i read watchmen as a grownup having already had my adolescent dreams dashed and seen political ideals betrayed, friends corrupted, and so forth, so to see a masked hero acting like a deviant coward charlatan (the book indeed does show them that way) came at no surprise to me at all, i took it as a given—i was already more cynical than the novel.

maybe if i had grown up reading superhero comics in my teens and then discovered watchmen before entering the “real” world this it would have had a different effect on me. kinda like wehn i found the bill my dad was paying for santa’s gifts (except that was nice, i appreciated what he was doing—it was a happy disillusion).

but yeah i kinda grew up seeing captain america as an agent of “yankee imperialism” ha ha ha. true story. therefore, etc.

it matters WHEN things are experienced.

I read Watchmen when it came out. It was the densest, most re-readable comic I ever saw. The marriage between the insane art of gibbons, and the dense, literary writing of Moore blew me away and still does. There is nothing better.

I read Dark KNight Returns when it came out. That shit scared me. It has now infiltrated mass consciousness to the point where the pop view of Batman is the one presented by frank miller, which is beside the point of the whole Dark Knight Returns.

yes!

Yes, and yes.

Dark Knight Returns is shit as a Batman summary. It’s awesome as a *possible* future that may or may not ever come to pass.

Anyway, you’re totally right about Watchmen. I read it in my early 20s — after years and years and years of reading Batman and Superman and loving the shit out of both, and loving the escapism of comics. Still, they were a childhood thing (they’re not really anymore), so Watchmen scared me. More than Dark Knight Returns did. Watchmen seemed so bleak and nihilistic (it kind of is!) that I actually gave up on it a couple times before reading it in full, and even then, while I recognized it was good literature, I wasn’t sure I *liked* it.

And I’d been reading “adult” comics — little bit of Sandman, some underground stuff and Moore’s Swamp Thing and V for Vendetta — for a while by this point. But Watchmen unnerved me.

I’ve re-read it twice since then (actually, maybe more than that), and each time it leaves a bigger impression. I don’t think it’s the best graphic novel ever, but I think it’s essential reading, and I actually have some mild affection for some of the characters at this point. Like Veidt, actually, and even Alt-Right vigilante Rorschach, (though he shouldn’t have killed those dogs... that was fucked up).

I was kind of replying to you and Rob with my above message, btw.

But if tl;dr then: I was also older and pretty jaded by the time I read Watchmen, and I *did* grow up reading comic books, balancing my political awareness with their escapism and idealism, and I had a different reaction in the long run.

Neil Young Special Deluxe, A Memoir of Life & Cars:
"All you have to do is step back and take a look at corporate-run
government to begin to understand why the media has not presented
global warming and its cause to the public as the real story of our times.
Because of the corporate-occupied Federal Communications Commission,
network television and printed media are now serving the corporations
by not exposing the true story of climate change and the future of mankind.
There are brave representatives and senators who oppose these laws, but so
far seem unable to overcome the forces they are up against. The people themselves
will have to drop their complacency and rally behind fundamental change, take their
country back, and support brave leaders.
However, this is a book about cars." - page 321
Kim Gordon Girl in A Band...both of these musician/artist-driven memoirs are real balls of yarn...
also:
Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything by Lydia Kang, MD & Nate Pedersen

yes but did you ever see stuff like this before watchmen?




in the 3rd world you see this type of thing often. superheroes agents of the american government? no kidding!

anyway latin america has had a bunch of different responses to american superheroes but the most enduring and significant one has been this



el chapulín colorado

you may have seen a bad copy of it on the simpsons but that’s totally lost in translation. do not/cannot compare based on looks.

chapulín colorado fits the latin american mythical imagination perfectly. he’s not an earnest overpowered bully with supreme weapons and bruce wayne/tony stark’s money. instead he’s a bumbling fool in cheap-looking costume, full of good intentions, and totally incompetent.

his weapons are a squeaky plastic mallet and some shrinking pills that get him in more trouble than they solve. as superheroes goes he’s supercowardly, but a mexican would tell you that más vale un cobarde vivo que un valiente muerto.

he wins in spite of his shortcomings through sheer luck, which he boast is cunning in front of others. he’s got a number of catchphrases that are just a bunch of bungled popular sayings, so he sounds like a well-meaning idiot.

he’s the perfect symbol of underdevelopment—cheerful and determined in spite of a great povery of material, moral and intellectual means.

like cheeto said, WHEN you read things is important— but also WHERE you read them from. perspective is everything, and it’s a big big big world of meaning out there.

