in the ’ Silly, weird, perhaps unanswerable questions about movies and TV’ thread there’s been superhero talk, which got me thinking of a question / observation for this thread: since superheroes have been so ubiquitous in popular culture for so long, why have there not really been any real-life superheroes? Or have there been? I did a search in this thread for the word ‘superhero’ and though there have been related mentions, it doesn’t look like this specific question has been asked.
You may say “because super powers aren’t real” but Batman has shown us that you don’t need super powers (as long as you are highly trained in combat arts; also, happening to be a billionaire who can afford to have lots of crime-fighting gadgets secretly made is a plus).
I’d say to qualify as a real-world superhero, one would need something like, but maybe not all, of these qualifications:
- A desire or obsession to fight crime outside of the normal channels of law enforcement
- Some sort of identifiable costume or uniform
- A secret identity (probably the most optional)
- Gadgets or abilities that give them an edge over bad guys as well as conventional law enforcement
The closest real-world parallel I could think of was Curtis Sliwa and the Guardian Angels in the 70s. They definitely had the costume part down, with the red jackets and berets: