Slider_Quinn21 wrote:So small spoilers for episode one of Daredevil. Not a major spoiler or anything you wouldn't see coming from a mile away (and yes you're in the right place).
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So Fisk becomes mayor of NYC. And the parallels to Trump are pretty aggressive. It's a little upsetting to see, but here's the thing that I keep thinking:
I think Fisk is better than Trump.
Fisk is a literal murderer, but in scenes where it doesn't make sense for him to lie or put on a show, he talks about wanting to be better. He talks about how much he loves the city. Maybe he's doing it for money or power or whatever, but as mayor, he starts making improvements. He doesn't appear to be sexist or racist or selling out the people for his personal gain.
Fisk is a bad guy, but at least he's making an effort. I haven't seen Trump make an effort once in a decade. And we know a lot more about Fisk than we do about Trump. I'm sure there are bodies that belong to Trump. He almost certainly hasn't done it himself like Fisk would, but I'd be shocked if he hasn't had people killed.
I used to think it was so silly that a comic book villain would be elected mayor or president. President Lex Luthor seemed so ridiculous and over the top. And here's the thing:
I think Lex Luthor is better than Trump.
Lex is a monster, but I do think he cares about humanity. He wants things done his way, and he wants to be the guy that gets celebrated...but he occasionally will step up and fight with the heroes when he realizes what side he needs to be on. Do you think Trump would do that? I certainly don't.
In some ways, we live in the ridiculous world.
In terms of President Lex Luthor: he was pretty effective as president, resolving near-wars and conflicts with diplomacy, cleverness, technology and relentless support for metahumans and the Justice League, with Luthor leading the war effort in OUR WORLDS AT WAR against Imperiex and saving the Earth. (There was some question as to whether or not Luthor had prior knowledge of the attack, and he was cleared by telepathic scan, but it may have been rigged.)
In the end, Lex was defeated not because of his presidential performance -- he was excellent -- but because he couldn't let go of his obsession with Superman, made false claims that Superman was drawing a Kryptonite asteroid to Earth, and then put on a crazy supersuit to attack Superman and a variety of heroes, leading to Superman punching Lex out of the suit and out of the White House with Lex buried in charges of illegal orders and falsifying evidence to declare Superman an enemy of state.
The overall sense was that if Lex had focused on his job instead of his weird hatred for Superman, he probably would have served two terms in adulation instead of not even finishing one and crawling out in infamy.
The world has gotten so crazy that Luthor and Wilson Fisk seem like sensible options as leaders: compared to Trump, they're actually competent. However, we have to consider that they may not actually be better; they may simply hide their sociopathy better.
Lex Luthor is an egotistical narcissist who needs to act out his petty vendettas against anyone whom he feels has ever slighted him whether it's someone at a Smallville bake sale who was a little brusque or Superman himself. Regardless of how long Lex held it together as President of the United States, he would have snapped sooner or later whether in his duties or in his obsession with Superman.
Wilson Fisk is a career criminal who used crime to bolster his sense of weakness and insecurity that came with poverty and being uncultured; he once murdered a man for interrupting a date and making him feel awkward and started a gang war over this slight; he ordered numerous murders when creating his empire including Karen Page; he ordered allies murdered to frame Daredevil; he killed Ben Urich for investigating him; he ensured Agent Ray Nadeem went into debt by eliminating his sister in law's insurance coverage in order to make Nadeem's credit score prevent him from being promoted above Fisk's control; he steered Benjamin Poindexter into sociopathy by getting him fired from the FBI and murdered Poindexter's friend Julie Barnes to keep Poindexter pliable and unstable; he ordered Agent Ray Nadeem's death; he engineered the death of Maya Lopez' father to control her and kidnapped Maya's grandmother.
That's just some of what we know. It's a safe bet he's done more.
Maya's powers clearly affected Fisk's mind in some way at the end of ECHO.
MURDOCK:"I was raised to believe in grace. That we can be touched by the divine and be transformed. So if you say to me that you're a new man, I say fine. But you should know I was also raised to believe in retribution. So if you step out of line, I will be there."
FISK: "This caution that you're giving me. Who's it from?"
MURDOCK: "Just stay in your lane. I'll do the same."
FISK: "I'm going to be mayor of this town. And when I am, I will not tolerate people running around in silly costumes. The rule of law will prevail. And should you go back to any of your old activities, there will be consequences."
MURDOCK: "Well then. It appears we really do understand each other."
FISK: "I love a man who rises above his nature. Good luck with that, Murdock."
MURDOCK: "Good day, sir."
But whether or not Fisk is a changed man, whether or not he's pretending or whether or not he's fooled himself -- it's really irrelevant. We have to assume Fisk will, given enough time, turn on New York City and seek to destroy it, even if he convinces himself that he's serving it. And to prefer him over Trump is not really a moral judgement on anyone. They're both bad. But one is competent.