While looking into this, I found out the motto has changed a number of times since Superman was created. But the first Superman movie with Christopher Reeves revived the American Way version and basically submitted it as a superhero's motto. So I would like to know what people think about this move by DC Comics. Is this a good thing to change his motto? Do you think it's sincere or marketing ploy or both? Why do you think it bothers people to change the motto and should it bother people?
Hey, Melissa, this is interesting. I had actually not heard about this. My initial reaction is that, of course, it's a good thing to change the motto. It was an outdated motto, one that I certainly don't think represents sense where most I don't know if I want to say most, but where a lot of people, certainly those that consume comics are at with regards to maybe their patriotism at this moment in time
Melissa Mccarter
@lissahoop · 0:52
Taylor, you are reflecting a lot of the citizen I felt when I heard the announcement. But I also heard the announcement in terms of the backlash Conservatives were talking about, how is anti American. And so I wonder how that fits into because they obviously knew that there was going to be a backlash and who they're doubling down as their audience. And I also was thinking in a larger context, too, that it could have to do with them wanting to have a market reach outside of America
Melissa, you know, I do think that this could be, in some ways a genuine attempt to attract new readers to DC comics. Now, we know that DC and Marvel and Disney and all these large corporations are trying to be as present in the here and now as possible. Being inclusive is sort of at the forefront of that, whether it's done in a truly honest way or not. That is something that we see them all doing
If I'm being honest to the point where it's become sort of painful. And yet the vast majority of people I come across just don't care about reading comic books. They couldn't be bothered. I think a lot of those same people just can't be bothered to read much in general. But that's a different story. And I'm wondering why that is is it because there are just way too many comic books out there and people feel overwhelmed?
Charlie Olivieri
@Charlieri · 3:08
I think it's probably just trying not to be cringe worthy, to be honest, because that's what it might come across like to read a comic written 2021 in America, praising the American Way as the best way
Sontaia Briggs
@PKBriggs · 3:20
And I think people are realizing that you're not even realizing but being responsible to let's do art well, particularly in a way, let's do marketing or let's present things in a way that appeals to the most people and then actually reflect the society that we live in. So I think it's a response of them being reflexive. I don't know. Good
Melissa Mccarter
@lissahoop · 4:16
As a comic book fan, I'm curious about if other people want to weigh in who aren't comic book fans in terms of what they would feel appealing, would they feel more included in this community? Would this make them into interested in comic books, or would they just make them more interested in terms of the movies and the television shows
Charlie Olivieri
@Charlieri · 4:18
Possibly the opinion that comic books are like the die Hard fans and no one else. Really. So there is a certain aura of inaccessibility that I don't know if you're aware of, but I guess that's what's been the barrier specifically for me, I would say, of getting into this traditional idea of comics rather than say a graphic novel that I can find in Mike local bookshop
Melissa Mccarter
@lissahoop · 2:15
Although I pointed out that the motto has changed over the years and hasn't always had the American way in it. So we're trying to maybe at a crossroads between nationalism and identity as a member of a world community. So thank you for bringing us up the nationalist aspect. Payment
And I think that just speaks to maybe where comic books is at and has been at in general. And maybe why younger audiences are more up. I guess you could say more up for the MCU and the DC films because they don't necessarily feel as reputationally tarnished. Can we say that as comic books do when we think about the way that gender and sexuality and women's rights are portrayed in history, comic books, the ones that have been around for quite some time
Melissa Mccarter
@lissahoop · 1:52
Thank you for pointing out how the American Way is also a dog whistle in America and how it is alienating people of color to say the American Way and divisive, and that if you're trying to reach out to that larger audience and make it not just a white male genre, that just changing that term itself is a step forward. I'm curious, though Superman is a white male, and is it enough to change his motto, or is he just a helpless?