Jesus. That’s my Jesus they’re talking about. Yikes.

Also, copyright infringement, but I doubt anyone’s worried about that.

No. No I can’t say I did grow up with anything like this. Though my parents did accidentally buy me a pornographic Spider-Man ripoff comic, to hear them tell it.
I wonder if it wasn’t just a regular comic and, it being the ‘80s, they were shocked at the amount of skin? Who knows.

ha ha ha.

right, your jesus is seen as an agent of american imperialism, just like the jesus of the 700 club when it gets dubbed and broadcast internationally (for real).

same with captain america, wonder woman, etc.

since they’re all us-centric and dressed in red white and blue they’re seen as spreading and promoting american values around the globe. whcih, in fact, they are. but unless you’re immersed outside the world of american values it’s hard to see that. theyr’e unbeatable, like nukes and advanced fighter planes, and protect and normalize the corporatocracy.

i wouldn’t be surprised if alan moore was influenced by 3rd world readings of american superheros when he wrote watchmen. plus the fact that the book is straight-up borgesian... hmmm (borges was a right winger though, lol— not everyone from the same continent thinks the same way).

anyway. my job here is done i guess lol. perspective and what not.

thanks for the morning’s procrastinations, now i gotta get back to moving house.

Borges was also deeply weaksauce physically, very un-superman...hahhahaha

El Chapulin Colorado was my favorite show when I still lived in Puerto Rico (1973-1980). I used to watch it religiously, and y favorite toys were the springy antenna and a plastic replica of his hammer that I would bop on my lil brother's head.

I used to watch it from the eye of a child though, and to me he was very much a superhero, but one that was comedic. It was not until I got much older and re-watched the show that it struck me how odd it is that the most popular Mexican superhero character is one that actually sux as a hero. To me that seems to expose the massive inferiority complex that Mexico and Mexicans seem to have in regards to us assholes in amerikkka.

In a land where the "self-made person" is the epitome of greatness (USA), a person who has great powers and uses them for good is a superhero. someone who has great powers and uses them for evil is a supercriminal. It is about the internal moral choice, and of course those powers must be used to affect the greatest number of people.

In latinoamerica, with it's deeply inbred mentality of class structure and what essentially is an uncommunicated caste system depending on your wealth and light skin, the idea of a normal human becoming a great superhero seems ridiculous, because to them, it IS ridiculous. I think that is why the ideaof superheros whose whole existence is devoted to the betterment and protection of humanity could only come from the USA as it existed in the early 20th century. Eternal optimism, eternal reinvention, eternal justice and morality....

Chapulin Colorado's USA equivalent is the Greatest American Hero, a bumbler who can barely control his powers, but who manages to right wrongs regardless. Cahpulin only fights crime in poor neighborhoods (because the poor do not deserve a true hero? hmmm or because a poor, low-caste crimefighter would undoubtedly be a bumbling idiot?). he also is not provided a dichotomy in an arch-enemy. Superman (all-good, all powerful) has Lex Luthor (all-bad, no powers, only his evil genius). Batman (rigorous and methodical crime fighter) has The Joker (irrational and wholly insane criminal for crime's sake).


I always wanted to believe tjat Chapulin's alter ego is El Chavo del Ocho.

You know what is sad? Chavo does not have a real name, and no one seems to give a fuck that he sleeps in a fucking rain-water barrell. No one in that fucking condado ever asks him to sleep indoors, or takes him in and raises him, or in any other form really care for him. That's latinoamerica to a T!

Began Albert Camus' The Stranger yesterday.

Isn’t Moore kind of a semi-right winger too, though? I think he’s gone back and forth a little. He’s not a far-righter, but I don’t believe he’s a “snowflake” in any sense. Maybe I’m mis-remembering things though. Hmm.

Weekend progress update: Goodreads says i'm 53% through Fellowship. Page 213 of 398 for the copy I have.

You must be reading a trade paperback rather than a mass-market pb. The cheapo editions are 550 pages easy. Not sure why I’m even saying this, but I am.

I got a box set and one that very purposely avoided movie tie-in designs. I didn't want any photo inserts in the middle of the books, etc.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bdn5xGeAhHI/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BeOQgbmgsge/

I also noted font size and such, with how much they pack in per page.

Cool. I love TPBs. I only ever read mass markets for convenience.

Just finished Paradoxes of Free Will by Gunther S. Stent. http://rxttbooks.blogspot.com/2018/0...d-all-its.html

Don't think you can get this book with this cover anymore.