Capitán Latinoamérica

Vinodh Venkatesh

Description

Capitán Latinoamérica is the first study to examine the unique contribution of Latin American cinema, television, and web series to the global superhero boom. Through an analysis of superhero-themed media from Mexico to Argentina, Vinodh Venkatesh argues that contemporary Latin American superheroes are a hybrid of regional tropes and figures such as the famed luchador, El Chapulín Colorado, and North American blockbuster characters from the DC and Marvel universes. These superheroes channel anxieties specific to their respective national contexts. In Chile, for example, Mirageman rehashes and works through the Pinochet dictatorship and its traumatic aftermath; in Honduras, Chinche Man confronts neoliberalism and gang violence. In Colombia's El Man, in turn, rapid urbanization and drug cartels are the central concerns, whereas corruption and the political machinations of the state feature most prominently in the television and web series Capitán Centroamérica. While the Latin American superhero genre may be superficially characterized by low budgets and kitsch aesthetics, it also poses profound challenges to the social, political, and economic status quo. Covering a wide variety of media bookended by wrestling films from the early 1960s and multimedia productions from the 2010s, Capitán Latinoamérica offers a comprehensive introduction to, and assessment of, the state of the superhero in Latin America.
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. Mexican Origins

2. Urbanization and Its Discontents in El Man, el superhéroe nacional

3. Allegories of Trauma and Transition in Mirageman

4. The Superhero and a Death Foretold: Chinche Man in San Pedro Sula

5. YouTube, Parody, and Neoliberal Critique in Capitán Centroamérica

Post Data: "Un pibe . . . un boludo más . . . nos vino a salvar"

Notes
Works Cited
Index

Sujets

• Télévision
• Film
• Gender studies
• Caribbean
• History of film
• Latin America
• Television
• Visual culture
• Película fotográfica
• Latin American

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 01 octobre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781438480169
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

CAPITÁN
LATINOAMÉRICA
SUNY series in Latin American Cinema

Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado and Leslie L. Marsh, editors
CAPITÁN
LATINOAMÉRICA

