Marvel Comics

Hollywoods zweitgrösster Kassen- erfolg 2018 ist der die erste Marvel- Comics-Verfilmung, die den Oscar ver- dient, weil «Black Panther» die Erweite- rung des popkulturellen Idioms mit his- torischer Tiefenschärfe verbindet und zeigt, was möglich ist, wenn Studiobosse sich zurückhalten: ein Budget von 200 Millionen Dollar, und am Ende ist es trotzdem Kunst.

Reprenant partiellement mon mémoire de master II, ce dossier aborde l'histoire des éditions Lug, principal importateur des comics Marvel entre 1969 et 1989 en France, évoquant à la fois la biographie de ses membres fondateurs, la pression de la loi de contrôle de 1949 et les méthodes employés pour la traduction et l'adaptation.

Super-héros : histoire d’un mythe américain
UE libre pour le Bureau des enseignements transversaux de l’université Paris 3 Sorbonne-Nouvelle
Année universitaire 2020-2021
Du 27 janvier 2021 au 21 avril 2021
Descriptif :
En plus de quatre-vingts ans, l’histoire des super-héros, apparus dans les comics des années 1930 aux États-Unis, est longue et complexe. Le genre d’ailleurs ne cesse de s‘enrichir chaque année de nouveaux personnages et de nouveaux récits alors qu’il se diffuse dans de nombreux médias (séries télévisées, jeux vidéo, cinéma, etc.) et sur tous les continents. Si une telle profusion interdit toute exhaustivité, il reste toutefois possible de comprendre, à travers les exemples les plus célèbres (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Captain America, les X-Men, etc.), mais aussi d’autres cas bien moins connus en France et parfois aujourd’hui oubliés (Namor, l’Escadron Suprême, le Punisher) les raisons sociales, économiques et politiques qui ont présidé à l’apparition et au succès de ce genre.

This presentation traces the history and appearance of so-called multiple states from their earliest role in the development and theorization of scientific psychology at the turn of the 19th century with the work of William James, Frederic Myers, Theodore Flournoy, and Morton Prince, to MPDs later resurgence in the 1980s, and its evolution and further theorization as “dissociative identity disorder” in the 1990s.  This historical “genealogy” serves as the theoretical basis to examine both the madness of the Marvel character “Legion” in The New Mutants comic book series as well as the creative – and profound – therapeutic healing that he undergoes.  In doing so, this highly illustrated presentation raises important questions around the nature of pathological versus non-pathological dissociation, how extreme states of psychological fragmentation and madness can be visualized, much less theorized, and takes up anew William James’ centuries-old question regarding the possibilities of “supernormal powers” and their potential relationship to psychological trauma. The presentation concludes with a depth psychological reading of The New Mutants through the contemporary lens of Jungian analyst and clinical psychologist Donald Kalsched’s mytho-poetic model of what he terms the “Self-Care System” (SCS).

ÉDITION POCHE réactualisée et complétée par un chapitre inédit.

Cinéma, séries télévisées, romans, jeux... les super-héros, nés en 1938 avec l’apparition de Superman, ont envahi la culture populaire planétaire.
Loin d’être un simple produit de divertissement, le genre super-héroïque a été pensé dès son origine comme un outil politique par des auteurs issus de milieux modestes. Captain America a ainsi été créé par deux auteurs juifs pour corriger Hitler dans des comics alors que Wonder Woman a été pensée pour promouvoir l’émancipation des femmes.
D’autres super-héros ont eu pour fonction de faire croire à l’existence d’un futur radieux à portée de main dans lequel le modèle démocratique se répandrait sur l’ensemble du globe en triomphant des tyrannies « féodales » totalitaires. Plus tard, de nouveaux personnages ont symbolisé une Amérique en plein doute, frappée de plein fouet par la crise pétrolière, la défaite au Vietnam, puis le 11 septembre 2001. Évoquant tour à tour Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Captain America, Namor, l’Escadron suprême, Black Panther, Luke Cage, Green Arrow, Spider-Man, Red Sonja, Howard the Duck, Punisher, Iron Man, les super LGBT et Wolverine, cet ouvrage se propose d’explorer les discours politiques qui se cachent derrière le masque des surhumains.

This book offers an interdisciplinary approach to the study of comic-books, mobilising them as a means to understand better the political context in which they are produced. Structured around key political events in the US between 1938 and 1975, the author combines analyses of visual and textual discourse, including comic-book letters pages, to come to a more complete picture of the relationship between comic-books as documents and the people who read and created them. Exploring the ways in which ideas about the US and its place in the world were represented in major superhero comic-books during the tumultuous period of US history from the Great Depression to the political trauma of Watergate and the end of the Vietnam War, Superheroes and American Self-Image sheds fresh light on the manner in which comic-books shape and are shaped by contemporary politics. As such it will appeal to scholars of cultural and media studies, history and popular culture.

