It's a Bird! It's a Plane! It's Huxley! By: Luke Meyer
Everyone loves to hate the society in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World just as much as they loathe comic book villains who are constantly trying to thwart the heroes' goal of world peace and happiness. Ironically, upon examination it becomes clear that the most acclaimed heroes are actually fighting towards a society like that in Brave New World while the most hated of villains are actually struggling to maintain the society that most are proud to call their own.
When searching for the archetypal superhero, one need look no further than Superman. He has the build, he has the backstory, and he has the fan base both in our world and in his own. However, upon examination, it becomes clear that the All-American Clark Kent is a paradigm of Brave New World values; Joseph Stalin was also called the Man of Steel, after all.
Superman hails from the perfect society of Krypton. Like Brave New World, Krypton employs the use of birthing matrices for the benefit of societal stability. Krypton is also a technocracy and is ruled by a council of esteemed scientists who hold all of Krypton firmly in their hold. Just as every human being intrinsically possesses near-limitless potential but is assigned to menial labor in Brave New World, Superman is a being of truly unlimited potential but chooses to live his life as a nondescript journalist. Additionally, Superman is often turning from one woman to another with little apparent regard for how it affects the women themselves. He has gravitated from longtime lover Lois Lane to winsome warrior Wonder Woman to high school sweetheart Lana Lang and even the domineering Maxima who only desired Superman for his breeding capabilities, "just like meat" (Brave New World 22). Since seemingly every woman in Superman's world wants to be with the obliging Man of Steel, he is the perfect example of the philosophy "everyone belongs to everyone else" (Brave New World 42).
Much like his Kryptonian counterpart, Batman is a widely-acclaimed superhero who is a living testament to Brave New World values. Whereas Superman exemplifies Brave New World society as a whole, Batman represents what the individual citizen should strive to be. Orphaned at a young age, Batman's identity has come from the loss of his parents, paralleling the parentless denizens of Huxley's dystopia. In fact, Batman makes a point to distance himself from any individual so as to retain a non-biased view of the world, a highly admirable trait in Fordian society. Batman's villains are also rooted in emotional turmoil, but much like the citizens in Brave New World, he distances himself from these emotions as much as possible (Fistfight 834).
Another beloved hero who conforms to the conformists of Brave New World is the spy Black Widow. Unsurprisingly, Black Widow and Brave New World share a common inspiration in the form of Stalin's Communist regime. Willingly submitting to behavioral conditioning and married to a man devoted to destroying symbols of American freedom, the Black Widow seems an unlikely candidate for widespread popularity in the American market. However, upon joining the Avengers, she has proven to be a major asset to the team when fighting intellectually dominating opponents due to the mindless nature of her hypnopaedic training. She, too, has had a frequently changing love life and often changes partners if her situation requires it. Considering her dispassionate attitude towards human life, her origin as a government product, and her rich Soviet education, the Black Widow would be the ideal citizen in the Brave New World.
Apart from the civic duty of conformity, Brave New World's residents enjoy many luxuries best imitated in the hero Iron Man. In his world, he his the embodiment of instant gratification; he has women at his beck and call, he has no shortage of drugs or alcohol, and his entire home and workforce is automated. Wherever he goes, he exerts his will on his lessers with impunity in the classic style of a capitalist technocrat. If he has any one identifiable goal throughout all of his stories, it is to expand his industry by any means possible: through government institution, consumer popularity, and even industrial buyout. Ever the utilitarian poster boy, Iron Man has shown little remorse in sacrificing few for the good of all; he once banished an unwilling Hulk to a distant planet for the sake of humanity (Planet Hulk). Given a generation or so, Iron Man would reshape the world in his image. That is, in the image of a Brave New World.
Conversely, when studying the nemeses of these heroes it becomes clear that these classic "bad guys" are in fact fighting for the very values that Brave New World tried to do away with, such as individuality, personal freedom, and true love. Lex Luthor, for example, is shown to be the epitome of selfish evil; in reality he is fighting for the rights of mankind. His emnity with Superman stems from the fact that Superman is not human, and for Luthor every time Superman takes on a duty for the good of the world, he actually detracts from the value of the common man who would have done that job. For this reason, Luthor's company LexCorp is entirely devoted to developing the potential of mankind in a kind of arms race with the Man of Steel. In fact, LexCorp itself is a stand against Brave New World's seemingly Capitalist market; whereas Brave New World sells the same thing to everyone, LexCorp strives to make as many unique products as possible. In all, Lex Luthor's human selflessness is precisely what is required to halt the spread of a Brave New World mindset.