SUPERHEROES IN CINEMA, TELEVISION, AND WEB SERIES
VINODH VENKATESH
Cover image: Bastián Cifuentes Araya (Instagram: periodistafurioso).
Photography of protester dressed as El Chapulin Colorado in Santiago, Chile,
October 21–22, 2019.
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
© 2020 State University of New York
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY
www.sunypress.edu
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Venkatesh, Vinodh, author.
Title: Capitán Latinoamérica : superheroes in cinema, television, and web series / Vinodh Venkatesh.
Description: Albany : State University of New York Press, [2020] | Series: SUNY series in Latin American cinema | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020018283 | ISBN 9781438480152 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781438480169 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Superhero films—Latin America—History and criticism. | Superhero television programs—Latin America—History and criticism. | Internet television—Latin America—History and criticism.
Classification: LCC PN1995.9.S7 V36 2020 | DDC 791.43/652—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020018283
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For Venkatesh Ramakrishnan
Contents
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1 Mexican Origins
Chapter 2 Urbanization and Its Discontents in El Man, el superhéroe nacional
Chapter 3 Allegories of Trauma and Transition in Mirageman
Chapter 4 The Superhero and a Death Foretold: Chinche Man in San Pedro Sula
Chapter 5 YouTube, Parody, and Neoliberal Critique in Capitán Centroamérica
Post Data: “Un pibe … un boludo más … nos vino a salvar”
Notes
Works Cited
Index
Illustrations
Figure I.1 Batman as a belligerent gringo in Latin America.
Figure 1.1 The silver-masked icon.
Figure 1.2 Faith as a defining superpower.
Figure 1.3 The asexual superhero.
Figure 1.4 More powerful than a locomotive!
Figure 1.5 Superheroines become super sidekicks.
Figure 1.6 Fighting crime in a bikini.
Figure 1.7 Situating Kalimán in an exotic space.
Figure 1.8 An iconic costume for an iconic superhero.
Figure 1.9 El Presidente Dictador (the dictator president).
Figure 2.1 El Man, a patriotic superhero.
Figure 2.2 Faith as a distinctively local superpower.
Figure 3.1 Trauma resurfaces in a jarring memory from the past.
Figure 3.2 Forensic clues in the moment of action.
Figure 4.1 Axiographic schema in the opening minutes of the superhero genre.
Figure 5.1 There are no heroes in the streets of Central America.
Figure 5.2 Parodic aesthetics and powers.
Figure P.1 Zenitram and Argentina in crisis.
Figure P.2 Fictionalizing the lay-hero in Capitán Menganno .
Acknowledgments
T he ideas developed in this book originated in an undergraduate Mexican and Central American culture and literature course I taught in fall 2014. Since it was my second time teaching SPAN 3464, I wanted to expose my students to something beyond the canon, and spent hours poring over YouTube and other streaming sites to find original and grassroots content. I stumbled upon the webisodes of Capitán Centroamérica , and was encouraged by my students’ response to the character and his antics; I was particularly taken by the connections we were able to make with other themes and texts covered in the semester.
A year later I was granted tenure at Virginia Tech, and received an email from the Provost’s Office stating that they would purchase a book for the library to celebrate my accomplishments: “You might wish to designate something in your field of research, or, because we know that our faculty read widely, you might want to select something in another field of science, art, literature, or technology.” I picked Liam Burke’s edited collection Batman . Going over the essays in this anthology, and many others afterwards, I slowly carved out a space for connecting superhero studies with my own research interests. This led to an article, which then was developed into the broader ideas present in Capitán Latinoamérica .
There are many people to thank who have supported me through their guidance, camaraderie, and suggestions over the past few years. I am incredibly grateful to all my colleagues in Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures for their support and friendship. I am particularly thankful to my colleagues in the Spanish Program.
Special thanks to Samanta Ordoñez Robles, Santiago Rozo, Carlos Evia, Mauro Caraccioli, Veronica Montes, David Dalton, Susan Larson, Ruth Grene, Olivia Cosentino, Rita Martin, Joana Jaime, Oswaldo Estrada, Juan Carlos González Espitia, Cristina Carrasco, Birgitte Bonning, Jeffrey Uhlmann, Craig Ferguson, Julia Simpson, Alexis Ballvé, and Grant Gearhart for sending me links, videos, and pdfs, and recounting anecdotes of watching superhero media when we have been able to talk at conferences or over a meal. Their excitement and knowledge of superheroes (in Latin America) undoubtedly enriched this book.
I am immensely grateful to the creators and producers of many of these superheroes for entertaining my emails, tweets, and Facebook messages. Thanks to Nicolás López and Steffi Lutz at Sobras International Pictures, the production and communications team at PuyA! Studios (formerly Puyaweb), Harold Trompetero, the production team behind Capitán Menganno , and the production team behind Zambo Dende . A personal thanks goes out to Súper H, Elmer Ramos, for answering all my questions. I am also incredibly grateful to Bastián Cifuentes Araya ( @periodistafurioso on Instagram) for allowing me to use the photograph of a modern-day Chapulín on the streets of Santiago during recent protests; the image goes to show just how important the superhero is in our collective consciousness.
Many thanks are also in order to my family. My love for superheroes is shared and nourished through conversations and trips to the cinema with my siblings, Sabitha and Vishnu. As kids, Vish and I would dress up as Spiderman while brandishing our Thundercats swords, fighting off imaginary villains as a dynamic fraternal-twin duo in Bangkok, lending credence to the notion that superheroes are malleable and “culturally and contextually dependent” (Denison and Mizsei-Ward 4). Watching the latest superhero blockbuster during Thanksgiving has now become a tradition with Sabitha. In Melilla, many, many thanks to Joaquín, Mari Carmen, Kiny, Chica, Alberto, Luis, Yaya, Julia, Blanca, and Clara. Most importantly, I am thankful for having wonderful parents, Narayini and Venkatesh. They have been role models and pillars supporting all I do. As cliché as it is (especially in a book about superheroes), they are my true superheroes.
This book would not have been possible without the support of those who have lived it on a daily basis. I am immensely thankful to my partner in crime, my media naranja , Mari Carmen, for her strength and encouragement. Her unwavering love and laughter have nurtured and sustained me in this journey. I must also thank Don Duende, el Marqués de Pitiminí, for patiently waiting for me to take him out on walks. Many thanks to the developers of FIFA and PES for providing intense but needed writing breaks.
I also want to thank my editor at SUNY Press, Rebecca Colesworthy, for her unwavering commitment to the project from the very first email I sent her. Her professionalism, guidance, and encouragement have made all the difference. Many thanks as well to Eileen Nizer, Ann Valentine, and Gordon Marce. The reports from the two anonymous readers greatly improved the manuscript—I am thankful for their suggestions, comments, and critique. I am also incredibly grateful to have the support of Ignacio Sánchez Prado and Leslie Marsh, who were from the very beginning enthusiastic about including this project in their series.
An early version of chapter 3 , “Capitán Latinoamérica: Affect, Bodies, and Circulations in the Superhero Genre,” originally appeared in a special dossier I edited with María del Carmen Caña Jiménez titled “Affect, Bodies, and Circulations in Contemporary Latin American Film” in Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies 20 (2016). I am grateful to the editors for giving me permission to use a version of that essay here.
Introduction
I n the past two decades, superhero films based on comic book characters have grossed some of the highest ticket sales in US and worldwide box offices. As Martin Zeller-Jacques points out, “Since the turn of the Millennium, Hollywood-produced superhero movies have dominated U.S. and global box offices. This cycle of films, beginning with X-Men (Brian Singer, 2000) and continuing to the present day, has provided three of the ten highest grossing films of all time … [and] earned a new cultural respectability for superheroes” (195). 1 In many Latin Am