Who’s the real bad guy?
I was intending to extend my obnoxious monologue on the topic of ‘Glass of Water’, but my last satire, in "I love the beautify" lamenting the shallow males was apparently backfired on me so I guess I’ll keep to a more direct style this time, easy on the eyes and good for the stomach(for digestion).
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I was lucky to catch Spiderman 3 finally, I dread watching it alone really cuz I thought its pretty sad to sit in the theater munching popcorn alone. Mateen was a great companion, and as funny as always as we joked about the cross pollination of DC styles in this Marvel picture. There was the Harry’s butler that somewhat reminds us of Alfred(Batman’s gay Butler), the powerful searchlights shining randomly on buildings in the final showdown, again reminiscent of Batman movie. And not to mention Sandman, who’s really another Terminator impostor. He gives me the "Asta la vista" look all the time.. haha
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Critics will also be there as always, so said Spiderman in the movie. So I’ll not go too far harping on the let downs. But overall, I thoroughly enjoy the show. This show has all the decent actions and fightings, and a stronger storyline than usual no-brainer action flick. Spiderman’s story is a journey of a self-discovering hero, with stages closely applied by Stan Lee chronicling fundamental structures that all heros will go through theorised by Joseph Campbell, call a monomyth. Well, if you haven’t realise it yet, you probably know it already if you had enjoy the show because most well-known heros more or less has this common structure that makes them ‘heroic’.
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But what is striking in this movie is that the director has novelly chose to present a more impartial view of the characters. Dangerously portraying no real bad guys in this movie as he justifies the actions of the villains. It looks to me the whole show blames the cause of crime committed at a societal level, that’s a social problem per se. Sandman wants money to save her daughter, thou unlawfully but morally correct as a duty of father. Venom needs a job badly to wed his girlfriend, played cheat, but got exposed(rightly) by Spiderman, turned to repent but got ‘blessed’ in church instead with his powers. And Goblin Junior was just fighting for his father’s honours, not entirely bad really. If they’re all bad, probably all of us are because so often we’re forced to make hard decisions that pivots between collective-individual interest that ultimately swing in favour of latter. Oh, that’s just the hectic city life I guess, and there’re numerous evidence of correlation between frequency of crime and stress level, and suggestions of causality if you will.
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So gone are the days where comic villain are childishly portrayed as mad man who just want total destruction together with themselves. And the meaning of ‘Bad’ is no longer narrowly defined by its morality but also include its legality making it sometimes paradoxical and ambiguous. What truly is bad then, I think in practice, is when something conflicts with our interest. Deep down, if you bother to learn the bad guy’s story, I believe he ain’t that bad after all. What then is a crime? That’s when we stop using our common sense, and blindly adhering to the law that has made us so cold and robotic sometimes. Law stems from common sense, not vice versa. Not that I prefer a lawless society, but when a tragic crime happens, who’s to blame really? Perhaps my moral compass is already warped and confused by the demands of the society, then again, I’m a good guy because I’m law abiding right?
