Action Comics #775 - Atop the Fourth Wall

hello and welcome to atop the fourth wall where bad comics burn but this patreon sponsored episode is sure as hell not a bad comic if you've been here for the long haul then you may recall all the way back in the Superman eter a SAN review where I opened it briefly talking about this book to understand this story we need to understand the context of superhero comics at the dawn of the new millennium moral compasses of society change over time what is considered okay or appropriate or even good or bad has changed popular opinions about what is right and just indecent will evolve in turn our media reflects those changes and thus Paragons of what is good must in turn reevaluate their ethics and determine whether they need to change superheros thus have evolved over time to reflect the ethos of the people making them what pop culture says is good and right during their present you can see it especially as the Bronze Age of comics emerged suddenly superheroes faced problems that can't be punched or put in jail from the Bronze Age into the dark age you have revaluations of what it means to be a superhero how to actually help the world you can create a direct line from squadron Supremes 1985 maxi series wherein the titular heroes try to turn the earth into a utopia directly to a 1999 book called the authority in between you have the time of heroes getting darker and more violent to respond to a darker and more violent world as conceived by writers who are no longer restrained by an idealism of ages past heroes could use guns could kill could Grint their teeth and never smile in many cases indistinct from the villains they were fighting and sure many lamented it even at the time but the changes were always going to occur eventually to quote mr. Spock changes the essential process of all existence superheroes and their ethics were always going to change because they had to if they wanted to stay relevant and interesting and that brings us back to the authority the authority was a Wildstorm book originally written by Warren Ellis that spun out of storm watch that book I reviewed the zeroeth issue of a few years ago as well as its later integration into the DC Universe post new 52 a secret United Nations force of superheroes designed to keep over the earth they were disbanded just prior to the authority for a few reasons that aren't really relevant although that does include the fact that they fought the Xenomorphs from alien some of them died and that story is considered canon the premise was that several former members of Stormwatch and other heroes banded together in a powerful alien spacecraft to basically say screw it we don't need the backing of the United Nations we're gonna protect the earth no matter what it takes without answering to any other Authority in the first 12 issues Warren Ellis is run the book was pretty good there was still a bit of edge Lord Ness at times but the characters had very real moments of humanity some of the things they did to stop threats were a bit morally questionable but ultimately they were always trying to save lives and dealt with very science fictiony kind of threats its downside really was that each storyline was only four issues long and thus there were a lot of ideas that could have expanded the story more but ended up just being footnotes in them as a result but that's not terrible really when I was reading this stuff in anticipation of this review the thought that occurred to me was wow this is clearly what Mark Miller wanted to do with The Ultimates but sucked at so anyway Mark Miller took over the book after Warren Ellis left reading those first twelve issues I was a bit confused about why what's so funny about truth justice and the American Way was a direct response to it and then I read some of Mark Miller's run and it all clicked into place ah this is what it's an answer to suddenly the team a very professional imaginative and interesting characters who didn't want to kill but believe that sometimes it's necessary to stop a threat became a bunch of smug jackasses who constantly swear talk crudely and happily discuss how they're gonna murder their opponents and then openly do so by flying at SuperSpeed through someone's head or the light they slaughter admittedly totalitarian governments with no plan in place to rebuild nations other than take on refugees in their massive spaceship they fight a thinly-veiled pastiche of Marvel heroes who are only worse than them because they're also extremely bigoted and happy to murder innocent people in the process hell their boss seems to be like a disgusting parody of Jack Kirby for no reason other than whoa look at how edgy I am which come to think of it is pretty much mark Miller's entire wheelhouse I don't know why I'm surprised who'd have thought trouble was actually one of his less awful works inexplicably this stuff was popular it wasn't topping sales charts but the readership was growing over time which is an uncommon thing these days outside of temporary sales gimmicks like crossovers and variant covers the sales orders between the authority and Action Comics were comparable to each other not great but consistent and indeed growing at times with the authority even