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Analysis of Lex Luthor

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KazuyaProta Shin Megami Tensei IV from A Industrial Farm Since: Jan, 2015 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
Shin Megami Tensei IV
#376: Feb 9th 2018 at 10:24:38 AM

Luthor is not totally devoid of good points, but he ultimately talks bigger than he actually is. He ultimately trips himself up in some way or another and undermines himself somehow. Classic Greek play sort of stuff. He wouldn't be entertaining without the tendency to get angry and spoil something.

The charisma of Lex is that he is flawed, he is no close to be the amazing supreme figure that he thinks he is, he is flawed as fuck, and not in a idealizable way.

As a Superman fan, not only do I don't mind Lex being able to challenge Superman on his morals, I would prefer it. Makes their dynamic more interesting if Superman does acknowledges that Lex has some valid points but highly questionable or extreme methods. My favorite story was Red Son, where Superman did allow Lex to bring humanity to a new golden age, and Lex in turn admitted Superman as a worthy opponent who had some legitimacy in his ideas.

Making Lex a smart genius that can have a genuine moral debate with Superman is fine.

Making Lex a genius that is RIGHT and makes Superman unnecesary is awful.

edited 9th Feb '18 10:27:01 AM by KazuyaProta

Watch me destroying my country
indiana404 Since: May, 2013
#377: Feb 9th 2018 at 12:40:11 PM

Thing is, whether or not Luthor is right about Superman, ultimately depends on Superman. Having Luthor kick a puppy or be revealed as a hypocrite doesn't by itself disprove any of his points; it's basically a scripted ad hominem in lieu of actual counterarguments - something the DCAU veered in at least two more times during the Justice Lords and the Cadmus crises.

Instead, I find it's Superman who might benefit from somewhat stricter writing standards, particularly given his recent bouts of paranoid prejudice... which ironically pushed Luthor into disillusionment regarding the whole hero business. In particular, the notion that he's outright necessary might have to be dropped, given there's a metric ton of other superheroes pitching in whenever he's incapacitated. The better fulcrum of conflict would be simply whether he's more harmful than helpful, since he does have the tendency to play world police and hold grand speeches as to what humanity should be like... and dodge accountability when, say, his efforts at nuclear disarmament leave the world open to invasion - the DCAU strikes again in that regard.

Ikedatakeshi Baby dango from singapore Since: Nov, 2015 Relationship Status: Singularity
Baby dango
#378: Feb 9th 2018 at 3:50:03 PM

Obviously Lex can't be completely in the right, otherwise he wouldn't be the villain. Even in Red Son, he didn't do it for the good of humanity, he did it because he wanted to rub his victory in Superman's face. Superman was also the better person in that story, only misguided. In Black Ring, Lex Luthor: Man of Steel and All-Star Superman, Lex Luthor is portrayed as a tragic figure whose flaws prevent him from becoming a legitimate hero, and he doesn't recognize it except in All-Star. I also never said that I want Lex to be in the right, just that he can actually challenge Superman with valid points .

NogaiKhan pic unrelated from close enough Since: Nov, 2017 Relationship Status: On the prowl
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#379: Feb 9th 2018 at 3:58:56 PM

Lex is at his best when he's angry at Superboy for making him bald and building time machines so he can go back in time and cuckold Superman's dad.

KazuyaProta Shin Megami Tensei IV from A Industrial Farm Since: Jan, 2015 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
Shin Megami Tensei IV
#380: Feb 9th 2018 at 4:00:07 PM

I seriously want a new Superman animated series that ends up having both versions of Lex, the silver age villain and the regular one.

Watch me destroying my country
Ikedatakeshi Baby dango from singapore Since: Nov, 2015 Relationship Status: Singularity
Baby dango
#381: Feb 9th 2018 at 4:04:23 PM

As a single person or as the three jokers BS?

Starbug Men of Letters Field Agent from Variable (Seven Years' War) Relationship Status: What is this thing you call love?
Men of Letters Field Agent
#382: Feb 9th 2018 at 4:07:17 PM

[up][up] Maybe something similar to the "Dimension Jump" episode of Red Dwarf, where one Lex meets the other.

I’ve faked death under many names. Carswell; Trelawney; Marcato; Haddo; Gallion; Felton; Riddle…
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#383: Feb 9th 2018 at 4:31:43 PM

I don't think you can say "tacked on pettiness" when the very point of the character is that he's always been a miserable hateful little troll of a human being. It's also a valid interpretation as there's an endless number of rich, powerful, and successful people who see the sole point of money as well as intelligence to lord over those they view as inferior. Lex Luthor can't imagine Superman not being a monster because if he had Superman's power, he'd randomly be shooting people from space every day just to prove he could.

