They are arguably among the most recognizable figures in American pop culture, and by their daring exploits, capture the imaginations of fans around the world. They are the fictional characters we call superheroes. Comic book and movie fans say characters such as Superman, Spider-Man and Captain America hold values that are especially relevant in today’s social and political climate. Elizabeth Lee reports on the pop culture significance of superheroes at Comic-Con in San Diego.
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At Comic-Con 2018, fantasy can come to life. Fans dress up as Superman, Spider-Man and Captain America, just to name a few.

These names have become some of the most familiar heroes in American popular culture. The values they represent have captured the imaginations of fans from around the world. 

Superman fan Dorian Black was dressed in a blue costume, a red cape, yellow belt, red boots and a big “S” on his chest.

At Comic-Con in San Diego, Black said he becomes the alien from the planet Krypton who represents the immigrant spirit. A story, he adds, that is just as relevant today as it was when superman was created in 1938.

“There was a lot of anti-immigrant sentiment happening at the time that he was created, and I don’t feel like that’s ever changed,” Black said. “We’d like to pretend that America has changed greatly from that time period. A lot of ways it has for the better, but we’re still having this argument of do we let in refugees? How much is too much?”

Relevant today

Superman is not the only superhero fans find relevant in today’s political and social climate in the U.S. The female comic book superhero Captain Marvel will be featured in a movie in 2019. Many female fans are excited about what she represents. 

“Strength and female strength especially, which I think is really important in our current world,” said Hayley West, who dressed as Captain Marvel, complete with a red, dark blue and gold jumpsuit with a star on her chest. 

Seeing a superhero’s relevance in politics and social issues is not a new phenomenon. Superman’s character first appeared during the Great Depression.

“He’s (Superman) almost a kind of anarchist, socialist,” said English professor Ben Saunders, who directs a University of Oregon comics and cartoon studies minor, the first of its kind in the U.S. 

Saunders said Superman originally fought representatives of the oil companies and advertising executives who were out to fleece the public, and campaigned for prison reform. He then became more socially conservative in the 1940s and 1950s as American values changed, but what stayed consistent was Superman’s ability to always do the right thing, Saunders said.

“Of course, our notions of what the right thing is changed. It’s culturally contingent. It changes month to month sometimes, and that’s what makes Superman a particularly challenging character to write,” he added. 

“The characters become the voice of whoever’s creating them at the time. Whoever the writer is or the artist. The things that are important to them are going to get interjected into those characters,” said Aaron Lopresti, a comic book artist who has drawn superheroes, including Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman, for publishers DC Comics and Marvel Comics. 

Lopresti said modern-day writers tend to have more liberal views on what is happening in society, which is often reflected in their work.

“When things change or different ideas come into view, I think a lot of times you see those things reflected in the characters or the situations they’re in, in their comics,” Lopresti said.

Timelessness of values

Fans, however, also see a timelessness in values held by their favorite superheroes.

“I believe that Captain America holds really good values of staying true to your family and really just making sure that you stick to what you’re going to say and what you’re going to do,” said 18-year-old Valencia Garcia, a movie fan who proudly held a replica of Captain America’s shiny red, silver and blue shield with a silver star in the middle.

“I like all of them. They’re all heroes to help save the people, and they do good deeds,” said Sonya Flores, a Laotian American who loves superhero movies.

Fans say these superheroes represent an ideal that people and those in positions of power should try to emulate.

“I feel like, as a society, we’re so jaded to the idea of power that if you have power, you’re just by default corrupted by it. And there’s that saying that absolute power corrupts absolutely. But Superman is sort of a counter argument to that. You can be all powerful and be good, but you have to try to be good,” said Black. 

In Spider-Man’s story, there is a famous line that says, “With great power comes great responsibility.”

“There are people in positions of power today who I think will be well-advised to remember that power and responsibility go hand in hand,” Saunders said.
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Pop star Demi Lovato was taken to a Los Angeles hospital on Tuesday due to a suspected overdose, according to media reports.

Lovato, 25, has spoken openly about cocaine and alcohol abuse.

Representatives for Lovato did not respond to a request for comment but People magazine, quoting an unidentified source, reported she was “okay and stable.”

TMZ, quoting law enforcement sources, reported that Lovato was found unconscious at her home and was treated with Narcan, an emergency treatment for suspected opioid and drug overdoses.

