Heroes and VillainsHercules, Jesus, James Bond, Luke Skywalker, Gandalf, Frodo, Harry Potter, Buffy Summers, Spiderman, Batman, Captain Kirk, Dr. Who, Darth Vader, Sauron, Voldemort, Lex Luthor, Dr. Doom, the Daleks, the Borg. Almost anybody living in the developed West would be able to group these individuals into two camps: the heroes and the villains. However, what criteria they may use to do this is less clear. Mike Alsford introduces us to a range of heroic and villainous archetypes on a journey through film, television, comic books, and literature. On the way, he addresses questions such as: What is a true hero? What is a true villain? Have we misunderstood these terms? What kind of societal values do our mythical heroes and villains represent? In trying to understand the extremes of hero and villain we are made more aware of our own ethical standards and given a space in which to explore contemporary concerns over notions of right and wrong, good and bad. |
From inside the book
Results 1-3 of 15
... concerning the relative behaviours of the Batman and Superman . I have chosen my examples of the heroic and the villainous largely from contemporary imaginative sources rather than draw upon the wealth of classical material that covers ...
... concerning the direction that our lives should take . Having such an existential map is not actually a matter of choice , only the nature of the map , where it is derived from and its reliability , are ever really at issue . To ...
... concerning the Greek Olympian pantheon ; and tales of Celtic gods and heroes such as the Tuatha De Danann and Cu Chulainn from the Ulster Cycle , as well as many others . All of these mythic stories represent imaginative responses to ...
Contents
Myth and Imagination | 1 |
Heroes and Otherness | 23 |
With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility | 63 |
Copyright | |
2 other sections not shown