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THE DUALITY OF IDENTITY IN THE SUPERHERO FILM A Thesis submitted to the faculty of San Francisco State University In partial fulfillment of A the requirements for the Degree FILM, Master of Arts •■£33 In Cinema Studies by Abas Ali Zadfar San Francisco, California August 2017 CERTIFICATION OF APPROVAL I certify that I have read “The Duality of Identity in the Superhero Film” by Abas Ali Zadfar, and that in my opinion this work meets the criteria for approving a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree Master of Arts in Cinema Studies at San Francisco State University. R.L. Rutsky, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Cinema ^ 2- 'SOLs'PrJ Julian Hoxter, M.F.A. Associate Professor of Cinema THE DUALITY OF IDENTITY IN THE SUPERHERO FILM Abas Ali Zadfar San Francisco, California 2017 This thesis examines the development of identity in superhero movies, specifically in the films Spider-Man 2, The Dark Knight, and Hulk. Referencing the concept of the shadow persona employed by Carl Jung and examining the notion of dual identity and the relationship between the real self and the imagined self, I will explore the essence and core of the personas of Peter Parker, Bruce Wayne, and Bruce Banner, and how they apply to the relationship between the viewer and the main character. Through the concept of spectatorship, the paper will analyze how Peter Parker, Bruce Wayne, and Bruce Banner are characters saddled with real-world issues and problems, and how their triumphs and tribulations enable them to become accessible to the audience. I certify that the Abstract is a correct representation of the content of this thesis. Date ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to give my utmost gratitude to Aaron Kemer and R.L. Rutsky. Without your helpfulness, guidance, patience, and support, I would not be able to finish my thesis and my education at this university. I also want to thank my awesome and very cool classmates Nettie Brock, Courtney Fellion, Rachel Hart, Carolin Kirchner, Ashley Nunes, Megan Payne, Alina Predescu, Shahrzad Sabbagh, Patrick Brame, Sean Bristol-Lee, Andrew Clark, Alexander Farrow, and Enrique Fibla Gutierrez for inspiring me in my life. And last but definitely not least, I like to thank my family and friends for your continuous support and for always being there for me. TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction................................................................................................................................ 1 Who Am I? I’m Spider-Man.....................................................................................................6 Batman: Seeking A Home......................................................................................................13 Hulk: He Can’t Help Being Green......................................................................................... 19 Happily Ever After?................................................................................................................ 26 v 1 Introduction The superhero cinematic genre, through the characters of Spider-Man, Batman, and the Hulk, symbolizes the struggle of dual identities that Peter Parker, Bruce Wayne, and Bruce Banner grapple with in their daily lives. In addition to the dualism in identity, the genre illuminates the relationship between the main character and the viewer, and challenges the boundary between the human and non-human and the conscious and unconscious. In their own similar and distinctive ways, these three characters illustrate a form of wish-fulfillment for the viewer, representing figures that use their pain, torment, and anxiety to become something bigger than themselves. The alter egos of these three characters become a tool in fighting back against the suffocating guilt that consumes and threatens to engulf them, which inspires viewers to identify with and establish a relationship with them, and contributes to the audience envisioning themselves as these three characters. Spider-Man, Batman, and the Hulk are larger-than-life, almost god-like figures, enabling the viewer to believe in these characters. Aristotle states that “the man who is isolated, who is unable to share in the benefits of political association or has no need to share because he is already self-sufficient, is no part of the polis, and must therefore be either a beast or a god.”1 When inhabiting their other persona, the three characters become superhuman, possessing a role that is above and beyond their human-selves. They become beastly and embody an animalistic semblance, that of a spider, a bat, and a monstrous giant. By suffering through personal trauma, battling between their selves and their enemies, and through their fluctuating relationships with their friends and loved 2 ones, Parker, Banner, and Wayne journey through life, overcoming the loss and regrets that have impacted their lives. The films Spider-Man 2, The Dark Knight, and Hulk exhibit the main character reclaiming his identity and