Superhero Fiction

Superhero fiction is a genre of speculative fiction examining the adventures, personalities and ethics of costumed crime fighters known as superheroes, who often possess superhuman powers and battle similarly powered criminals known as supervillains. The genre primarily falls between hard fantasy and soft science fiction spectrum of scientific realism. It is most commonly associated with American comic books, though it has expanded into other media through adaptations and original works.

Common plot elements

Superheroes

A superhero is most often the protagonist of superhero fiction. However, some titles, such as ''Marvels'' by Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross, use superheroes as secondary characters. A superhero (sometimes rendered super-hero or super hero) is a type of stock character possessing "extraordinary or superhuman powers" and dedicated to protecting the public. Since the debut of the prototypical superhero Superman in 1938, stories of superheroes—ranging from brief episodic adventures to continuing years-long sagas—have dominated American comic books and crossed over into other media. The word itself dates to at least 1917. A female superhero is sometimes called a superheroine (also rendered super-heroine or super heroine). In the United States, the term "SUPER HEROES" is a registered trademark co-owned by DC Comics and Marvel Comics.

By most definitions, characters do not strictly require actual superhuman powers to be deemed superheroes, although terms such as costumed crime fighters or masked vigilantes are sometimes used to refer to those such as Batman and Green Arrow without such powers who share other common superhero traits. Such characters were generally referred to as "mystery men" in the so-called Golden Age of Comic Books to distinguish them from characters with super-powers. Normally, superheroes use their powers to counter day-to-day crime while also combating threats against humanity by their criminal counterparts, supervillains.

Long-running superheroes such as DC's Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman and Marvel's Spider-Man, Captain America and Iron Man have a "rogues gallery" of such enemies. One of these supervillains might be the superhero's archenemy. Superheroes will sometimes combat other threats such as aliens, magical/fantasy entities, natural disasters, political ideologies such as Nazism or communism (and their proponents), and godlike or demonic creatures.

Supervillains

A supervillain or supervillainess is a variant of the villain character type, commonly found in comic books, action movies, and science fiction in various media. They are sometimes used as foils to superheroes and other heroes. Whereas superheroes often wield fantastic powers, the supervillain possesses commensurate powers and abilities so that he can present a daunting challenge to the hero. Even without actual physical, mystical, superhuman or superalien powers, the supervillain often possesses a genius intellect that allows him to draft complex schemes or create fantastic devices.

Another common trait is possession of considerable resources to help further his aims. Many supervillains share some typical characteristics of real-world dictators, mobsters, and terrorists and often have aspirations of world domination or universal leadership. Superheroes and supervillains often mirror each other in their powers, abilities, or origins. In some cases, the only difference between the two is that the hero uses his extraordinary powers to help others, while the villain uses his powers for selfish, destructive or ruthless purposes.

Secret identities

Both superheroes and supervillains often use alter egos while in action. While sometimes the character's real name is publicly known, alter egos are most often used to hide the character's secret identity from their enemies and the public.

With superheroes, the duality of their identities is kept a secret and closely guarded to protect those close to them from being harmed and to prevent them from being called upon constantly, even for problems not serious enough to require their attention. This can be a source of drama with the superhero being forced to devise means of getting out of sight to change without revealing their identity, or bearing the price of keeping such a secret. In addition, this narrative trope can allow fantasy characters to be in occasional realistic stories without the fantasy element of the sub-genre appearing.

With supervillains, by contrast, the duality of their identities is kept a secret and closely guarded to conceal their crimes from the general public, so that they may inflict greater harm ''on'' the general public, and to enable them to act freely, and hence illegally, without risk of arrest by law-enforcement authorities.

Death

Death in superhero fiction is rarely permanent, as characters who die are often brought back to life through supernatural means or via retcons (retroactive changes to the continuity), the alteration of previously established facts in the continuity of a fictional work. Fans have termed the practice of bringing back dead characters "comic book death".

