We’re still giving this murderer digital ink?

Good editorial.

Unlike some commentators that I’ve heard in the news media, I don’t think comics or movies bear the slightest responsibility for the horrible shooting, but if nothing else positive comes out of this, I hope that at least people start to realize that the psychopath isn’t actually cooler than the hero.

Just today I saw an interview promoting a new Batman comic, wherein artist Greg Capullo doesn’t say much about Batman, but he’s all over the Joker, saying — “What artist doesn’t want to touch The Joker? He’s just the coolest and the most badass, the most evil, the most insane, and so there’s so much to play with.” He goes on to say that he’s looking forward to going, “down the road of, like, Texas Chainsaw Massacre stuff,” saying that he and writer Scott Snyder will be,”turning the Joker up a notch, you know? If you can turn the Joker up any higher.”

Now, I don’t mean to point any fingers at Capullo or Snyder — they’re just doing their job. I only cite the interview because it was a handy example of how creators seem to be in a race to out-crazy the last guy. All of the heroes are becoming morally-conflicted anti-heroes, and all of the villains have become Ted Bundy on crack!

The anti-hero was once a fresh antidote to a code-controlled industry, but after thirty years, I’m starting to feel like I need to take a bath after every comic I read. I guess angry, antisocial, mentally-unbalanced people aren’t very appealing to me.

I guess I long for the return of the “good guy.”

I have great sympathy and compassion for the victims of the Aurora shooting, but that’s where it ends for me.

To indulge in reactionary navel-gazing and/or fantasize about some magic prescriptive policy that will fix everything is to give the killer the attention and recognition he so desperately sought to achieve via mass murder. I refuse to do that.

IMHO, the best way to deal with this tragedy is to insure that the victims and their loved ones all the support and sympathy they require — but to otherwise change nothing and do nothing save to try, convict, and execute Holmes in the most efficient and least publicized manner possible. We shouldn’t give him or his crimes a millisecond more attention than is absolutely necessary to see justice done.

@Jim Keegan
Good guys are absolutely real, They just don’t get the press time. Nothing sexy about guilt complexes.

We all have a responsibility to each other, regardless of influences.
Whether the influences are defined as chemical, social, or the latest chapter of a filmmaker’s trilogy is unimportant.

Responsibility begins on an individual level, but also extends to include anyone who functions as a member of a support system – this includes family, friends, casual acquaintances, right down to the person who stops to lend a hand when they see someone in distress.
When these support systems fail – when we choose not to address troubling behavioral signs from those around us – the results can be devastating.

I’m always disappointed to hear the old saw, “What would you do if you could get away with it?” emerge at times like this.

My answer?
You would do what you know to be the right thing in that given situation, because the people who care about you do not want to see you or anyone else suffer due to your actions.

That’s placing the responsibility squarely where it belongs, influences & dark impulses be damned.

“change nothing and do nothing save to try, convict, and execute Holmes in the most efficient and least publicized manner possible.”

Right…one more death, that’ll fix everything. Great message to send, “what do you do with a murderer? Murder him!”

Life in prison. No chance of parole. Institutionalized murder in the name of “justice” is still murder…but hey, maybe we can get some woman dressed in a Wonder Woman costume to snap his neck and bring things full circle.

May the human race survive to see a day when nobody has any reason or feels the need to kill anyone ever in any circumstance.

“Why are the villains the interesting characters in stories?”

One reason is simply because they’re the active characters. They make the story happen.

Also, memorable villains tend to have some complexity. They’re often rebels against the established order of things, which makes them sympathetic if you have a grievance with it.

It doesn’t help that nowadays heroes don’t behave much better than villains.

The recurring use of villains in the comic book stories does raise questions as to how effective they are at making any kind of valid point about anything. A Super Friends type story is written for children, and the moral point of it is clear. The adult stories, though–it’s been claimed that Spider-Man, Superman, Batman, et al. are good for thousands of stories each. They’re not, though. Repetition of a theme is as deadly, over time, as repetition of plot elements is. If the moral of a story is that Good triumphs over Evil, then Good actually has to triumph and vanquish Evil. Chasing Evil away for a few issues isn’t a triumph. However many stories a hero might be good for, a villain such as the Joker is good for one or two. Three? That would be stretching it. Once it’s been established that he’s Batman’s opposite, he’s been defined completely. There’s nothing more to say about him. He should have been vanquished decades ago. Using him again and again doesn’t serve any purpose except to glamorize the very Evil that the heroes are supposed to be fighting.

SRS

Why would anyone label him the “cosplay killer”? He wasn’t dressed a comic character. He was wearing full body armor. I know he supposedly referred to himself as the Joker, but nothing in his dress or demeanor is related to the Joker. Even the photo from the adult website shows him with orange hair, not green hair. His mugshot appeared on Friday and he has brown hair.

You could say that, Rick (I actually agree with you) but why does the media jump to any conclusions? They’ll say nearly anything to keep this story going. They’ll blame this on video games, for instance.

“I don’t know if this marks the end of the grim reality which has infected superhero comics since 1985.”

I hope so. For one it’s sucked all the fun out of superhero comics even to the point where action has just been replaced with cheap shock and gore. For another, it’s a lopsided view of reality in the first place.

There’s more to reality than just the dark side.