Los Angeles police said they had responded to a medical emergency on Tuesday involving a woman on the Hollywood Hills street where Lovato reportedly has a home, but declined to name the person.

Lovato released a song last month called “Sober” in which she sang, “Momma, I’m so sorry, I’m not sober anymore, And daddy, please forgive me for the drinks spilled on the floor, To the ones who never left me We’ve been down this road before, I’m so sorry, I’m not sober anymore.”

Lovato rose to fame on Disney Channel shows “Camp Rock” and “Sonny with a Chance” 10 years ago, and forged a pop career with hits like “Skyscraper” and “Sorry Not Sorry.”

In a 2017 YouTube documentary, “Simply Complicated,” Lovato spoke about years of substance abuse, eating disorders, and drinking, saying she first started using cocaine when she was 17.

She entered rehab at the age of 18, where she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

Lovato, who has some 69 million followers on Instagram, was in the midst of a U.S. tour and due to perform in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on Thursday.

Her hospitalization became the top trending item on Twitter on Tuesday, with fans and celebrities expressing concern and support.

Country singer Brad Paisley tweeted, “Addiction is a terrible disease. There is no one more honest or brave than this woman.”
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Famous landmarks across Japan were illuminated simultaneously on Tuesday to mark two years to go until the start of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.

Tokyo Tower and the Yoyogi Building shone in the Japanese capital, while other buildings stretching from the Goryokaku Tower in the northern Hokkaido region to Fukuoka Tower in the south were also lit-up in the colors of the Olympics rings.

Tokyo Skytree, the tallest tower in the world, was also illuminated following a countdown event held halfway up the 634-meter structure.

At the ceremony, commemorative lanterns were lit by school children, athletes and dignitaries, including Tokyo 2020 President Yoshiro Mori and Governor of Tokyo, Yuriko Koike.

“We want to send a message to the world that Tokyo is a host city. Also, the success of the Tokyo Games depends on reconstruction (in Fukushima),” said Koike.

Eric Garcetti, the mayor of 2028 host city Los Angeles, was also in attendance as a guest of Koike.

“We share a common geography of the Pacific and we share a common dream of the future between Los Angeles and Tokyo,” Garcetti said.

“We come here with a delegation from Los Angeles today to pay our respects to the wonderful organizing efforts of Tokyo 2020.”

The presentation stage was decorated with 731 paper lanterns, each representing the days remaining until the Games’ opening ceremony. Attendees wrote their wishes for the 2020 Games on the lanterns.

Sport climber Miho Nonaka, who will hope to be competing in the sport’s Olympic debut in Tokyo, said she wrote ‘even higher’ on her lantern.

“I want the (climbing) walls and my goals to be higher, and I want to climb to the highest point,” she said.

After the illumination, the athletes joined the assembled children in performing the Olympics’ official song ‘Tokyo Gorin Ondo 2020.’

The Tokyo Games will start on July 24, 2020 and run until Aug. 9.
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Ricki Lake never in her wildest dreams thought she’d be celebrating the 30th anniversary of the film Hairspray at the lofty Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

“I never thought the movie was going to come out, let alone have this lifespan. And for me to be alive 30 years later, for me to be turning 50 in two months … you know, it’s all kind of surreal,” she said.

Most of the film’s surviving stars, as well as its writer-director John Waters, gathered Monday at the Academy for a special screening of the film, hosted by Oscar-winning Barry Jenkins, the writer-director of Moonlight.

Jenkins was just 8 years old when the film was released, but he said his parents were big fans of the period comedy, set in 1962 Baltimore. It’s about a teen-dance TV show that is rocked when a short, plump dynamo — the adorable Tracy Turnblad — unseats Amber Von Tussle, the nasty blond beauty who long has been the reigning queen. Turmoil ensues when Tracy suggests producers stop limiting black dancers’ appearances and pushes for the show to be fully integrated.

Jenkins noted that Waters’ script is loosely based on real events.

“In real life, that show never integrated. It just went off the air rather than integrate,” Jenkins said. “I think John gives us this very happy, hopeful ending, by having the show integrate at the end of his version of the film. So I think, even in that, you see that he was trying to say that it is possible for us to come together.”