Another common trait of superhero fiction is the killing off of a superhero's significant other by a supervillain to advance the plot. Comic book writer Gail Simone has coined the term "Women in Refrigerators" (named after an incident in ''Green Lantern'' #54 where Kyle Rayner's girlfriend Alex DeWitt is murdered by the supervillain Major Force and stuffed into Rayner's refrigerator) to refer to this practice.Prowse-Gany, Brian (August 12, 2015)
"Rise of the Female Superhero"
Yahoo! News.

Continuity

Many works of superhero fiction occur in a shared fictional universe, sometimes (as in the cases of the DC and Marvel Universes) establishing a fictional continuity of thousands of works spread over many decades.

Changes to continuity are also common, ranging from small changes to established continuity, commonly called retcons, to full reboots, erasing all previous continuity.

It is also common for stories works of superhero fiction to contain established characters and setting while occurring outside of the main canon for those characters.

Crossovers

Crossovers often occur between characters of different works of superhero fiction. In comic books, highly publicized "events" are published featuring crossovers between many characters. In previous eras, especially in the Bronze Age of Comic Books, Marvel and DC had dedicated series in which their marquee characters such as Spider-Man and Superman would meet various characters in single stories such as ''Marvel Team-Up'' and ''DC Comics Presents''. However, that publishing fashion has fallen away in favor of occasional limited series and guest appearances in regular series when the writers felt the character's presence was justified.

Intercompany crossovers, between characters of different continuity, are also common.

Genre flexibility

Over the history of the comic book genre, writers for major characters' series were required to produce material to strict regular publishing schedules that often ran for years. As such to fulfill this strenuous creative requirement, superhero stories have used a wide variety of story genres such as Fantasy, Science fiction, Mystery, Horror, Crime fiction etc. that put superhero characters in a vast variety and combinations of story settings and fiction tropes with their presence the major common element. As such, it has become an expected element to superhero fiction for the heroic characters to be placed in nearly any story situation, including relatively down-to-Earth drama with their personal lives out of costume.

For instance, '' The New Teen Titans'' was a mainstream superhero series which had characters that were a mix of fantasy ( Raven, Wonder Girl), science fiction (Cyborg, Starfire, Changeling, Kid Flash) and crime fiction ( Robin). Furthermore, their series had such a variety of stories, such as in a year-long period of 1982-3 where in rapid succession, the team would face Brother Blood, a costumed supervillain cult leader, then promptly have a space opera story where the team goes to another planet to oppose the imperial forces of Blackfire and then return to Earth only to get involved in a relatively realistic urban crime story about runaways.

History

Prototypes

The mythologies of many ancient civilizations feature pantheons of gods and goddesses with superhuman powers, as well as heroes such as Hanuman, Gilgamesh, Perseus, Odysseus and David and demigods like Heracles. Real life inspirations behind costumed superheroes can be traced back to the " masked vigilantes" of the American Old West such as the San Diego Vigilantes April 30, 1992 and the Bald Knobbers who fought and killed outlaws while wearing masks. The character of Spring Heeled Jack, who first emerged as an urban legend of the early 19th century, was re-conceived as a masked and costumed adventurer during the 1890s.

The hero's journey is a well-known archetypal story type in which the protagonist undertakes a quest to achieve both material advantage and psychological and ethical maturity, and is generally considered to function as a metaphor and guide for children transitioning to adulthood or from egoism to altruism as the core concept of the self. Antecedents of the superhero archetype include such folkloric heroes as Robin Hood, who adventured in distinctive clothing, and King Arthur, who possessed a supernatural weapon, Penny dreadfuls, shilling shockers, dime novels, radio programs, and other popular fiction of the late 19th and early 20th centuries featured mysterious, swashbuckling heroes with distinct costumes, unusual abilities and altruistic missions. The 1903 play ''The Scarlet Pimpernel'' and its spinoffs further popularized the idea of a masked avenger and the superhero trope of a secret identity; such characters as the Green Hornet and the Scarecrow of Romney Marsh, would follow. Likewise, the science-fiction heroes John Carter of Mars, Buck Rogers, and Flash Gordon, with their futuristic weapons and gadgets; Tarzan, with his high degree of athleticism and strength, and his ability to communicate with animals; Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian and the biologically modified Hugo Danner of the novel ''Gladiator,'' were heroes with unusual abilities who fought sometimes larger-than-life foes. The word "superhero" itself dates to at least 1917.

