Quote Originally Posted by Ascended View Post
Agreed. I think people have different ideas of what "Everyman" entails. To me, it means a person who is very much normal and mundane, and readers are supposed to see themselves reflected directly in the character; not allegory but (near) direct comparison. Peter Parker is as "regular guy" as it gets; he could be any of us, or live next door to us. His problems are, by and large, no different from our own, his flaws, by and large, the same as our's. I never really related to Parker since I wasn't a socially awkward nerd, but I did relate directly with Kyle Rayner.
Ugh, Peter Parker was so relatable from like 8th grade to sophomore year haha. It's crazy I don't keep up with the character because I got the first few Masterworks back then and those were the best comics ever to me. I just sort of feel like I got Superman better when I matured, of course not meaning that to sound like an insult to that other character and his fans.

Superman as an everyman to me is a common minded man with a simple to understand, reasonable but not stock response to the world around him. With modern sensibilities that keep his flaws far below a level that causes divisiveness, like being a bigot. Even though he sees all of this crazy stuff, the fantastic is still fantastic to him because if we're reading about a bored Superman, aren't we bored? Just like we're outraged with him when something tragic happens, etc.

But he's still Superman. "Super" never impressed me much as an adjective really, so I would really still say the premise is that he is the overall greatest man in the world. And for us, he's the father of the genre. He's brought so much to the table that his own influences aren't even in the rearview. No one can say he didn't inspire Batman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man, etc. Never mind the mountain of expy characters. He's broadly influenced "every man."


But he shouldn't be seen worrying about something as basic as paying rent. Really, that's the crutch of the argument for me. Is a character the kind of person who will be seen dealing with the same problems as me, or will they deal with fantastical problems that elicit the same emotional response as my problems? The first is an Everyman, the latter is not.
Superlad once proposed the idea of a Superman comic about completely mundane things, and I have to admit I enjoy that idea. Because he's super, those things come back around to being kind of funny.