overtaking the premiere book of Superman and thus with that popularity and people showing support and love for a group that basically said we'll do what we want with our power just be grateful we're somewhat nice and think racism and homophobia are bad except when we do it the question rear its ugly head our traditional superheroics pointless naive should Superman and heroes like him be willing to kill people with their power to match the supposedly far more successful and effectively brutal tactics of groups like the authority and please know pedantic about well Superman did kill this one time in this cannon story or anything like that aside from circumstances being contrived to do such a thing it doesn't mean the story is good or if they even still considered it canon by that point and more importantly you know what we're really talking about should Superman just put his fist through Lex Luthor's face to end him that sort of thing because that's what the authority did that is what is at the heart of the story a complete and fundamental shift in the morality of mainstream superheroes and don't think it hasn't happened before even Captain America the dude who punched Hitler at one point in time thought killing was always wrong absolutely the morality z' of our heroes can shift with a change in popular opinion so why not Superman in 2001 writer Joe Kelly had an answer the comic we're gonna review today most of you are probably more familiar with the story thanks to its animated adaptation Superman vs the elite and it is a very faithful adaptation owing mostly to Joe Kelly being the writer of set adaptation as well little details were change changed a battle on Io became a battle on Earth's moon sort of thing back stories and the like were expanded for the sake of movie length it's definitely one of the better DC straight-to-video animated movies but we're concerned with just the comic that spawned it so let's dig into Action Comics number 775 what's so funny about truth justice and the American Way [Music] the boys with bad [Music] you [Music] imagine gun we're just bad Amazon trucks [Music] the cover is bad yeah sorry for such a critically acclaimed book highly celebrated and beloved this is just an awful cover it's Superman kneeling or standing I thought he was kneeling but it actually looks more like he's trying his best to do a split seer amidst some wreckage his eyes are glowing red the area seems to be devastated honestly it looks like he did it himself especially with the red eyes also his cape has cracks in it yeah I don't know what's going on there those aren't folds it's like it was a solid piece and it was fragmenting maybe it's supposed to be dirt but it doesn't look like it and none of the rest of him is like this I mean you combined this image with the title what's so funny about truth justice and the American Way and it looks like Superman is being immensely serious about it you think there's something funny about those well so did this building behind me we open on Superman flying over the earth on his way to Libya where a terrorist attack has taken place it only takes him about four minutes to fly from metropolis to Tripoli but right before he gets there the terrorist threat has ended admittedly this is the DC Universe and before 9/11 so terrorist attack in this case equals giant cyborg gorilla it was also holding a giant gun which just seems like overkill at that point but yeah that thing's dead as hell and probably several thousand other people too by the looks of it we cut to the Daily Planet where Jimmy Olsen is loudly complaining about another newspaper scoop on the story how the gorilla was brought down by four people known as the elite Perry White is equally unimpressed the elite saves Tripoli I'm sure the families of 2000 soldiers feel saved I mean not to side with the elite but they did technically save it the headline is not inaccurate not even particularly inflammatory or misleading days like this I really really wish I knew more swear words doesn't matter Jimmy the comic would still censor them giant bloody hole in a gorilla though that's perfectly fine to show Clark Kent is reporting on the scene and communicating with the planet from there manchester black apparent leader of the group told the libyan general the old ways are dead trust me in less than a year you'll love me for this they forgot to mention he followed that up by severing the man's leg The Shins using only his mind new headline the elite saves general from athlete's foot the reporter who wrote up those details Jack Ryder aka the antihero The Creeper enters and defends his story and unfortunately I have to give a bit of a critique of the book I'm not really a big fan of Doug monkeys art as it is he's another artist where everyone looks like they're scowling even when they're smiling but he really dropped the ball on this page Clark Kent and Jack Ryder are drawn almost exactly the same like Ryder has a different suit and scruffier hair but just glancing at the page I keep thinking it's just Clark Kent has taken off his trench coat then you put them side-by-side like in these panels and it's really evident speaking of these panels Clark wants to know how we could portray such obvious murderers as heroes