Neste artigo são abordadas características temáticas e formais presentes nas histórias em quadrinhos do período conhecido como Era de Ouro, bem como rupturas estéticas surgidas em consequência ao Comic Code Authority, que levou ao desenvolvimento de um novo estilo conhecido como Era de Prata. São abordadas as convenções estabelecidas por uma primeira onda de autores vinculada à National Comics e seu posterior desenvolvimento por uma segunda onda no surgimento da Marvel Comics ao redor de Stan Lee e a importância de Jack Kirby e Steve Ditko nesta produção.

In this article are discussed the thematic and formal features present in the comics of the period known as the Golden Age, as well as aesthetic ruptures arising as a result of the Comic Code Authority that led to the development of a new style known as the Silver Age. It deals with the conventions established by the first wave of authors linked to the National Comics and its later development by a second wave in the appearance of Marvel Comics around Stan Lee and the importance of Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko in this production.

Ballester, P., (2021, 15 mars), Le Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) et la ville simulacre. La Furia Umana, 40, Tracer les villes, Track the cities, 35.
https://www.lafuriaumana.it/index.php/74-lfu-40/986-patrice-ballester-le-marvel-cinematic-universe-mcu-et-la-ville-simulacre

Le MCU est-il en train de perpétuer la vision de la ville des possibles et des simulacres utopiques et chaotiques que les auteurs de comics ont voulu faire partager avec leur public de lecteurs ? Au-delà, la marvelisation des villes existe-t-elle à travers le MCU et sa vingtaine de films ? En outre, l’image de la ville par Marvel-Disney n’est-elle par réduite à l’architecture contemporaine et à l’uniformité des comportements urbains audibles et visibles dans le monde entier et non pas uniquement en Occident ? Il s’agit d’un essai de cultural studies qui se veut à la fois par la méthode un recensement des villes et des images de la ville dans le MCU pour connaitre, percevoir et analyser la fonction et les représentations des villes afin d’entrevoir une sorte de transposition entre les films et les parcs de loisirs, mais aussi les espaces publics et grandes infrastructures comme les hôtels de New York et de Las Vegas devenant des réceptacles à la fois touristique et culturel (pop culture) de la franchisse cinématographique la plus rentable. Entre une approche complexe mettant en lien la pop culture, la culture de masse, les super production Disney et surtout la volonté par certaines cultures de transposer du cinéma à la ville ou de la ville au cinéma une vision simplifiée et/ou héroïque du geste urbain, nous aborderons le super-héros comme un simple reflet de la ville ou à l’inverse une identité renversée de la ville le définissant, voire le caricaturant ?
I. LE CADRE DES AMBITIONS SURHUMAINES : VILLE, CHAOS ET UTOPIE URBAINE
Ville technologique, ville de la peur, ville des mystères, ville utopique.
II. LA RETRNSCRIPTION DANS NOTRE MONDE CONTEMPORAIN DES ELEMENTS FILMIQUES DU MCU
L’exemple du Wakanda et green city Birnin Zana et de l’environnement d’Iron Man, usine, exposition internationale et maison contemporaine.
III. LA MARVELISATION DES VILLES MONDIALES : DU FILM A LA REALITE, PARC DE LOISIRS & TOURISTIFICATION
Infrastructures hôtelières, maison contemporaine - la carte, le territoire et le film - parcours touristiques en lien avec les films, les parcs de loisirs Marvel.

Este trabalho procurará analisar a presença de elementos religiosos nas narrativas das revistas da editora Marvel Comics entre as décadas de 1980 e 2000. A editora em questão publica alguns dos personagens mais populares dos chamados super-heróis, e até os anos 1980, a apresentação de conteúdo religioso nas histórias era velada. Mesmo em cenas de casamento ou de funerais, não ficava explícito em que os personagens creiam ou a manifestação da fé em um Deus único. Isto mudaria a partir da elaboração de histórias com conteúdo mais adulto, quando alguns símbolos começaram a apareceram nas narrativas, tais como: crucifixos, estrelas de Davi, bem como a presença de padres, pastores e rabinos. No universo mítico dos EUA a figura do herói cruza juntamente com a ideia do Destino Manifesto, ou seja, um sistema de crenças interdependentes por intermédio do qual os Estados Unidos passaram a ver a si mesmos como um “povo eleito” dotado de uma espécie de missão salvadora do mundo. Essas histórias em quadrinhos aliam interpretações da democracia e liberdade com um exame das heroicas e redentoras imagens presentes na cultura popular estadunidense. Como suporte teórico, o trabalho tem uma abordagem sob a luz de autores como John Shelton Lawrence, Robert Jewett e B. J. Oropeza que oferecem um olhar sobre os super-heróis a partir das funções espirituais e mitológicas que desempenham na vida real, além de evidenciar como suas habilidades super-humanas refletem uma esperança no divino. Para o aspecto religioso da formação da identidade nacional estadunidense, as obras do sociólogo Robert Bellah e de Sacvan Bercovitch serão analisadas. Esses autores trabalham como a fusão do sagrado e do profano moldaram os sermões americanos no qual buscou forjar um ritual de progresso pelo consenso, difundindo um sentido de missão e virtude como valores culturais dos EUA.