But I think Grant Morrison said it best, "Superman Good, Lex Luthor Evil."

edited 9th Feb '18 4:32:01 PM by CharlesPhipps

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
Sigilbreaker26 Serial Procrastinator Since: Nov, 2017
Serial Procrastinator
#384: Feb 9th 2018 at 6:45:28 PM

[up]x4... that is basically what we got with DCAU Lex. He was regular in Superman, and transitioned to Silver Age Lex in JL and JLA.

[up]I do think simplifying it down that much might be more true than it first appears. Lex wasn't made evil by fate or circumstances, heck if he ever wanted to he could make a Heel-Face turn and do some real good in the world. But it's the choices he makes every day that make him the villain, or rather the same choice that he keeps saying the same answer to - if it comes down to his fellow man, or Lex, Lex always chooses himself.

"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"
NogaiKhan pic unrelated from close enough Since: Nov, 2017 Relationship Status: On the prowl
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#385: Feb 9th 2018 at 7:04:15 PM

I liked that one story where Luthor could solve all the problems forever and save octillions of lives while bringing eternal happiness to all and being worshiped as Jesus x10,000,000, but chose not to do it because he wanted to spite Superman. Like, he literally responds to Superman saying "Please Lex, I'm very sorry for what I did to you, but you can't blow this!" with "DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!".

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#386: Feb 9th 2018 at 8:36:38 PM

There was a good scene in the Countdown series.

Superman disappears for a year and Lex Luthor creates a bunch of superheroes so he can MURDER them all.

Superman's reaction was, "Where's the cure for cancer, Lex? You said you could do amazing things if I wasn't there."

"This is amazing!"

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
windleopard from Nigeria Since: Nov, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#387: Feb 9th 2018 at 11:12:01 PM

Personally, I think this is what puts him above someone like Doom, where lately they've tried really too hard to make Doom a good guy and he starts to lose some of the charm he had as a hammy villain.

Well, Reed hasn;t been much of a hero so that balances out.

Another issue with Luthor is that he is by far the most accomplished human character in the Superman mythos. He pulled himself out of poverty and has turned Metropolis into arguably the most advanced city in America. So depicting a guy like this as a petty, envious miser doesn't give a good view about how the writers see humanity. Batman may have his faults, but it at least comes with the notion that humans aren't completely helpless sheep or vile goblins needing to be dictated to by a god from on high. Remember that scene from Kill Bill when Bill describes the Clark Kent persona as a mockery of the human race? That's how Luthor can be read at times.

Of course, an alternative solution could be to make Lois less of a damsel in distress and emphasize John and Natasha Irons a lot more.

indiana404 Since: May, 2013
#388: Feb 9th 2018 at 11:13:11 PM

...if it comes down to his fellow man, or Lex, Lex always chooses himself.
Well, there was the final Darkseid incident in JLU. And his stint as a hero in The New 52 / Rebirth - which to even my own great surprise didn't end with him being revealed as evil all along, but rather organically disillusioned by how Superman himself, of all people, reacted to the idea. The guy does stick his neck out for humanity often enough, even if it's for reasons other than pure altruism.

And this is something I kinda wanna see developed further. Luthor as a well-intentioned extremist is one thing, but it's difficult to balance or organically develop the extremism to go with the intentions. So instead, it might be interesting to overplay his egotistical nature on the philosophical level, turn him into an Objectivist ubermensch, slap on some anti-alien humanity-first bigotry... and play it so honestly, it actually becomes valorous in a way. This is a guy who thoroughly believes it's a dog-eat-dog universe, that wealth and power are the mark of greatness and a result of effort and will, and that the only saviors humans can rely on are themselves. That way, it makes sense that he'd see himself as the paragon for people to emulate, defend the Earth to his dying breath, yet still look for ways to destroy Superman, both physically and philosophically. He's not entirely right, but - in a universe where actual alien invaders are a dime a dozen - he's not entirely wrong either.

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#389: Feb 10th 2018 at 12:56:10 AM

I always think Lex Luthor as the capitalist superbeing is something that needs to be tempered. Doctor Doom is often depicted as the guy who would be able to make Earth a paradise if he was in charge but I think that's a bad way of doing it. It's why I like the Empire series where we discover what Doctor Doom ruling the world would be like: a hellhole of murder, tyranny, and brutality because tyrants don't value the lives of individual subjects.

If Lex Luthor made Metropolis the brightest city on Earth, there needs to be a horrific downside because he's not the guy who would ever do something for pure decency. The irony is, I'm entirely onboard with a Luthor everyone DOES see as a saint because does it matter if the guy cures cancer because he wants to be rich and famous versus the guy who does it save the world?