Melissa Mccarter
@lissahoop · 3:57
She may get into this culture, into the comic books, into this world. We're talking about going to Comic Con together as a family and her feeling part of something. What's interesting about just as a side note about this shop is one of the few places that you can go in our conservative community where people can feel like outsiders. They're one of the only places where it's required to wear masks. So there's a sense of respect for science
Don't just brush it under the rug. I understand that this is a Press release, and they're not brushing it under the rug, as in they're announcing it, but contextually within the story. Let's see a reflection of those changes. There were many issues where Superman was fighting side by side with the American military. I'm just curious to see where they will take things with this shift
Charlie Olivieri
@Charlieri · 4:38
I think there is an openness, as you said, Melissa, to these comic bookshops in these spaces where, yes, they want to listen to the science and keep their people safe with masks. And they're often quite open places for LGBTQ people and all of that kind of stuff as well, just because it kind of is a place to explore ideas, I think they aren't as closed off as they used to be. Definitely
Melissa Mccarter
@lissahoop · 2:01
And I was thinking about how truth and justice in itself is such embedded with certain cultural assumptions and that with Black Lives Matter and other social justice movements. The whole idea of justice has been questioned in general and that it's laden with certain white supremacy and certain racist undertones the idea that there is justice for some people and not justice for others and how that relates to Superman being a white male, although he is an alien, how he can really fight for justice. What does justice look like?
Melissa Mccarter
@lissahoop · 1:38
Charlie, I wish that I had heard your response before I responded, I tagged you in it below, and I kinda addressed what you're talking about in a side kind of way, and it kind of leads to a larger question of can Superman escape his past? Is he just intrinsically part of the past, problematic history that he has? And also further, if he just embodies as a character problematic aspects of American culture, white heteronormatives, the idea of isolationist
Jessica McMillan
@JLMcMillan · 3:46
So the comic book artists I followed. So the Frank Fizada and the Boris and the Julie Bell and things like that. And then I have a husband who's obsessed with the comic book world. And so it's very much part of our everyday conversations in the house, and soon my daughter will follow suit. And I think it's nice to know that there are these shifts happening not only with more female people, people of color, and that's again, that's MCU
Melissa Mccarter
@lissahoop · 1:38
Jessica, I'm curious how the world would think about it if we had Captain Canada or Superman had been fighting the Canadian fight. If that's even possible. I'm thinking about how Canada is is portrayed in the Handmaid's tale, and it's like a refuge and a resistant to this conservative ideology that overturned American government and how it gives a specific sense of Canada's role in the world and how it would be totally different. And would you even be able to do a superhero that was Canadian?
Sontaia Briggs
@PKBriggs · 1:56
Superman is much of a good boy for me, and that's all I'm going to say on that. I want to go with this whole rant about the wrong thing. So I think it is good. I think it means that people are aware of things that could be problematic. And as far as I can tell the comic world, I have all kinds of friends from varied backgrounds who are in the comics
Jessica McMillan
@JLMcMillan · 1:59
And I don't know, what would the world think often, Canada is also portrayed as being passive because we aren't the first to rally to go to war. We're not the first to assert ourselves as a world power. And there's a huge difference right there in displays of nationality. So there isn't this imperative to emblazon a hero figure with a flag that's just not really actually part of our cultural identity, which is fairly multiple
Dewuan .
@FryedOreo · 1:28
This was one thing that Frank Miller used as a plot device in the Batman versus Superman. Or, I should say, the Dark Knight Returns comic limited series that he put out where he depicted Superman as this sort of puppet of the government of the US government that was basically killing on behalf of the American people. So, yes, we are updating ideas, hopefully, to have better concepts in terms of this comic book with Superman. But it almost seems like a natural pull in that direction
Clay Lowe
@soulcruzer · 2:27
But I would question now what even is the American way? I would be hard pressed if someone now asks me what the American way actually is now. So I think we need to refigure that out. And while we're figuring that out, then maybe this is a good model to stay in its place in terms of for better tomorrow, which is what we all need to be working towards anyway. Yeah. I think it's a good thing that's my bottom line. It's a good thing