(pp. 17-24)  Although paving the continuity road towards 'The Avengers', 'Captain America: The First Avenger' is as interesting for the ways in which it differs from the previous four Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) films as for its similarities and connections with them. Fittingly, at the heart of the film is the notion of mould-breaking, as the emergence of Captain America (Chris Evans) simultaneously heralds a new beginning for U.S. efforts in the Second World War, and the disappearance of a promised future army of Super-Soldiers with the death of scientist Abraham Erskine (Stanley Tucci) at Nazi hands. In Marvel comics, the status of Cap as a one-off is regularly foregrounded in the dynamic of his relations with other heroes; respecting this singularity, Cap's origin as an instrument to fight a specific war is developed by director and screenwriters in a way that accounts for the existential loneliness, as well as the matchless virtues of heart and courage, of the character.

After their middle school developed a curriculum on comics, six students met with a teacher-researcher for a year to continue the critical conversations that started in language arts class. In this article, we explore how students purposefully used superhero texts to engage in critical inquiries related to gender and sexism.

Patrice Ballester (2021), 26 avril 2021, Marvel Studios - Walt Disney Company and the world expos / world's fairs : the identity of a nation ? Episode 5 Saison #1 Anticipations Archifictionnelles -https://culturesvisuelles.org/archifictions/

LES
EXPOSITIONS UNIVERSELLES ET INTERNATIONALES PEUVENT ELLES SERVIR DE TRAME SCÉNARISTIQUE POUR LES SUPERPRODUCTIONS HOLLYWOODIENNES REPOSANT SUR LE MYTHE DE L’AMÉRIQUE CONQUÉRANTE ET LES AVENTURES DES SUPER
HÉROS DANS CETTE ÉTUDE DE CAS, LE CINÉMA ET SES DISPOSITIFS NOUS AIDENT À PENSER ET À VOIR LA VILLE OU LES VILLES DU MCU PAR DEUX TEMPORALITÉS SE COMPLÉTANT LA TEMPORALITÉ
IMAGINAIRE URBAINE DES FILMS DE SUPER HÉROS ET LA TEMPORALITÉ AVÉRÉE DES EXPOSITIONS UNIVERSELLES TENUES AUX ÉTATS UNIS LES FILMS QUE NOUS ANALYSONS SONT LES TÉMOINS,
VOIRE LA PROPAGANDE D’UN MONDE OCCIDENTAL SE PERMETTANT DE RECRÉER UNE CHRONOLOGIE FICTIVE AU SEUL BUT D’INCLURE DANS LE SCÉNARIO D’UNE SUPERPRODUCTION HOLLYWOODIENNE UN ÉLÉMENT DE CULTURE DE MASSE, DITE POP CULTURE POUVANT SERVIR DE CADRE ET DE DÉCOR À TOUT UN PANEL DE SPECTATEURS LES EXPOSITIONS UNIVERSELLES SONT UTILISÉES COMME DES RÉFÉRENTS COMMUNS AUX ÉTATS UNIS PAR LES TRACES DE MÉMOIRE DES GRANDES MANIFESTATIONS DE NEW YORK, CHICAGO
ET SEATTLE QUI S’ADDITIONNENT AUX SOUVENIRS DES FÊTES GÉANTES PARISIENNES, LONDONIENNES OU ASIATIQUES UN PREMIER REGARD SUR DES FACILITÉS SCÉNARISTIQUES CRÉATRICES DE LÉGENDES URBAINES S’ANALYSE PAR LES REPRÉSENTATIONS DU
PROGRÈS ET DE SES AFFRES POUR DES HÉROS COMME TONY STARK ALIAS IRON MAN, TOUT EN RAPPELANT LES LIENS ÉTROITS ENTRE CINÉMA, ARCHITECTURE ET EXPOSITION UNIVERSELLE (I) PERMETTANT D’ENTREVOIR LA CRÉATION D’UNE LIGNE TEMPORELLE
FICTIVE D’EXPOSITION UNIVERSELLE COMME ÉLÉMENT FÉDÉRATEUR D’UNE HISTOIRE FANTASTIQUE POUR LES MASSES DANS LE CADRE DE LA FRANCHISE MARVEL STUDIO ET DU PREMIER DES VENGEURS CAPTAIN AMERICA (II). ENFIN, LA VILLE EST UN ENVIRONNEMENT QUI OFFRE DES CONTRE POINTS IMPORTANTS AU SCÉNARIO DU MCU AVEC NOTAMMENT LA DÉCLINAISON ET TRANSPOSITION DE SES FILMS (LES AVENGERS) DANS LE CADRE DES PARCS DE LOISIRS
DISNEY QUI RETRANSCRIVENT LES SCÉNARIOS ET LA STAR EXPO OU WORLD EXPO (III) COMME IDENTITE D'UN GROUPE ET D'UNE NATION?

