On the Utilitarian Value of Fictional Heroes - Whether Super or Just Extremely Competent in Fast Cars

Awhile back while attending one of the fabulous and free outdoor summer jazz concerts at the Hollywood-Highland Center here in Los Angeles, 

something happened that put in perspective for me exactly why we need heroes in our popular entertainment—whether super or just extremely competent in fast cars. My wife and I were listening to the fine music of the Downtown Jazz Project 

when four young women sitting directly behind us began to talk loud enough for us to have joined in the joy of one anticipating her upcoming wedding, and commensurate with another about the vicious politics at her office. Despite this being an outdoor concert where people may feel freer to chit and chat than they would if they were in a concert hall, I found the women to be exceedingly rude and discourteous.

I turned around and—as nicely as I could, but probably not as nicely as I should have—asked them to either stop talking or leave. The leader of the pack was righteously offended, and made me feel as if I had committed the faux pas. Somewhat intimidated, I turned back around and tried to concentrate on the music—but their backbeat of inanities was never-ending.

A fantasy of herohood, to coin a word, began to sprout in my head.

If only I was Superman, 

I thought, my understated authority, not to mention the most famous costume in creation, might well shut them up — after humble apologies for having annoyed me. Although even as the Man of Steel I might have found these women’s rudeness as toxic as kryptonite. 





My only super-option then would have been to fly off around the world at super speed gathering up raw materials and using them to construct a hermetically sealed, lead-lined soundproof room—with oxygen provided—fly it back to Hollywood-Highland, grab the four up in my super arms, put them in it, shut and seal the door, and then go back to the concert. A harmless fantasy that put a smile on my face and made the situation a little easier to endure.

But just a little. The women kept talking, even louder than before, and I became angry enough to conjure up more fantasies.  

What would the Batman have done? 

Taken the batrope, perhaps, tied the four women up and hung them high off the trunk of one of the giant elephants at the Hollywood-Highland? 

That would have been fun. But their screaming to be let down would have disturbed the music just as much as their energetic yadda-yaddas. A purpose defeated.

Had I been Spider-man I could have gagged them with four accurate shots of web. 

Or, taking a cue from one of Nature’s other insects, I could have cocooned them and really shut them up. 

Then I thought of the Thing from the Fantastic Four. 

Yes, I definitely would have enjoyed some “clobbering time” despite the accusations of being a sexist-fascist pig that inevitably would have followed. 




As a counterbalance I saw no reason why I should not have a cross-gender fantasy, imagining myself as Wonder Woman 

really upset over the bad name these four were giving my sex, and so hog-tying them with my golden lasso, putting them in my invisible plane, flying them off to Paradise Island and letting my mother deal with them.


Wonder Woman’s costume probably would have pinched, though.



As to the non-super yet extremely-competent-with-fast-cars heroes:

As James Bond, 

Tribute artwork by Graham Kennedy for the 50th anniversary of the James Bond 007 movie series.

having a license to do so, I could have just put one shot each into the center of their foreheads with my Walther P.P.K. Neat, simple, clean in its way. Yet it may have disturbed the other concert goers and then I would have been the rude one. 









Although as Michael Westen from Burn Notice, 





or, indeed, my own hero, the Fixxer, from my novels Blood is Pretty and Hollywood is an All-Volunteer Army 

I could have conned them into leaving by making them believe that I was a producer holding auditions “right now” next door at the Dolby Theater for a new Reality TV series, The Really Rude Women of Hollywood, and that I thought they had a very good shot at it and they should Go! Now! Quickly! 

No sweat—and no bloodshed.

Not that I didn’t dwell on some darker fantasies as well, fantasies involving 







Wolverine and his lovely slicing and dicing blades, 












the Hulk and his crushing personality, 











Aquaman and the inability of humans to breathe underwater, 











and even Dexter, who I don’t really consider to be a hero—but he is extremely competent.

No real person could do any of this, of course, without being willing to commit an illegal act or being declared a sociopath. But is this not exactly how we wish we could act when we are crossed, hurt, or have our lives nearly destroyed by other people or faceless institutions? Who would not want to send a Wall Street banker into the Phantom Zone? Who would not want to take certain BP executives and deliver them to the Arkham Asylum? Who would not want to put a pack of climate change deniers onto a recently separated hunk of arctic ice and watch it not-so-slowly melt ?

