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January 29, 2005
Spiderman in India
The Weekly Standard has a good column by David Adesnik about a new Marvel project to make a comic book for Indians about Spiderman, with Peter Parker being replaced by Pavitr Prabhakar. There are other differences too such as the comic being set in India and Pavitr Prabhakar getting his powers by magic for the express purpose of fighting evil instead of by radiation through chance. Also his Uncle Ben is killed after bravely confronting thugs abusing a woman after Pavitr had not bothered to save the woman when he had the chance, instead of the original version where Uncle Ben's death was a passive coincidence after Parker does nothing.
Adesnik points out that most super heroes in American comic books are American and that may reduce their appeal in other countries, but I think he overstates this some. Most of the better comic books cover universal themes and there are many examples of heroes who are from other countries. While it is hard to see how Captain America would be popular in some other countries, there are fairly major titles like The Mighty Thor and X-Men where many characters were from other countries. The author points out again that Superman was an immigrant, but one of the reoccurring themes in many major comics that has appeal in other cultures is heroes that are orphans (Batman, Spiderman, Superman, etc.). There are other immigrant heroes as well notably the Silver Surfer (also from space) and in a way even Hellboy (who is from Hell) counts as an immigrant. In the end I think the setting of most comics being America matters more than the nationality of the characters.
Posted by Pete at January 29, 2005 09:34 AM
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