The largest difference between Brave New World society and today's world is the fact that Brave New World strives to devalue the individual as much as possible. While many are quick to criticize this aspect of Brave New World, they are slow to give recognition to comic book figures who constantly fight for the intrinsic value of a single human being. In the case of classic villain Mr. Freeze, he is tirelessly working to save his cryopreserved wife, Nora Fries. Often chastised by hero and villain alike that he is throwing his life away in pursuit of a hopeless cause, Mr. Freeze refuses to view his wife as anything but an end that justifies all nonhuman means to bring her back to life. Similarly, X-Men villain Mr. Sinister wishes to achieve immortality on the grounds that his set of mutations makes him worth preserving. However, he is constantly thwarted by those who do not view his life as particularly valuable; he is often nearly killed in his noble pursuit for the preservation of human life. The value of human life is universally understood; the villain Thanos is so aware of its value that he considers mass genocide to be the greatest possible show of power in the universe. Indeed, in an attempt to show off to his steady love interest, he often orchestrates elaborate schemes that would result in the annihilation of entire solar systems. While death in and of itself is not frowned upon in Brave New World, Thanos' insistence upon the importance of death as well as his exclusive courtship would be seen as highly taboo.
In the carefully ordered Brave New World, citizens must never be allowed to tamper with the system. Of all comic book characters, no one tampers with the system with more irreverence than the anti-hero Deadpool. Despite superior weapons mastery and a healing factor that makes him nigh invincible, Deadpool is best known for breaking the fourth wall. He is aware that he is a character in a story; this knowledge makes him highly unorthodox because he is able to question the structure of the story he inhabits, much to the confusion of the characters around him. In many series, Deadpool has intentionally acted in a way to change the storyline just so see what would happen. This kind of experimentation would be seen as dangerous and altogether intolerable in Brave New World. Another villain to question the order of things, the Joker, is purely interested in spreading chaos. Brave New World is best seen as a precisely scientific community, which is precisely the kind of community that the Joker targets. The Joker is the antithesis of Brave New World ideology; to him, there is no order, and to the World Controllers of Brave New World, there need be no chaos.
The fact that audiences are paradoxically cheering for superheroes and rejecting the Brave New World ideas they represent does not inherently mean that they are forced to choose between today's ordinary world or the fantastical Brave New World. As Huxley himself said, "[Brave New World] was intended for us to find the best of both worlds – the disorderly [modern] world of liberalism and the much too orderly Brave New World where perfect efficiency left no room for freedom or personal initiative" (Revisited 4).
When searching for the archetypal superhero, one need look no further than Superman. He has the build, he has the backstory, and he has the fan base both in our world and in his own. However, upon examination, it becomes clear that the All-American Clark Kent is a paradigm of Brave New World values; Joseph Stalin was also called the Man of Steel, after all.
Superman hails from the perfect society of Krypton. Like Brave New World, Krypton employs the use of birthing matrices for the benefit of societal stability. Krypton is also a technocracy and is ruled by a council of esteemed scientists who hold all of Krypton firmly in their hold. Just as every human being intrinsically possesses near-limitless potential but is assigned to menial labor in Brave New World, Superman is a being of truly unlimited potential but chooses to live his life as a nondescript journalist. Additionally, Superman is often turning from one woman to another with little apparent regard for how it affects the women themselves. He has gravitated from longtime lover Lois Lane to winsome warrior Wonder Woman to high school sweetheart Lana Lang and even the domineering Maxima who only desired Superman for his breeding capabilities, "just like meat" (Brave New World 22). Since seemingly every woman in Superman's world wants to be with the obliging Man of Steel, he is the perfect example of the philosophy "everyone belongs to everyone else" (Brave New World 42).
Much like his Kryptonian counterpart, Batman is a widely-acclaimed superhero who is a living testament to Brave New World values. Whereas Superman exemplifies Brave New World society as a whole, Batman represents what the individual citizen should strive to be. Orphaned at a young age, Batman's identity has come from the loss of his parents, paralleling the parentless denizens of Huxley's dystopia. In fact, Batman makes a point to distance himself from any individual so as to retain a non-biased view of the world, a highly admirable trait in Fordian society. Batman's villains are also rooted in emotional turmoil, but much like the citizens in Brave New World, he distances himself from these emotions as much as possible (Fistfight 834).
Another beloved hero who conforms to the conformists of Brave New World is the spy Black Widow. Unsurprisingly, Black Widow and Brave New World share a common inspiration in the form of Stalin's Communist regime. Willingly submitting to behavioral conditioning and married to a man devoted to destroying symbols of American freedom, the Black Widow seems an unlikely candidate for widespread popularity in the American market. However, upon joining the Avengers, she has proven to be a major asset to the team when fighting intellectually dominating opponents due to the mindless nature of her hypnopaedic training. She, too, has had a frequently changing love life and often changes partners if her situation requires it. Considering her dispassionate attitude towards human life, her origin as a government product, and her rich Soviet education, the Black Widow would be the ideal citizen in the Brave New World.
