As much as I had to smile while reading Kevin Melrose’s wrap-up of the Captain America #25 angst — anger that it happened AND sold out in a nanosecond — I kinda dug reading this think piece from Saturday’s Boston Globe, entitled Super Realism: Comic book heroes aren’t as invincible as they once were, about the effect even imaginary characters have on real people when extreme violence and death harm their fictional friends (see Harry Potter book #7).
A couple of interesting sidenotes:
From Bradford Wright, the author of Comic Book Nation, a cultural history of comic books: They’ve been a few steps behind the trend toward more violence in other media. When you compare it to movies like Saw and Hostel that are basically just torture sessions, what comic books do is pretty tame. But they do feel some pressure to keep up with that.
From Dina Borzekowski of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, who believes the attitudes and behavior of children 8 to 12 are more affected by media they perceive to be realistic than by media they see as fantastical.
So, if your eight-year-old gets a copy of Cap #25, chances are good he or she won’t be permanently damaged. Can’t say the same for his or her older brother, however… Truth in reporting: I did get a little misty when Capt. Kirk died in Star Trek: Generations.
March 13th, 2007 at 8:37 am
Now there’s a well-informed quote.
March 15th, 2007 at 1:47 pm
I think this is a publicity stunt which is why they went and got Stephen Colbert involved. Its just to grab attention and get people interested. I think they may even go as far as to say Stephen Colbert was involved in the murder as I posted in my blog via the link below.
Either that or they think Punisher is more popular and should take over. But marvel says SHIELD is investigating the Will that left the shield to Colbert. Something is off.
http://flogger.looble.com/2007/03/colbert-suspected-in-murder-of-captain.html