Zephram Cochrane and all that.

edited 10th Feb '18 12:57:03 AM by CharlesPhipps

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
indiana404 Since: May, 2013
#390: Feb 10th 2018 at 1:38:08 AM

Isn't Empire more of an expy-filled alt-fic in the vein of Watchmen? At any rate, the thing about Doom is that he works well enough as a local despot, a hero to his country, so to speak. Really, a technocratic dictatorship is far from the worst form of government the Balkans have endured; guy would be a saint compared to some of the folks we have right now. He doesn't need to rule the world in order to drive the point that his way of doing things is valid even if it's not universal - something that could be adapted for Luthor as well.

So depicting a guy like this as a petty, envious miser doesn't give a good view about how the writers see humanity.
Abject misanthropy being prevalent among superhero writers notwithstanding, I reckon there's a considerable amount of sour grapes envy at hand, precisely because Luthor is a self made man, and not entirely unrealistic given the number or first-generation tech tycoons in real life. Superman is easy to praise because there's no particular expectation to emulate him, except in the most symbolic of ways. But Luthor - a relentlessly driven over-achiever who started from nothing and relied on both booksmarts and streetwise guile for his success - that's actually something feasible, and thus rather embittering to those with greater initial assets, yet lesser accomplishments.

The usual comparison I make is as between a surgeon and a faith-healer. High-level doctors are often stereotyped as cold and cynical gloryhounds - see Stephen Strange before his accident - even though they've dedicated their own lives to preserving others. Meanwhile, faith-healers and assorted gurus are glorified to no end, even though or perhaps because their actual abilities and accomplishments are strictly in the eye of the beholder. You can easily say they are blessed by whatever supernatural forces you personally believe in, and thus absolve yourself of responsibility as to why you're not trying to do the same as they are. The same doesn't exactly apply to a decade's worth of medical training, even if you have the money to afford it.

Consequently, when the same mentality is applied to all of humanity - when they are compared to an explicitly unreachable pedestal - it's that much easier for one's own lack of achievement to be concealed. Sure, there are people wealthier, prettier, smarter and more popular than you, but because not even they can compare to the infinite awesomeness of Superman, that makes the difference much easier to bear... right?

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#391: Feb 10th 2018 at 2:50:23 AM

Mind you, there's no end of similar genius billionaires on the good guy's side as well.

The big problem with Dawn of Justice is basically Batman and Lex Luthor somehow got switched in their roles with Lex Luthor furthermore getting the Joker.

But I actually like the Man of Steel 80s series argument for Lex Luthor: the reason he hates Superman is because Superman makes Lex Luthor look normal. Lex Luthor wants to be the richest, most famous, most beloved person in Metropolis and he'll never be anything but number 2# as long as Superman exists. The xenophobia angle I've always felt kind of undermines him and strikes me as something more like Lex would play off of to stoke the fears of the public.

Mind you, I really like Veronica Cale's hatred of Wonder Woman in the original series because it's purely how much she loathes the fact she did come from a trailer park and built up a massive company only to hate the fact Wonder Woman effectively stepped out of a badass Disney movie to overshadow anything she could accomplish.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
windleopard from Nigeria Since: Nov, 2014 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
#392: Feb 10th 2018 at 3:02:21 AM

Mind you, there's no end of similar genius billionaires on the good guy's side as well.
Yeah but how many of them earned their wealth as opposed to being born into it?

The big problem with Dawn of Justice is basically Batman and Lex Luthor somehow got switched in their roles with Lex Luthor furthermore getting the Joker.
Considering how Batman has been depicted as being extremely paranoid of superhumans since the 90s at least, I’d say Dawn of Justice basically just acknowledged that Bruce and Lex weren’t all that different. And Bruce’s victims were at least limited to rapists and guys who kidnap old ladies. Compare to Tower of Babel or Brother Eye which actually got thousands of innocent people killed in his attempt to single-handedly police the world.

Mind you, I really like Veronica Cale's hatred of Wonder Woman in the original series because it's purely how much she loathes the fact she did come from a trailer park and built up a massive company only to hate the fact Wonder Woman effectively stepped out of a badass Disney movie to overshadow anything she could accomplish.
You know much as I respect Rucka as a writer, that really does not paint a good view of how he sees people not born into privilege.

indiana404 Since: May, 2013
#393: Feb 10th 2018 at 7:12:02 AM

To say nothing of how comic writers in general treat mental illness or childhood abuse... As in the above musing, the psychological principle at hand is actually easy to explain. When you write a hero with the explicit mentality that they are supposed to be above regular people - as in, when this is their defining characteristic - then any form of power mobility can be seen as threatening. You see this with urban fantasy protagonists being disdainful of civil authorities, supernatural powerhouses getting anxious whenever their abilities are scrutinized and potentially reproduced by science and technology, and in the above cases, low-born plebs amassing power to rival the privileged designated heroes.