Ryder says the military we're about to do a lot more damage trying to fight the guerrilla and the elite stopped it although I'm pretty sure he says it with a bit of racism in there too because suddenly Jack Ryder is that much of a dick the situation could have been contained without a single life lost Superman could have Superman that would have been great enough monkey business guys I'm taking you and your terrorist chums downtown for a spanking and three months later it would happen all over again you'll notice however that that response did not actually address the point that less lives would have been lost he just complained because he saw Superman as corny or naive image is more important the world is sick and broken Kent people want someone to fix it not handout slogans and bandages I mean I think the injured people might want some bandages at least we cut over to the White House this was during the time when Lex Luthor was president god I miss the days when that seemed unbelievable and Alexis being informed that there's a considerable percentage of people who approve of the elites actions what's more the power levels that even one member of their team cold-cast is displaying could potentially rival Superman the one called cold-cast blinked his eyes and shorted 15 satellites from 300 miles out TV reception is regularly a problem when cold cast isn't sleeping the instant the elites look crosswise at American citizens we we'll turn them into cat food British citizens though hamster chow until then these people tend to mix with their own meta fighting Medes for bragging rights dude I just sliced off the legs of a Libyan general and killed a giant gorilla beat that release some statement condemning violence in all of its horrible forms and meanwhile we wait and see who's standing when the smoke clears [Music] the elite release a manifesto onto every computer on earth they're the good guys namely us and there are the bad guys yeah good guys are regularly known for having manifestos we do not believe in nations we do not believe in treaties or boundaries or classes or politics we do believe in a thing called love but only when we listen to the rhythm of our hearts basically it says if you treat people like trash to further your own petty aims they'll come down on you like an atom bomb they're downloading data via post dimensional probability run old using multimodal reflections sorting Superman starts using his own Kryptonian computer systems to try to track them but his fingers move so fast that the keyboards start overheating and smoking he's talking about this with Steele who notes that the elite seem to have gotten under his skin Superman decides to wash off his skin with like lava I don't know maybe it's like mellow yellow or something point is Superman does wonder for a moment if the world hasn't moved on from them before they can really talk about it there's an alert from Japan Superman flies off as we see some news broadcasts where there's a ton of support for the elites activities the elite are here to stay who's strong enough to say otherwise okay at the moment nobody even knows what the elite look like and they've only done like one activity maybe it's time for people to cool their heels on how super mega awesome they're supposed to be I mean yeah they took down a giant cyborg gorilla but I'm gonna go like five guys on the Justice League who could do that too anyway Superman is intercepted by a group of Japanese super villains and is knocked back before he can get his bearings again at the elite arrive and quickly slaughter the villains he's having trouble recovering from whatever hit em eventually gets back up the elite showing themselves these are the four of them manchester black is the dude in the Union Jack shirt he's a powerful telekinetic the guy behind him in Chains is cold-cast who can manipulate electromagnetism I don't know why he's wearing all the chains only that I think it might have been an iffy decision to make the black dudes outfit just a bunch of chains the blue hair dude is the Hat a magic user who can conjure up stuff from his magical hat and finally Menagerie her outfit is made up of creatures called sim beasts basically weird alien creatures that are kind of like say Marvel symbiotes but there are many of them all in one and more bizarre and appearance the sim beasts can be used for various tasks and form into various objects including wings for her to fly what's interesting is that while this is meant to be a critique of the authority they're not really a pastiche of them in the traditional sense unlike Mark Miller is hugely unimaginative parodies of Marvel characters in his run it's more about the attitude of the team than a one-to-one copy there are references you could probably make menagerie being a flyer with wings is kind of similar to the authority's Swift Manchester black wears a Union Jack t-shirt like Jenny sparks did during the war and Alice run but that's pretty much it anyway they bring Superman back to their base of operations where cold-cast explains that he's the one who took out Superman by accident a high-frequency neutrino wash he was using it to try to bring the villains down but they were shielded Manchester says that the villains were