standing up for himself amidst his struggle and challenges in life. While audiences might watch these movies for the spectacle, what makes these three characters relatable to the viewer is their humanness and the problems that they have to deal with. They become vessels for the viewer to believe in, figures that they can live vicariously through, an escape from their everyday lives. They allow fans to psychologically project themselves onto them, and as a result, it deepens the relationship between the character and the viewer. Through the viewing experience, Vivian Sobchack states, the relationship between the spectator and the film becomes “a dialogical and dialectical engagement of two viewing subjects who also exist as visible objects.” She notes that this manner of viewing “implicates both embodied, situated existence and a material world” and that the viewing subject “must be a body and be materially in the world, sharing a similar manner and matter of existence with other viewing subjects, but living this existence discretely and autonomously.”3 The viewing experience becomes a personal relationship between the viewer and the character, and it enhances the connection and alliance that fans have with the character. It allows the attraction to be solely for them. Parker, Wayne, and Banner encountering human issues such as coping with their identity, questioning their status and roles in the world, feeling guilty and 3 regretful about their decisions, and grieving about their past mistakes makes them relatable and enables the viewer to identify with and believe in these characters. One way the three characters invoke empathy in the viewer is through their parental issues, which becomes the formation of the guilt that haunts their lives, and they use their extraordinary alter egos to help deal with the inner pain that they feel. Their alter ego allows them to temporarily become someone else, enabling them to escape from the torturous struggle of their lives as human beings. The challenges the three characters encounter in the films force them to reflect on their past and to focus on the regrets that they have experienced, and they try to ameliorate these struggles through their alter ego. For Parker, Wayne, and Banner, their alter egos are a space where they can leave their real-world issues behind and become someone other than themselves for a while, a fantasy of their own making. They are moving away from the world that they are living in and are engaging in the realms of fantasy. They are living in an imaginative space where they are the rulers of that world, a creation where their subconscious can roam free, a space where they can feel free and unlimited. James F. Iacchino notes that Jung defined the persona as “our conscious outer face, our social mask that we put on to conceal the private self which lies within.”4 Iacchino also discusses the Jungian aspect of shadow and how it is “the one aspect of that self we tend to ignore and repress from consciousness,” and “how many people tend to cover up their shadow with the persona, but if they look under the social guise, they will find a brutal primitive waiting to be unleashed upon the world.”5 The alter ego feeds off their pain and regrets to make itself 4 known, and those pains and regrets congeal to become a part of their body and soul, thus becoming a part of their lives, a part they cannot get rid of no matter how hard they try. They are enslaved to their childhood, while being present in mind and body. It is this pain and their continuous vulnerability that makes them relatable to the viewer. By becoming another person, Parker, Wayne, and Banner are fulfilling a need that is lacking in themselves, a deficit that can only be fulfilled by becoming someone unlike themselves, a form of repression which comes from a lack of parental figures in their life. They repress their past by creating a new identity. Sigmund Freud defined repression as “some force that prevented (people) from being conscious and compelled them to remain unconscious.”6 Repression allows them to disappear from public life and become a secret being, a creation that is of their own making, an invention that is solely for themselves, an island that only they know exists. For instance, in Ang Lee’s film, the Hulk is not a traditional superhero. Banner is just a person desiring to take control of his life and of his past. The Hulk looms over his shoulder and his daily life, and Banner wants nothing more than to get rid of his monstrous side and go fully back to being an ordinary human being. For Banner, his other persona is a jail cell for his human body and rationality, a cage where Banner is held in check and cannot affect his alter ego. These three characters’ missing needs are fulfilled by their other personae, and their alter egos are essential to the fabric of their being. That is why Parker cannot stop being Spider-Man, why Wayne cannot stop being Batman, and no matter how hard he tries, why Banner cannot shed 5 himself of the Hulk.

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