MOTS CLÉS : RECOMPOSITION, ESTHÉTIQUE, ARCHITECTURE SPECTACLE, TRANSMÉDIA, TOURISME, URBAIN, SUPER HÉROS.

CAN WORLD’S FAIRS SERVE AS A BACKDROP FOR
HOLLYWOOD BLOCKBUSTERS CENTERED ON THE MYTH OF CONQUERING AMERICA AND THE ADVENTURES OF
SUPERHEROES? IN THIS CASE STUDY, THE CINEMA AND ITS DEVICES HELP US TO THINK AND SEE THE CITY OR CITIES OF THE MCU THROUGH TWO COMPLEMENTING TEMPORALITIES THE IMAGINARY URBAN TEMPORALITY OF SUPERHERO FILMS AND THE PROVEN TEMPORALITY OF THE WORLD EXPO HELD AT THE UNITED STATES THE FILMS THAT WE ANALYZE ARE THE WITNESSES, EVEN THE PROPAGANDA OF A
WESTERN WORLD ALLOWING ITSELF TO RECREATE A FICTITIOUS CHRONOLOGY WITH THE SOLE AIM OF INCLUDING IN THE SCENARIO OF A HOLLYWOOD BLOCKBUSTER AN ELEMENT OF MASS CULTURE, KNOWN AS POP CULTURE THAT CAN BE USED SETTING
AND DECOR FOR A WHOLE PANEL OF SPECTATORS THE WORLD'S FAIRS ARE USED AS COMMON REFERENCES IN THE UNITED STATES BY THE REMEMBRANCE TRACES OF THE MAJOR EVENTS IN NEW YORK, CHICAGO AND SEATTLE WHICH ARE ADDED TO THE MEMORIES OF THE GIANT FESTIVALS IN PARIS, LONDON OR ASIA A FIRST LOOK AT THE SCRIPTWRITING FACILITIES CREATING URBAN LEGENDS IS ANALYZED BY THE REPRESENTATIONS OF PROGRESS AND ITS PANGS FOR HEROES LIKE TONY STARK ALIAS IRON MAN, WHILE RECALLING THE CLOSE LINKS BETWEEN CINEMA, ARCHITECTURE AND
UNIVERSAL EXHIBITION (I);  PROVIDING A GLIMPSE OF THE CREATION OF A FICTIONAL WORLD EXPO TIMELINE AS A UNIFYING ELEMENT OF A FANTASY STORY FOR THE MASSES AS PART OF THE MARVEL STUDIO FRANCHISE AND THE AVENGERS' FIRST CAPTAIN
AMERICA (II);  FINALLY, THE CITY IS AN ENVIRONMENT THAT OFFERS IMPORTANT COUNTER POINTS TO THE MCU SCENARIO WITH IN PARTICULAR THE VARIATION AND TRANSPOSITION OF ITS FILMS (THE AVENGERS) WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF THE DISNEY LEISURE
PARKS WHICH TRANSCRIBE THE SCENARIOS AND THE STAR EXPO OR WORLD EXPO LIKE COMPANY OR NATION IDENTITY ? (III).

KEYWORDS
RECOMPOSITION AESTHETICS, SHOW ARCHITECTURE,
TRANSMEDIA, TOURISM, URBAN, SUPERHEROES

The vast popularity of the Marvel Universe is hard to ignore. The enormous success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) over the last 12 years, and the unprecedented popularity of Netflix Marvel spinoffs, means that the reach of Marvel comics has been deepened and extended. The various characters, either on the page or screen, play out relatable sagas in which we can identify. In no trivial way these comic book heroes have become a new pantheon of gods to which we relate personally. It is to this scenario that the collected essays within this book speak. Importantly Gregory Stevenson has brought together a collection of writers who read theology through the tales of the Marvel Universe. Quite unlike any other book to address comic books and religion, this collection deals with an array of connected characters and explores them through quite different mediums, comics, television, and film. Yet, despite this freedom the authors focus directly on how these stories can be read through theology.

