The Neverending Battle

I haven't seen the new Superman film yet, but I will later tonight. I have avoided spoilers on the film itself, wanting to go in cold; will it be good? Could be, I have faith in director James Gunn to treat the character well. But maybe not, I mean, the recent history with DC comics properties on film has been a mixed bag, to put it charitably.

But I am amused by the prerelease backlash the movie has gotten from right-wing blowhards. Republicans, evidently, hate Superman. Not the movie—though they claim to hate that without even seeing it—the character.

Most of the nonsense I've seen relates to the fact that Gunn apparently (again, I have yet to see the movie) celebrates the fact that Superman is an immigrant to America. Immigrants Good! is sure to make 21st Century Republicans blow their tops. Right-wing actor Dean Cain, who once played Superman himself in the 1990s ABC TV series "Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman," reacted to a comment from Gunn about Superman being an immigrant and the character and film embodying "basic human kindness" by spouting off with incredulity, "How woke is Hollywood going to make this character?"

Putting aside the fact that "woke" is a term originally referring to awareness of one's surroundings and a measure of empathy for others and therefore those railing against it by definition mark themselves as preferring unconsciousness and disdain for others, it's remarkable that even someone like Dean Cain goes immediately to outrage over someone championing kindness.

Right-wing podcasters jumped on the immigrant angle to claim that Gunn's use of this very basic element to the character's origins and almost-90-year history would deter people from seeing the movie. “[Gunn]'s not going to get any more viewers saying this, and he might chase some people away," said podcaster Christian Toto while stoking his anti-immigrant fires. Podcaster Ben Shapiro is offended that, in his view, Gunn has tried to "separate Superman off from America" while podcaster Tim Pool went the other way and said Superman would be "denied birthright citizenship" as an illegal alien.

Fox TV personality Jesse Waters said that, because the phrase "truth, justice, and the American way"—something used only in radio and 1950s TV incarnations of Superman during and after World War II until said satirically in the 1978 Superman film, wherein Lois Lane responds to it by telling Superman "you're going to end up fighting every elected official in this country"—is not used in this movie that therefore Gunn's Superman "fights for truth, justice, and your preferred pronouns," as if everything has to come back to picking on trans folks. Not satisfied with that, Waters went on to say "You know what it says on his cape? 'MS-13.'"

Yes, Jesse Waters equates not overtly espousing support for "The American Way" to being a member of a violent criminal gang of bogeymen.

On the same show as Waters, everyone's favorite advocate for "alternative facts," Kellyanne Conway, complained of the film that, "We don't go to the movie theater to be lectured to and to have somebody throw their ideology on to us." No, people go to Fox News for that, obviously. Kellyanne is jealous that someone might be working her corner on the throwing ideology front.

All of this I find entertaining, because it illustrates how threatened the modern Republican party is by anything in popular culture that doesn't reflect their brand of cruelty, preferably wrapped in jingoism. Oh no, people like this thing that shows value in empathy and tolerance and decency! We must demonize it immediately so those same people come to think it's all some sort of psy-op. But not like our propaganda ops, never reveal those.

As for the folks who made the movie, they've responded to the backlash properly. "Somebody needs a hug," said actor Nathon Fillion, who appears in the film. When asked what he thought of the right-wing critics, Gunn himself was succinct: "Screw ’em."

Our pal Craig Calcaterra mentioned this in his newsletter too, and he pointed out how much these modern Republicans would relate to the villains in Superman movies. Noting the Christopher Reeve Superman movies, Craig says, "The first one featured a scheme to nuke California as part of a real estate play; the second one centered on the desecration of the White House and the destruction of the American way of life by an evil whack job who constantly demands fealty from others; and the third one featured a bad guy billionaire fixated on financial domination via technology and the final boss of the movie was some insane, sentient A.I. computer monster thing. The shit's relatable."

Superman, of course, foiled all of those villainous schemes. "No wonder Republicans hate him."