The Appeal of Superman (Bonus Material)

PART 1: LOOKING UP TO THE EVERYMAN

Some people say Superman is appealing because he's inspirational -- but they don't explain how he's more inspirational than any other inspiring superheroes. Some people say he's appealing because he's so "human" -- but they don't explain why that's resonant or unique to him in any way. This analysis seeks to explain both in one thesis.

TLDR: Unlike every other superhero, Superman typically lacks a definitive origin moment where he becomes a hero, and this removes a fundamental element of superheroes that usually divides the audience's life from theirs. This keeps Superman's life as relatable as possible. Being more relatable means the good qualities he possesses seem more attainable to the audience, and thus he becomes the superhero who inspires others most easily. I would express this as, "He's just like me in so many ways, and that makes me want to be more like him in the ways that count."

Introduction:

Superman appears to be the most inspiring superhero both in-universe and in real-life, and there's no obvious reason for this. His speeches are just as inspiring as Captain America's, his determination is just as inspiring as Batman's, his care for others is just as inspiring as Wonder Woman's. He's kind, but most superheroes are kind. He never gives up, but neither do any other superheroes. What makes Superman's good qualities more inspirational than everyone else's? When you collate some of Superman's characteristics that are sometimes cited as his appealing qualities, there seems to be a firm reason why he is the most inspiring hero.

Firstly, one major characteristic that is mentioned in regard to Superman's appeal is that he is incredibly "human", more human than alien, that the "-man" in "Superman" is the prevailing component. This is vague and doesn't constitute much of an analysis on its own -- however this relatability ties into what makes him so much more inspiring than other characters.

Secondly, Grant Morrison has mentioned that they interpret Superman as an exaggerated everyman. He has a den with all his possessions just like us -- but his den is a giant Fortress. He takes his dog for walks -- but flies Krypto around the solar system. This is a neat observation and speaks to a fun idiosyncrasy of the character mainly developed during the Silver Age/Mort Weisinger years (See Appendix A for elaboration), and also informs his inspirational quality.

Superman Lacks an Audience-Disconnecting Life Experience in His Origin:

Tying these two elements together helps elucidate a major distinction between Superman and other superheroes. Unlike the others, Superman typically does not undergo, in his conscious life experience, any extremely unique origin experiences that make him unrelatable, besides the general experience of having super-abilities. Most likely, you and I have not had our parents killed or have trained for 18 years to become enlightened, found a magic lantern that told us to use our willpower for good, grown up on a hidden Amazonian island learning the ways of peace, lost a loved one due to our irresponsibility, had our courage rewarded by the physical freedom of a super-soldier serum, or went through any extreme, unique life experience undergone by nearly every other superhero during their origin.

It's not just that Superman has lived a normal life very similar to yours and mine, beyond the fact that he jumps higher and runs faster than us, it's that every other character has undergone an extreme and unique life experience while Superman has not. We cannot relate to those unique origin experiences. The way Wonder Woman learned about faith and compassion is not how we will learn them. The way Green Lantern learned about exercising willpower is not how we will learn it. The way Batman learns to make order in life through self-development came from experiences that did not happen to us, so when we're inspired by him, we're inspired only by the lessons he ultimately imparts, and cannot relate to the experiences that got him there. Even other everyman characters like Kyle Rayner undergo strong experiences we cannot directly relate to (being handed the responsibility of being the final Green Lantern, in Rayner's case). But with Superman, we relate heavily to the majority of his life because there was no extreme experience in his origins that made him different from us. We grew up with working-class parents, went to school, have probably moved cities, and got a job, just like him. The broad strokes of Superman's origins are mundane from his perspective. (Notably I'm talking about experiences that he was conscious for, so the destruction of Krypton should not count because in the majority of canons, he was not aware at that age and has no memory of the event.) In a way you could even argue that Superman is the default prototypical superhero because he almost doesn't have an origin. The Krypton explosion just explains why he's biologically different from humans, but other than that it's the same story as any random human kid who grows up to become a firefighter because he just wants to, or a doctor because he just feels he's suited for it, or a psychologist because he wants to help others. There's no heightened dramatic moment. From his perspective, Clark's life was just about growing up and becoming what he felt was natural, just like our lives are. (See Appendices B and C for elaboration on the relatability point.) But the argument does not stop there.

Relatability Bolsters Inspiration by Making the Desired Traits Seem More Attainable:

Superman being relatable and mundane in this way has been broadly mentioned in prior analyses I've seen, but it doesn't make the firm point that I believe is critical: Superman's mostly-mundane and relatable life lacking unique experiences that define him is the reason why he is the most inspiring superhero.

