A Hero Who's Time has Come... To Go!!

The author discusses the concept of heroes in Greek mythology and compares it to modern-day heroes like Superman and Spider-Man. He expresses his frustration with the trend of sequels and reboots in books and movies, citing examples like Indiana Jones and Sherlock Holmes. The author concludes by suggesting that he might just repeat one post every week to be as popular as Hollywood. Hi, and welcome to Mr. O's Sideways View, a blog and podcast dedicated to all those folks who aren't me. And I've noticed a surprisingly large number of people who aren't. Hmm. Anyway, I'm Mr. O, and it's time to take another sideways view at our crazy world. In Greek mythology, there was this cool dude named Jason. Now Jason was heir to some throne or another, but his father was imprisoned and killed just for being the heir to some throne or another. Back then, that kind of thing happened a lot. Frankly, I'm glad I'm not the heir to anything, but I'm getting off topic. Anyway, the goddess Hera, who didn't like the guy who was doing all that imprisoning stuff, sent Chiron, a centaur, to teach Jason all kinds of hero stuff. It never says why it had to be the horse dude who did the training. I would have preferred someone who looked more like Ronda Rousey, the great MMA fighter. I mean, what can a dude learn from a horse? But frankly, women had fewer rights 5,000 years ago, so they went with the horse guy. Either way, Jason built a great ship, did lots of heroic stuff, and reclaimed his rightful throne. Yay! This is not my point. I'm sad to say it took me so many words to avoid making my point, but there you have it. However, I can tell you my secondary point, which is Jason is considered to be the world's first hero. Funny, I'm still talking and I haven't made my primary point yet. Let's get to it, Mr. O! That last bit was directed from me to me. Bear with me for another moment while I get back to Jason. You see, after Jason did all his heroic stuff, his wife, Madea, cast a bad luck spell on him. He eventually lost his kingdom in an extreme high stakes poker game where he was holding three aces, became poor, and so boring even his grandkids wouldn't listen to his heroic stories. Eventually, as a broken old man, he was walking on the beach where his once mighty ship fell apart and crushed him. That's my point. He died. In the Greek myths, heroes did great stuff and then went to the great beyond. Even Perseus, son of Zeus and slayer of Medusa, eventually stopped doing heroic stuff. In Perseus' case, there is some confusion as to how he passed on. Some say he took his own life by looking at Medusa's severed head. He might have been killed by a vengeful son of the king he killed, or he might have just jumped into the sky one day and turned into stars. Who knows? Who cares? The point is, he retired. Fast forward to today. A hero is forever. We have six million television channels and movie studios all over the world, yet we're still making Superman movies 86 years into it. Nine separate people have played the Man of Steel on radio, television, and in the movies. Most of them are retired, but old Blue Tights lives on. Spider-Man's even worse. He's supposed to be around 18. Eventually, he gets a bit too experienced, so the comic books just flip over to another dimension and rebuild him from the ground up. I have heard his origin story so many times, I'm having nightmares and cold sweats. Although, that could be my daughter learning to drive, but I don't want to think about that, so let's just go with the Spider-Man thing. The latest iteration is some weird thing called the Spider-Verse. Would someone tell me what they were drinking that day? Because I want some. Apparently, there is a Spider-Hero in every universe out there. There is even a Porky Pig Spider-Man in his universe. But that's not all, folks. There are women, men, young, old, black, white, purple, and the electric Spider-People. Not all of them wear the cool tights. One wears a black overcoat and fedora made out of shadows. How he sewed a shadow into clothing, I have no idea. But I do know this crap did not exist before marijuana was legal. Coincidence? I don't think so. The reason I bring all this up is I was talking to a publisher for my book this past month. They were only mildly interested. Oh well. The problem was, the biggest question she had was, How many sequels do you think it'll have? I answered truthfully, I never thought of any sequels. I ended the story there. You could hear that woman hang up the phone in the next county. I guess that was the wrong answer. I'm sorry, but I grew up on Heinlein. Asimov and Bradbury, those guys never wrote a sequel. Or at least never wrote intending to write a sequel. Also, their books were about 300 pages. And they told great stories. These days, for some unknown reason, publishers want thousand page tomes with seven sequels. You can't keep a character that long, they get stale. I was reading one of those books. Instead of a good riveting story, I got three love stories. A heartbreaking journey of someone's hamster's terminal disease, a cross-country map described in great detail, and the beginning of a tale about an alien invasion, to be continued in the third book. The second book was reserved for the hamster's funeral, and the introduction of a mysterious stranger. No thank you. A sequel is fine, if you have enough story. But frankly, most of the time you don't. Most good novelists can get away with a trilogy. Three out. After that, you're repeating yourself. Sorry, it's boring. I just saw the newest Indiana Jones movie. That's number five. I can sum it up in one word. Don't. There was none of the magic of the original. Plus, he's an old man, not a swashbuckling rogue. They make no bones about it. It starts out, Hey, I'm an old man. No kidding, Sherlock. It's time for Indiana Jones to die. Let's remember him as the cool guy, not the broken down loser. What are they thinking? It's not like they did it to make money. It lost $134 million in one weekend. That's more money than it took to make the first movie, and that one's still raking in royalties to this day. While we're at it, I wonder if there's anyone else we can kill. Batman? Superman? My brother? Oh, sorry, but he keeps coming back all the time as well. The real stupid one is Jessica Fletcher. She's supposed to be a writer who solves mysteries. There are 56 books in this series written by five different authors, none of them Jessica Fletcher. Apparently, she's not a very good writer if she can't write her own stories. Everyone she meets dies. Why not her? Now, I'm no Hollywood producer or publisher, but I'm noticing a trend. To heck with new protagonists. Just rerun names people know. Heck, I hear they're running another version of Sherlock Holmes. Of course, you can't just redo stuff. You have to add an artsy reality. When they did Riverdale, they turned artsy comics into Count Dracula's Transylvania. Sure, dark reality is cool, but you can't mess with Jughead. Maybe I'm living in the past. From now on, I'm picking one post to just repeat over and over every week. I'll be as popular as Hollywood in all the new books. ♪♪♪ Thanks for listening, and I hope you laughed a lot. Stop by anytime. Open 24-7 for your smiling convenience. If you liked it, push like, or share it with a friend. If you missed an episode, you can hear Mr. O on Apple Podcast, Google Play Music, and Spotify. Remember to subscribe so you won't miss it again. If you'd like, you can send me an email at osidewaysviewatgmail.com. That's O-H-H-S sidewaysviewatgmail.com. And remember what I always say, laugh now. You can be crabby anytime.