Why Tragedy Should Not Be the Norm but the Exception Part 2

By Snow Drift

Many months ago, Dan Didio said “Heroes shouldn't have happy personal lives. They are committed to being that person and committed to defending others at the sacrifice of their own personal interests. […] It’s wonderful that they try to establish personal lives, but it’s equally important that they set them aside. That is our mandate, that is our edict and that is our stand,” emphasizing how people, to truly be heroes, need to have tragedies and sacrifices in their lives. To him, a person cannot care about humanity without them suffering tragedies over and over again. To him, without tragedy, there is no motivation to save. To him, a hero having a happy personal life is a subtraction of their heroic selves. I personally believe him to be incorrect. 

   

I believe that what many readers, since the humble origins of comics, have found so enticing and endearing about comic book superheroes is not simply their fights and superhuman adventures, but the fact that these men and women are symbols of hope. Superman decided to help humanity out of his own will and love for it. Wonder Woman, also known as Princess Diana, saw that Man’s World could still be saved through peace and love. Green Arrow aka Oliver Queen saw that even the most cornered citizens of the world deserved to live in safety. These people loved humanity and its potential so much that they saw their salvation was worth it. It goes beyond the notion of it being simply “the right thing to do”: it’s about how these men and women believe in the goodness of humanity at its core; that every single human, if given the chance and being guided when needed, can become heroes too. Each person deserves to live, to love, to give, and to receive.

   

For love for humanity to manifest itself to such an extent that Barry Allen would sacrifice his life in Crisis on Infinite Earths, for Superman to do the same when fighting Doomsday, for Charles Xavier and his X-Men to fight for the unity of humans and mutants; it all comes down to their own experiences of love. These heroes feeling that they can belong, that they are loved and cherished by people who will always be by their side, who will always smile at them at the end of the day and say “you did good”, is what motivates many of them to keep getting up every day to fight the evils of the universe. Because we must all remember that these characters, be they humans, aliens, spirits, or machines, still feel. They still experience emotions, from happiness to anger to pain; they still experience loss and loneliness, desperation and hopelessness. For them to have the strength and courage to fight incredible odds every day, they need to be reassured that their struggle has a reason to exist. Lois Lane always being there for Clark Kent to keep him grounded and hopeful and full of love; the Amazons of Themyscira nurturing and loving Diana throughout all of her life, Supergirl and Superboy having found a family with the Kents, Jaime Reyes, the Blue Beetle, being able to find a home where a family awaits him with pride and love, and the Bat Family, from Dick Grayson to Cassandra Cain to Damian Wayne, finding all of the same in Bruce Wayne, who himself found it in Alfred. In a world where everything is in constant tragedy and suffering, is very hard for an individual, one like any of us, to jump in and proclaim at the top of their lungs that they will save everyone until the very end of time. If they do not have a backdrop, an experience of love and compassion in their own lives, then they cannot see the same in the world outside of their own private lives.

Because these heroes are not gods or the Messiah or anything equivalent to those; they are not people who were born with the purest of hearts, chosen by a divine entity to save the universe from the darkness and evil. These are people who were born to have the same probabilities of either having a normal or abnormal life, depending on their future circumstances. None of them are perfect; they have all done their mistakes and erroneous decisions. Some have harbored prejudice where there was none to be deserved, others have not had the ability to be a proper parent, brother, sister, lover, or friend. However, they struggle to do better and we, as readers, witnessing their development and transformations into heroes are what motivate us to keep up with their lives.

Again, is it bad to have heroes whose motivation is based on tragedy and who keep experiencing it multiple times? No, it is not, nor is it bad for someone to have interest in these type of stories. But if every single hero in a comic book universe is made to be tragic from beginning to end, then this fictional plane of existence will drown itself in the darkness and whatever happens in this will affect reality, for fiction does not exist in a vacuum; it has consequences on the lives of the readers.

All in all, there is an incredible importance for these heroes to have a semblance of happiness in their lives. Some of their back-stories might be tragic or maybe their ultimate suffering will come later on in their adulthood, but to have them submerged into absolute darkness takes away what is essential of their beings.

   

Heroes are not named as such for their capes, their poses, or their powers. Their true heroism comes from not only physically saving innocents, but from also inspiring the same to do better; to fight, to run, and to stand again and again every time they fall, for we all have the strength and hope in ourselves to stare at the darkness and say “No. You may push me, you may wound me, but you will never stop me, for I am strong and live by the power of love and hope.” And so does everyone.  

Why Tragedy Should Not Be the Norm, but the Exception Part 1

By Snow Drift 

Ah, tragedy. You’re misery, you’re pain, but gosh darn it aren’t you so luring. From Oedipus Rex to Romeo and Juliet to Batman, you follow us all around the world, across all of time, giving us an infinitude of stories where men and women suffer and die. And sometimes we love it so much. 

Tragedy has always been a literary aspect for thousands of years that have helped create drama and compelling and memorable characters. And sometimes, within our hearts of hearts, we love to see this side of characters. It’s interesting, one has to admit, to witness the growth of a man or woman from their fall into the metaphorical darkness of misery and despair to their stand as beacons of light for humanity, both in the fictional universe and the real one.
  
However, ever since the birth of what can be called the Dark Age of comics (what many believe began with the death of Gwen Stacy, but that is still being debated), but especially with the explosion that was the DC Comics company-wide reboot, the New 52, almost every single superhero, no matter who they are and where they come from, have a massive pile of tragedy thrust into their lives, with an added dose of the oh so famous “grim and gritty”. Superman’s adoptive parents are now dead; Barry Allen’s, the Flash’s, mother was murdered by one of his enemies and his father was erroneously condemned to life in prison because of it; Hal Jordan’s, the Green Lantern’s, father was killed in a plane crash; Bruce Wayne has had two Robins actually die, including his son; the Amazons are now men-and-baby killing warriors; Buddy Baker’s, Animal Man’s, son has been killed and so on and so forth. 

On and on and on do we see this new tendency to infiltrate tragedy into the lives of our heroes over at DC Comics. Is it bad to do this? Not necessarily, since many heroes may have different motivations for their actions and decisions to fight as vigilantes. Batman and the Punisher are classical examples of men motivated by tragedy, along with Peter Parker with his Uncle Ben, Cassandra Cain with experiencing what it feels like to kill another human, and Helena Bertinelli, the Huntress, with the massacre of her family, these last being based on the old DC Universe. It’s fascinating to see how these characters attempt to right the wrongs of these tragedies and avoid the same events from happening to others who do not deserve it. To see them fight and struggle for these beliefs is enriching in itself. However, among these characters and many others, there is another tendency that follows them around, along with the memories of their tragedies: their happiness, especially the one coming from their loved ones.

Bruce Wayne could have ended up hating the world that he lived in. He could have witnessed the crimes, the injustice, and the corruption of the police and justice system and determined to himself that society was a lost cause; that it did not deserve, or was unable to reach, a future of happiness and peace. But he didn't, because within the tragedy of the murder of his parents, he had the opportunity to witness love and comfort from Alfred Pennyworth, hope in the police from Commissioner James Gordon, joy and innocence against all odds from Dick Grayson back when he was Robin, and so on. He saw all of that and understood that life, and the world, was made up of more than just hate and misery: it had love, it had happiness, and it had justice.