a group of genetically accelerated metahumans working for an isolationist faction of the government planning on destroying Tokyo in another few seconds Superman however objects to their need to kill the metas to stop them the actual watch a live rerun of Hiroshima only with blokes who can turn your guts inside out with their eyes don't even get me started on what they could have done with their elbows Superman scoffs at their attitude and ends justify the means kind of thing black tries to be diplomatic in return explaining that their base is actually a bacterial colony from another dimension a living spacecraft that they stole and brought back here which they've nicknamed bunny this one is definitely more of a direct reference to the authority which also had a living spaceship but their relationship with it was more benign at least in the Warren Ellis issues never away saw them do much with it during the mark millar ones I read anyway yeah Superman just says he doesn't care if they're terrorists or armed rebels or anything like that they are murdering people and calling themselves heroes and he wants them to stop black thinks he's just jealous you may not believe this but as a kid I used to love heroes though I never used the word for us instead I used a word that made a sound like snobs that's what good guys do right good you're pounding the snot out of evil and bright tights no questions no gray areas it was a perfect bloody dream for a boy who lost a mother to lung cancer and a father to Adolf and then I woke up turns out I had wet the bed because I don't follow your systems man masks of a hiding capes of a play tights actually do wonders for my bum so I'm gonna keep wearing those villains don't share their plans before they smoke you cept in campaign speeches or the pulpit or in front of the classroom this is the DC Universe they most assuredly still do that I mean have you met dr. sivana reality is a mite bloodier than sitcoms or comics the gray stretch-out father okay this one might be a direct reference to the authority wherein the Hulk parody directly said comic books are well there you are and if you want to disregard what they say because hey it's a villain saying it well the leader of the authority also tells the president we're not like comic book heroes it astounds me when I see writers and comics insulting comic books it always comes off as so try-hard and immature like those comics take me seriously anyway Superman says that he recognizes the darker elements of the world but that they can't throw morality in the garbage because of difficult times black counters that P's privileged and hasn't encountered real difficult times that survival sometimes means doing morally questionable things there are human beings with the power to make a difference and they're doing it their way and they love us for it I like that that is especially brought up because I think it really highlights another cheak of the authority we're in they really embrace their celebrity status and use it for drugs sex and money they can say it's about the greater good as much as they'd like but it often comes across like they do care more about how they look than doing the right thing black says Superman can handle the traditional bad guys but everyone else is gonna be dealt with their way now be a good little dream and say I understand mr. black of course a person up yours dick knows I'm sorry I said that wrong uh-huh cram it puss lips yeah I think I got it that time Superman says he'll stop them but they just teleport him down to earth Clark meets with his father and discusses all this especially how people are more and more embracing the elites point of view some folks mostly loud and angry ones others just scared they look outside and see revolving doors on prisons government corruption maniacs hiding in the desert children yes children truly are the worst among all the things you listed well what happens to children these days gets anyone's brought up damn kids in their fortnight's sometimes the truth justice and the American Way just doesn't make them feel better they want easy answers quick results dammit dad it's almost as if nobody even listens to me when I say their problems are over there and that over there needs to take care of it themselves Clark asks if they're right but of course Paul Kent says it isn't but that you can't just talk someone down from that position you need to lead by example Clark thinks he's right pas can't even saying that hey you can always just defeat him in battle if the lesson doesn't work but Clark seems to indicate that he's not sure if he can actually win after a quick montage of Superman observing people debating the elite including some kids play-acting a fight between him and the elite we get into something that was definitively not in the animated adaptation a parody of the men in black who are attacking a city it's only for like two pages but it's just kind of weird that that reference is in there anyway Superman uses his knowledge of the aliens with them who think water is a poison to get them to surrender without a single person killed he of course knows the elite are watching and they show up he says now he'll get the JLA to detain the aliens and then question the