tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30391088.post-1151504932902744322006-06-28T07:07:00.000-07:002006-06-28T07:31:20.713-07:00I am now 35 years old. I have two kids, ages 8 and 3, with a third on the way. One of life's wonderful twists of fate is that when you have kids, all things become new again as you see the world afresh through the eyes of each child. Holidays, birthdays, cartoons, stuffed animals, books such as <span style="font-style: italic;">Green Eggs and Ham</span> or <span style="font-style: italic;">Where the Wild Things Are</span>...they're all new again.<br /><br />I am now watching episodes of Cartoon Network's "Justice League" rented from Netflix in 2006 with my kids while I remember watching "Super Friends" on Saturday mornings in the 1970's and 1980's when I was their ages.<br /><br />Wow!<br /><br />For bedtime stories sometimes, my little girl wants to know the history of why Dr. Doom hates Reed Richards, how the Fantastic Four met the Silver Surfer (and who's Galactus, Daddy?), or the background stories of various X-men.<br /><br />I'm afraid my children are going to follow in my geeky footsteps. (Sigh.)<br /><br />One thing I have really come to reflect on in all of this is how much comic books and super-heroes tap into social issues and make powerful commentary on the human condition and the positive and the negative aspects of our times.<br /><br />More and more people are realizing that the super-hero genre is bona fide literature and not just kid's stuff.<br /><br />In a Bonus Feature on a "Twilight Zone" DVD, I learned that Rod Serling originally wanted to do powerful social commentary that the Powers That Be of his era wouldn't permit on the airwaves. His answer? Sneak the social commentary under the radar with the Twilight Zone. He figured the censors and other television media gatekeepers would just chalk the show up to a geeky sci-fi thing. He was right. They did.<br /><br />I'm not saying that every single comic book in existence is of Shakespearean quality or <span style="font-style: italic;"></span>that every episode of the "Twilight Zone" is golden.<br /><br />It is gratifying to see as a high school teacher, however, that comics are doing more than just encouraging reading (as important as that is), but they're also encouraging THINKING.Jon Klementhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12306152777041334959noreply@blogger.com