Why I Can't Stop Watching Superhero Movies

On Christmas day, Wonder Woman 1984 was released on HBO Max. I couldn’t believe how excited I was for it. When I’d finished watching it, I became aware that the urge for this type of movie wasn’t quelled. I found myself rewatching the first Wonder Woman movie as well as Justice League for the first time. 

I started to contemplate why I was suddenly so interested in superhero movies. 

Of course, I’d enjoyed them in the past. As a child, I loved watching these heroes in Saturday morning cartoons—Batman, Xmen, Superman, Spiderman. I never got into the comic books themselves, but I remember becoming fixated on the backstories of the characters and asking my brother to explain who this was and why they did that. 

I remember being especially interested in characters like Magneto. Sitting on the living room floor (before our house was remodeled) in front of an old white sofa with bowls of sugary cereal in front of us, I’d ask my brother “so, he’s a bad guy?” 

“Kinda,” my brother would reply. 

“Kinda?” I’d ask. 

“Well, he wasn’t always bad. He and Professor X used to be friends?”

“Friends?” The thought of myself and my best friend at the time, Kela, no longer being friends was a concept I couldn’t wrap my head around. It was impossible. “Why are they fighting then?”

“‘Cus he doesn’t like people. He only likes mutants.”

After that, my brother would be sick of answering all of my questions and I’d be left staring wonderingly as the two once-friends fought each other viciously. 

In my childhood brain, my schema for relationships was broadened by these cartoons. I was suddenly aware that there could be more than just friends or not friends. There could be once-were friends. I also started to see that there was more than just “good guys” and “bad guys.” Sometimes, people could be both. Sometimes, people could change. 

Maybe this logic is what draws me back to these stories again today. 

In many of the superhero stories, there are human bad guys and then there are manifestations of evil—and we’re able to distinguish between the two. When faced with battling a human bad guy, our superheroes often face an internal struggle. They remember the person this baddie was or see the potential goodness they could have in them. Harvey Dent, Oswald Chesterfield Cobblepot, Felicia Hardy. 

 They were once people with family, love, insecurities, pain… it was only after trauma or hardship that they turned into a “bad guy.” 

Even Loki, who is definitely not a human, is depicted as having a caring side though his own trauma and nature often send him on a path of trouble and destruction. Still, there is love for who he was and who he could be from the often too black-and-white Thor. 

And none of these superheroes are out to publicly shame any of these baddies. That’s not the point. They may do something silly to them in the moment if they’re just bank robbers and not serious criminals, but their ultimate goal is for rightful justice. (Thor may be here the exception because I believe he (as all older brothers do) likes to torture his little brother a bit). 

I think this is what I’m craving from 2021. 

Not only the obvious desire for law enforcement to act for justice, rather than punishment, pleasure, or power, but ourselves as well. How we bask in the glory of seeing someone fall from a pedestal! These days, it feels like we’re not only trying to stop gross actions from happening—and don’t get me wrong, they need to be stopped—but we’re also thrilled by the opportunity to ridicule those who have committed these acts. We’re succubuses for other people’s shame. 

I guess we’ve been like this for centuries. What would a good witch trial be without a mob of excited peasants with pitchforks?
I am no exception either. I can’t hide the fact that I was enthralled with the story of Hilaria Baldwin and loved that the media was covering it so extensively. 

But why? Why find joy in someone else’s misery? That’s not what I want to find joy in. I’d like to believe, instead, that they’ll see what they’ve done, how they’ve hurt or betrayed others, and want to change. 

This doesn’t always happen. Even in the superhero movies. But our heroes continue to hope. And every so often, a baddie does change (even if it’s only for an episode, one comic, or movie). 

I think the other type of “bad guy” has drawn me back to superhero movies as well. The non-human manifestations of evil. 

This type of bad guy creates a hopelessness in the world. There’s no goodness within them that you can appeal to. 

With the Coronavirus, we’re facing this type of hopelessness. It can feel overwhelming. Something about a superhero who has powers and uses those powers simply to save us… it’s comforting. 

Comfort. That’s why superheroes were created, right? 

So many were a product of wartime. They were there to give us comfort while soldiers fought horrific battles. They helped us escape what evils we faced in real life by promising, in another universe, evils were being defeated by people with powers (and often with capes). 

Superheroes make uncertainty feel less uncertain. 

So I’ve rediscovered my interest in superhero movies. They may be ridiculous and over-the-top, but for now, they’re helping me see the world a bit brighter (even if it’s only for one episode, one comic, one movie).