rogue de o agents to find out who they are and what they want but black says he already knows who they are mostly thanks to these same guys being responsible for Menagerie z-- well menagerie black says that these people are bad and that their trial will be a sham just resulting in them training more people to be [ __ ] then I'll stop them again and again and again if I have to until they get the message and I'll do it without melting anyone into slag for kicks Superman not melting anyone into slag for kicks damn you Americans like to hear yourselves yep okay dude you just gave us a whole friggin monologue about who the aliens are and why you should be allowed to murder them after they've already been stopped don't claim Superman is the one who talks too much anyway he tells the Hat to kill them all and then rain acid on their families to send a message remember we're the good guys Superman punches the hat before he can do that to hit getting seen by floating cameras that the elite brought with them transmitting that to the world thanks for the just cause mate if you're not part of the solution etc etc tomorrow and they teleport away so like noonish I just wanna know if I have time to get lunch first actually it's Clark Lee's in bed with Lois he says he's gonna have the fight at dawn Lois asks as his wife why he needs to do this and not bring in the JLA to help the elite didn't take the fight to the JLA or the new gods or someone they wanted me know you went to them no they threatened innocent people with acid and wanted to murder people already in custody just because Clark has been eager to take them down doesn't mean he started this conflict Lois is genuinely concerned that the elite can beat him he tells Lois about something he overheard during his excursion in the city kids playing a Superman in the elite I heard a child that tell his friend that he wanted to be in the elite because it would be fun to tell bad guys fun too kill okay but to be fair Clark have you played doom eternal because hot damn people have to know that there's another way Lois they have to hear a voice of compassion and faith instead of spite and anger they have to see that someone believes in humanity strongly enough to die for them okay Lois let's be real here dying in the DC Universe is like taking a long weekend you're back by Tuesday he leaves a note for her and heads out at dawn calling on the elite to finally end this time to wake up little man the dream is over well good I was tired of going to work naked everyday they want to throw down right away even calling up body parts they want to take but Superman asks them to not do it in the middle of a city black agrees and they teleport to Jupiter's moon Io with a little reference to 2001 a Space Odyssey thrown in because why not let's not dwell on that Superman makes one last appeal to them that there's another path besides the violence they've chosen this fight is being transmitted to the entire world and I can't help but wonder if this message is meant for humanity as well not just the elite anyway black of course refuses and Superman gets tossed around rule number one he has the power makes the rules rule number two no parking on Sundays no one hits one of my people and walks well that's easy considering you just sent him flying this isn't about love is about removing the cancers that fester in us and flushing them down the toilet the people don't want babysitters and spandex to slap them on the wrist when they're bad they want surgeons to cut the ugly bits from them and charge them through the moral nose dr. Manchester black at your service okay now we're getting into the real nitty-gritty of this whole thing four additional points that I'm gonna try not to repeat check out SF Tabriz review of Superman vs the elite a lot of good stuff there that can be echoed here as I brought up in the Superman 4 review Superman is not a god he's just a guy trying to do good wherever he can unilaterally declaring yourself to answer to no one to make choices that will affect billions of people without even asking anybody first does not make you someone in service of humanity but rather placing yourself above them and while black is saying that people don't want babysitters and and X he made it clear with his first sentence that he does not care what people want he who has the power makes the rules he said might makes right but to paraphrase my favorite movie if superheroes are modern-day Knight Terrence then the code they should be following is might for right those who have power should use it only for that which is moral no one hits one of my people and walks was the next thing he said basically we are in charge defy us and you will die what the elite and the authority promise is not a better world it's just a world living in constant fear ordinary people have to be afraid of escalation they have to be afraid of these super powerful beings suddenly deciding you know what you guys never vote for your own self-interest so you don't get to vote anymore they have to be afraid of being collateral damage because beings like them don't actually care about them they claim to but the truth is they just like flexing their might their hammers and every problem looks like a nail people