It’s becoming an increasing occurrence that every time we head to the cinema, there’s a bigger, better, more in-your-face superhero movie splashed across the coming soon posters. If it’s not Spider-man, it’s Superman, and then it’s Spider-man rebooted, or Superman re-made (for the second or third time). Superhero movies are getting more and more popular and with budgets of hundreds of millions of dollars per film, you start to wonder what the big idea is when we’ve been in an economic recession since 2009.
We all know that superheroes started with comic books, but before the Great Depression and WWII, comics were just light-hearted reads filled with goofy characters and cheesy jokes. The trend of the cape-and-tights hero started in 1938, with the publication of Action Comics #1 featuring the all too familiar Superman on the cover, lifting a car high above his head. The series would go on to become the second largest number of issues of any comic book series. It was published in the time of the Great Depression, which America and the rest of the world were knee-deep in right into the late 1930s. The popularity of these characters only grew with the declaration of WWII. Captain America #1 was first published in 1941 - no surprise to know that America entered WWII in the same year.
Captain America was a superhero resplendent in the stars and stripes of the United States and was the poster boy for the war effort against the Nazis. This hero’s first comic book featured the Cap’ throwing a right hook to Hitler’s face.
This era of comic books and superheroes became known as the Golden Age of Comics, with famous companies like DC and Marvel emerging and rapidly gaining ground as a result.
The comic book industry met a bit of a downturn in the 1950s, when America hit an economic boom. This was the age of the ‘American Dream’, nuclear families and white picket fences. This was the age of the post-war economy, lasting between 1945 and 1960. This was also the time of the ‘Baby Boom’, when there was a sudden increase in births in the US, resulting in even more consumers. By 1956, most of the smaller comic book publishers were out of business. This wasn’t a coincidence: the average American didn’t exactly need a hero when he was already living the dream. There was more than enough money going around, but none of it was being spent on comic books.
Comic book superheroes have now started to enjoy a re-invigoration in the form of big-budget, action-packed movies. Yet again it’s no surprise that this trend began in the early 2000s, in the wake of 2001’s 9/11 attacks. Just as the 9/11 attacks displayed a threat, so too does the recession. Both threats represent faceless enemies and villains, just as superheroes are depicted as fighting stateless organised crime and threats.
Leading up to and including 2009 and beyond, superhero movies began to release in their droves, from the X-men film series in 2000, to Daredevil and Hulk in 2003, Catwoman in 2004 and The Fantastic Four in 2005. The superhero movies of the 2000s enjoyed relative success but it was 2008’s The Dark Knight that really showed what superhero films could do, being the highest-grossing superhero movie of all time and winning two Oscars, including one for the late actor Heath Ledger for his portrayal of the mentally-disturbed villain, The Joker.
The genre was again given a boost, with 2010 releases like Iron-Man 2 followed by 2011’s Thor, X-men: First Class, The Green Hornet and The Green Lantern. Movie adaptations of arguably “indy” comic books like Kick-Ass show that not only are the more “mainstream” characters like Batman and Spider-man getting the multi-million dollar treatment, but so too are the less conventional characters (Kick-Ass had an estimated budget of $30 million). Not only this, but superhero movies were not only based on comic books, but films like the rom-com My Super Ex-Girlfriend (2006) and the family movie Sky High (2005) featured super-powered heroes packaged in dime-a-dozen, mainstream films.
Movies like the Spider-man series released in 2002 are now already getting the re-boot, leaning on the sudden popularity of the genre in the late 2000s and early 2010s, with the release of The Amazing Spider-man in 2012.
So why the sudden interest in superheroes again? The US (and the rest of the world) has been in a recession since February 2009. It’s been called a “lesser depression”, and it’s an on-going problem, with businesses shutting down constantly, countries declaring bankruptcy and political instability on the rise worldwide.
So when the world is in a mess, it’s those cheesy, spandex-clad heroes we turn to, to lift our spirits and leave smiles on our faces when we leave the cinema. Subconsciously we’d like to believe that those heroes will save us from losing our jobs, from terrorist attacks and from war.