I believe that it's easier to be inspired by someone when they are more similar to you. You put yourself in their shoes that way, you feel the similarities between your life and theirs and that clearly highlights the differences: you feel that you're just like them, but you can see how their character is stronger than yours, and then you become inspired. Superman lived a life just like yours, with no extreme experiences placing a barrier between your life and his, and yet he's often kinder than you, more humble, more selfless, more just. It's easier to be inspired by those traits because he's just like you otherwise -- this makes acquiring the traits that Superman possesses seem like a more attainable goal. To put the unconscious feeling of the character's unique inspiration into words: "If Superman can be that good, and we've lived fairly similar lives, why can't I be that good too?"

It's not like with Batman, for instance, where you can understand that he became such a determined person because he underwent such extreme and unique things and you know that you haven't undergone those things, and thus you have to take his lessons as those of a stranger's whom you listen to from afar. With Superman, he's just like you besides having powers. He's close to you in the vast majority of ways. And when you stand next to your brother and he's acting like a saint, you feel you're capable of doing the same.

I believe this explains why people feel such an intimate connection to the character and why he means so much to people in an inspirational way, more so than other characters. Superman's good qualities seem more realistic to attain than those of other characters as a result of his mundane origins. When people say, "Superman is great because he's essentially just a good guy, it's simple", I believe that this is what they are deeply referring to, that this is why him being a good mundane human resonates so much. We look up to Superman in the way we look up to role-models in our real-lives who are fellow human beings with inspirational qualities, more so than in the way we look up to fictional characters who were defined by experiences we will never undergo. 

In a way, Superman having been the most popular superhero from either DC or Marvel is partially explained by this point, as he is almost a synthesis of the popular characters' ethoses from each company. He is as inspiring as Batman, Wonder Woman, or Alan Scott, but is only so inspiring because of his relatable, mundane qualities, which are characteristic of Peter Parker and other 1960s Marvel creations.

Conclusion:

Even understanding this relatability-inspiration point myself while writing this analysis has made me feel closer to the character and more invigorated to act like him. It seems more attainable to be like Superman than any other superhero when you realize how similar your life is to his, that there was no big personal tragedy or unique bestowing of a heroic role that he went through that you have to look at from a distance and say, "I probably can't be like him because I never went through that!". Superman's life is closer to yours than is the rest of the superhero pantheon. And this helps reframe Morrison's exaggerated everyman approach, because now all those little things that Superman does that highlight how his super-life resembles your mundane-life just reinforce how normal his origins were, which makes you feel more inspired. I write in a journal, he writes in a journal, I have a den, he has a den, we lived similar lives, we are similar, so when he acts morally, I feel more encouraged to act morally too. After pondering Superman and writing this analysis, Superman feels closer than ever, and thus all his good qualities feel closer than ever to attain. Superman is a lot like you, and that means you can be a lot like him.

Summary Statement:

Superman lacking a definitive origin moment makes his life similar to and more relatable to the reader's, which makes his strong moral qualities seem more attainable, so it's easier to feel inspired by him compared to other superheroes.

It's easy to be inspired by Superman because his origins don't involve a unique defining event that we can't relate to. 

Appendices

Appendix A:

For fun, here's a quick list of some of the exaggerated everyman traits of Superman that come to mind:

-Being an immigrant = landing from Krypton

-Den filled with collectibles = Fortress of Solitude

-Pet = Krypto

-Group of friends with shared hobbies = The Legion of Super-Heroes

-A family member who understands you well = Supergirl

-Journal to write in = the giant stone journal in the Fortress that he engraves with heat vision

-Best friend = Batman or Jimmy Olsen

-High school sweetheart = Lana Lang

-Childhood best friend who you aren't as close to as an adult = Pete Ross

-Sometimes-difficult boss = Perry White

-Crush = Lois Lane

-Hobby that you cherish but neglect too much = the bottled city of Kandor

-Going home for comfort = going to Smallville or shrinking down to Kandor

-The Sun provides everything on Earth with the ability to live, and it provides Superman with extranormal abilities

Appendix B:

I understand that a counterargument to this relatability proposition would be that Superman's possession of superpowers itself is an extreme life experience that we cannot relate to, because it would color his entire perspective of the world and make it easier for him to be moral, which is a privilege and luxury we don't have. However my point is not that Superman is necessarily 100% relatable, that he is exactly like us; my point is that he is more relatable than virtually any other superhero, because every other superhero has both those abilities that make them unrelatable along with unique life experiences in their origins that are unrelatable. Superman only has the former to separate us from him, which keeps him closer to us relatively-speaking.