It’s simple: Heroes in popular fiction, comics, TV and movies are our surrogates. They do it for us, allowing us to vicariously find Justice and/or live the revenge—and we love it. It is not a new idea, Aristotle called it catharsis, but it is an ever potent one.

Which brings up the question of evil. 

For you cannot have heroes without evil. As the heroes in popular fiction, though, are all larger than life in both spirit and action, the evil in popular fiction is often more pure, deeper, and darker than in reality. Especially in superhero fiction where the bad guys often know they are evil and, indeed, take great delight in being so. 

Reality is different—in reality I do not think anyone ever considers themselves evil, unless, of course, they are clinically insane, and even then they often do what they do because of some authoritative voice—God or a dog or their dead Aunt Millie or the cockroach in the corner.  In reality there is the great possibility that the only real evil in the world is believing there is evil in the world.  

It was not so much that Hitler—everyone’s poster child of evil—was evil, 





as it was that he believed that the Jews were evil; it was not so much that the terrorists of 9/11 were evil, as that they believed Western Civilization was evil. And when you believe people, places, or things are evil, you have a tendency to want to eradicate them.

Even if there is no tangible force of evil, 

a force as real and effective as gravity, 

actions that are evil are undeniable. 

If we define evil as a person, persons, or institutions bringing harm to one or few or many while in pursuit of their own goals and desires, then we can see that evil permeates the world. And that it has gradations—from the slight evil of the rude women behind me in Hollywood to the massive evil of genocide in Africa, with much in-between that causes, at best, annoyance and irritation; at worst, injustice and tragedy. Often in our lives we feel powerless to do anything about this multifaceted evil, and there is not quite a worse feeling in the world than powerlessness in the face of evil, wrongdoing, injustice, and even simple rudeness.

Heroes battling evil in our popular fiction give us a theater in which to act out our desire to have the power to vanquish evil and the ability to correct injustice. Without these heroes—super in colorful costumes; competent in fast cars; struggling mightily despite the odds—the lives of many might be filled with more angst and drained of some joy, but, in any case, they would most definitely be poorer than what they are today.

What is often considered frivolous entertainment, then, is anything but, it is, indeed, a necessary respite from reality in order, ironically, to better deal with reality.

And that’s just super.

LITERARY INCARNATIONS

TO BE OR NOT TO BE, THAT IS THE QUESTION

IT IS UNIVERSALLY ACKNOWLEDGED THAT A SINGLE

MAN IN POSSESSION OF A GOOD FORTUNE MUST BE IN WANT OF A WIFE

UP, UP, AND AWAY!

IT WAS THE BEST OF TIMES, IT WAS THE WORSE OF TIMES...

THE GAME'S AFOOT!

SING TO ME OF THE MAN, MUSE, THE MAN OF TWISTS AND TURNS...

D'oh!

Of Heroes and Foreskins

Comic books use to have a bad name. They were considered corruptors of youth that infected their minds with horrific images of violence and sent them out into the street to wreak havoc. Those little colored panels were but a Communist plot, many thought, to undermine the squeaky-clean children of America and direct them to unweave the very fabric of all that was good in America — a true force for evil.


Today comic books are considered a legitimate and fine art of storytelling. While they may not necessarily be a force for good, they are certainly a force for good profits if Hollywood can successfully turn them into a series of tent-pole films.


Now, however, comic books may again get a bad name and that bad name is: Foreskin.


One Matt Hess of San Diego, a supporter of efforts to ban circumcision in San Francisco and Santa Monica, equating, absurdly, circumcision with female genital mutilation in Africa, has published two issues of the super-hero comic book, Foreskin Man. FM, as I will call him, is as buff as most super heroes and as blond as some of them, and fights a never ending battle against Monster Mohel to stop him from snipping the foreskins of innocent boy infants. Monster Mohel is clad in the traditional Orthodox Jewish wide brimmed hat and sports a tallis around his neck and comes equipped with all the instruments needed for a brit milah. Monster (obviously not his “Christian” name) Mohel is designed to be so ugly and evil looking that he would make even Batman crap in his tights.  


