From trauma victim to terrorist: redefining superheroes in Post-9/11 Hollywood

In this paper I use trauma theory to identify and discuss post-9/11 film adaptation of graphic novels as trauma narratives. I argue, for example, that since the first major recognition of the graphic novel as a legitimate form of literature in the late 1980s, trauma has played an important part in the genre of the American graphic novel. Major works from that period consistently established the graphic novel’s viability as an art form by connecting references to the Holocaust and Vietnam war trauma to figures and icons of popular American comic book traditions. In my paper, I argue that a similar "revisionary" process has taken place in two recent superhero films - 'Batman Begins' and 'V for Vendetta' - in which familiar superhero tropes are redefined from a post-9/11 perspective.