A Symbol of Hope

Tonight, B and I finished what we started almost a year ago: the Smallville series.

Wow. 10 seasons packed into about 11 months.

I'm not going to go into the show here--although it was a good show and very enjoyable, especially since we didn't have to stick with it for 10 years and wait through commercials and season breaks. Instead, I want to write about what the show means. Actually, what Superman means.

I think it's easy to dismiss Superman as just a "comic book superhero", a story for children. That's how many of the characters that are household names today got their start. The superheroes who have raked in the box office dollars over the past few years had very humble beginnings as rather simplistic characters in children's tales. Superman, Iron Man, Captain America, Batman, Spiderman...all started out as drawings in comic books, many of which were first published when my grandparents were kids.

But why do these stories endure? Why has Superman existed in America's pop culture consciousness for over three quarters of a century (the first Superman comic book was published in 1938)?

For Superman, I think this question is answered through shows like Smallville and the Christopher Reeve movies of the late 1970s. Superman represents hope. He is meant to be an inspiration to all mankind, to inspire us, to make us strive to be something better. Superman--Kal-El--could rule Earth like a god, but instead chooses to protect the people of our world and find the good in them, no matter how deep it's buried. (I've discussed in a previous post on this blog how differently things would have been if Kal-El had been found by people who lacked the moral compass and honest values of Jonathan and Martha Kent.)

While I wasn't a huge fan of the "Man of Steel" movie from a couple of years ago, there was a line of dialogue that I think really captured the essence of Superman. Jor-El, Kal-El's father (played by Russell Crowe), had this to say to the last son of Krypton:

"You will give the people of Earth an ideal to strive towards. They will race behind you, they will stumble, they will fall. But in time, they will join you in the sun, Kal. In time, you will help them accomplish wonders."

As B will tell you, I'm a sucker for these kinds of things. But with all the garbage that passes for entertainment these days, I think it's good to have an uplifting story that focuses on ideals rather than violence, sex, and drama.

Indeed...a story that can lift you up, up, and away.