How far is too far?

[Iron Shadow]

It all started, in my opinion, with Batman and Superman. They are the Two. They represent the extremes, the far ends of the superhero spectrum. Batman is your superpower-less superhero, the mortal man with the will and tenacity to hang with the most powerful beings in the universe. He was always all about pushing the limits of human capability, about wringing every last drop of potential out of himself in the pursuit of justice. You have to admire that, and at the same time you feel, even though you know it isn't true, that just maybe somebody could really do the things he does. Just maybe. Then you have Superman, the Big Blue Boyscout, the god in his long-johns. He was pure, good-hearted, filled with more humanity and human kindness than the humans he protected. Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful that a locomotive, able to leap the tallest buildings in a single bound. He always got there in the nick of time, always foiled the evil plot, always got the bad guy. Bullets bounced off his chest in every other panel and Lois Lane was sure to end up in his arms a split-second before she kissed the pavement. He was as good and as powerful as it got.

But then something changed. Writer's, trying to make their characters better, tougher, faster, cooler, started a sort of "war of escalation".

"Oh, Batman trained from the time he was a teen to begin his crusade on crime? Well, my character started when he was a preteen."

"So what, mine started from the womb!"

Or:

"So, Superman can punch through walls and lift a ship, huh? Well, this new character can pick up a mountain and smash through the Earth itself!"

"Yeah, so? Mine can destroy the very fabric of the Universe! Take that!"

Take Batgirl for instance. A supposedly normal, mortal, non-superpowered little girl that undergoes training that would kill a healthy fullgrown man before she's 9. Being shot is part of that training. In the end she can punch through concrete, dance through gunfire and see people's moves before they even know they are going to make them. C'mon. That's not cool. That's retarded. No one is going to look at that and think "Well, maybe." They think "Only in comics." Now, granted, most things that happen in comics and adventure novels could only happen there, but it's gotten to the point of being distracting.

I hate this. It's even affected Supes and the Bat. I mean, do we really need a Superman that can cross the Universe in seconds? Or a Batman that can somehow find a way to dodge Darkseid's Omega Beams? Isn't that kind of overkill? I long for simpler days. I would like to see writer's put more effort into coming up with compelling, interesting, original stories instead of trying to one-up each other in the training/power department.

But that's just my opinion.

[Sharpandpointies]

We don't actually do hate threads here. Which is obviously where this is starting - given that, I can't see it going anywhere but further in that direction.