Apart from the civic duty of conformity, Brave New World's residents enjoy many luxuries best imitated in the hero Iron Man. In his world, he his the embodiment of instant gratification; he has women at his beck and call, he has no shortage of drugs or alcohol, and his entire home and workforce is automated. Wherever he goes, he exerts his will on his lessers with impunity in the classic style of a capitalist technocrat. If he has any one identifiable goal throughout all of his stories, it is to expand his industry by any means possible: through government institution, consumer popularity, and even industrial buyout. Ever the utilitarian poster boy, Iron Man has shown little remorse in sacrificing few for the good of all; he once banished an unwilling Hulk to a distant planet for the sake of humanity (Planet Hulk). Given a generation or so, Iron Man would reshape the world in his image. That is, in the image of a Brave New World.
Conversely, when studying the nemeses of these heroes it becomes clear that these classic "bad guys" are in fact fighting for the very values that Brave New World tried to do away with, such as individuality, personal freedom, and true love. Lex Luthor, for example, is shown to be the epitome of selfish evil; in reality he is fighting for the rights of mankind. His emnity with Superman stems from the fact that Superman is not human, and for Luthor every time Superman takes on a duty for the good of the world, he actually detracts from the value of the common man who would have done that job. For this reason, Luthor's company LexCorp is entirely devoted to developing the potential of mankind in a kind of arms race with the Man of Steel. In fact, LexCorp itself is a stand against Brave New World's seemingly Capitalist market; whereas Brave New World sells the same thing to everyone, LexCorp strives to make as many unique products as possible. In all, Lex Luthor's human selflessness is precisely what is required to halt the spread of a Brave New World mindset.
The largest difference between Brave New World society and today's world is the fact that Brave New World strives to devalue the individual as much as possible. While many are quick to criticize this aspect of Brave New World, they are slow to give recognition to comic book figures who constantly fight for the intrinsic value of a single human being. In the case of classic villain Mr. Freeze, he is tirelessly working to save his cryopreserved wife, Nora Fries. Often chastised by hero and villain alike that he is throwing his life away in pursuit of a hopeless cause, Mr. Freeze refuses to view his wife as anything but an end that justifies all nonhuman means to bring her back to life. Similarly, X-Men villain Mr. Sinister wishes to achieve immortality on the grounds that his set of mutations makes him worth preserving. However, he is constantly thwarted by those who do not view his life as particularly valuable; he is often nearly killed in his noble pursuit for the preservation of human life. The value of human life is universally understood; the villain Thanos is so aware of its value that he considers mass genocide to be the greatest possible show of power in the universe. Indeed, in an attempt to show off to his steady love interest, he often orchestrates elaborate schemes that would result in the annihilation of entire solar systems. While death in and of itself is not frowned upon in Brave New World, Thanos' insistence upon the importance of death as well as his exclusive courtship would be seen as highly taboo.
In the carefully ordered Brave New World, citizens must never be allowed to tamper with the system. Of all comic book characters, no one tampers with the system with more irreverence than the anti-hero Deadpool. Despite superior weapons mastery and a healing factor that makes him nigh invincible, Deadpool is best known for breaking the fourth wall. He is aware that he is a character in a story; this knowledge makes him highly unorthodox because he is able to question the structure of the story he inhabits, much to the confusion of the characters around him. In many series, Deadpool has intentionally acted in a way to change the storyline just so see what would happen. This kind of experimentation would be seen as dangerous and altogether intolerable in Brave New World. Another villain to question the order of things, the Joker, is purely interested in spreading chaos. Brave New World is best seen as a precisely scientific community, which is precisely the kind of community that the Joker targets. The Joker is the antithesis of Brave New World ideology; to him, there is no order, and to the World Controllers of Brave New World, there need be no chaos.
The fact that audiences are paradoxically cheering for superheroes and rejecting the Brave New World ideas they represent does not inherently mean that they are forced to choose between today's ordinary world or the fantastical Brave New World. As Huxley himself said, "[Brave New World] was intended for us to find the best of both worlds – the disorderly [modern] world of liberalism and the much too orderly Brave New World where perfect efficiency left no room for freedom or personal initiative" (Revisited 4).
Referenced Works
Cates, Isaac. "On The Literary Use Of Superheroes; Or, Batman And Superman Fistfight In Heaven." American Literature 83.4 (2011): 831-857. Academic Search Complete. Web. 5 May 2014.
Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World ; And, Brave New World Revisited. London: Harper & Row, 1960. Print.
Planet Hulk. Dir. Sam Liu. By Greg Pak. Perf. Rick Hasserman, Lisa Beley, and Mark Hildreth. Lionsgate, 2010. DVD.