have to be afraid that one day their masters will grow bored of them and wipe them out after all they already don't care about anything not lives not treaties not governments not morality so why would they care about the people they're supposed to protect and let it not be said that I'm not fair even mark Miller's book asked hey shouldn't we be concerned about that guy with godlike powers also being a heroin addict I'm kind of iffy about him being a part of the good guys if this keeps up reality is pain bile and darkness reality rules more on this in a bit anyway yeah the elite wail on Superman dropping stuff on him blood vessels bursting thanks to telekinesis and finally cold cast unleashing a massive energy field that blows Superman away leaving only part of his cape however even as the Hat is pulling out champagne Superman speaks to them I finally get it now thank you I've been trying to understand that Doge meme for years now but I finally get it I've made the mistake of treating you people like people you will now be treated like gopher something hits Menagerie and her body goes wild the sin beasts basically not keeping calm and she collapses the hat says she's not breathing and Manchester wants cold-cast a blanket the area and his electromagnetic power is odd the blast that supposedly killed Superman has worn him out Superman creates a massive sandstorm around them black protects cold-cast with a telekinetic field but the Hat is out in the open normally his magic would protect him from any physical damage but the wind speeds create a vacuum that sucks away all the air collapsing his lungs Superman then sends cold-cast away he took a trip into space and Mach 7 if you had super hearing you'd hear a pop in ten seconds that'll be the bubble wrap I put him in points to monkeys art in this next page this is an ugly Superman and it's supposed to be ugly it's supposed to look harsh and unattractive and everything you don't want to see out of a Man of Steel and the torn ass is a nice touch how does it feel knowing that everything you thought you had has been taken away from you how does it feel to have your flaws exploited to be deconstructed there are like 70 billion what if Superman was a bad guy stories so let's act him out shall we how does it feel to watch dreams die the dream of being a murderous douche canoe is gone forever black prepares to use his telekinesis to fight back but Superman uses his heat vision laser focused through blacks retinas right into his brain he says he used his x-ray vision to identify an unusual part of his brain the source of his telekinesis and cut it out destroying his powers he whacks black around for good measure as he starts to cry both terrified and outraged by this his one recourse is to talk to the cameras that have been observing this and transmitting it to earth proclaiming that Superman is no better than they were yes they did see didn't they they saw all the ugliness the anger and I bet it frightened them it frightened me when I decided to cross the line do what you do I was terrified thought it would be tough but you know what anger is easy eight is easy vengeance and spite are easy as was indicated by Jack Ryder's words at the beginning of the comic there is a misconception that Superman is a big meathead who just delivers corny lines because that's the stereotype of superheroes but superheroes have evolved their writing has gotten smarter and consequently Superman is not stupid one of the greatest things about Superman is that he possesses all this power all these abilities that any cynical person would say would corrupt and make him into a terrifying tyrant but it didn't he chose to use his powers for kindness to be a good person the kind of person who wouldn't murder everyone when he got angry to always hold his power in check in a world full of cardboard to make sure that he never hurt innocent people he got smarter because he needed to be smarter to ensure that he wouldn't take a life it's not like he's never thought about doing these things it's just he chose not to he thought about it he considered it and he decided it was wrong the elites have all that power and none of the wisdom they're sloppy they're arrogant and they're cynical a little imagination and they could use the magnificently broad powers they have to accomplish the same things they claimed to be about without a single life lost but no they think the world is ugly and mean and so they got ugly and mean in response it's easy to look at the terrible things happening at any given point in history and see all the examples of greed corruption and evil but it's also easy to overlook the compassion the decency to see people being nice and good and wonderful that's my deconstruction of superheroes people can be and are kind so why wouldn't someone with incredible abilities be kind to anyway as Superman himself says he doesn't like his heroes ugly and mean doesn't believe in it which is why he didn't kill the elite they're all unconscious and the Justice League have commandeered a bunny who of course as a living being they were able to communicate with and it is more than happy to be free of them well he didn't even destroy blacks powers he gave him the equivalent of a concussion nullifying