Mark Hess has claimed that he is not being anti-Semitic. I assume he has said that with a straight face. I assume he has had surgery to paralyze the muscles in his face.


(On a side note, it has just occurred to me that if Kryptonian males are exactly like males from Earth, and if it was not taken care of before Krypton blew up — and Jor-el and Lara were a bit preoccupied just before that catastrophe — then Superman is uncircumcised.)


Now I disagree with Mr. Hess that circumcision is the “unkindest cut of all” and if I lived in San Francisco or Santa Monica I would vote against the ban, but I must defend his right to bring the foreskin into literature — for I have done so myself.


I find the male foreskin funny — or at least amusing — as demonstrated below in several excerpts from my novel, Blood is Pretty: The First Fixxer Adventure. The Fixxer is a mysterious character who works in Hollywood and is paid big bucks to fix the dire problems of the Show Biz elite. He does this using various skills he picked up while in the employ, it is hinted, of some secret agency. He also does this by calling on the service of a “crew” of talented individuals, including Petey, who still works for some secret agency. Petey is my homage, twisted though it may be, to James Bond’s Q. Petey is a short, possibly obnoxious, certainly loud man, who also happens to be a genius. If I were to cast the role today I would cast the comedian Gilbert Gottfried.


In this first excerpt the Fixxer is on the phone asking Petey to fly to Los Angeles to help him on a case. Just for fun in our fantasy casting, let’s pair Gilbert Gottfried as Petey with Jon Hamm from Mad Men as the Fixxer.


    “Petey?”
    “Fixxer! How’d 12-72 do?”
    “Just fine, Petey, just fine. Listen, how much vacation time do you have built up?”
    “Oh, well, let’s see? Two weeks a year for the last, uh, 22 years, that would be...”
    “Forty-four weeks.”
    “Yeah, forty-four weeks. Guess I’ll add them onto my retirement.”
    “Well, sacrifice some of it and get out here. I need you.”
    “When?”
    “Catch the next flight.”
    “Well, I’ll have to talk to—”
    “I’ll deal with your immediate superior. Is it still Duckmeyer?”
    “No, Fucky-Ducky’s gone. It’s Heartburn.”
    “Really? Hillburn? Even better. Got any new, undetectable body homing devices?”
    “Have you been circumcised?”
    “Circumcised?”
    “Yes, circumcised.”
    “Isn’t that a matter between a man and his god?”
    “Come on, stop kidding with me. Have you been circumcised?”
    “Yes, Petey, the good doctor who brought me into the world took my foreskin out of it.”
    “Good, then I have just the thing.”
    “Dare we go into the details now?”
    “No. It’ll just disturb your sleep. See you soon.”


In this next excerpt the Fixxer has gathered his crew — the beautiful Anne Eisley, an actress, the authoritative Captain, on the payroll of the LAPD as well as Fixxer’s, the Fixxer’s “Watson,” Roee, an Israeli of singular talents in the kitchen as well as with deadly weapons, and, of course, Petey — to discuss the covert action he is going to take against the antagonists of the story, ex-motion picture executive, budding world-conquering villain Andy Rand and his henchman, Batsarov. The Captain addresses the Fixxer:


    “So you and Anne get invited to Rand’s secret hideout,” the Captain said, “to get some evidence against Rand.”
    “Yes. Evidence. Or a witness willing to testify.”
    “York?”
    “Yes. He has a vulnerable personality.”
    “Well, you better have a homing device on you so we can give you some backup.”
    “That’s the plan.”
    “And it better be a well hidden one. Batsarov is versed in such things,” Roee added.
    “Petey assures me he has a good one.”
    “Yeah! I have a great one! You want to see it?”
    “Petey, I think that can wait until...”
    “No, here, look, I got it right here!” Petey whipped out of his pocket something that was 2 to 3 inches long, wrinkled, flesh colored and floppy. He held it proudly in his hand.
    “What the hell is that?” The Captain moved closer for a better look.
    “A synthetic male foreskin attachment with a built-in flexible nano-electronic homing device. It’s really great! It has an anti-detection chip built in so no electronic scan can pick it up. And, as you can see, it is totally non-detectable during visual inspection. Of course, it only works with a man who’s been circumcised. But as most men are, thanks to the good, hygienic sense of your people, Roee, we find it applicable to 92.4 % of our agents. You see, you attach it with this special glue—.”
    “Yes, well…” I had to stop him. He was unzipping his pants.  “You and I can go over this tomorrow.”
    “Oh, okay. But I better tell you before I forget, it has one drawback.”
    “What’s that?”
    “While you’ve got it on you can’t take a bath. It might short out. Sponge-wash the penis only.”
    Anne could no longer contain herself and began to laugh. The Captain shook his head and leaned back in his chair. “Petey.”
    “What?” Petey answered still proudly displaying the foreskin homing device in the palm of his hand.       
    “You are one sick puppy.”


The next day the time comes for the homing device to be attached to the Fixxer.


    About 6 pm, just before I was going to dress for the evening, Petey burst into the library.
    “Hey, Fixxer, you know, it’s time to put on the homing device!”
    “Yes, I suppose it is.”
    “Do you want me to put it on you!?”
    “No, I think I would prefer to put it on myself.”
    “You told me you were circumcised when you were an infant!”
    “I spoke the truth.”
    “So you really have no idea exactly the placement of this fake foreskin!” He held it in his hand, its floppy nature a wonder to behold. “I mean exactly how far it should extend from the tip of the penis!”         
    “I’ll try to figure it out.”  
    “That’s funny! You know almost everybody says that! But it’s not like a man knows his penis like the back of his hand! So I prepared this little diagram which shows exactly where to attach the foreskin!”           
    Handing me the fake foreskin, he held up the diagram, which, in black and white line drawings, showed two penises. One was an uncircumcised penis with a dotted line encircling it about three quarters down from the tip. There was an arrow pointing to the dotted line and which extended from a legend that read: ATTACH FORESKIN HERE. The other penis was obviously an example of what the situation should look like once the attachment was on.  
    “You can use this!” He held up a little silver tube, the same kind that Formula 12-72 came in. “It’s my special adhesive glue! It spreads on easily, so you should have no problem!”
    “Thank you, Petey.”
    “See, the beauty of this thing is, if you have to go through a strip search, they may look up your rectum, but nine times out of ten, they won’t play with your penis!”
    “I’ll count on those odds.”
    “Take the little tube of adhesive glue with you, ‘cause it sometimes comes undone! Which is also why you should wear briefs and not boxers!”
    “I’ll be sure to pack it.”
    “And remember: No baths! Here!”
    He handed me a little plastic bag. “What’s this?”
    “Skin tight plastic briefs. Wear them during showers. Then sponge bathe the—.”
    “Yes, I—I think I’ll know what to do.”
    “Well, if you’ve never lived with a foreskin, you may not know proper—.”
    “Petey, please. Can I forego the instructions and just use common sense on this?”
    “All right! All right! It’s your penis.” He started to walk out, then stopped and turned with one more point. “Oh yeah! You can only put the foreskin on when you are fully erect! Do you think you can handle that!?”
    “Well...“ I wasn’t sure Petey was aware of his double entendre. I decided it was best to assume he wasn’t. “I’ll have to, won’t I?”
    “Okay! Well, have a good time tonight!”
    “I’ll do my best.”
    “Wish I was going with you!” There was now a hint of charming sadness in Petey’s voice. “I’ve never been to a fancy ball before.”
    “Well, Petey, that was once the case with Cinderella. And look what happened to her.”
    Petey brightened up. “Yeah! Yeah! I suppose there is always hope! Well, thanks, Fixxer, for those kind words.”


There you have it. Possibly not as politically of the moment as Foreskin Man, but hopefully amusing enough to divert your attention from the image of an uncircumcised Superman. Which, by the way, I apologize for.

 ###

If you would like to read the complete first adventure of the Fixxer, you can download the e-book for $2.99 from Amazon or the audiobook version from Amazon Audio, Audible.com, or at Crossroad Press.