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The Psychology Of The Anti-Hero

Aperture | October 2, 2025



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I have a pretty serious confession to make. I donā€™t like Superman. Before you destroy me in the comments, I know this is an unpopular opinion, but the Man of Steel has just never resonated with me. The problem for me has always been that he is too strong. I mean, one of his primary powers is invulnerability. Talk about a tension killer. The conflict is never if Superman will save the day, only how.

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#aperture #antihero #superhero #superheroes #superman #marvel #dc

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Comments

This post currently has 24 comments.

  4. @chaosinorder9685

    October 2, 2025 at 2:54 pm

    The way I describe the difference between the antihero and the hero is that the villain will run to the darkness to try and hide from the hero. The hero will not follow the villain into the darkness at a fear of being corrupted by it. But the antihero not only chases the villain into the darkness. They understand you must enter it to capture the villain. Some people are better off, staying away from the darkness, but someone has to be strong enough to go in and catch the villain. Otherwise they will never be stopped.

  5. @andrewporter1868

    October 2, 2025 at 2:54 pm

    Interesting. You have an issue with moral absolutism. It is indifferent to be absolutist, whether it be moral or not, since the employment and taking of such a position can be used for good or for evil. Concerning morals and whether or not objective morals exist, to say otherwise would be absurd as it would be a denial of any objective and actual good or evil; and it would be a failure to recognize a self-evident fact that conveniently no one in this society gets mention of in school: we are all given life (self-evident); that life, if rights exist, contains those rights (self-evident); therefore our rights are given. Morality consists in the exercise of rights: moral good being exercise simply; moral evil being deviation from that on account of other capacities and powers on our part which exist in their own right apart from rights proper.

    If you accept this as true just as every other intellect is obliged to recognize it as true (mine no less), then you also recognize as a corollary: 1) the impossibility of morals being subjective; 2) that upon realizing this fact, the necessity of finding the cause of our rights which is clearly not in man himself, nor in lesser creatures which lack free will and intellect as these are supernatural to creatures that lack them by nature; consequently, no amount of composition by parts of deterministic rules can create something non-deterministic, so for these reasons alone, it follows that the rights governing free will and intellect cannot be found in anything created that is beneath us; and within us ourselves, my claim to you is that, were it not for the fall of Adam and Eve, we would all have a perfect knowledge of our rights and be in unanimous agreement, but the consequences of sin deprived us of original grace whereby we had the whole Law as a habit that could be known with ease, leaving us only with synteresis at birth; and the cure, the result of which makes every temporal act eternally meritorious, is sanctifying grace, while actual grace is the means of overcoming our nature beyond our own power (thus it is a supernatural power, and it is freely gifted by God, acquired by prayer, and used by simply acting).

    Also, completely unrelated, but I find it amusing that several times, the Jedi contradict themselves and make themselves to be Sith since Obi Wan says "Only a Sith deals in absolutes" which statement is an absolute; and Yoda also has said "Always two [Sith] there are" which is also an absolute. The problem with relativism is that the relative is meaningless without at least one absolute because by definition the relative is tied to something else. An infinite regression of relative principles is thus absurd as it implies an endless series of events without beginning so that one would have to deny reason in claiming "they always were", even with respect to what is yet to happen (contradiction), or they simply come into being without cause (self-causing: a self-evident contradiction), or that the first is both relative and absolute (contradiction: these are opposites, so they have to exist as distinct parts within a composite if a whole is to be predicated of both simultaneously), forcing us to conclude there must exist a first cause which is absolute whereby the relative receives existence.

  7. @joshswenson8390

    October 2, 2025 at 2:54 pm

    I really enjoyed your video. You really illustrated well why we are attracted to anti-heroes and how it all comes down to cultural shifts.

    However, I am a devout Christian and disagree that all of religion's morals are black and white. While, yes, we have the commandments, they are not the end-all-be-all. They are merely a framework for a deeper connection with the Lord. Sort of a "foundation" for sainthood.
    Take 1 Nephi Ch. 4 for example: Nephi's actions stand in stark contrast to "Thou shalt not kill". Yet, we believe he was in the right.

    I sympathize with your thoughts on Superman. He is not an engaging character to me. It strikes me that Jesus Christ is also a very idealistic figure–though not a fictional one.

  9. @steverome293

    October 2, 2025 at 2:54 pm

    I always saw Superman as a question: if you were this powerful, what would YOU do with it? His struggle is to continue to fight for us in face of OUR fallibility

  10. @RealTimeStrategy-Games

    October 2, 2025 at 2:54 pm

    I like well written characters. If I hate a character or like a character to a effecting limit then I know they're well written. I personally also side in grey area. I've never chosen any side. I still choose morally right stuff , but leave gap for when that can change . I mostly don't like interacting but observing , which is why I like heroes and villians or even anti-heroes alike. Superman isn't boring , but can be if you realize he is predictable, but it don't make it that boring you don't watch it anymore , just different level of perception. I like characters that speak less or very little to none. , they certainly make me interested.

  14. @AVENUENIGHTS

    October 2, 2025 at 2:54 pm

    Spawn is the ultimate antihero. He's morally ambiguous. He murders and kills bad guys and demons for heroic reasons. Even his presentation. Visually he looks like a villain but he's a protagonist.

  16. @TurkanDevrijova

    October 2, 2025 at 2:54 pm

    What a content! āœØthanksšŸ™ your opinion on Superman reminded me of 12 rules for life.. JB Peterson shared how non vulnerable qualities of Superman created a superficial idea of power, or hero and then they remade it making him more humanlike..
    I agree btw

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