Tra le numerose ossessioni che abitano l'immaginario americano c'è indubbiamente quella dell'origine e quindi della famiglia. Un tema esploratissimo nel cinema e nella televisione statunitense, tra liquidazioni e riabilitazioni. Una delle più fortunate recenti esperienze audiovisive d'oltreoceano degli ultimi anni è la trasposizione cinematogra ca dei supereroi Marvel, operazione complessa che, nell'arco di dieci anni, ha portato alla realizzazione di venti pellicole di successo. Il cosiddetto Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) è un media franchise composto da una serie di lm di supereroi basati sui personaggi apparsi Archivio storico di Settimana Archivio di SettimanaNews 1 2 3 4 5

For the past decade, Hollywood’s North American and global box office has boomed thanks in part to the release of films derived from DC comic book heroes (e.g., Superman and Batman) and those by Marvel (e.g., Iron Man, Captain America, Black Panther, and The Avengers). While Hollywood’s box office superpowers are widely recognized, perhaps less obvious is how the US. Department of Defense (DoD) has been assisting Hollywood’s production of superhero films for more than a decade. The most recent of these collaborations is Captain Marvel (McCrae 2019; Secker 2019). This chapter focuses on how the DoD assisted Marvel Studios’ Captain Marvel (2019), a film whose production, storyline, and marketing exemplify a 21st century “DoD– Hollywood complex” product. Part of a steady supply of globally popular militainment products, Captain Marvel serves both DoD publicity goals and Hollywood’s bottom line. The chapter examines Captain Marvel’s production (as assisted by the DoD), content (the story, plot, characters, and themes), and marketing (publicity and cross- promotion), and shows how Captain Marvel helped the US Air Force communicate a positive image of itself to the world, and helped Hollywood turn a global profit. The chapter’s first section highlights Hollywood’s worldwide dominance and Captain Marvel’s global box office success. The second section defines the “DoD–Hollywood complex” and explains how the Air Force Entertainment Liaison office assisted Marvel Studios’ production of Captain Marvel. The third section probes how Captain Marvel’s content and marketing synergistically supported Air Force publicity and recruitment goals. The conclusion critiques Captain Marvel’s politics, especially the notion that this militainment is “progressive” and “feminist,” and considers Captain Marvel’s significance with regard to US “cultural imperialism.”

As Histórias em Quadrinhos (HQs) são bens culturais inscritos na Cultura da Mídia que, como tais, são fontes de pesquisa que permitem explorar importantes questões acerca da sociedade. Tal qual os demais gêneros, as superaventuras são capazes de apresentar questões referentes ao mundo “real”, contudo, transpostas para universos fantásticos habitados por seres superpoderosos. Diante disto, nota-se que, ainda que as HQs sejam consideradas diversão frívola para crianças e adolescentes, elas representam um vasto terreno de investigação. Este trabalho tem como objetivo desenvolver uma reflexão acerca do super-herói Estrela-Polar, mutante e homossexual, criado pela editora Marvel. Para tanto, adota princípios da Crítica Diagnóstica proposta por Douglas Kellner (2001), para traçar considerações sobre os contextos social, político e cultural que permeavam suas narrativas desde sua criação, em 1979, passando pela revelação de sua sexualidade nos anos 90, até as histórias mais recentes do personagem, que incluem o seu casamento, tido como a primeira união civil entre duas pessoas do mesmo sexo protagonizada por personagens de uma publicação mainstream. Esta reflexão não desconsidera o direcionamento mercadológico do personagem uma vez que se trata de um bem cultural, entretanto, compreende que seu desenvolvimento oferece uma alternativa ao modelo heteronormativo de super-herói, ao apresentar novas possibilidades de subjetivação não apenas circunscritas na binaridade legitimadora, mas também nas singularidades propostas pelas pulsações do desejo.

This chapter argues that the destruction and defense of metropolitan spaces in the alien invasion film is intimately related to post-9/11 geopolitical concerns. The chapter’s main focus is on the racial and sexual imageries that direct and help fuel these concerns. With this in mind, it considers how The Avengers (2012) creates urban spaces in which ritualized performances of idealized white masculinity occur in front of a dual audience, one existing within the film itself and one outside of it. The essay thus suggests that these invaded and bravely defended metropolitan territories constitute white spaces in the sense that they are sites where a particular conception of whiteness is produced through the spectacular performance of violence.

The presence of female combatants on the big screen has gained a spotlight in the academic debates at present. Female empowerment and sexual objectification each take position at the opposite ends of these debates. The portrayal of female superheroes has evolved with time in Hollywood cinema which has attempted diverse projections of the female body. With gender and cultural studies forming the basis of this research, this study has examined how ‘female agency’ operates within superhero movies by analyzing the Marvel superheroes, Black Widow, Jean-Grey and Gamora, locating them in the movies Avengers- The Age of the Ultron, X Men: The Last Stand and Guardians of the Galaxies respectively. In this analysis, it has been made evident that female agency is subjected to control due to the resilience of patriarchy. However, the interesting blend of form of the selected superheroes of a human, mutant and an alien has enabled this research to argue for the deconstruction of the normative constructions of gender and sexuality that regulates the body. This study has also examined how these superheroes transcend genres by analyzing how camera angles and thereby the positioning of the characters portray the level of female agency.

