Final Reflection

Coming into this class I knew nothing about the Hulk. I didn’t know anything about how he got his powers, let alone his origin story about the abuse he went through as a child.  All I knew was when he became mad, he turned into a giant green superhuman thingy and could smash everything. As discussed in one of the articles we read for class, the Hulk really isn’t that much of a superhero.  The good things that come out of the Hulk are just a result of him getting angry. He doesn’t set out to save people or the world. It just happens. I’m glad that I was able to learn how he got his superhuman strength and where all his anger came from.  I feel like the Hulk can relate to a lot of people including myself.  I can definitely relate to the Hulk’s blind rage.  Sometimes I just get so mad and freak out so hard I don’t even know what I’m really doing. And then I feel disappointed in myself and angry that I let myself get to that state.  The Hulk let me know that some of the psychological things that go on in my head are not my fault. They are a result of passed down behaviors and learned behaviors that I have no control over.

I didn’t really have any preconceived ideas about any of the superheroes because I have never studied or pay attention to superheroes before this class. I guess a preconceived idea I had was that I always thought that Batman was a dark person. I’ve only seen The Dark Knight Rises so all my ideas about Batman were based off of that movie. It wasn’t until we started studying the camp-y Batman that I realized that all not all of his days were dark ones.  He has been a goofy and ridiculous character at one point so I thought that was pretty cool.  

Hero helped me confirm my beliefs and feelings about gay people. I really felt bad for Thom when he had to hide who he really was from the world.  I don’t feel like ANYONE should have to hide who they really are from anybody.  Nothing pisses me off more than when someone uses homophobic slurs when talking about a homosexual.  The ignorance and immaturity is sickening.

I think we could’ve talked about Hero a little more. I think the relationships that the league shared with each other was important and different.  Maybe we could of looked at each of the characters from a psychological standpoint? I just really liked Hero so I would’ve loved to talk about the book more.

The first few readings we did for this class have especially helped me to better understand the role of a good citizen.  Superhero moral duties and codes and what they stand for are guidelines that the human race should strive for.  The real life superheroes have showed me that we can take superheroes moral duties and codes and act them out in real life. Not to the same extremes of course, but we can still use the behaviors of superheroes to help real people in our communities.  I’d have to say that Superman is the best model for citizen. I mean he does stand for truth, justice, and the American way.  He was the original superhero and the first one to show us these moral codes that we have been studying. He fights for what he believes him and he will always be around to save us.