As for the film’s pro-integration message, Waters noted: “It was a sneak attack. It was a Trojan horse. It was the only radical movie I ever made, because it snuck in middle America. And they didn’t notice. I mean, they didn’t notice the message. Well, they did notice the message. But I’ve said that even racists like Hairspray.”

Before Hairspray, Waters had directed just a handful of features that earned him a cult following. But Hairspray was his breakthrough, marking his introduction to mainstream audiences. It also marked a breakthrough for American actor, singer and drag queen Divine, who portrayed Tracy’s mother Edna.

Divine died of complications from an enlarged heart just a little more than a week after the film’s wide release.

Blondie lead singer and Hairspray actress Debbie Harry remembered her co-star.

“Divine was very generous and relaxed and sort of soulful and there’s that soft voice,” Harry recalled. “And then we had to struggle during the scene of the exploding hair. And I had bruises on my arms. Mother was very strong!”

Hairspray featured a cameo appearance by recording artist and actress Pia Zadora, who said she wasn’t surprised by the film’s long life. It eventually was adapted into a Broadway musical, a musical feature, and a musical television production.

“I mean, John — you can’t deny this guy knows what the hell he’s doing,” Zadora said. “It was right. It was just right.”
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At Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field this June, Kenny Chesney flew in a large group of VIP guests to visit with him before performing for some 55,000 fans. They weren’t music industry bigwigs.

 

They were school children and teachers from the U.S. Virgin Islands, where Hurricane Irma made landfall last year and caused massive destruction. And they also happened to be his neighbors on the island of St. John.

 

“I’ve spent the majority of my adult life walking those beaches and hanging out in those bars and writing songs,” Chesney, 50, recalled later in his manager’s office in Nashville, Tennessee. “All of a sudden, it was a place that was very beautiful and that was very broken.”

 

St. John was among several Caribbean islands hit last September by the most powerful hurricane to develop over the open Atlantic. Throughout the Caribbean, the Category 5 storm knocked out power and cell phone towers for weeks or months, damaged roads, airports and hospitals and smashed up boats, businesses and homes.

 

Chesney was not on the island, but he opened his home there to friends and neighbors so they could ride out the storm. They survived, but his home was destroyed.

 

“I could hear the anxiety and the stress on everyone,” Chesney said. “The people that actually rode the storm out in the bottom of my home, I was able to get them off the island a couple of weeks after the storm. And you know when they got to my home, they were wearing the same clothes they had on that morning (of the storm).”

 

Immediately after the storm hit, he wrote the title track of his new album, “Songs for the Saints,” out Friday.

 

“I was writing the songs as a lot of the destruction and devastation was happening,” Chesney said. “I’ve never made a record like that in the middle of such anxiety.”

 

Although born in landlocked East Tennessee, Chesney has become an islander at heart. On St. John, he made friends and enjoyed the peace and isolation away from the demands of his superstar life. There were years where he’d step off a tour bus and head straight for a boat.

 

“The people that I met there didn’t care what I did,” Chesney said. “They had no idea. It was great.”

 

He turned that island lifestyle into his brand and the loyal No Shoes Nation that pack out stadiums. The island had fed his human spirit and his creative side as a songwriter, but now he had his chance to give back.

 

Within days, Chesney set up a foundation called Love for Love City, also the title of the second song he wrote after the storm. He helped bring in medical supplies and equipment, had crews clear out debris and rescue pets and bought new musical instruments for the St. John School of the Arts.

“Not many people know what Kenny has done and is still doing for the rebuilding efforts in the Virgin Islands,” said his friend and country star Eric Church. “It’s a place that is a part of his DNA, of his story. It tells you the kind of person he is and how big his heart is to see him helping in this way.”

 

Chesney was also in the midst of working on a new record deal with Warner Music Nashville, making his move from Sony after more than two decades. He called up John Esposito, the chairman of Warner Music Nashville, and told him he was ready to work with Warner, but he had a caveat.

 

“He says, ‘The first record I’m doing is a charity record,'” Esposito said.

 

Esposito absolutely agreed that proceeds of the record should go to the foundation, but beyond that Esposito said the record is just a great album.

 

“I’ve actually listened to this album 250 times and not only am I never bored with it, I hear something else unveiled with every listen,” Esposito said.

