there also - my
point is that when you "read" a work as a literary or visual art scholar - whether it be a
comic, a painting, or a novel - you should be able to tell the difference, almost instinctly,
between something that COULD be studied as a cultural artifact, and something that
SHOULD.
he word superhero is one which can be heard in a multitude of contexts throughout modern society.
From an early age children learn about superheroes, which come to save the world from impending
doom. As time progresses and adulthood approaches, it is now expected that aspirations of learning
to fly and obtaining super-strength are grown out of and have moved towards the notion of
superhero which describes someone to admire and model their moral and ethical standards. Society
presents a wide range of superheros which take into account modern concerns of age, culture,
gender and religion.The superheroes of the modern world can consist of anyone from a great
religious leader (Moses, Muhammad, Buddha, Jesus etc.), or icons of pop culture (sports-stars, pop
idols, movie celebrities), as well as including those that belong to our films, cartoons and literature:
and while they are all vastly different there are also many unifying factors.

Superheroes are most commonly accessed through film and television, with a large number of
heroes being religious figures or displaying religious characteristics. The purpose of this essay will
be to explore the notion of the superhero, paying particular attention to the ways in which religious
heroes are represented in film. In order to do this I will first explore the mythical construct of the
superhero before contextualizing the role which is played by religion in the film industry. From here
the notion of the religious superhero portrayed through film will be analysed drawing upon the film
The Last Temptation of Christ before moving to religious themes and attitudes represented by
cinematic hero’s such as ‘Neo’ the main Character from The Matrix.

As was briefly mentioned earlier, there are many observable characteristics held in common by the
various types of superhero that modern society glorifies. Significant and well known to those
interested in the notion of hero is mythologist Joseph Campbell, whose works cover the mythic
superhero in great detail. His view is that the mythological journeys and stories carried out by the
‘hero’ tend to follow a structural pattern which he calls the “nuclear unit of the monomyth”.
(Campbell, 1968, p.30) According to Campbell it doesn’t matter what religion or civilization a hero
myth comes from, they will all follow this pattern of the nuclear unit: “a separation from the world,
a penetration to some source of power, and a life enhancing return.” (Campbell, 1968, p.35) In
outlining the structural monomyth Campbell further divides these three overarching facets into
smaller components, however, for the purposes of this paper the three are sufficient. 

As the notion of the monomyth is only a framework the themes presented appear in a variety of
guises throughout mythical history. Other similarities also lie in the hero’s mission in that the world
which the hero is entering is always suffering from a “symbolic deficiency” (Campbell, 1968, p.37)
which the hero must deliver it from. This deficiency could be the presence of a distressed damsel,
impending doom, or that the world as a whole has fallen away and reduced itself to evil. Along with
Campbell, Norman also acknowledges that in order to be successful in redeeming the world the hero
must undergo a transformation where he/she discovers the hidden potential that will lead to
victory. For Norman this transformation requires the hero to “abandon all and be abandoned,”
(Norman, 1969, p.5) By this she is saying that the hero will enter into the space where evil lurks so
as to emerge from it liberated – much like Friedrich Nietzsche’s well used saying “Whatever does
not kill me makes me stronger.” (Nietzsche, p.5) The hero and his/her actions provide warning and
advice, as well as encouraging the everyday being to live full and productive lives. They provide a
hope that all people have great potential and that the key to satisfaction is to unlock and harness
that potential, putting it to good use. Campbell reiterates this in saying, “the hero is symbolic of
that divine creative and redemptive image which is hidden within us all, only wating to be known
and rendered into life” (Campbell, 1968, p.39).

Campbell’s work in both the areas of mythology and religion makes easy work of transferring his
notion of the monomyth to religious figures and their cinematic representations. The transcendent
nature of the language used in the previously mentioned quotation from Campbell also serves as an
example of the close link between the notion of hero and religion. This relationship is best observed
in the medium of modern filmmaking, which has maintained its popularity since its emergence in
the late 19th Century. Films and their content are designed to captivate their audience, temporarily
transporting them into the make believe and instilling in them a wide range ideas about the world in
which we live. Because of the integral part that religion and spirituality play in a large portion of
human lives, it is not surprising that it features heavily in the films produced. In their commentary
on the relationship between film and religion, Pope and Johnston agree that in today’s largely
secular world, questions which were traditionally considered to be religious (i.e. Those concerning
origin, meaning and purpose in life) have been shifted from religious institutions to the secular
world. “The questions are still being asked,” says Pope (2007, p.8) “but in different ways and in
different places from those traditionally held to be appropriate.” 