I am also speaking largely about Superman's origin story only, beceause I feel that's where the bulk of unconscious comic character appeals lie. Once you get into the adult life-events of superheroes and try to analyze them for their appeals, most characters basically undergo very similar things in monthly comics and it's hard to find special specific things that underlie their adult history. (An exception for me was Plastic Man, whose changing roles in his superhero career reflected the character's metaphor as a symbol of human change.)

Appendix C:

I used to believe it was a weakness of the Superman origin that there was never a moment in which Clark Kent firmly decided to start fighting injustice and become a superhero. Moments like that were later added to the mythos in Elliot S! Maggin's novel Miracle Monday where Clark sees the life-essence of a dog fade away and decides to become Superboy, in Geoff Johns' Secret Origin where Clark saves Lana Lang from a tornado and decides to become Superboy, in Mark Waid's Birthright where Clark saves an African village from a political threat and decides to become Superman. But it's notable that none of these ideas stuck around to become rigid aspects of the story going forward -- maybe because they're too recent to have been integrated into the collective consciousness, maybe because they were overwritten by writers shortly after publishing -- or maybe because, by acting as unique and unusual life experiences for Superman, they lessen the aforementioned relatability of the origin that is so integral to his uniquely strong inspirational quality. After all, the character had previously been around for decades and reached peak popularities around World War II and in the Silver Age, and to my knowledge there was not a definitive becoming-a-superhero moment established back then. Perhaps he doesn't need one. Maybe a typical life like yours and mine where he falls into superheroics naturally given his abilities is perfect.

PART 2: UP, UP, BUT NOT ABOVE

Another major appeal of Superman is his humility. It manifests through all of his kind behavior, such as in the memorable cases of him helping people standing on the edges of rooftops, in which the humble aspect shines brighter than any other characteristic -- he's humble enough to feel everyone is worth his time, regardless of the scale of their problem. And although other superheroes are similarly humble, Superman's humility stems from a unique point in his origin.

Superman was not only raised to be humble by Ma and Pa Kent, but the story of Krypton is a story of hubris vs humility. The Science Council failed to heed Jor-El's warning about the planet's destruction for varying reasons throughout the history of Superman myth, but it often centers around arrogance. Often they dismiss Jor-El as being wrong because they arrogantly feel they know better, because they feel invincible, and in the first elaborated comic book origin told in Superman #53, they reject the prospect of emigrating to Earth because they consider themselves above human beings:

If Superman were to take any lesson from his learning about Krypton, it would be one of humility.

A second lesson of humility was learned in certain iterations, particularly Superman: The Movie, when Pa Kent dies of a heart attack. Clark learning that despite his powers, he still has limitations, is a fan-favorite element of the origin, and that may be because it makes Superman become more humble.

Beyond manifesting in his regular heroics and demeanor, Superman's humility manifests in the superhero no-kill rule. You must be humble in order to realize that you don't have the authority to decide whether or not someone is beyond redemption. When Superman kills, the reason for such outraged fan reactions may be because it specifically makes him seem arrogant, which contradicts the appeal of his humility.

Lex Luthor acts as a perfect counter to Superman's humility. Both of them have exceptional abilities -- though where Superman's abilities are physical, Luthor's abilities are intellectual. Thus, Luthor feels he is above other humans because of his superior abilities, while Superman feels he is equal to other humans despite having superior abilities. Luthor is extremely arrogant, Superman is extremely humble.

I would also add that Clark Kent moving from a humble town, appropriately named "Smallville" to indicate modesty and meekness, to a big bustling city helps to reinforce the humility in his life.

And to connect this analysis to the previous one, humility may manifest in the everyman aspect of the character, because being an everyman supports the sense that Superman considers himself to be a human just as important as any other. Superman doesn't start his own country or planet even though he has the ability; he lives a simple life (that is exaggerated because of his superpowers) and doesn't seek anything more than that because he's humble. If he wasn't humble, he wouldn't remain an everyman. He wouldn't have his Fortress of Solitude as an isolated den filled with his collectibles, he would have a lofty palace floating above Metropolis, which would not be a relatable everyman home.

To further connect this analysis to the previous one, it could be that Superman being an everyman makes him the most inspiring superhero, and the specific trait that he inspires may be humility. Therefore, to summarize: having humility keeps Superman a simple everyman, and being an everyman makes his humility inspiring.

Summary Statement:

Superman is uniquely humble due to the lessons present in his origin, such as Krypton dying of arrogance and Pa Kent dying of Superman's limitations, and his humility manifests in his life in his obviously humble manners, his contrast to the arrogant Lex Luthor, his moving from a humble town to a big city, his no-kill rule, and his everyman life.