Originally published at: Why Superman is more like Moses than the Jesus allegory that Hollywood can't let go of | Boing Boing
…
7 Likes
Well, yeah. The story of the exodus from Egypt to the Promised Land is one of the original immigrant narratives. The parents of Siegel and Schuster were all Jewish immigrants from the Old World, trying to assimilate into the New World. Any studio executive who thought this was a Jesus allegory was either not Jewish or thought he should be pandering to the Gentiles.
12 Likes
Cause I’m just like Moses, no one knows this
The way I dress and my lifestyle shows this
6 Likes
About 99% of the problem with Man Of Steel was Zack Snyder.
13 Likes
I’m waiting for them to do a good version of the story of Jor-El, the Kryptonian scientist the politicians wouldn’t listen to, who desperately tries to save his family from planetary destruction in the midst of willfully blind and hostile opposition.
15 Likes
Bryan Singer’s Superman Returns really brought in the Jesus allegory whole hog
Though Superman 2 could be seen as “The Last Temptation of Superman”. (Not at the time since it predated LTOC as a film by 6 years)
3 Likes
Anything is better than SNL’s take with Sam Kinison.
5 Likes
He wanted to turn Clark Kent into Wolverine so badly it hurt.
Clark even spent time as a drifter working odd jobs across Canada while trying to avoid getting in bar fights that would expose his super-invulnerability.
11 Likes
For the record, The Last Temptation of Christ was published in 1955. (You did say “as a film”, though.)
3 Likes
Fictional characters Death Match, Moses vs Superman, with a tag team of Moses/Jesus. I’d watch that.
6 Likes
The Moses story was predated by similar stories.
I guess for Superheroes it’s Gilgamesh, all the way down? Until we find one earlier.
12 Likes
I doubt the book (or premise) was on anyone’s pop culture radar until the Scorsese film.
1 Like
The book’s author, Nikos Kazantzakis, was nominated for the Nobel Prize in nine different years. He also wrote the book that the film Zorba the Greek (which won the Oscar) was based on. It is likely the book was well known.
7 Likes
Well known in literary and religious circles but not reaching pop cultural awareness.
Even most people who haven’t seen the film or read the book know “Last Temptation” of the hero is to settle down to mundane life. Primarily from the movie. Just like they associate Zorba the Greek with Anthony Quinn.
Pop culture is idiotic at times.
everyone knows Adam Warlock is Space Jesus
5 Likes
The book was extremely well known in its day, since it was famously condemned by both the Catholic and the Greek Orthodox churches, both at the time of original publication and again when the English translation came out a few years later. It spent 13 weeks weeks on the NYT bestseller list (dropping off just in time for Christmas 1960).
3 Likes
I thought the cartoon did Jor-El pretty well.
3 Likes
I just don’t think General Zod is all that essential. You could do a pretty good first movie without him.
(That and Zod isn’t really all that good as a representative of Kal-El’s culture, what with having been someone Kal-El’s culture decided to chuck into the phantom zone.)
3 Likes
The Diniverse version did a lot of Superman mythos pretty well.
3 Likes
Given the constant rebirth, would Doctor Who be Space Buddha?