Johnston provides two ways of examining the theological content embedded in cinematic
productions. In talking about the religious issues raised by films he states, “They affect the heart,
then the head.” (Johnston, 2006, p.250) In greater detail this refers to “experiential” and “critical”
axis of analysis. The “experiential” refers to the immediate experience of receiving the film, the
thoughts that are provoked and discussion that follows. The “critical” axis of deconstructing what
has been seen comes with reflection on what has been experienced in a critical manner in order to
create an understanding of what these initial reactions mean. In summary, his view is that
theological and religious themes are intertwined into the fabric of film – all that has to be done is to
approach them with a ‘religion lens’ and examples of theological reasoning will be found.

Now that the relationship between religion and film has been explored, along with the notion of the
heroic monomyth, the attention of this paper may turn to applying these theories to cinematic
examples. There are two main ways that religion can be observed in film: 1) Films which depict the
lives and tales of religious superheroes. 2) Films whose characters and storylines resemble those of
religious myths and events. Each one of these categories will now be discussed beginning with the
former.
One of the best ways that religion, and its superheroes, can be discovered through the world of film
is in those films which retell the narratives and events from a given religion. Films such as The
Prince of Egypt (1998), The Passion of the Christ (2004), Little Buddha (1993) and The Last
Temptation of Christ (1988) all tell the stories of religious superheroes which are derived from the
myths and stories of their respective religions. The representation of religious characters such as
Jesus, the Buddha and Moses in popular film builds their image to celebrity status much like
society’s other superheroes – pop stars, sports man and alike. The Last Temptation of Christ (1998)
directed by Martin Scorcese, is a prime example of the way that film has been used to elevate the
position of the religious superhero. In order to demonstrate the level to which Scorcese’s portrayal
of the life of Christianity’s Jesus lives up to the superhero, a deconstruction using Campbells theory
of the heroic monomyth will be conducted. 

Flesher and Torry, in their book Film and Religion (2007), provide a critical deconstruction of the
film The Last Temptation of Christ, focusing on the positioning of the audience to experience the
well known story of Jesus in a confronting and unexpected way. As outlined in the book, Martin
Scorcese’s – the director of the film, intention for this film was to attempt to capture the human
image of Jesus as conflicting with the divine, by portraying human weakness within him. The film
depicts Jesus as lustful towards women, uncaring and often selfish. It also portrays a confused, God
denying Jesus who is reconsidering the mission he was to carry out. By employing Campbell’s
framework of the classic hero myth and applying it to the narrative context of the Last Temptation
of Christ, as deconstructed by Flesher and Torry, many similarities arise between the figure of Jesus
and Campbell’s ‘hero.’ In its entirety, Martin Scorcese has effectively produced a hero myth in
accordance to Joseph Campbells structure of the “nuclear unit of the monomyth” (Campbell, 1968,
p.35) 

Campbell suggests that there are a number of essential features within the concept of monomyth
beginning with the Separation (1968, p.35). Using Jesus as the hero of Scorcese’s film, two
separations can be extracted from the narrative. Firstly, Jesus is separated from God the Father in
being born into the world; however he is also separated from the world because of his dual nature
as both human and divine. 

