Seitz. Writes.

I’m usually pretty mixed in my opinion of Rolling Stone. I’m not a fan of music magazines in general, so that’s a strike against it right off the bat, but there are usually enough good features or interesting interviews to get me to read it on a semi-regular basis. My favorite thing they’ve got going right now is Matt Taibbi’s column. His book Spanking the Donkey, which he wrote while covering the Kerry-Bush election in 2004, is one of  my favorite political books not written by Hunter S. Thompson. I actually went to a reading he did at BU a year or so ago and asked him if he had any advice for an aspiring journalist. He signed my copy of The Great Derangement and wrote “have a backup plan.”  This website probably isn’t what he was talking about.

But that’s the good part of Rolling Stone. The bad part is their music coverage, and the really bad part is their movie coverage. Considering the focus of the magazine, that doesn’t exactly work in their favor. I’m not going to accuse them of “going corporate” or “selling out,” but I always feel like they’ve become followers when it comes to music. You never hear about Rolling Stone singing the praises of some small band no one’s ever heard of. Their job is to sell magazines, so they cover what sells. Their movie coverage, on the other hand, is just abominable, but for different reasons. I don’t care about them writing about popular movies, but it’s the way they write about them. Peter Travers, their movie critic, is one of the most aggravating people to read because everything he writes sounds like it’s gunning for a spot in the trailer. The worst offender by far being his review of Peter Jackson’s King Kong, which was quoted almost in it’s entirety for the trailer.

Which leaves their features. Given that it’s Rolling Stone, most of their features about about musicians or bands, or occasionally about politicians (Have you heard of this Barack Obama guy?). My problem is that they always love the subject of their profiles, even if they don’t give them a good review in the same issue. Remember in Almost Famous when the band was all terrified about the rock writer was going to say about them? I don’t think many bands have that problem anymore.

And that brings us to “The Legend of Master Legend,” by Joshua Bearman. It’s a really interesting article about a “Real Life Superhero” and his sidekick living in Winter Park, Florida (as opposed to all of the fake superheros at Disneyworld and Islands of Adventure in neighboring Orlando).  I think the writing is a little too bland for the subject matter, but that may have been a concious decision by the writer so that it wouldn’t sound mocking. I also think that they buried the most interesting story, all of the humanitarian/philanthropic work that the guy does, under the more sensational aspects like the costume, secret hideout, and rock band. Still, I’d recommend reading it. If you’re still interested, I’ve got some thoughts on the subject after the jump.

My first thought on the article was that it’s about life imitating art. Guys dressing up like superheros is nothing new, but guys actually trying to be superheros is a little different, although still just as not new. I mean, Alan Moore’s Watchmen came out back in the ’80s. The internet has definitely helped publicize these Real Life Superheros, and another interesting side of the article, that really wasn’t explored enough in my opinion, was the RLS community that exists on the internet, complete with suppliers for superhero gear. I think the natural reaction is to assume that all of these guys are just nerds living out a fantasy, and that they may be mentally imbalanced or even dangerous to society.

But once I started thinking about the whole concept of life imitating art, trying to be a superhero actually started to seem a little more reasonable. I think that, to some extent, we all allow art to shape our lives and personalities. There are guys who imitate Entourage, and chicks who imitate Sex and the City. I’m sure that there a lot of people who use drugs not so much for the effects, but for the glamour and lifestyle associated with it. Hell, the whole reason product placement works is because we want to be the people we watch on TV. From what I can tell that’s the basis of the whole fashion industry.

If I’m really into a book, my mind will start to follow the patterns of the writing. I’ll catch myself writing or speaking like the book. I think the friendlier term for this is “influence,” but it’s basically finding something that you like, and attempting to imitate it.

Obviously, what you imitate counts for a lot. Master Legend and the RLS people are trying to be superheros, and because that involves costumes and fighting crime, they’re very easy to dismiss as cranks. But think about bands like Kiss, Gwar, Lordi and Slipknot. They get dressed up in costumes to go out and play music. Maybe it’s a coincidence that the “Justice Force” is also a band, but if all they did was dress up as superheros to play music about superheros–because nobody’s done that before–they’d just be another band with a cheap gimmick.

Even for bands that don’t have a cheap gimmick, there’s almost always a certain degree of costuming that goes into it. If you’re in a metal band, you either go with long hair or no hair, wear black and get tattoos and/or piercings, because that’s what the bands that came before you did. Same with rappers and the gangsta image, or indie bands and the hipster ensemble.  For some reason though, it’s less weird for you dress like a rock star when you’re not one, because being a rock star seems like an attainable goal, especially compared to being a superhero.

But like I said, the most interesting part of the article for me was the end, when they started talking about all of the community work and philanthropy that Master Legend. I think it’s always interesting when an article has a twist like that. When Master Legend is off trying to fight crime with a rusted out truck and a potato gun, he’s crazy. But when he’s giving out socks to the homeless or fighting for gopher tortoises, still in the Master Legend character, you really don’t know what to think.

On one hand, there are plenty of people who do things like that without needing a costume. I’m working on an article now about community opposition to a condo development, and the woman who runs this resident’s association works around the clock for her community. She doesn’t try to make it a superhuman effort, and the fact that Master Legend does this work in character might bring an unwanted air of absurdity to the whole thing, and draw the attention away from all the normal people who do this stuff every day. On the other hand, the fact that the guy does work in character makes the story more interesting, and makes it news. If it brings attention and publicity to the problem, then it’s gotta be helping on some level.

But to some extent, the costume, and the anonymity associated with it, changes the nature of the work he does. You might say that he doesn’t want personal attention, hence the mask. You could also say that the mask is all about personal attention. I think that the really interesting thing is that he considers this community work to be on the same level as fighting crime. He’s doing it because it’s right, regardless of whether or not he’s in costume. I don’t want to get too sappy here, but he’s kind of operating as a living metaphor for all the people who do charity work. By becoming a superhero and doing charity, he’s saying that the people who do charity work are superheros. It’s kind of touching, in a weird, spandex-clad way.

And personally, I think it’s good that he’s doing it. You never hear about Batman or any other “real superheros” doing this kind of stuff, unless it’s ancillary to some other task. Superheros have always occupied fantasy worlds and dealt with fantasy issues and villains, with the possible exception of X2 and The Dark Knight (I don’t want to launch any comics versus movies debates. I like the characters and the movies, but I’m not a fan of the actual books. I’m weird like that) which used fantasy issues and villains as metaphors for real world problems. Coincidentally, those are probably the best two Superhero movies out there.

So what’s the point of all this rambling? I’m not really sure. Sometimes I just get stuck on an idea and I’ve got to write it out for it to make sense to me. If you want some kind of a conclusion, then I guess what I’m trying to say is that this was a good article with a great story (and a Tenacious D-esque title), but it was a little botched in the execution. Too bad.

Tags: Florida, Joshua Bearman, Journalism, Matt Taibbi, Real Life Superheros, Repetitious titles, Rolling Stone, The Legend of Master Legend
Filed under: Commentary, Journalism