To contrast, say what you will of the macho action stars of the eighties and nineties, and the dark age anti-heroes they influenced, but the vast majority of them are positively working class in both attitude and relative power, with abilities gained by mil-spec technological advances or just plain hitting the gym. There's a lot more profound sense of empowerment in that core concept - that anyone could be a hero. Even Luthor's egotistical streak may be written as stemming from the honest belief than anyone could be like him, and it's people's own fault they're not setting their priorities straight.

Consequently, one of the main unfortunate implications regarding the Justice League is that - as they generally shun civil government yet also try and police every other cape in the verse - even aspiring self-made heroes are still forced to answer to a group of aristocrats whose idea of justice is whatever they feel like at the time. Civil Wars notwithstanding, even the Avengers don't have that kind of problem. (There's a considerably greater sense of freedom in the Marvel verse proper, since most of the time, the bigwigs aren't interested in enforcing their views on even the most borderline anti-heroes like Deadpool or the Punisher.)

All in all, you can see why Luthor can be enticing, and getting only more so as real life tech tycoons shed the image of the corrupt executive and embrace that of the futurist visionary who launches a car into space for a test drive. Making him petty and needlessly malicious won't make that go away. Perhaps a more thorough revamp is needed if the character is to remain a consistently villainous archetype. I dunno, maybe make him one of the Boston Brahmins, a privileged aristocrat afraid of losing power, while emphasizing Superman's own working class ethos. Food for thought.

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#394: Feb 10th 2018 at 10:31:22 AM

Ted Kord made his fortune in the "geek turned good" way. Oliver Queen routinely loses his fortune because the writers have a weird problem with the idea of a billionaire being a super liberal despite the fact that's a very common thing in real life. The Bourgeois Bohemian thing is hardly uncommon. Bruce Wayne is really the only "to the manor born" rich jackass on the side of the angels.

Also, Lex's super wealth being made on his own two hands is something that was only important to one variation of Lex. We saw him as a Bruce Wayne figure in Smallville and during his Presidential Election, he had it retconned into his backstory he came from a Hearst like family. The current Rebirth version is the Smallville version brought into the comics.

Mind you, even the Suicide Slums Lex Luthor wasn't a self-made man. He got the seed money for his education by murdering his parents in an insurance swindle.

I'm reminded a bit of Charles Dickens who created the "self made man" parody in Ebenezer Scrooge because he wasn't fond of the lionization of the idea.

[up]All in all, you can see why Luthor can be enticing, and getting only more so as real life tech tycoons shed the image of the corrupt executive and embrace that of the futurist visionary who launches a car into space for a test drive. Making him petty and needlessly malicious won't make that go away. Perhaps a more thorough revamp is needed if the character is to remain a consistently villainous archetype. I dunno, maybe make him one of the Boston Brahmins, a privileged aristocrat afraid of losing power, while emphasizing Superman's own working class ethos. Food for thought.

I think it's important to remember Mogul Lex is based on Enron and 80s Era Trump as well as the Kingpin more than Elon Musk or Jobs. It's just he is capable of building his own death ray. He's the guy who doesn't care about climate change because he'll have an underground city built for himself when the environment collapses.

edited 10th Feb '18 10:38:50 AM by CharlesPhipps

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
indiana404 Since: May, 2013
#395: Feb 10th 2018 at 11:21:18 AM

Or someone who'd solve it just because it might depreciate his beach front properties. Like I said, since he's not a physical powerhouse, and his plans are only as cunning as the current writer's imagination, making him unambiguously evil pretty much cuts down the only remaining reason why he's challenging and engaging as a character. If anything, it's that sort of attitude that precipitated Luthorberg, though at least he had his symbolic rage-against-the-heavens deal. Just as how his old mad scientist image is now all but a discredited trope in light of Neil Tyson and Michio Kaku, the tech tycoon spiel is only becoming more popular as a heroic archetype. Either run with it and go full Magneto with his characterization, or look for another baseline to build on.

edited 10th Feb '18 11:21:47 AM by indiana404

NogaiKhan pic unrelated from close enough Since: Nov, 2017 Relationship Status: On the prowl
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#396: Feb 10th 2018 at 1:52:32 PM

