. When she arrived on the scene, many thought she was the world’s first social justice superhero.
Yes, Superman, strange visitor from another planet who came to Earth with powers and abilities far beyond those of mere mortals. The Kryptonian hero, appearing in, didn’t start his career battling Lex Luthor or the evil General Zod. He started out racing against the clock to exonerate Evelyn Curry, an innocent woman scheduled for execution by the state, rescuing another woman from an abusive spouse, and nabbing a corrupt lobbyist trying to deceive the American public.
And as I prepare to step away as President of The Opportunity Agenda to join the faculty of Harvard Law School, I thought it would be instructive to look back through that history of social justice values in our comic books and movies, to see how we got from then, to now. These themes are not new to the superhero genre, but they have become far more prominent in recent years. As creators – including directors like Ryan Coogler and Patty Jenkins, and writers like Eve Ewing and G. Willow Wilson – have become more diverse, storylines about racial profiling, sexual harassment, queer equality, and the humanity of immigrants have become more common in comic book, film, and TV superhero tales.