Saturday, January 31, 2009

This should drive Jason nuts...


Everyone in this video has never kissed a girl.

Note how everyone speaks in comic cliches to the point where its clear, they have no idea what they're really saying... It's an odd mish-mash of comic thought captions, Batman quotes, and poorly rehearsed, awkwardly presented, badly penned heroic platitudes. The stuff you gloss over on the page when you know you're reading substandard dialog, etc...

Every once in a while I give Reals (Real Life Superheroes) a mention on this site. Let me be clear: I'm not about to put on a cape and mask and go out to try to confront the dude going through the DT's in front of Walgreen's. I don't find this to be a particularly useful idea, or an effective one, but I do find it fascinating.

Here's a guy who challenged The Real Superheroes.


This guy could be a real menace to The Reals, but first he's going to need to secure permission to borrow his Grammy's car

What's unreal is how many of these guys there seem to be once you search "RLSH" on YouTube. And that the videos are uniformly awful.

I kind of appreciate that these folks seem to basically realize that the best they can do is offer volunteer work, but I'm not sure why the masks and capes... The people at the city food pantry would probably prefer if they had your real name and did not have to refer to you as Dark Vengeance Monger.

And I don't even know what to say about this video:


The video is literally 10 minutes of moment after moment of soul-crushing awfulness.

The video is pretty long, but, seriously, I only WISH I could come up with this stuff. There's a feature film in here somewhere.

So, yeah, these guys are pretty much the numb-nuts you thought they were. FFWD to the 8:00 mark if you need an example.

So what can you do to join (because I know Michael is already wondering)?

I have no idea. But here's a website. I tip my hat their direction, only because the suggestions listed for activities are (a) not likely to get anyone killed, and (b) might actually be beneficial (even if by accident) to somebody, somewhere.

EDIT: For some reason the comments link has disappeared. To see comments, please click on the title of the post and scroll down.

6 comments:

Michael Corley said...

My sheer number of costumes from 15years of storytelling already gets me free membership.

I thinking the long yellow cape with bright blue rope tie.

Awwww yeah.

The League said...

Michael, my man. I knew you wouldn't disappoint.

J.S. said...

It doesn't exactly seem like all of these people are on the same page. The suggestions listed on the website you linked do, indeed, sound logical, harmless, and even helpful. The people in the first of the videos you embedded, however, seem likely to end up clubbing some hobo to death when they catch him smoking a joint behind the 7-11. Mostly the whole thing just makes me kind of sad that people can't find a way to make their own lives interesting without parading around in Underoos (unless they have a really good sense of humor and self awareness about the whole thing, in which case more power to them, I guess).

The League said...

I think you're absolutely right that these people aren't on the same page. That's part of what makes the thing so interesting/ scary. It seems like a good chunk of these people have realized "hey, dressing up as a superhero doesn't make you a invulnerable to bullets. I think I'll try working at the homeless shelter". Or, you know, addressing the sources of crime rather than Batman-like pummeling of "crooks".

But there have been reports of a few of these people who want to actually bust heads. Just a matter of time before we end up with a Real in traction or worse.

J.S. said...

I just hope that when some of these "Reals" go up against a real, armed gang, someone is there and rolling with the videotape.

The League said...

That's the beauty of it. There most certainly will be a camera.