Comic
books are rife with heroes with colorful names. But it seems a majority of
characters are simply a description of what they do and who they are.
Spider-Man, SuperMAN, BatMAN, Animal MAN for pete’s sake. Etc. Sometimes they
get creative like The Human Torch but that’s just a less gender specific word
for man and switching the order between man and thing. While I give huge credit
to the creativity of the characters, there seems to be a lack of skill in the
naming department.
Now
when comic book super heroes first arrived on the scene, they were primarily
aimed at children. As any parent or childcare person can tell you, you need to
keep things simple with children. The younger they are, the harder it is for
them to deal with complex concepts and ideas. That’s one of the driving forces
for the initial popularity of a character like Superman. He is dressed in
primary colors with simple powers, such as super strength and speed. It is easy
to see the initial appeal of those early fans.
While
the idea of characters calling themselves “______” Man, I am even more annoyed
by characters who call themselves Doctor “_______”. I have many friends who
have worked hard for the past several years to become an actual doctor. They
have worked hard to earn the right to use that descriptor. Many of the
characters in comics who refer to themselves as Doctor, have no such degree.
Even a character like Doctor Strange, who does have a legit medical degree,
should no longer refer to himself as Doctor since he has long since stopped
practicing any form of medicine. 
Doctor
Doom never even got a medical degree. He dropped out of college after a
horrible accident (that’s why he wears the mask). He then became the despotic ruler
of his home country of Latveria through a combination of science and sorcery.
While all that is an impressive accomplishment, still he never finished
college. Of course, Mister Doom doesn’t quite have the same ring to it.
As
opposed to Doctor Doom, Captain American is an actual Army Captain. Steve
Rogers has the rank of captain with all the privileges and responsibilities
that rank implies. Though the very fact that he has that rank seems to imply a
bit of corruption in the armed forces of the Marvel Universe. I mean, prior to
becoming Captain America, Steve Rogers was a puny weakling who was classified
4F and unfit for service. It was only due to the injection of the Super Soldier
Serum that he was able to become Captain America. But he didn’t really earn
that rank. It’s not like he started out as Private America and then climbed the
ranks to Captain. They gave him the rank of Captain without him having performed any service to earn such rank. |
| Union Jack |
In
the comics, just like in reality, Captain America was created as propaganda. He
was created during a time of war to inspire Americans to feel a renewed sense
of pride in their country. In the comics
he was supposed to be the first of an entire battalion of super soldiers but
the scientist who created the formula was murdered. And so Steve Rogers was
left as the only successfully created Super-Soldier. Now being the ultimate
American soldier someone decided to slap a flag on him and use him as a symbol.
Sadly, many other countries decided to follow suit. There are several national
heroes of multiple countries, each really just being a thinly veiled copy of
Captain America. There is a Captain Britain, though the British equivalent of
Captain America would be Union Jack, a costumed super spy. Captain Britain is
more an inter-dimensional protector seeped in Arthurian mythology.
 |
| "Have no fear. Captain Canuck is here!" |
Over
the years, comics have had brief periods of stagnation. These periods of
stagnation have seen the industry nearly vanish from existence. The usual thing
that saves comics from going extinct is the introduction of some new way to
tell these mythic stories of heroes. Finding a new way of looking at the
characters that had not previously been considered (usually by a British
writer). Perhaps one of the inciting causes of these stagnation periods is that
writers get lazy. They come up with a simple concept and give a character a generic
name, causing the stories to never evolve into something the readers have not
seen before. And thus the readers abandon their beloved funny books in search
of more innovative sources of entertainment.
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