Thursday, October 18, 2012

Murderous Heroism

I love a good hero story.  It's about overcoming your obstacles while holding yourself to a certain standard, no matter what the opposition chooses to hold themselves to.  So when I find myself drawn to the darker heroes that employ tools o' murder, I find it's time to dig deep and dissect that inclination.

My conclusion comes down to probably the most shallow it could: they just look cooler on the page or big screen.  I mean, some of my favorite characters employ this deadly violence.  Green Arrow isn't really in that hallowed mental pantheon, but others like Wolverine, Deadpool, Hawkeye, Cable, Nick Fury, the Punisher all fit that bill.  These are just the ones I like, not to mention the others that choose to strap a gun or sword to their hip or shoulder.

Don't get me wrong, Captain America is still at the top of the food chain and he usually only carries his vibranium shield.  He does everything that I feel a hero should and doesn't find himself in situations where he has to sacrifice his beliefs to get the job done.  That doesn't stop me from enjoying Wolverine dig those claws into the henchmen masses trying to get to the root of whatever problem is in front of him.

All this to say, I watched the premiere episode of Arrow this week and actually liked it quite a bit.  The production values were high, while the character was just as much of a bastard as Oliver Queen is supposed to be.  Regardless of how much I enjoyed the show, I found my grimace growing as the typical bad guy, who recently had arrow-ridden thugs in his employ, shouts at our protagonist "you put my guys in the hospital!"  Did he? Or did he in fact shoot them with arrows only to leave them not moving in the parking structure?  It is on the CW though, so while there may be blades, arrows and guns a'plenty, I doubt the body count is going to rise much at all in this early season.

C-c-c-combo breaker! Enough of this nerd talk, I'll talk at you all later.

Punch it, Chewie!

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