By Carol S. Pearson

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Pondering our politics, I asked myself what I thought was true about America that most of us might agree on. My answer: we are in a time of fast and chaotic change and a growing divide between those who want to return to former times and those who wish to move ahead. So what to do? In my case, go to a movie. As it happened, I went to see Deadpool & Wolverine, a film based on comic books that holds a mirror up to America’s psyche during the current presidential race. Was it intentional? Probably not.

Deadpool & Wolverine’s plotline follows an archetypal hero’s journey form. In myth and history, heroes in war were chosen as kings for their valor. But they also needed court fools, or jesters, to puncture their arrogance and egotism so that they could govern for prosperity and their people’s quality of life.

Both of our major presidential candidates present themselves as heroes: Donald Trump threatens violence if he does not get elected and promises a utopia if he does, while Kamala Harris promotes her knowledge about national and international issues, based on her experience in public service and progress already made during the Biden administration. She asks voters to simply choose what kind of America they want to live in. Both candidates evoke laughter to make their points, whether to satirize their opponent or, more so in Harris’s case, to dispel conflict. Both Trump and Harris, each in their own, distinctive ways, combine the Ruler and Jester roles. Trump also uses humor, so that some who do not like what he proposes think he is just joking.

In Deadpool & Wolverine, extreme violence is normalized and often even pleasurable to watch. Throughout most of human history, heroes came back from wars scarred emotionally or physically, with wounds that were very real. Families lived with deep grief when their sons did not come home. President Biden still lives in this world. As many others have noticed, ours is a time when people increasingly are disconnected from one another and their embodied selves. Even real wars may not feel distressful if we see them only on a screen. And, in lives so lived out through technology, it is difficult for many to distinguish verifiable facts from lies.

So, after watching the movie, it occurred to me that Deadpool & Wolverine could clarify things for me about the state of the American psyche in the present moment. Having said this, I also know that comic books were first created to appeal to the psyche of adolescent boys, and only later expanded out to encompass more serious adult themes. Thus even I, a female academic, was intrigued to see this film.

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Deadpool & Wolverine as a Parody of the Hero’s Journey

The movie is timely as well as fun. It encourages a sense of belonging, with references to previous films in the Marvel Comics Universe that fans can catch and feel in the know. The plot also follows the basics of the archetypal hero’s journey. In Joseph Campbell’s formulation, it involves a call to a perilous journey in which the hero must overcome adversity, which generally requires killing monsters or monstrous people. As dramatized in Star Wars and in politics, the hero rebels against unfit rulers in order transform a culture. In Deadpool & Wolverine, the enemy, believing that our world is crumbling, seeks to destroy it all at once.

In myth and folklore, the hero often performs dangerous deeds to win the love of a beautiful and virtuous lady, and in some cases must overcome evil. True to form, our Deadpool hero wants to have a serious purpose to please his girlfriend. This reminded me of how, in heroic chivalry, it was thought that knights were not ready to rule until their pure love for a virtuous woman motivated that growth. Deadpool also jokes his way through battles where characters fight with horrible weapons that somehow do not harm him or his companion, Wolverine. Interestingly, the most evil, terrifying figure is a lovely-looking witch who can literally get inside their brains, forcing them to face the weaknesses underneath their macho exteriors.

Wolverine is a drunk seeking first to escape and then to be redeemed from the harm he has done—a pattern that links to the heroic story of sin and redemption. In our politics, Trump claims he is a savior like Jesus, apparently without realizing how that story ends. Many of his followers believe that they must support him to save the country from iniquity, or else experience God’s wrath.

These are all traditional hero’s journey plotlines, with the difference being that in this film they are parodied even as they are being acted out.

However, in Deadpool & Wolverine, while the form the heroic myth takes is quite ancient, and perhaps anachronistic, its feeling is ironic and very contemporary. Most of it involves constant slaughter of one side or the other, as in war, while the score includes lovely and inspiring songs that have little or nothing to do with the action. Might there be some unconscious reason so many people love Marvel movies like this, besides their humor? Some part of us is aware of this contradiction and is inwardly amused because in this time of transition, we find ourselves distanced from old plotlines we still live.

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Glancing into This Fictional Mirror to Learn About Ourselves

Could it be that Marvel films are successful not just because they are entertaining, which they are, but because they demonstrate something true and real? As may always be true in a time when one age is dying and another emerging, some people want desperately to retreat to the past, while others want to rush to the future. In the meantime, we all find ourselves living plotlines that no longer fit us. But in truth, no one can take us back to the past, although they can try to promote what they liked about it. And we cannot know the future. We can only live in the present, even as it changes moment to moment.

Even when we are still living out archetypal (universal) story plotlines, they inevitably will be different than they were. We and our politicians will need to express those patterns in forms yet to be lived. To notice their emergence, individually and as a culture, we have to return to more embodied living. That requires paying attention to verifiable facts and our own experience, while also facing our true feelings and yearnings.

Over the next four years, we need to be grounded in reality, with attention to what is true now. We need to use common sense to determine what can be done in our own lives, in our communities, and by both our government and our economic system. In choosing our leaders, some of us want a savior. Some primarily want to win at others’ expense and view this next election as part of a culture war. And some of us want to connect with what we truly desire for ourselves, for others, and for our country, and in this way further the nation’s progress toward realizing its founding promise.

Yet, systemic changes require new storylines, as they often have. Our culture war is based on divergent moral beliefs. Neither Deadpool nor Wolverine could be viewed as moral people. Not only that, but Deadpool was not that interested in heroically saving the entire world. His energy was focused on rejoining his world—the small number of people he loved and who loved him. And neither was a traditional solitary hero. Neither could save the day alone. It took both Deadpool and Wolverine to kill the wicked witch who was intent on destroying our world.  

In a democracy, the future that emerges depends on our choices. That includes how we vote. This requires personal responsibility for exploring our own desires and our wishes for others, which in turn means recognizing the strength in our diversity. Some of the emerging stories that provide signs to what the future could hold may be right here, but rarely make the news. We can each be hypnotized by what we have long thought. I find it an interesting experiment to notice all the times I’m unconsciously living a habitual version of an archetypal story that some part of me knows is outdated,and hence ridiculous. In a democracy, I suspect we all need to be the Rulers of our own lives, ideally checked by our inner Jester, the kind that brings us down to earth, perhaps letting us all share a laugh. Grounded in our own actual reality, we can imagine what kind of world we now want to experience ourselves and for others and let it govern how we vote, not just at the ballot box, but with how we live our lives.

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