‘‘I’m a Crook”
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changes within the United States during this period. American political and
military failures in Vietnam and the dishonesty of the Watergate affair created a
cynical outlook towards government among many. This, coupled with the
economic problems of the late seventies and early eighties, produced a downturn
in American confidence and a distmst of government which noted by President
Jimmy Carter in his famous “malaise speech” of 1979. Later scandals, such as
the Iran-Contra Affair, helped to cement the idea of the inherent
untrustworthiness of the government in the minds of a number of citizens. While
the Prez comics of 1972 often portray the government as coirupt, the series
would never employ a former President as a villain as Richard Nixon was
portrayed in 1993’s Saudman. However, by the early 1990s, though the
President, and the government he symbolized, was no longer tmstworthy or
honorable to a large percentage of the populous. Because much of the blame for
this lack of confidence in the President can be traced back to Richard Nixon’s
Watergate scandal, it is only appropriate that he became a symbol of a bad
President in Prez’s world and in ours.
The Darkness of the Eighties
Before the aforementioned Prez revivals of the 1990 s, another rendition
of the American leader helped define comic book Presidents in the 1980s. Frank
Miller’s seminal 1986 mini series. Batman: The Dark Knight Returns—in which
an aged Batman emerges from retirement to again fight crime—is widely
credited as one of the most important comic book stories in the medium’s
history. Miller’s psychologically intense film noiresque version of Batman
created a gritty dystopic style that redefined comic books for a generation. In
Miller’s alternative future, crime is rampant, moral ambiguity abounds, and
superheroes such as Superman work for a powerful President who uses the
media to help control the country’s citizens. Although never mentioned by
name, the President is clearly a caricature of then President Ronald Reagan. One
of the defining concepts of The Dark Knight Returns, and its portrayal of the
President, is the moral relativism of American society and its government.
Government officials in the story, including the new Police Commissioner and
the President, merely aim for order and stability in society. Only Batman sees
right and wrong in the world and values terms like “justice” and “honor” This is
a departure from earlier comic book versions of the President, because in
Miller’s world, there is no great leader or sacred office as both are only political
tools in a multi-layered world that has moved away from the black and white of
good and evil. While early comic book versions of the President were meant to
be revered—President Kennedy was to be liked and respected, and Prez
attempted to extol the virtues of the office if not the man—Miller’s version of
the Presidential office-holder is no longer holy but rather merely a CEO whose
Job allows him to control an entire society instead of one corporate entity. This
almost certainly is an extension of the distrust created during the Watergate era
and fostered during the period afterwards. Throughout the Dark Knight storyline