introduction
In the end credits of the movie Spider-Man: Far From Home, the villain Mysterio releases a edited video to the world that transforms Spider-Man from a revered hero into a shameless villain; In Batman: The Public Enemy, the villain Luthor framed Superman as a murderer, making him the Public Enemy.
In superhero stories, the fundamental way for villains to fight heroes is to destroy not their bodies, but the spirits they symbolize, just like the above. Of course, after many misunderstandings and hardships, our heroes can always win the people's trust again in the end; while the villains are ruined, and they have become the ones who have been punished.
However, there is an old saying in China: look across as a ridge and form a peak on the side. How something looks depends entirely on how you look at it. In superhero stories, our perspective is God's perspective, and we know the truth; but the ordinary people in the story, from their perspective, how do they know who is the hero and who is the villain?
Will there be a world where the "heroes" are really villains who are not worthy of their names, and where the "villains" are heroes who survive and overcome difficulties?
That’s the story Amazon’s recently launched anti-hero drama, The Boys, will tell.
1. Super creative lineup
"Black Pickets" is based on the comic of the same name by Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson; the series is directed by Evan Goldberg, Seth Rogen (Seth Rogen) and Dan Trachtenberg.
Garth's representative works include "Hell Detective" and "Preacher", and his "Preacher" was also directed by Evan and Seth, which has become a popular American drama in recent years; another director, Dan, has no background. Young, who directed the third season of "Black Mirror". Among them, we can say a few more words about Seth Rogen. He is a famous yellow violent comedian. He once directed, wrote, and starred in "The Interview" (2014). Another name of this film is that it can't be said. "Assassination of Jin Moumou"; he also wrote and starred in the filthy "Sausage Party" (Sausage Party, 2016), which is highly recommended to watch this film with the elders in station A and B; he has many more Participated in the screenwriting and dubbing of The Simpsons.
The main actors are also big names. The show's main character, Billy Butcher -- we'll get to him later -- is played by famous New Zealand actor and lovable uncle Karl Urban. He has been a golden supporting role in various super productions all the year round - "The Lord of the Rings" series, "The Bourne 2", "Star Trek" series, "Thor 3: Ragnarok", etc. Known as the protagonist, he is proficient in all things evil, charming, mad, high, cold and cute.
What kind of story does such a strong creative lineup tell? In fact, for fantasy stories, having a good setting is half the battle, so let's start with the world view setting of this play.
2. Wonderful story setting
This is a world in which superhumans are born in large numbers; at the same time, this is also a world in which superhumans and capital are perfectly combined.
The New York-based company called Vought International represents more than 200 American superheroes.
Their relationship is a lot like the relationship between a star agency and a star—Walter packs, promotes, schedules, and pays the superheroes, and the superheroes follow all of Walt’s instructions. As a result, "Xingxia" has become a multi-benefit business - Walter's income mainly comes from the security fees charged for dispatching superheroes, as well as advertisements, movies, peripheral goods, etc. brought about by the "star effect". income; superheroes sell their abilities in exchange for money and fame; the government and the public enjoy the protection of the heroes, without spending a penny, they can also buy peripherals to support their idols.
In contrast, the superheroes of DC and Marvel are too shabby: Spider-Man even has to wash his own clothes, you must know that even such trivial matters are in charge of Walter; Batman and Iron Man are of course If you have money, you can pay for all the expenses of each team, but this workshop-style pit-filling model is also dwarfed by Walter’s continuous profit model of industrialization that gathers global capital, sub-sectors, and the entire industry chain; DC and comics Weijia's superheroes have been involved in various lawsuits for many years, but Walter's superheroes will not--Walter has the crime department to plan reasonable patrol routes and targets for his superheroes, as well as professional lawyers and teams. The public relations team handles various legal and ethical matters and helps Chaoying avoid various risks perfectly.
The marketization of "Chivalry and Righteousness" and handing it over to the capital can unleash tremendous power. Businesses, heroes, governments, and the public are all rejoicing.
It's a bit like what we've learned in history and economics: capitalism can greatly boost productivity, even in "chivalry" industries.
