ABSTRACT
The traumatic effects of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 cannot be overstated. The horric assaults on the World Trade Center in New York City, the Pentagon in Washington D.C., and the crash of United Airlines Flight 93 in Pennsylvania marked an abrupt cultural change in America, and the entire world. In the years following 9/11 desperate measures have been taken to safeguard America as a nation and as individuals. The Bush Administration’s War on Terror, The Patriot Act, wiretapping, torture reworded as “enhanced interrogation techniques,” etc., etc. But the intervening years have still witnessed a nation perilously unsafe from further terrorist attacks like the Boston Marathon bombing, from domestic terrorism like the attack at Fort Hood in Texas or the Navy Yard in Washington, the persistence of school shootings at places like Sandy Hook in Newtown, Connecticut, racially motivated shootings in a church in Charleston, South Carolina or on the streets of Ferguson, Missouri, and even natural disasters such as hurricane Katrina continue to foster a culture of fear. National feelings of trauma, vulnerability, xenophobia, and paranoia have dictated a dramatic shift in the American way of life and American beliefs. But the effects of terrorism in America also spawned a sense of unity, fantasies of violent retribution, and an ever-vigilant attitude. As dozens of lm critics and scholars have pointed out, the current dominance of the superhero lm genre is a direct result of post-9/11 anxieties. Time and again superhero lms invoke the horrors of 9/11 only to excise our cultural fears through a fantastical ctional response. At least at the movies characters like Superman, Batman, Captain America and Iron Man can enact a comforting revision of 9/11 where exceptional heroes can triumphantly protect American cities from terrorism.