The most direct antecedents are pulp magazine crime fighters such as the masked and caped Zorro (introduced by Johnston M. McCulley in 1919 with '' The Curse of Capistrano'') with his trademark "Z," the technologically advanced "Black Sapper" (1929), the preternaturally mesmeric The Shadow (1930), the "peak human" Doc Savage (1933), and The Spider (1933), and comic strip characters such as Hugo Hercules (1902), Popeye (1936) and Olga Mesmer (1937). The first masked crime-fighter created for comic books was writer-artist George Brenner's non-superpowered detective the Clock, who debuted in Centaur Publications' ''Funny Pages'' #6 (Nov. 1936). In August 1937, in a letter column of the pulp magazine ''Thrilling Wonder Stories'', the word superhero was used to define the title character of the comic strip Zarnak by Max Plaisted. Historians point to the first appearance of Superman, created by Jerome "Jerry" Siegel and designed by Joseph "Joe" Shuster, in ''Action Comics'' #1 (June 1938) as the debut of the comic-book archetype of the superhero.

Outside the American comics industry, superpowered, costumed superheroes, such as Ōgon Bat (1931) and the (early 1930s), were visualized in painted panels used by kamishibai oral storytellers in Japan. They both anticipated elements of Superman and Batman. Prince of Gamma, for example, had an extraterrestrial origin story and a secret identity (his alter ego was a street urchin), much like Superman. An earlier example from Japan is Sarutobi Sasuke, a superhero ninja from children's novels in the 1910s. By 1914, his abilities included superhuman strength, chanting incantations, appearing and disappearing, jumping to the top of the highest trees, riding on clouds, conjuring the elements (water, fire and wind), and transforming into other people or animals.

Golden Age

In 1938, writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, who had previously worked in pulp science fiction magazines, introduced Superman. (Siegel, as the writer, actually ''created'' the central and supporting characters; Shuster, as the artist, ''designed'' these characters, and gave Superman the first version of his now-iconic uniform.) The character possessed many of the traits that have come to define the superhero: a secret identity, superhuman powers and a colorful costume including a symbol and cape. His name is also the source of the term "superhero," although early comic book heroes were sometimes also called mystery men or masked heroes.

DC Comics, which published under the names National and All-American at the time, received an overwhelming response to Superman and, in the years that followed, introduced Batman, Wonder Woman, The Green Lantern, The Flash, The Hawkman, Aquaman, and The Green Arrow. The first team of superheroes was DC's Justice Society of America, featuring most of the aforementioned characters.
Although DC dominated the superhero market at this time, companies large and small created hundreds of superheroes. The Human Torch of the Golden Age and the Sub-Mariner, from Marvel Comics (then called Timely Comics and later re-branded Atlas Comics), and Plastic Man and Phantom Lady from Quality Comics were also hits. Will Eisner's The Spirit, featured in a comic strip, would become a considerable artistic inspiration to later comic book creators. The era's most popular superhero, however, was Fawcett Comics's Captain Marvel, whose exploits regularly outsold those of Superman during the 1940s. When Fawcett Comics went out of business as such, DC Comics, which had been embroiled in a bitter copyright dispute with Fawcett Comics over Captain Marvel, bought out the copyright to not only the character but also his ancillary "Marvel Family" of heroes and villains.

During World War II, superheroes grew in popularity, surviving paper rationing and the loss of many writers and illustrators to service in the armed forces. The need for simple tales of good triumphing over evil may explain the wartime popularity of superheroes. Publishers responded with stories in which superheroes battled the Axis Powers and the patriotically themed superheroes, most notably Marvel's Captain America as well as DC's Wonder Woman.

Like other pop-culture figures of the time, Superheroes were used to promote domestic propaganda during wartime, ranging from the purchasing of war bonds

Following superheroes's popularity during this time, those characters' appeal began to dwindle in the post-war era. Comic-book publishers, casting about for new subjects and genres, found success in, particularly, crime fiction, the most prominent comic of which was Lev Gleason Publications's '' Crime Does Not Pay,'' and horror. The lurid nature of these genres sparked a moral crusade in which comics were blamed for juvenile delinquency and the United States Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency began. The movement was spearheaded by psychiatrist Fredric Wertham, who argued in ''Seduction of the Innocent,'' that "deviant" sexual undertones ran rampant in superhero comics. In 2012, his methodology was reviewed and his results were found to be misleading if not falsified.Carol L. Tilley. (2012). Seducing the Innocent: Fredric Wertham and the Falsifications that Helped Condemn Comics. Information & Culture: A Journal of History. 47 (4), 383–413.

In response, the comic book industry adopted the stringent Comics Code. By the mid-1950s, only Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman retained a sliver of their prior popularity, although effort towards complete inoffensiveness led to stories that many consider silly, especially by modern standards. This ended what historians have called the Golden Age of comic books.

Silver Age

In the 1950s, DC Comics, under the editorship of Julius Schwartz, recreated many popular 1940s heroes, launching an era later deemed the Silver Age of comic books. The Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman and several others were recreated with new origin stories. While past superheroes resembled mythological heroes in their origins and abilities, these heroes were inspired by contemporary science fiction. In 1960, DC banded its most popular heroes together in the Justice League of America, which became a sales phenomenon.

Empowered by the return of the superhero at DC, Marvel Comics editor/writer Stan Lee and the artists/co-writers Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and Bill Everett launched a new line of superhero comic books, beginning with The Fantastic Four in 1961 and continuing with the Incredible Hulk, Spider-Man, Iron Man, Thor, the X-Men, and Daredevil. These comics continued DC's use of science fiction concepts (radiation was a common source of superpowers) but placed greater emphasis on personal conflict and character development. This led to many superheroes that differed from predecessors with more dramatic potential. For example, the Fantastic Four were a superhero family of sorts, who squabbled and even held some unresolved acrimony towards one another, and Spider-Man was a teenager who struggled to earn money and maintain his social life in addition to his costumed exploits.

In non-comics media

Film

Superhero films began as Saturday movie serials aimed at children during the 1940s with the first film adaptation of a comic book superhero being ''The Adventures of Captain Marvel'' in 1941. The decline of these serials meant the death of superhero films until the release of 1978's ''Superman'', a critical and commercial success. Several sequels followed in the 1980s. 1989's ''Batman'' was also highly successful and followed by several sequels in the 1990s. Yet while both franchises were initially successful, later sequels in both series fared poorly both artistically and financially, stunting the growth of superhero films for a time.

Hit films such as 1998's ''Blade'', 2000's ''X-Men'' and ''Unbreakable'', and 2002's ''Spider-Man'' have led to sequel installments as well as encouraging the development of numerous superhero film franchises in the 21st century, both successful (such as 2005's ''Batman Begins'', a reboot of the Batman film series) and unsuccessful (such as 2004's ''Catwoman''). With that resurgence, the subgenre has become a major element of mainstream film production with outstanding successes like 2008's ''The Dark Knight'', 2012's '' The Avengers'' and ''The Dark Knight Rises'', 2013's '' Iron Man 3'', and 2015's '' Avengers: Age of Ultron'' attracting major revenue and critical plaudits. This trend was reinforced in 2016 with the outstanding success of the critically lauded ''Deadpool'', a film adaptation of a relatively minor Marvel Comics character that premiered at over $100 million in February, a time of year generally considered poor for movie audience interest. It was an observation further confirmed in 2018 when '' Black Panther'' was an even grander success with a $235 million debut in the same time of year, and later became the first superhero film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. '' Avengers: Endgame'' became the highest-grossing film of all time. In 2017, the film ''Sign Gene'' featured about deaf superheroes who use sign language.

