Austin, Texas – Once upon a time, comic books were considered the worst sort of influence on American youths. In the 1950s, the prominent psychologist Frederic Wertham shocked the nation with his denunciations of the pulpy medium. Among other things, he claimed that Wonder Woman promoted lesbianism and that Robin was, essentially, Batman’s catamite.
Thanks to Wertham’s efforts (in addition to writing a book, “Seduction of the Innocent,” he testified before Congress), the comic book industry created a “Comics Code Authority,” which for decades held the medium to stultifying standards of decency.
Greg Garrett can be regarded as Austin’s anti-Wertham. In his new book, “Holy Superheroes: Exploring Faith & Spirituality in Comic Books” (NavPress/Pinon Press), he argues that superhero comics are a modern version of mythology that have much to teach us about the temptation to do evil and necessity of doing good.
Garrett, a 43-year-old English professor at Baylor University, is studying for the priesthood at Austin’s Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest. One recent morning, after Greek class let out, he answered a fellow comic book fan’s questions.
Q: When did you start reading comics?
A: When I was about 8 years old. My first comic was a copy of “The Avengers,” and the artist was John Buscema. It was an episode where Captain America had a chance to go back and change history and rescue Bucky, his World War II mascot and partner. It was one of those time-travel stories, and I was blown away by it. I remember reading it over and over again and then going out to my grandparents’ barn and swinging from the rafters and trying to execute the maneuvers that I saw Captain America and Black Panther doing – with considerably less grace!
Q: When did you make the connection between comic books and religion?
A: You know, that was a sort of intuitive thing. You don’t have to look too hard at Superman to see there is a whole Jesus complex working out of that. I didn’t start thinking about it seriously, though, until I really had the chance to do some writing about religion and popular culture. A couple of years ago I co-wrote a book on the “Matrix” films (“The Gospel Reloaded”) with my best friend, who’s a pastor in Houston, and the more I thought about it, I thought, well, (there are religious themes) in comics as well. We have a tendency to think of superheroes comics as purely escapist literature, but they’re really our myths and hero legends boiled down to the most extreme and outrageous depictions.
And they’re familiar in ways that even some of the biblical stories are not for my students anymore. If I say, “Remember when Ruth …” and I look out, it’s like, “Am I the only person who ever went to Sunday school?” But if I say, “Remember like in the first ‘Batman’ movie …” they’re like, “Oh, yeah.”
Q: Do you ever discuss comic books in seminary?
A: Mostly they just rag me about it. Comic book superheroes are, as you know, a typically male adolescent phase, and you can talk all day long about how they’ve become an adult art form, but still, if you say, “I just wrote a book on comic book superheroes,” you’re letting yourself in for a bit of good-natured ribbing.
Q: One thing you don’t discuss in your book is the nonsuperhero comics that deal with issues of good and evil in an explicitly Christian context, such as Hellblazer and Preacher. What sort of job do you think books such as those do with Christian imagery, texts and ideas?
A: Both of those are really interesting books. Hellblazer is actually one of my very favorite comics. I know that a lot of evangelical Christians would find it alarming, because it takes Satanism seriously – the idea that there is an actual hell and that you can relate with the denizens of it. But there’s also this really strong element of good and evil in it. And for me, because I’m the kind of Christian who thinks we’re all sinners, when I look at John Constantine (the occult magician who is the protagonist of Hellblazer), I think, “Here’s somebody who by a lot of people’s definitions would be evil and unredeemable, but over and over again he sort of stands up for us, and he becomes the force of good against the forces of evil.” And that, for me, is a really incarnational kind of idea, that God works through even the most flawed of his creations.