Well if we're talking about the comics, Lex Luthor's not a self-made man because he actually does have a completely ridiculous superpower- Super-Intelligence. Brainiac outright stated that he was more intelligent than entire rest of the Earth... combined. Considering he can concoct utterly convoluted plans that require him to be nigh-omniscient to work, master every form of science from robotics to cryogenics to human biology to theoretical physics, build devices that can hurt Superman (including a power-armor suit that flat-out makes him nearly as strong as Superman, enough to curb-stomp Supergirl and injure someone stronger than Superman as long as he's immobilized), and so on, that sounds pretty believable.

edited 10th Feb '18 2:29:41 PM by NogaiKhan

Robbery Since: Jul, 2012
#397: Feb 10th 2018 at 2:27:32 PM

[up] Quite right. Luthor's super-intelligence might as well be a super-power. People talk about Batman, for instance, not having super-powers, but as far as the average person is concerned, he does. People tend to read hard-won skills as super-powers, even in the real world (ascribing the achievements of the very skilled to "talent"). If a hero can do something that the average person cannot with a significant degree of proficiency, then it might as well be a super-power. Luthor has every bit as much of an "unfair'' advantage over humanity that Superman does (he was born a genius; it's not like he built normal intelligence into super-human proficiency through hard work or anything) . And, has been said, Lex as a billionaire could hardly be said to have made his money honorably. I've no doubt Superman could make himself a fortune as well, if he were so inclined, but you'll note that he does not. Lex desperately wants humanity to know, and acknowledge, that he's better than they are, while Superman just wants to be accepted as human.

The parallel between Lex and Superman comes from the fact that they echo each other (as do all the best Batman and Spider-Man villains). Superman is a gifted being who uses his gifts to help humanity, while Luthor is a gifted being who uses his gifts to enrich himself and dominate humanity. As was said in All Star Superman, Lex could have saved the world years ago, if it was something he actually cared about. Trying to denigrate their conflict into some simplistic brains vs. brawn dichotomy, or super-being vs. "normal" human is reductive, and completely misses the point. Sounds more like someone trying to sell their own agenda, or a fanboy trying to sound clever, than like an actual interpretation of the material. ,

edited 10th Feb '18 2:29:19 PM by Robbery

Rubber_Lotus Since: May, 2014
#398: Feb 10th 2018 at 2:56:03 PM

On a largely-unrelated-but-somewhat-on-topic note, I really hope the upcoming Metropolis show will make tycoon!Lex Lois' Arch-Enemy (one of the few things I wholeheartedly liked about Byrne's original Man of Steel mini). That conflict would look a lot less lop-sided, not to mention let the writers have their cake and eat it too.

Just imagine - by the time Superman shows up at the end of Season 2 or 3 or whatever, Lois and her plucky sidekick(s) have completely shattered and/or reformed Lexcorp, and Lex himself has gone full-on Mad Scientist, a fugitive from the law who thinks he's got nothing left to lose...

indiana404 Since: May, 2013
#399: Feb 10th 2018 at 3:21:21 PM

I'm generally wary of the whole "before they were famous" prequels like Gotham, Smallville etc. Say what you will about the TV MCU or the Arrowverse, but at least they don't feel like perpetual spinach before cake. I'd much rather have a Metropolis show in the vein of Powerless, showing how the rest of the world handles being in the crossfire of heroes and villains.


Now then, considering it's precisely All Star Superman where Luthor most clearly demonstrates his respect for hard work and dedication - including praising Clark Kent's own smarts and integrity - I'd say touting his intelligence as a superpower in its own right goes against his demonstrated characterization. He's smart, yes, but he's better described as educated and skilled - factors dependent on determination rather than some inborn gift. Consequently, as I noted above, his idea of saving the world may yet be for him to embody and demonstrate his vision of self-reliance and personal development as the key to human prosperity... which becomes a tad more difficult around an alien who gets superpowers the same way most people get a sunburn. Factor in Superman's tendency to try and police even other heroes according to his own ideals, and it's easy to see how this can be taken as him throwing his weight around rather than let people choose how to conduct their affairs for themselves.

NogaiKhan pic unrelated from close enough Since: Nov, 2017 Relationship Status: On the prowl
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#400: Feb 10th 2018 at 3:23:37 PM

I mean, I'm not "touting" intelligence as his superpower. His intelligence is a superpower. As in, no human to ever live or who ever will live comes even remotely within ten orders of magnitude of his brainpower. As in tens of billions of people living in a civilization advanced enough to build time machines and ships that can travel millions of times faster than light, collectively come nowhere close to him. That's canon. According to the smartest being in the universe, at least.

edited 10th Feb '18 3:26:43 PM by NogaiKhan


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