Evaluation Of What Makes Superman A Hero
Superman is a beloved superhero who was brought to life in 1938 by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. Absolute power corrupts absolutely is something that is seen over and over, but superman seems to be the only acceptation as he never lets his power interfere with his desire to do good. Superman has been an adored figure in our culture for almost 80 years. With his super strength, super speed and invulnerability to pain it’s hard not to admire him as a superhero. However, though many superheroes have similar or greater abilities, superman’s incredible powers are truly not his defining features.
Superman is often analyzed through his own moral judgment and more so his ethics as a person. Superman always wants to do what’s good and has many key defining attributes. Superman is a polite person who cares for everyone and treats everyone with dignity and respect. In superman 1978 we see this trait come out. For example, upon bring a criminal to a police officer he addresses the officer by name, when with Lois Lane he makes sure to help her with her seat, and when he saves a girl's cat that was stuck in a tree. Later during the film superman had saved California from falling off into the ocean and stopped an atomic bomb from hitting New Jersey and yet, he asks for no thanks. From these deeds throughout the film we see that all though superman is a god, he thinks of himself as no different or special than anybody else.
Superman is always trying to find the right thing to do just so he can help. This is what superman is all about and is portrayed through his 80-year run as the ideal superhero. Harlan Ellison an American writer stated that “Superman is the 20th-century archetype of mankind at its finest. He is courage and humanity, steadfastness and decency, responsibility and ethic.” With this quote we can simply put that he is our highest ambition in human form. Superman’s real dad, Jor-El, was a hologram in the movie and he told his son that he should inspire and help, but to never abuse his powers to alter human events too greatly. If superman were to take a more dominate role on earth it would almost make people lose what makes them human and begin to fear him rather than respect him.
Though Superman mostly obeys his father’s commands, he decides to go against him by using his ability to turn back time to save the many lives of the people living in California. In this scene we see that Superman has a sense of utilitarianism by using the happiness of the many lives he saved versus the happiness of his father. We as people can only truly trust those who have good moral judgment, and in the case of superman he is seen as morally good because he usually always does what is right.
Superman could save more people, if not everyone from danger if he wanted to. However there exists a theodicy that explains why god permits evil to exist, and this can be related to superman. People may argue that if superman was on the clock 24/7 trying to save people then us as a species wouldn’t be able to progress due to everything being given to us. Superman knows that if he never made contact with humans other than to save them that he would slowly become physiologically damaged. The people of the world depend on superman and his moral judgment and if these were to be harmed in any way then the consequences may make humanity worse off. In order for superman to exist he can’t be superman all the time and has to take the role of Clark Kent.
