Latin America, According to Superhero Comics

With Hispanic Heritage Month around the corner, it’s a good time to look back at how Latin American countries were depicted in the early days of superhero comics–and why those depictions no son buenas.

The first mention of a Latin American country in a superhero comic happened in the very first official superhero comic: Action Comics #1. Clark Kent is assigned to report on “a war going on in a small South American republic, San Monte.” But it wasn’t until Issue 2 that our hero actually went down there. Where “there” is exactly is left deliberately vague; the writing and art are very basic, so we get no context clues about local geography, customs, culture, language, etc. They could be in Europe, or Asia, or anywhere else, for that matter.

I do love cheeky vintage Superman, though.

This formula of a small, fictional country embroiled in a conflict between democracy-loving freedom fighters and rebellious guerrillas led by a greedy would-be dictator set the standard for how comics depicted Latin America for the next few decades. You can see it in Journey Into Mystery #84…

…Avengers #35…

…and Justice League of America #98, to name but a few examples.

In the later stories, creators did try to add a bit of “local flavor” to the fictional nations. Still, their sources of inspiration were minimal, extending no farther than Revolutionary Mexico and Totally Not Cuba. The characters they meet there are cut from the same, worn-out cloth: banditos, tyrants, oppressed peasants, beautiful women of mystery.

Another thing they had in common was the need for our white-bread, star-spangled heroes to come charging in and save the innocent locals from the chaos, ineptitude, and violence that never had anything to do with foreign interference. No matter how brave or determined the freedom fighters are, they can never protect or elevate themselves or their nation.

The United States CIA’s meddling in Latin American affairs didn’t become common knowledge until the Church Committee hearings in the 1970s, so I certainly don’t expect early comics to tackle that issue. (It does come up in later stories, like The Flash #53 from 1991.) It’s only natural that the comic’s main characters should save the day. They are the main characters, after all. The problem is that all the main characters were white, and the Latin American characters, lazy coloring notwithstanding, typically are not. The whole thing reads like a super-powered white savior narrative.

Due to the nature of superhero comics, we still tend to travel south of the border and anywhere else only when there’s trouble afoot. These days, though, the problem is more likely to be environmental and/or imperialist in nature, rather than a civil war. We see this in Absolute Superman #1…

…as well as Nubia: Queen of the Amazons, which had the added benefit of featuring Brazilian superhero Yara Flor, alias Wonder Girl.

These are necessary stories that should certainly be told. It’s nice to see superhero comics acknowledge that Latin America’s problems are more nuanced than the overly simplistic, “our rebels good/their rebels bad” dichotomy. The next step is for comics and their creators to find a way to spotlight the good things about Latin America rather than defaulting to its long, troubled history of conflict and exploitation.