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Heroes and Villains
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There’s a tweet from ten years ago that I think of often: “Is (pop star) a feminist? Is MasterCard a queer ally? Is this tv show my friend?” This tweet and the memes it spawned speak to a truth about cultural criticism and media consumption in general: Questioning the politics of anything oftentimes takes precedent over the actual content. The joke is in the absurdity of the question. Is Jurassic World Rebirth anti-vax? Is The Fantastic Four: First Steps pro-life? And then, a real one that is being asked on social media and elsewhere ever since the release of the latest reboot: Is the new Superman pro-Palestine?
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No, of course James Gunn’s Superman, which sees the titular hero intervening in a global conflict and becoming the target of a tech billionaire villain, isn’t in and of itself a pro-Palestinian film. But more than one thing can be true at the same time. In real life, political actors don’t serve the public, the media fails to do its job properly, and villains are pretty much running the show. Viewers will gladly reinterpret stories to get some comfort out of them, especially when there is an urgent and imminent need for action to end the suffering of millions of innocent people.
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Superman comes out at a time when Gaza is being systemically starved by Israel, so it’s not so far off to think that the film, which includes a fictional state under attack by a much stronger fictional state, is commenting on real life events. But this has more to do with wishful thinking on the part of the viewer, and not on Hollywood growing a conscience. Yes, on a surface level, Superman is about anti-imperialism and ethnic cleansing, but it’s not purposefully anti-Israel. As much as it isn’t anti-Russia or about regime change in Afghanistan or Syria. That supporters of Israel have called for a boycott regardless, even though there is not a single mention of Israel in the film, only serves to reinforce the very interpretation they are seeking to discredit. And that speaks volumes.
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There is also a new Marvel offering, The Fantastic Four: First Steps, where a cosmic entity devours entire planets without impunity and has its eyes set on Earth next. A subplot involves killing one child to save all of humanity. Given the state of the world right now, it wouldn’t be a stretch to make comparisons to a certain country that has bombed almost all of its neighbors over the years, killing thousands in the process. But whether the filmmakers meant to say something about current events or not, we should perhaps shift our focus on creating strategies to counter real life villains, and not ask superhero movies to say the unspeakable for us.
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© Fadi Al-Hawari on Instagram (@imhawari)
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This week, in addition to a new Seifenblase by Mitch Speed, we are sharing pieces from our archive featuring stories of heroes, villains, and some figures in between.
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Mitch Speed
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"If cultural spaces in Berlin would not allow content that engaged with Gaza, they would instead have an image of the man who, in many people’s eyes, holds substantial responsibility for the tactic of prohibiting that content in German institutions."
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Guli Dolev-Hashiloni
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"This group of Polish Holocaust survivors amassed fortunes that rose to tremendous heights through shady business dealings, and were labeled by some German journalists as a mafia. I cannot speak to the extent of illegal activity among the ganefs’ deeds, but several years of research and a master’s thesis later, I can attest to their impact: Elusive yet omnipresent, the few dozen ganefs lie in hiding behind almost every important Jewish moment in the Federal Republic’s history."
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Mitch Speed
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"It seems vulgar, to say that the Austrian-Jewish poet Erich Fried (1921-1988) had a friendship with neo-Nazi Michael Kühnen. And yet in Friendly Fire, a new documentary from Fried’s son Klaus, their correspondence approaches what Germans call a Brieffreundschaft. On such matters, the film ignites hard questions: when does political conviction give way to naivete? Can a brilliant poet believe too strongly in the magic of his pen?"
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