Campbell’s second aspect of the monomyth is the initiation, whereby the hero enters a discovery
process of both potential, reason and mission. (1968, p.35) Throughout the movie, Jesus is
portrayed as struggling to develop his mission and purpose on earth and battles with his dual nature.
According to Flesher and Torry’s analysis, Jesus comes to a gradual understanding of his mission,
through a staged “discovery process” (Flesher & Torry, 2007, p.144). which incorporates various
“turning points of Jesus’ development..[through which] his character also changes”(p.145).
Campbell also refers to the sacrificial nature of the hero stating, 

“The really creative acts are represented as those deriving from some sort of dying to the world;
and what happens with the interval of the heroes nonentity, so that he comes back as one reborn,
made great and filled with creative power.” (1968, p.36)
In reference to the movie’s reflection of the Jesus story this would be considered to be the point
where Jesus acquires “access to the power of his divine character and begins to perform
miracles.”(Flesher & Torry, 2007, p.145) Also referring to this part of the monomyth is Jesus’
decision to make the ultimate sacrifice for humanity with his life. Flesher and Torry also reiterate
this in saying, “Christianity’s mission of salvation is to rescue all human beings from the punishment
that their sins deserve, and to give them the heavenly rewards of which sin had deprived
them.”(Flesher & Torry, 2007, p.145) This epitomizes the redemptive power of the hero to restore
peace and hope to the world. And finally, no great story would be complete without knowing the
hero didn’t die for good which Campbell describes as the “Life enhancing return” (1968, p.35)
which is for the Christian story, the resurrection of Jesus and his conquering of death. 
Finally, examination will now turn to the way in which filmmakers extract and manipulate religious
themes, concepts, stories and histories in order to create their superhero’s and the narratives which
they enact. Flesher and Torry (2007) also expressed the view that films often draw on religious
symbols and motifs in order to enhance the message of their hero making it more emotional and
personal. (Flesher & Torry, 2007, p.3) There are many different films which express religious views
explicitly and others more implicitly. Ford (2000) offers that myths are a form of human expression
and are constantly evolving, while being adapted and re-contextualised to create meaning for a
wider variety of audiences. Attention will now be transferred to Lana and Andy Wachowski’s film,
The Matrix (1999), in order to gain an understanding of how both Buddhist and Christian themes
have been adapted for this film. 

The Matrix is a well known film that is often recognised as carrying strong Christian themes and as
representing the messianic story of Christianity. Ford acknowledges that while this is certainly a
strong narrative basis for the film there is also strong parallels with Buddhist philosophy. To
understand his position Laurie Honko’s definition of myth, as cited in Ford’s article, is helpful: 

There are “Four criteria of myth with respect to form (narrative of sacred origin), content
(cosmogonic in terms of cultural origin or existential condition), function (model for human
activity), and context (in the sense that myth provides the ideological content for a sacred form of
behaviour.)” (Ford, 2000.)
Ford believes that the Christian over-tones within The Matrix do not meet these criteria of myth.
His view is that in order for The Matrix to be considered mythic it must meet all the criteria, as
defined by Honko, and so fails resoresenting the content aspect of Honko’s definitionof myth. It is
however, fulfilled by existing themes of Buddhist philosophy. 

A brief description, in the table below, of the Christian influence present in The Matrix will be
provided before focusing on the newly exposed ideas of Buddhist revelation also operating within
the film. 

Neo (main Character): Represents the redemptive figure of Jesus. He is the ‘Chosen One’ who will
deliver the world from the hands of the enemy. He sacrifices himself and is later resurrected
transforming him into a more divine figure who has the full power to defeat evil ascending into the
sky at the end.(Christian story of Jesus’ ascension.)
Morpheus: Seen as being John the Baptist – preparing the way for the ‘Chosen One’. Could also
represent God the Father who guides Jesus and shows him the way.
Trinity: While having a clearly Christian theological name, she is similar in many ways to Mary
Magdalene – slight hint of possible love interest – but cares for and helps Neo.
Cypher: Represents Judas. He is the trusted friend who betrays the team handing them over to the
forces of evil, death and destruction.
Oracle: Holy Spirit – Revelatory powers, also empowers them and gives guidance.
Agent: Devil/Roman soldiers – try to inhibit Neo’s mission/beats and tortures Neo. Neo eventually
conquers both. 
Intelligent Technology: Satan/Sin. Morpheus says, “The world (the matrix) has been pulled over
your eyes to blind you to the truth...that you are a slave. Have been born into bondage.”
(Wachowski, 1999)