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Crazier than a Sack of Ferrets!: Deadpool as the Post-Watchmen Superhero

Introduction

Many comics historians and fans believe the Bronze Age of comics died in 1986 with the publication of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon’s Watchmen. Something happened in that series which revolutionized what comics were and could be. Joss Whedon1 said that Watchmen is "proof of everything a comic could do, but also an affirmation of everything comics had done.”2 Not only did it become the first and only graphic novel to make it to Time Magazine’s Top 100 English language novels3, but it has also been described frequently by fans and scholars alike as the comic to read if you’ve never read a comic before. Watchmen introduced ideas such as the dark and dubious nature of the motivations and psyche of those who would dress up in spandex and fight crime by night. Suddenly, our superheroes were flawed, driven by greed, lust for power, and even mental instability. The line between “hero” and “villain” became blurred and walking the straight line of the righteous became nearly impossible in the post-Atomic, post-Vietnam worl. These are all themes that slowly integrated themselves into the superhero genre at large, but no character reflects and enacts them better than Marvel’s Deadpool. I request permission to investigate and research how Deadpool embodies the post-Watchmen genre and how he represents the ever-evolving figure of the anti-superhero in comics. The following proposal will outline my research topic and questions, my proposed schedule for the duration of this research project, and a list of sources I would like to use to support my claims.

Research Topic

Because the field of comics scholarship is only now gaining momentum in the academic arena and because there exists no scholarship at all on the Deadpool comics, my research questions must begin at a basic level: “What themes and ideas are introduced in Watchmen that impacted the comics industry?” From there I will progress towards questions like, “How does Deadpool embody these evolutions?” and “What does this mean for the future of the superhero genre?” My initial research will focus on the Watchmen graphic novel and how the heroes in it differ from those of the Golden Age and Silver Age of comics. Then, I will move on to an examination of the character traits, origin story, personality, and mental prognosis of Deadpool. Because comics, by nature, combine both text and words, much of my research will focus on the existing comics scholarship of visual rhetoric.

Resources

Due to the lack of pre-existing research on this topic, I will be looking to the source material of Watchmen and Deadpool in order to define most of my claims. Deadpool has been a popular running series since 1991, so I will narrow my scope towards a few issues from the mid-2000s series and the well-known series Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe. In addition, I plan to use Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud and Peter Coogan’s Genre Theory for portions of the theoretical background of the superhero genre itself. The remainder of my sources will be pulled from recorded interviews of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons following the release of the Watchmen film.

Project Schedule

1 Oct: Locate at least five resources

3 Oct: Locate additional three resources

10 Oct: First half of annotated bibliography

15 Oct: Second half of annotated bibliography

20 Oct: Thesis paragraph

22 Oct: At least two pages complete

26 Oct: Six total pages complete

28 Oct: Ten total pages complete

29 Oct: Writing center appointment

30 Oct: Revision and editing

15 Nov: Project due Conclusion and Authorization

In the larger scope of academic research, this project is intended to add to the minimal comics scholarship. It will be directed at other comics scholars and comics fans in a way that both increasing field knowledge as well as opens up a new conversation about the turning point of modern comics in the Bronze Age. This project will also serve as the initial step in my Master’s thesis research and will eventually become a chapter in my thesis project.