Seite - 60 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Band 03/01

60 | Toufic El-Khoury www.jrfm.eu 2017, 3/1, 59–74 become interested in movies, intrigued not only by selected authors or film aesthetics, but also by movie genres. following the interest of stanley Cavell in hollywood comedy and melodrama, other philosophers have explored the codes and themes of established genres: Robert Pippin with film noir and the Western2 and, in France, Eric Dufour with horror movies and science fiction.3 Movies and TV series adapted from comics and, more specifically, from the superhero genre are starting to attract interest beyond the circle of critics and film historians.4 the superhero movie is still at its beginning, whereas superhero comics have a longer and richer history, but with the release and success of Spider-Man (sam raimi, Us 2002) and the steady production of superhero mov- ies since 2002, the superhero genre has taken form – before 2002, the rare hits were scattered and limited to the most iconic figures of the genre, Superman and Batman.5 even though the genre still has to prove its potential, through a philosophical and generic approach we can identify thematic links between these movies. Those topics will consolidate and appear more clearly when film- makers and screenwriters free themselves of the simple fan’s nostalgia for com- ics, for then they will be able to concentrate on the genre’s mythical potential and its ability to address universal topics in a specific socio-cultural context. in terms of the contemporary syntax of the superhero movie, one of the most relevant topics of the genre is the problem of evil. this focus is the most solid link between those movies and their mythological and religious roots. ref- erences to Christian theodicy and to political debates underline the authors’ efforts, since the 1980s, to free the genre of its childish yoke, making possible diverse illustrations of our world’s complex issues. the irON AGe, the thirD AGe Of sUPerherO COMiCs: AN AGe Of PessiMisM? in the history of superhero comics, three “ages” are usually delimited: the Gold- en Age, silver Age, and iron Age, the third one being the most discussed. Many genre’s familiar “iconography”. the syntactic elements are the “thematic undercurrent”, topics and subjects linking a series of movies on a deeper level. The pragmatic aspect (suggested by Moine) refers to the public reception and the genre’s acceptance in a specific socio-cultural context. The exact defini- tion of a genre depends on a certain equilibrium and on the interaction of those different aspects in a particular historical period of production. See Altman, 1984, 6–18; Moine, 2008, 10–25. 2 see Pippin 2012; Pippin 2010. 3 See Dufour 2006; Dufour 2011. 4 We already have examples: White/irwin /Arp 2008; Forest 2009. 5 in a book he edited in 2009, Claude forest suggested the production of superhero movies was still too limited for him to write about the superhero movie as a movie genre (see forest, 2009, 12–13). in 2016 that is no longer the case, as a result of the impressive commercial domination of those movies in U.s. and international markets, with film series like The Avengers (Disney), Batman (Warner), and X-Men (fox).