But is it really okay to let capital control everything?
The story begins with such a question.
Let's get to know "The Seven" first - it is the strongest representative of the Walter heroes, much like a copycat DC "Justice League", which includes: flying, invulnerable and Cyclops The "Homelander", wearing the national flag, is full of positive energy, like a combination of Captain America and Superman; the powerful and invincible "Queen Maeve" (Queen Maeve), a copycat version of Wonder Woman; speed The fast "A-Train", a copycat version of The Flash, the play even used the phrase "the fastest man alive" (the fastest man alive) to describe the Flash on him; he can go underwater "Deep", who breathes and talks with aquatic creatures, is a copycat version of Aquaman; martial arts master "Black Noir", who is taciturn, can be regarded as a copycat version of Batman; in addition, there are also invisible, extremely hard skin "Translucent" and "Starlight", a girl who can control electricity, just joined through the water national draft.
On the other side, the IT abandoned house Xiuyi and his girlfriend Robin are talking to each other on the street, and the girlfriend is suddenly smashed by one of the seven "locomotives" inexplicably. Repair Iraq was directly splashed a girlfriend's body tissue.
Repair Iraq was greatly traumatized. However, after the event, the "locomotive" and the Water Company did not hesitate to distort the facts and conceal the truth in every possible way. Huey thus got a glimpse of the tip of the iceberg of the truth: these so-called "superheroes" are nothing but a group of lawless gangsters. A mysterious man, Billy Butcher (our Uncle Urban), appears and pulls Huey into a small group that specializes in hunting these corrupt superheroes - The Boys, specializing in combating the sanctimonious The superhero and the all-powerful Walter Company.
3. The dangerous combination of superheroes and capitalism
"Black Robe Picket" brazenly depicts a world of despair. The black-robed pickets have to fight not only the "heroes" with superpowers and admired people, but also the system that creates these "heroes". So they can only use violence to control violence, or use some indiscriminate tricks. Garth Ennis from Northern Ireland, UK, is very good at portraying these bridges. The whole work is filled with a dark, crazy, decadent, ruffian and cynical taste that is unique to England.
"Black Robe Picket" is first and foremost anti-heroic. This isn't really innovative. Many works point out that superheroes are dangerous, which can be said to be the product of the authors' conscious or unconscious use of philosophical dialectics in the creative process. On the one hand, this danger is manifested in that absolute power brings absolute corruption, which is in line with the view of "putting power in a cage" in political science, "Watchmen", "Injustice: God Among Men" etc. have discussed the issue of the corruption of Chaoying; on the other hand, it is also reflected in the fact that the public always blindly follows an absolute authority and is unwilling to "put power in a cage".
But in previous stories, Superhero's corruption was either personal, lacking organization ("Watchmen");
"Black Robe Picket" is different. In its world, the corruption of superheroes is organized on a large scale; at the same time, it is very covert in the packaging of mass media. Even superheroes with supernatural powers can't do these things - in fact, the irony is that they are just pawns of the capital behind them. The corrupt superheroes are the villains, but the big consortium that controls them is the real villain.
So we say that "Black Robe Picket" is anti-capitalist on the basis of anti-heroism; or to be more specific, it exposes and criticizes the negative effects brought about by the introduction of capitalism in inappropriate fields. "Chivalry and righteousness" is originally a public welfare undertaking. Once profit-seeking capital is introduced, it is used by capital to maximize profits, and human life becomes the least important thing. For example, on a runaway passenger plane, the "Motherlander" found that he could not save everyone. In order to maintain his public image that he never failed, he decided to let everyone die.
This privatization of superheroes is simply worse than the nationalization of superheroes in Marvel's Civil War. We can see the power of monopoly capital like Walter—it uses media, entertainment, political lobbying, etc. to weave a big net, including superheroes, civilians, and even military, police, and politicians. The energy of the people must be at the mercy of the people and make profits for them.
Epilogue
In any respect, "The Black Robe Picket" is a very creative, very personal and very interesting work. It uses a bizarre story to tease and ridicule various problems in the real world. In this sense, it can also be regarded as an ingenious magical realism comic and series.
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