In December 2018, Sony released Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse, the animated origin story of Miles Morales and his journey to becoming Spider-Man. What makes the narrative of this origin story different and unique is the tackling of a multiverse where different Spider-Mans (or, as the characters confusingly dub themselves, “Spider-People”) appear in Miles’ universe after Kingpin and Doc Ock use a particle accelerator to reach across different parallel universes. Into the Spider-verse therefore provides a unique entry point for new and old fans to enjoy by bridging the characters graphic to screen adaptation through nostalgia.

To use Matthias Stork’s term, the “re-genrification” of these multiple Spider-People creates an interesting and new engagement of not only the Spider-Man character beyond the traditional male figure (with the inclusion of Spider-Gwen, Peni Parker, and Peter Porker), but also by focusing on PoC Miles Morales as protagonist. Each character establishes and maintains the Spider-Man origin story as a universal constant in how they received their powers, but the movie subverts portions of this through miniscule changes that provide “new strategies in character, plot [...]” (Stork 89). Furthermore, the visual medium of the film in its animated form plays with the comic book format by mimicking traditional panels and full-page splashes, captions, dialogue/thought bubbles, and sound effects. The differing art styles of the multiverse characters therefore reflect not just the overarching narrative, allowing numerous nostalgias to exist at once in a single story or cinematic medium, but also their graphic origins.

Ultimately, my paper will demonstrate that the nostalgia remembrance -- or as Jenkins’ might say, the “repisodic” nature -- toward Spider-Man is not limited to a particular iteration, but can exist across different versions and mediums while maintaining core elements that make these “Spider-People” inclusive to all.

By considering the movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a case study, I bring Tolkien’s explication of mythopoesis in “On Fairy Stories” to bear on the current popularity of superhero films to argue that such works qualify as cinematic examples of Tolkienesque fantasy tales. After summarizing Tolkien’s criteria for the genre in Nietzschean aesthetic terms, I both demonstrate how the builders of the MCU have crafted a sub-created fictional world and defend the existence of fairy stories in visual media from Tolkien’s own criticism of such a possibility.

From Savage to Sensational, from lawyer to hulking beast, from advocate to Avenger and from independent woman to hyper-sexualised feminista – She-Hulk provides a case study in what occurs when ‘great power’ meets the ‘great responsibility’ of the legal professional. This article seeks to fill a gap in the fledgling field of Law and Comics via an analysis of She-Hulk, revealing a character defined by binaries, constructed through real world and imagined patriarchal forces, whose superpowers do not make her immune from the struggles faced by the female voice within the legal system. Yet She-Hulk offers a solution to this exclusion – the realm of the abject, the monstrous, splintering the law to protect her client’s interests. She-Hulk reveals that superhero powers are needed to overcome the challenges of feminist lawyering.

A cultural Analysis of the brief point in Marvel Comics history when creators attempted to avoid addressing contemporary racial politics by changing the name of the company's preeminent African superhero, the Black Panther, to the Black Leopard so as to avoid association with the American political party of the same time while paradoxically tying the character even more deeply to the struggle against South African apartheid in the 1970s.

Like its central character, the television series Jessica Jones is troubled. The show grapples with the depiction of trauma, post-traumatic stress disorder, and psychological and sexual abuse, and does so with a grungy, dirty, film noir aesthetic. The darkness and grittiness of the show, its self-declaration as neo-noir in style, and the tension at the heart of its protagonist, immediately calls to mind classic films noir of the 1940s and 1950s. An analysis of the figuration of female characters in The Killers (Robert Siodmak, 1946) and Laura (Otto Preminger, 1944) reveals that the show’s influences combine to create a nuanced and complex protagonist.

In 1962, the world was introduced to a character of epic proportions, not because he was as alien as Superman, as technically savvy as Batman, or as patriotically moving as Captain America.  He was epic because he was the everyman; a teenage kid with this new super power thrust upon him.  His gigantic heart and humble upbringing shaped the super hero he would become.  Stan Lee and Jack Kirby combined their writing and artistic talents to create a character whose popularity skyrocketed exactly 40 years later when modern technology immortalized this character on the big screen. 
This paper explores the danger of increased monetary resources and cutting-edge technology potentially leading to neglect in the area of character development and storytelling.  As the expectations for realistic visual effects are raised and artists are inclined to impress visually, they tend to ignore the true essence of characters, forgetting the stories that originally made them popular.  As evidenced in the third Spider-Man film as well as the musical currently running on Broadway, an emphasis on the visual element has the very real potential to reverse the relationship between story telling and the elements of production.  Rather than utilizing technology to serve the character and the story, this emphasis on the visual leads to the character serving the aesthetic environment created by the artist.
In a discussion of the Spider-Man trilogy and the Broadway musical, I will show how these trends are manifest.  In addition, I will consider the implications for other characters in the comic book film genre. Are these characters brought to the big screen because they are so beloved or because of their monetary potential?  With the power that filmmakers have to expose these super heroes to the world, comes a great responsibility to use the tools available to them to honor the story telling tradition from whence these characters took flight.

