“Comics aren’t political!”

cOmIc BoOkS hAvE aLwAyS bEeN pOlItIcAl!

cApTaIn AmErIcA wOuLd PuNcH oUt TrUmP!

Allow me to destroy this utter fallacy in a 12 second clip, courtesy of the late Dwayne McDuffie, a Black creator far more wise than any of the current hacks running these characters into the ground: pic.twitter.com/9eTUbVVy6r

— Nacht: Writer for @studiosuperoff (@Nachtbrezel) November 30, 2023

This is a clip from the 2001 Justice League series, which is still one of the best animated superhero adaptations.

If you go into this clip blind, it appears Superman is telling Shazam that superheroes can’t pick political sides or do commercials.

OK, so that seems like it is clear as day. Nachtbrezel is right, Superman is saying superheroes don’t do politics. Superman has a comics history of being political, Kingdom:Come, is a good example. But if we focus on this show, it appears Nachtbrezel found the perfect clip to sum up his point.

However, since I’ve watched this series multiple times (and still remember this episode), I know that’s not the case.

Here, Superman is criticizing Shazam for taking a picture with Lex Luthor. Luthor, at this point in the show, appears to be reforming. He is trying to create a more positive public image, and the pic with Shazam (along with a Shazam quote) is branded as an endorsement by a newspaper.

That is the context for Superman’s quote about politics. Later in this episode Superman realizes he may have been wrong.

The context for all of this is political. This entire season of the show had a story arc revolving around the Justice League’s conflict with the government. A branch of the government, Cadmus, wants them more controlled.

That is political. But it is tough to know that if you’re only exposure is a 12-second clip. This was honestly eye-opening. How often do people post clips from shows they haven’t even watched, cherrypicking and thinking they owned the libs (or the conservatives)?

This is just another lesson in media literacy. Don’t just read a headline, read the article.

When it comes to this tweet, the part that I found most amusing was the mention of Dwayne McDuffie. McDuffie, RIP, was the co-creator of Static Shock and the main writer for this season of Justice League.

McDuffie was very vocal about diversity in comics, which is why he created Milestone, a minority-owned and operated comic book company.

To paint McDuffie as a good Negro who avoids politics, shows that this user probably Googled the writer after finding the clip. Then he got excited because he could get brownie points for liking a black person’s work, thereby getting a “black friend” card too.