 

The album has already produced Chesney’s 30th No. 1 single, “Get Along,” making him the artist with the most songs to top Billboard’s Country Airplay chart, surpassing Tim McGraw, Alan Jackson and George Strait.

 

On the title track, Chesney’s vocals take center stage at the beginning with an acoustic guitar and a single drum beat, as he sings that “God lifted these islands from the ocean.” On “Love for Love City,” Chesney adds delicate steel drums and Ziggy Marley to the loping, reggae-inspired song in which he promises to be a part of the island’s encore.

 

The songs aren’t sad odes to what was lost, but reflective of the grit and hope necessary to keep going. At the end of the album, Chesney covers a song called “Better Boat,” written by Travis Meadows and Liz Rose, which is a poignant description of the struggle of personal recovery.

 

Others like “Trying to Reason (With Hurricane Season),” a duet between Chesney and Jimmy Buffet, who wrote the song, are more lighthearted. Mac McAnally, an acclaimed guitarist and songwriter who worked on the record, said that Chesney kept the instrumentation to a minimum to keep the focus on the lyrics.

 

“That kind of framework lets you be a little more contemplative as you listen,” McAnally said. “A song that’s got some depth to it benefits from being listened to a little quieter.”

 

In February, Chesney visited students and their teachers at St. John School for the Arts after donating new instruments and he talked to them about life post-Irma.

 

“It was a really emotional day when we went there, just to see the look on their faces when you give them a guitar or a steel drum,” Chesney said. “You never know what one of those guitars will do. I know what one guitar did for me.”

 

There’s still a pressing need for help in the islands as hurricane season starts anew this year. Chesney, who says he is a firm believer in global warming, predicts that the catastrophic storms will continue to be a threat to the Caribbean as well as the United States. He’d like the foundation to help build up the infrastructure of the islands, possibly even opening a hospital on St. John and improving schools.

 

Chesney isn’t always comfortable talking about his philanthropy and he’s quick to point out that many people have been helping with hurricane recovery. But he does know how his music can affect people, which is why he considers this album among the best of his career.

 

“If you believe music heals and rebuilds the human spirit, this has the potential to be one of the most important albums I’ve made,” Chesney said.
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For years, Dumbo the Flying Elephant hung from his living room ceiling, a Mr. Toad Wild Ride car was parked in his library and Bashful’s cart from Snow White’s Scary Adventures sat on his front lawn in suburban California.

Now collector Richard Kraft is selling off his 750-item collection of theme park vehicles, props and artifacts spanning six decades of Disneyland history.

Kraft, a Hollywood agent, began his collection 25 years ago, spurred by nostalgia for his visits with his late brother to Disneyland in southern California.

Van Eaton Galleries in Los Angeles said the result was an extraordinary array of Disneyland memorabilia.

“Through Richard’s passion for the park and his love for his brother and family, he has amassed a collection that is unequaled,” co-founder Mike Van Eaton said.

Such is its scale that hundreds of the items are being displayed for a month at a free public exhibition called “That’s From Disneyland” at a 20,000 sq. ft. (18,500 sq. meters) abandoned store in suburban Los Angeles ahead of the auction on Aug. 25 and 26.

Visitors will be able to dance along with six singing animatronic dolls from It’s a Small World, or board one of the pirate ships from Peter Pan’s Flight.

“Real artisans made this and I love putting it in an exhibit setting so it could be admired differently. You never actually see this stuff up close and personal the way you would see it in this exhibit,” Kraft said.

“We had Dumbo hanging in the living room of our house – 800 pounds (360 kg.) of elephant hanging over people’s heads,” Kraft said. “We used to decorate Dumbo for Christmas.”

The Dumbo the Flying Elephant vehicle is expected to be among the top sellers with an estimate of $100,000-$150,000, while a Peter Pan’s pirate ship vehicle is seen fetching $75,000-$100,000.

Other artifacts include a Disneyland ticket booth, an animatronic singing bird from the Enchanted Tiki Room, as well as original drawings, concept sketches and posters from the 63-year-old theme park.

Kraft intends to donate a portion of the proceeds to two organizations benefiting children who, like his four-year-old daughter Daisy, suffer from the rare genetic disorder Coffin-Siris Syndrome, and other special needs.

“She’s in a special school program that is so underfunded. This collection I’ve had for all these years can be put to good use in helping kids and people with disabilities,” he said.
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