Greetings folks, and Happy Thanksgiving! Sorry for the lack of updates lately.  It’s been a weird time here at BAM! Comix.  2022 has been a momentous year in many ways, some good, some not so good.  Between work demands, health problems, and more, progress has been a little slow, but slow progress is better than no progress, and we continue to make progress, so that’s the important thing.

Since the last post, a lot has happened.  For example, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever opened to the tune of $180 million dollars or so.  That sounds like a lot, and it is, but not exactly what you might call the MCU’s finest moment.  It comes in behind the original Black Panther’s $200+ million opening weekend, and only just ahead of Captain America: Civil War.  Not bad, but not great.  But then something even less great happened.  BP:W(t)F slid a whopping 62% it’s second weekend, bringing in only $67 million.  This is down there with clunkers like Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and The Eternals. Why this drastic drop in performance?  What could possibly account for this massive slide?  Well, a lot of things.

First, Chadwick Boseman’s shoes are not easily filled.  The man had a great screen presence with charisma to spare.  It would have been difficult to recast the role of T’Challa, but Marvel could have done it and pulled it off.  Instead, they made the disastrous decision to replace T’Challa with his little sister, Shuri.  Don’t get me wrong, Letitia Wright is a fine actress, but even at her best, she falls far shy of Boseman.  So instead of Black Panther looking like this: Black Panther now looks like this: I don’t know about you, but BP1 above even at his ease is far more intimidating than BP2.  Poor little Letitia Wright looks like a child dressed for Halloween.  She simply lacks the physicality, the heft, the weight that is necessary to make a convincing super hero. She looks exactly like what she is, a skinny girl who might weigh 100 pounds soaking wet.  Sorry, Shuri, I simply don’t believe that you can beat up a man twice your mass, even with the magic BP suit on.

But the hero of BP:W(t)F is not the only one lacking a heroic physique. It’s been rightly said that any hero is only as good or interesting as their villain.  Well, the villain of BP:W(t)F is Prince Namor of Atlantis, the Sub-Mariner.  In the Marvel Comics universe, Namor has been around as a villain and anti-hero for a long time.  He was once the sworn enemy of the Fantastic Four, even though he carried a torch for Susan Storm Richards.  Namor was able to hold his own against the mighty FF, and when you look at him in the comic book, you can see why.  Namor looks like he could take on just about anyone.  The dude is an impressive specimen and does not lack for muscle. Making Namor the villain of a Black Panther movie was a strange decision to begin with, given Wakanda’s status as a land-locked country in the middle of Africa, but let’s give that a pass for the moment.  How did Marvel choose to portray Namor in the movie?  What did he look like?

If you think about the male MCU heroes and anti-heroes from Iron Man 1 to today, most looked like they spent countless hours in the gym so they might bear some resemblance to their comic book counterparts.  Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Chris Pratt, Jeremy Renner, and more hit the gym to help their characters make the transition from the page to the screen, and for the most part, it worked.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A lot of guys out there would give their eye teeth to be built like that, and a lot of gals would do the same to go out with a guy who was built like that.  These men look the parts they played.  I can honestly say that I would not like to meet any of these dudes in a dark alley on a bad day.  They look like they could lay a hurtin’ on me in no time.  You’d think that Kevin Feige and the production team at the MCU would make sure that Namor, the anti-hero who held off the entire FF, would be built like Superman.

You’d be wrong.  Take a look.

 

Sorry to do that to you, but this dude looks like he spent more time at the Kripsy Kreme than the gym.  (Hmmm…maybe that was the idea.  Maybe they wanted an antagonist that little Shuri could take on and win?  Nah, even this guy could beat BP2/Shuri.  Nevermind.)    As I was saying, I’m sorry Marvel, rolls of fat at the waistline do not an intimidating villain make.  Heck, I’m built better than this guy is.  At least he’s not alone. Look at the roll of fat around blue (blue?) henchman number one below on the right.

That guy is suffering from a bad case of Dunlop’s.  You know his poor gut was sore after a long day of filming.  It’s time for him to lay off the Twinkies and do a few push ups and sit ups.  Next to him, Namor looks pretty good.  But next to him, just about anyone looks pretty good.

You do get the impression that if old Namor there wasn’t sucking in his gut a fair amount, he might look a lot like his henchman.  BTW, what’s with the terribly fake, plastic looking wings at Namor’s ankles?  I mean, really guys, come on.

I’m don’t know if it get’s more amateurish than that.

Getting back to the main point, as a contrast to Namor, take a look at Killmonger, the antagonist from the first BP movie.  Killmonger looks like he could bench press a Buick.  This guy was a good villain and he looked the part.  I believed that he could take on T’Challa and win.

Namor doesn’t even come close.

But we can’t let the comparisons stop there.  If Namor looks bad next to Killmonger, he looks worse next to Aquaman.  That’s right, even DC got Aquaman right, and DC doesn’t get much right at all.  When DC makes their Atlantean superhero look better than yours, you know you’re in trouble.

Granted, Jason Momoa has the Aquaman supersuit on, but it would be a mistake to think he is not capable of filling it out.  The guy is built like a tank.

“But that’s Jason from the front”, I hear someone say.  “You only showed us Namor’s back.”  Fair enough, here you go.

Even from the back, Momoa looks like he could stop the sea from coming in, which is why Zack Snyder took this shot.  It’s darned impressive.

Now look, I have nothing against body positivity in the movies, but save it for the winter Oscar bait dramas or the awkward buddy comedies.  These are comic book superhero movies.  Am I focusing entirely on the superficial visual appearances of the characters?  Yes I am, because that’s why comic books exist in the first place, to give you something to look at.  Comic book heroes need to catch your eye in order for you to be convinced that their story is worth reading and spending money on.  No one would buy a comic book about 98 pound weakling George McFly if he did not change into something far more interesting.

Human beings have always wanted our heroes to look heroic.  Read Homer’s descriptions of the great heroes of the Iliad and Odyssey, or Virgil’s descriptions from the Aeneid.  Their heroes are impressive to look at; handsome, muscular, and well-proportioned, just as their women are beautiful and well-proportioned in their own right.  If you don’t like Homer or Virgil, look at the sculptures from the ancient world.  They, too bear witness to the perfection of the human figure.

The heroes and heroines from our collective literature and visual arts throughout our history represent ideals, something for all of us to strive to emulate.  No, of course we can’t all look like Jason Momoa, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Zoe Saldana, or many of the other men and women cast as the heroes and heroines in the MCU and DCEU, let alone the sculptures of ages past, but that’s not the goal.  We all have the potential to be a little more than what we are, physically, intellectually, morally, and spiritually.  We might not be able to muscle up like Captain America, but we don’t need to look like Homer Simpson.  We can spend a little more time on the trail or in the gym.  We can turn off the TV and pick up Homer or Virgil.  And we can spend more time at church or reading our Bibles.  Perhaps inspired, if only a little, by the ideals we find in comic books and on the big screen.  Ideals that might even point us to greater things beyond them.

Is it a stretch to suggest that a muscular man on a comic book page or movie screen can inspire us to better ourselves?  Maybe.  But I’ll admit that a strapping Captain America telling us that “there’s only one God, ma’am, and I’m pretty sure He doesn’t dress like that” comes a lot closer to inspiring me to better myself than a pudgy Namor waddling out of a river with plastic wings on his ankles surrounded by flabby blue henchmen.

Just sayin’.