UNIVERSITY LUISS GUIDO CARLI & FREE UNIVERSITY OF BRUSSELS Department of Political Science The Exceptionalism of the Avengers: 9/11 Representations, Security and Manicheanism presented by GRILLO, Hugo (638942) in the framework of Master Thesis - Double Degree in Political Science Supervisor: Professor Sorice, Michele Co-Supervisor: Professor Giansante, Gianluca Academic Year 2018 - 2019 Table of Contents Introduction ......................................................................................................1 Chapter I - Popular Culture and "Spectacle" ..................................................4 Introduction .....................................................................................................................4 1. Popular Culture and International Relations .............................................................5 2. Film and the "Spectacle" ........................................................................................... 10 3. Construction of identities ........................................................................................... 16 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 20 Chapter II - Superheroes and American Exceptionalism ............................... 22 Introduction ................................................................................................................... 22 1. Superheroes ................................................................................................................ 23 1.1 Superheroes after 9/11 ................................................................................................................ 27 1.2 Superheroes and Justice ............................................................................................................. 30 2. American exceptionalism ........................................................................................... 35 2.1 The exception of 9/11 .................................................................................................................. 39 2.2 The Exceptionalism of Justice.................................................................................................... 44 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 49 Chapter III - The Exceptionalism of The Avengers ........................................ 51 Introduction ................................................................................................................... 51 1. The Plots ..................................................................................................................... 52 2. The Avengers.............................................................................................................. 54 3. Representations of 9/11 .............................................................................................. 69 4. Security and Insecurity .............................................................................................. 75 5. Us and Them .............................................................................................................. 82 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 86 Conclusion ...................................................................................................... 87 Bibliography .................................................................................................... 89 Appendix ......................................................................................................... 98 Plagiarism Chart ........................................................................................... 106 I Summary This thesis asks as the research question: "How do the four Avengers movies reflect American exceptionalism?" The four movies analyzed are The Avengers (2012), Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Avengers: Endgame (2019). There are three hypotheses to answer the research question: firstly, in terms of representations of 9/11 (by representations we intend references and aesthetic), secondly in terms of security and thirdly in terms of Manicheanism. To conduct this analysis, the thesis is divided into three chapters. The first chapter starts by showing that the study of popular culture is relevant in the fields of political science and international relations. It then presents how visual representation impacts the audiences and vehiculates messages through images. Finally, the last section of this chapter explains the choice of constructivism as the theoretical approach. Constructivism allows to understand how identities are created by ideas and, in turn, how it shapes actions, behaviors and discourses. This approach is, firstly, used to understand how the identity of the six superheroes analyzed (Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Hulk, Hawkeye and Black Widow), was constructed in connection with the U.S. administrations' actions, behaviors and discourses and how it is portrayed in the four movies. Secondly, it permits to comprehend how, through concepts such as the American Utopia, the American Dream or the American myth, the American identity was built around the concept of American exceptionalism. The second chapter analyzes the history, portrayal after 9/11 and notion of justice of both superheroes and American exceptionalism. The second chapter showed that there are a lot of parallels that can be made between the two concepts, notably in terms of 9/11 representations, conception of insecurity and Manicheanism. Finally, the third chapter first analyzes the construction of the identity of each one of the six Avengers before conducting the analysis of the four movies. The last chapter validates the first hypothesis (about the representations of 9/11) in the first two movies, but only partially for the two next ones. The second hypothesis (about security) is validated in all movies but not validated in Avengers: Infinity War. The third hypothesis (about Manicheanism) is validated in all four movies. The conclusion is that the four Avengers movies do reflect American exceptionalism, Avengers: Infinity War being less relevant because it displays less elements of American exceptionalism. II Introduction This research project was inspired by the current trend of superhero movies and TV shows. Actually, it was inspired by the increasing production of movie and TV shows in general. The fact is that the future will witness an exponential production of movies and tv shows because of a simple thing: automatization. Take for instance self-driven cars: it will mean that audiences will have even more time on their hands to watch Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube, Apple + or even Facebook productions. Yes, even Facebook. All the GAFA companies understood that there is a big market for visual production and we can now see the trailers for their new (big budget) productions. This demand from audiences can already be seen in public transports: it has become rare to see someone reading a newspaper while it has become ordinary to see someone watching a show on their smartphone. Superhero movies and TV shows in particular have witnessed a boom ever since the beginning of the 21st century, which also corresponds to one of the most (if not THE most) traumatic event in American history: 9/11. So, this raises a question in the fields of political science and international relations: does popular culture interact with these fields and, if they do, how do they interact with these fields? Furthermore, popular culture is, today, mostly consumed through visual representation (music is also, often, accompanied by video clips). The question is, therefore: does visual representation have an impact on the public? Both these questions will be addressed in the first chapter as well as the choice of the theoretical approach for this thesis: constructivism. The idea for this choice stems from the two main topics of this research: American exceptionalism and superheroes. Constructivism, by trying to understand how ideas form identities, allows for an empirical and interpretive analysis of how these identities shape actions, behaviors and discourses. In the case of American exceptionalism, this will permit to comprehend how concepts such as the American Myth, the American Utopia or the American Dream built American identities and therefore how these identities modulated actions, behaviors and discourses after 9/11. In the case of superheroes (the Avengers in particular), constructivism will allow first of all to understand the context in which they were imagined and conceived and then to see how their identity determined how they behaved in the Avenger movies. To conduct this analysis, the primary source will, then, be the Avengers movies which will be completed with a qualitative content analysis. 1 The objective of the second chapter, then, will be to dive into the history, the portrayal after 9/11 and the relation with law and justice of both American exceptionalism and superheroes. By mirroring the sections of both American exceptionalism and superheroes, the second chapter will draw a parallel between the two notions to see how they can interact. The concept of superhero will use the definition of Peter Coogan: A heroic character with a selfless, pro-social mission; with superpowers – extraordinary abilities, advanced