his powers temporarily until the authorities can come by and put on psychic dampeners to hold him back black is pissed saying that Superman should have just killed them all so long as the hot beats in my chest I'll come after you you punsie twit if you think this is over you're living in a bloody dreamworld you know what black I wouldn't have it any other way dreams save us dreams lift us up and transform us and on my soul I swear until my dream of a world where dignity honour and justice become the reality we all share I'll never stop fighting ever although I suppose we could set up a superhero black ops team to deal with darker threats in the world with your sister leading them and put Cassandra Cain on it oh and cold-cast to know our feelings dude and so our comic ends with Superman flying off uh you know you guys are still on Io right might want to teleport back to earth especially since you're not exactly looking in great shape Clark this comic is great and I think you all know that by now it does feel a little skimmed down in places especially in terms of individual characterization and motivation for members of the elite but it hits the important elements quiet moments of contemplating and debate from Superman to his friends and loved ones seeing that people have varying opinions about the elites position and it doesn't really have an easy answer for some of the stuff black says just that it's more important to stick to morality than to embrace the darker elements of our nature after all how can we make the world a better place to live the dream if we're not willing to try to live up to the better world one could argue that it's more interested in trying to parody and deconstruct the authority that it detracts from the narrative but I don't think so as I said a Superman versus the elite served to expand the story in all the right ways and it helps having the original writer on board with many lines lifted straight from the comic and a few others slightly modified Monkees art might not be my favorite but he especially has a dirty quality to a lot of his art that's served well in some areas like the ugly Superman or the elites much grimmer visages and I especially like the ending lines contextualizing that old superman motto fighting a never-ending battle it's not never-ending because it's a cause that will never be won but because he'll never give up on his dream this is not the first time Superman has been confronted by this kind of thinking and it will not be the last but this is definitely one of the best examples of Superman's sticking to his principles and winning through on them next time the build-up for the six hundredth episode begins and as such I need a bit more time to work on it so let's have ourselves some more comic-book quickies [Music] [Music] one of our first gigs these obelisks popped up all over the solar system turned out there were mega ovum prepping to hatch and mama was an act of God with an attitude figure if there was nothing left alive for her to hatch maybe she'd stay home this one was the farthest along generated its own o2 up here sort of a cutie in a dead alien baby kind of way so in the DC Universe the monoliths weren't full of stars but dead alien babies hello my friends please be sure to like this video subscribe hit the bell and share it with others need to get a chance maybe check out my patreon [Music]

Channel: Linkara-AtopTheFourthWall

Views: 172,491

Keywords: at4w, linkara, atop the fourth wall, comic, comics, comic review, dc, dc comics, superman, action comics, superman vs the elite, what's so funny about truth justice and the american way, action comics #775, the elite, manchester black, the authority, joe kelly, warren ellis, mark millar

Id: AQNQNBHghho

Length: 37min 6sec (2226 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 14 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/BiMikethefirst]

The Superman comic "What's so funny about truth, justice, and the American Way?" was written by Joe Kelly originally in response to the supposed "deconstructive" comic series the Authorities, a comic series that called the concept of superheroes childish and naive, while its attempts of realism revolve around having shitty main characters who gleefully murder people, have more drugs in their system than blood and murder corrupt world leaders without any attempts or ideas of how to rebuild a country.

While originally this was an excellent criticism of the cynical violent nature of edgelord comics while actually answering why superheroes do what I do, I think it actually works better now as a criticism of series like The Boys, a nihilist escapist series obsessed with "taking down convention" by just saying "fuck you man" while conventionally ignoring any flaws they're worldview has.

[u/CMORGLAS]

“I made the mistake of treating you people like...people.”

[u/Batknight12]

Kingdom Come is similar to this, deconstructing edgy 90's anti-heroes of the time and showing the consequences of allowing superpowered beings to kill and have free reign to take the law fully into their own hands without any restraint. Pitting that against the more traditional idealistic values of classic heroes and showing their way worked better despite the drawbacks.