Pregret
I thought I’d invented this word. Oh, well.
Have you ever been writing an answer on a test and you’re fairly certain it’s wrong, but you write it anyway because the alternative answer sounds even more wrong?
That happened to me yesterday.
But more importantly, I just realized that I’d unnecessarily recreated a concept. Last week, when I wrote my Callooh! Callay post, and last year when I invented the concept of an anti-life, I thought I was being bright and making a useful concept. I didn’t stop to wonder if anyone had thought about it before, I just went with it.
But someone had already created it. Specifically, Otto Binder and artist George Papp in issue 68 of Superboy. I’m talking, of course, of bizarro world.
Now, I hate superman for many reasons (some of which Steve will probably point out in the comments). So I didn’t think about bizarro world when I recreated the concept. But now that I realize it is the same thing as anti-world, I feel like a guy on Linux in a world of PC.
My only consolation is that bizarro world is the opposite of the DC universe, not our own universe. (Believe me, the metaphysics of this bother me.) I’m also slightly consoled by the fact that I hate superman and don’t want to be referencing him– however slightly– in even my rarest of posts.
So yeah. I feel a bit cheated and self-conscious, but silly for feeling that way because it’s a stupid comic. (Not that comics are stupid: just Superman and all associated ‘Super’ superheroes.)
And now I have to think of an awkward end to this post/segue to link to this somewhat related post. ((Oh, nevermind: I got it.))
I thought I’d invented this word. Oh, well. Have you ever been writing an answer on a test and you’re fairly certain it’s wrong, but you write it anyway because the alternative answer sounds even more wrong? That happened to me yesterday. But more importantly, I just realized that I’d unnecessarily recreated a concept. Last…
YOU CALL AND I ANSWER:
Superman has three primary irritating factors
1. Too powerful. While modern writers make efforts to reign Superman in (either with depowering factors, mitigating factors, or enemies who are flat out ridiculous), Superman exists conceptually as the most powerful thing since sliced bread was bitten by a radioactive spider, exposed to gamma rays and given the ring of power. Compound this with an all-or-nothing weakness (either you got Kryptonite or ya don’t) and you’ve got Superman.
A normal story needs to have some degree of threat, some feeling that the hero may not succeed, in order to be anything other then a yawnfest. Superman can only have three genuine enemies.
“The princess is in another castle”, where the villain is in one place, while his evil scheme is elsewhere, so it’s a race against time for Superman to win. Superman is super fast, so he always wins.
“I have Kryptonite!” Hooray, they have Kryptonite, and Superman has to find a way to beat them. Batman probably shows up.
“I am stronger then you!” Superman faces off against someone who is just as powerful as him, in which case it’s just a punch off where Superman eventually wins.
2. Do-everything-man. I understand he was made in a different time, but Superman is just too versatile. He can breath out frost, shoot heat-beams from his eyes, has incredible strength and toughness, can fly, can run at super-speed, is intelligent enough to thwart Lex Luthor (a complete genius) time and time again, and can weave a basket in mere seconds.
He can do too much. It’s just dull. He’s like a swiss army knife of a super-hero. BORING. Give a hero a niche and let them call in help for a cross-over when their niche is no good.
3. Too boring. Superman is a lawful good boring wanker. There, I finally said it. While some stories have danced around what would happen if he did it, if Superman went spare he could kill all the irredemable bad guys that infest the DC universe in a day. Lex Luthor… seriously Supe’s, the guy is just plain evil. The Joker? Take him out already. He could get at least through half the DC universe’s rogue’s gallery before Batman shows up and stops him.
Yes, we’ve all seen the stories where everything is worse off because Superman does this, but I find Superman’s “Truth justice and the boring way” of doing EVERYTHING really dull. This is a flaw in the character. He is just boring.
Do you guys see the anger and forethought Steve has given this? I could say many of the same things, but with nowhere near the passion Steve has.
By the way…
OMG OMG OMG FREE COMIC BOOK DAY!!!