Mark White is a philosopher who writes for an academic audience but has also extensively written for a more popular audience about how comic-book characters – Batman, Iron Man, Green Lantern, etc. – or TV Shows – Downtown Abbey – do provide us with philosophical insights. His last book, The Virtues of Captain America: Modern-Day Lessons on Character from a World War II Superhero, falls into this second category. And, as it was the case with his previous works, the book is particularly interesting, very well written, even if sometimes a bit too casually, extremely well documented – using an incredible number of examples, illustrations and quotations from Captain America's adventures –, stimulating and convincing. What is convincing is the demonstration White makes that Captain America is not a black-and-white, right-or-wrong Manichean, character. Convincing also are the moral lessons that Captain American can really teach us, as individuals and collectively.

Español: Cuando la industria del comic book dio sus primeros pasos en los primeros años treinta del siglo pasado, la forma de producir cómics se asemejaba a la de una cadena de montaje, con el personal creativo diferenciado y separado en función de su rol (escribir o dibujar), a los que los editores les imponían una serie de repetitivas fórmulas comerciales. Sin embargo, en los años sesenta Marvel Comics, con su editor Stan Lee a la cabeza, ganó popularidad gracias a su nuevo sistema de producción: el método Marvel, una nueva forma de trabajo garantizaba una gran libertad creativa al personal artístico. ¿Pero era un sistema de trabajo justo? ¿Se escondía bajo la etiqueta “libertad creativa” un ardid para cargar con nuevas responsabilidades al personal artístico, sin por ello remunerarlo ni reconocerlo adecuadamente? En este artículo se analizan las declaraciones de diferentes personas que trabajaron como personal creativo para Marvel, buscando a través de sus palabras una definición de qué era realmente el método Marvel y cómo los empleados de la editorial se sentían con respecto al mismo.

English: When the comic book industry get started in the early 1930s, comics were produced as in assemble line, with writers working apart of artists, and editors imposing repetitive commercial formulas. However, in the 1960s Marvel Comics and its editor Stan Lee started to gain popularity with a new production system – the Marvel Method, which gave great creative freedom to artists. But was it a fair work system? Where ‘creative freedom’ a ruse to overload artists with new responsibilities without gave them theirs rightful recognition and salary? This article analyzes declarations of diff erent Marvel artists and writers to know the exact way Marvel Method worked and how the Marvel employees felt about it.

The conceptual framework of Cool Pose (Majors and Billson, 1992) has yet to be examined against the backdrop of a Black comic strip. Thus, this study seeks to expound upon two key aspects of cool pose – Playing the Dozens and The Search for Pride and Manhood.

Through an analysis of a contemporary Black comic strip – Aaron McGruder’s The Boondocks - we may become aware of the continuity and extension of Majors and Billson’s conceptual framework of cool pose, which raises complex questions about assimilation, accommodation and male-female dynamics within the Black community. Though The Boondocks is a comic strip, the relationship between language and society is a bi-directional one; social issues manifest within language and language produces and reproduces social dynamics.

It is the intent of this session to shed the spotlight on examples of Nordic-inspired medievalisms and to bring them into ongoing conversations and debates about the reception of the medieval in the post-medieval world. We are especially interested in the reach of Marvel’s versions beyond the United States and how other approaches to the material engage with, react to, or ignore Marvel’s work. In addition, we hope to include coverage of texts from non-Western media (like anime and manga) that have embraced the traditions of the Norse gods in innovative ways.

Interested individuals should submit, no later than 15 September 2018, (1) paper proposal or abstract of approximately 500 words, (2) a 250 to 500-word academic biographical narrative, and (3) a completed Participant Information Form (accessible at https://wmich.edu/medievalcongress/submissions) to the organizers at [email protected] using “More than Marvel” as their subject heading.

In planning your proposal, please be aware of the policies of the Congress (available at https://wmich.edu/medievalcongress/policies).

ESPAÑOL: La Era Atómica engendró un nuevo tipo de monstruo, el mutante. Esta criatura fue explotada en las historias de ciencia ficción y consumida principalmente por
una audiencia adolescente, pero fue más que un simple monstruo. A través de un análisis detenido, el mutante puede mostrarnos los miedos y las expectativas que
despertaba en su público. Para lograr eso, necesitamos conocer el modo en que estas historias eran creadas, cuál fue su contexto histórico y qué temas desarrollaron
los autores. Este trabajo estudia dos casos concretos producidos en Marvel Comics durante los primeros años sesenta: Hulk y los X-Men, gracias a los cuales
sabremos más sobre el tiempo y la sociedad en que fueron producidos.

