Adam Graham's Blog: Christians and Superheroes - Posts Tagged "magic"

One thing you won't find in any of the superhero stories I do is any of that magic.

Magic is of course represented in mainstream comics by such characters as DC's Dr. Fate and Marvel's Marvel's Dr. Strange.

Perhaps, this is partially because of upbringing. (Growing up Magica De Spell was verboten.

But, it always strikes me as kind of weird when these characters appear besides major superheroes. It all seems really awkward at best. You have Spider-man fighting an evil spirit along with Dr. Strange and Spider-man's just out of place compared to when Spider-man's fighting Doctor Octopus. He's simply not equipped for this sort of situation, totally helpless in fact. Spider-man's strength is his scientific mind and his fantastic physique. Adventures with "Spirit World" enemies take him so far out of his element that it's absurd. Same thing with Superman who can't fight magic.

Beyond the absurdity, I think that the portrayals of magic in superhero stories have taken on a far darker turn in recent years than perhaps silver age stories and the Super Friends when most of the magical villains acted like Magica De Spell. The darkness of this sort of magic leads to a sort of Harry Potter problem that I don't want to portray even in parody.

Of course, there is scientific stuff that borders on magic and there's magic that makes things ordinary heroes can defeat and that's fine. Thor comes to mind as an example who while having this mythic world is really more or less of an interdimensional alien particularly as portrayed in the Avengers.

I do think there is a place for portrayal of other aspects of the supernatural with demons and angels (thought not the way the comics and cartoons do it), but I'll leave that discussion to another post.