Live-action television series

Several live-action superhero programs aired from the early 1950s until the late 1970s. These included '' Adventures of Superman'' starring George Reeves, the action-comedy ''Batman'' series of the 1960s (often interpreted as being campy) starring Adam West and Burt Ward. In the 1970s however, the genre would find a newfound credibility in the medium with the original series, ''The Six Million Dollar Man'' and its spinoff, ''The Bionic Woman'', being sustained successes. This led to direct adaptations of comic-book superheroes such as ABC/CBS drama series ''Wonder Woman'' of the 1970s starring Lynda Carter. ''The Incredible Hulk'' of the late 1970s and early 1980s, however, had a more somber tone. ''Superboy'' ran from 1988 to 1992 in syndication. In the 1990s, the ''Power Rangers,'' adapted from the Japanese ''Super Sentai,'' became popular. Other shows targeting teenage and young adult audiences that decade included '' Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman''. In 2001, ''Smallville'' retooled Superman's origin as a teen drama. The 2006 NBC series ''Heroes'' tells the story of several ordinary people who each suddenly find themselves with a superpower. The British series ''Misfits'' incorporates super-human abilities to undesirables in society. In this case, young offenders put on community service all have super powers and each use them to battle villains of sorts. In the 1980s, an unsuccessful attempt was made to realize this last concept in the United States with the short-lived action comedy, ''Misfits of Science''. In the 2010s, Warner Brothers created a successful adaptation of the Green Arrow, ''Arrow'', that began the successful ''Arrowverse'' television franchise. Marvel meanwhile had a successful television spin-off of their Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise ''Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.'', while creating a number of series on the streaming service Netflix, before moving the bulk of their properties to the copyright owner's, Disney, to its own streaming service, Disney+. DC series include '' Shazam!'', ''The Secrets of Isis'', ''The Flash (1990 TV series)'', ''Birds of Prey'' and '' Gotham''. Arrowverse series include ''The Flash (2014 TV series)'', ''Supergirl'', ''Legends of Tomorrow'' and ''Constantine''. Marvel series include ''The Amazing Spider-Man'', ''Spidey Super Stories'' and '' Mutant X''. Netflix series include '' Daredevil'', '' Jessica Jones'', ''Luke Cage'', '' Iron Fist'' and '' The Defenders''.
Japanese tokusatsu series include ''Ultraman'', ''Spectreman'' and ''Kamen Rider''.
Other series include- ''Buffy the Vampire Slayer'', ''Angel'', ''The Phantom'' ''Captain Nice'', '' Mr. Terrific'', ''The Green Hornet'', ''Electra Woman and Dyna Girl'', ''The Greatest American Hero'', '' Dark Angel'', ''No Ordinary Family'' and'' Alias''.

Animation

In the 1940s, Fleischer/ Famous Studios produced a number of groundbreaking ''Superman'' cartoons, which became the first examples of superheroes in animation. Since the 1960s, superhero cartoons have been a staple of children's television, particularly in the U.S.. However, by the early 1970s, US broadcasting restrictions on violence in children's entertainment led to series that were extremely tame, a trend exemplified by the series ''Super Friends.'' Meanwhile, Japan's anime industry successfully contributed its own style of superhero series, such as ''Science Ninja Team Gatchaman''.

In the 1980s, the Saturday morning cartoon ''Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends'' brought together Spider-Man, Iceman, and Firestar. The following decade, '' Batman: The Animated Series'', which was aimed at somewhat older audiences, found critical success in mainstream publications. This series lead to the successful DC Animated Universe franchise and other adaptation such as ''Teen Titans'' Marvel emulated ''X-Men'' and '' Spider-Man: The Animated Series''.

Comics' superhero mythos itself received a nostalgic treatment in the 2004 Disney/Pixar release ''The Incredibles'', which utilized computer animation. Original superheroes with basis in older trends have also been made for television, such as Disney's '' Gargoyles'' by Greg Weisman and Cartoon Network's ''Ben 10'' franchise and Nickelodeon's '' Danny Phantom''.

Radio

Beginning 1940s, the radio serial ''Superman'' starred Bud Collyer as the titular hero. Fellow DC Comics stars Batman and Robin made occasional guest appearances. Other superhero radio programs starred characters including the costumed but not superpowered Blue Beetle, and the non-costumed, superpowered Popeye

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