ENGLISH: The Atomic Age spawned a new monster type – the mutant. This creature was exploited in science fiction narratives and mostly consumed by a teenage
audience, but it was more than a mere monster. Through an inquisitive analysis we can learn about the nightmares and hopes that mutants represented for its
audience. In order to do it, we need to learn how these narratives were created, what was its historical context and what topics were portrayed by the authors. We
are studying two concrete cases from Marvel Comics in the early 60s – Hulk and the X-Men, which will show us more about their time and society.

Despite the popularity of today’s comic book film adaptations, superheroes did not make the leap from comics to screen in a single bound; rather it was a series of incremental steps. This chapter examines one of the most important yet overlooked steps in the comic book character’s journey from niche interest to mainstream success: animated series. In particular, it focuses on the early 1990s animated Marvel series X-Men (1992-1997) and Spider-Man (1994-1998).
Drawing on the transtextual relations Gérard Genette puts forward in Palimpsests, film scholar Robert Stam suggests that film adaptations are “hypertexts derived from preexisting hypotexts that have been transformed by operations of selection, amplification, concretization, and actualization.” He expands this point by suggesting, “diverse prior adaptations can form a larger, cumulative hypotext that is available to the filmmaker who comes relatively ‘late’ in the series.” For instance, when asked on the X-Men DVD commentary whether the 1992 animated series X-Men had influenced his live action adaptation, director Bryan Singer replied, “Tremendously. The animated series [… featured] the characters that had risen through the comic franchise and had become part of a more public lexicon, I wanted to take advantage of that.”
Focusing on industrial and formal relationships between comics, cinema, and animation, this chapter argues that animation is not so much the missing link, but rather the forgotten bridge between the comics that are respected as the source text and the excitement that greets each new transmedia franchise installment.

Introduction Although many observers might categorize superhero comic books as a marginalized medium, the recent success of such big-budget cinematic productions as The Hulk, Spider-Man, The Daredevil and The X-Men signals a renewed interest in superheroic topics. These films have given new life to characters that have evolved, reflected societal changes and influenced the broader culture for decades. Superhero comic books are nearly unique among pop culture genres for their endurance across generations of readers and their ability to adapt fluidly to changing social, cultural and ideological norms. The comic book market has traditionally been dominated by male readership and masculine concerns, but female super characters such as Wonder Woman, Phoenix, and Elektra have been relied on as sites of feminist inspiration and interrogation (witness Simone, 1999 and the dialog on her critical project by Watson, Wheeler and Johnston, 2002, along with Robinson's 2004 take on feminism and superheroism). In a feminist context, some analyses have praised super heroic women for the emancipatory power of their representation (Vowell, 2000), while others have decried the presumed sexual objectification and victimization of über-women in skin-tight clothing. And, like male superheroes, female superheroes have set standards for the mediation of heroic characters in other contexts, particularly encompassing mainstream entertainment icons such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, secret agent Sidney Bristow (of the television program Alias) and the recently updated Charlie's Angels.

Superheroines are paradoxical figures: they are empowering, and yet hypersexualized, strong and independent, and yet they fight for a society in which women are subordinate to men. “The female superhero originates in an act of criticism – a challenge to the masculinist world of superhero adventures”, writes Lillian S. Robinson in Wonder Women. However, at the same time, as superheroines, they should embody the values of the society they are protecting, that means they embody the status quo and confirm its stereotypes; but in a prevalent male chauvinistic society, where men are in power and women must fight for their rights, how can they protect this kind of status quo?
Thus, an ambiguous situation is created in which the status quo comes at once protected and questioned. In the superheroine “stereotype and innovation work together” concludes Robinson. Even if they are objectified, drawn with hypersexualized bodies, provocative, with revealing clothes, superwomen always keep an antiheroic element, disruptive, potentially revolutionary – even monstrous when it appears in villainesses.
“The ambitious woman and the heroine are strange monsters”, writes Simone De Beauvoir in Le Deuxieme Sexe. Like antiheroes, superheroines are dangerous threats to the status quo; they challenge our stereotype about women and superheroes. Their hyper-sexualization appears then as a way to control them, to exorcise their potential threat.
“In this modem era, the hero is a heroine; however, this 21st Century heroine still more closely resembles the antiheroic archetype”, writes Cynthia Lyles-Scott. Is it true? Are superwomen, today, still extremely antiheroic? How are they challenging our concepts of “hero” and “heroine”? I will try to answer these questions: through the analysis of characters like Wonder Woman, Jessica Jones, the new Ms. Marvel and Catwoman, and referring to Simone De Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre philosophy, I will focus on this antiheroic aspect of superwomen in comic books and its dialectic with the most normative and stereotypical ones.