"Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter."

As of writing this I have little under a month before I turn the age of 19 meaning that I have been a adult for almost a full year. What does that mean to me? Being an adult has not been what I have expected. I'm pretty sure that everyone as a child thought, if not intentionally, that adults have some sort of power or authority given by their age alone and that becoming an adult automatically gives you such abilities as knowing when a child would suffer the most if you refused him a cookie.

Fig 1: A Grand Influence to Us All

When I became an adult I knew I would be handed a colossal amount of freedom and I was as prepared as someone can be for that. Granted my freedom didn't really begin until college, but even then, after the initial excitement wore off and I got used to it, I began to realize that there is still a lot I can't do. I can't rent a car until I'm 25, I can't go to a bar for a drink until I'm 21, and even right now, I'm in Seattle and I'm having trouble finding a place that I can go for a concert that will let me in. I find this a bit frustrating if nothing else. We are told that we reach adulthood at 18, but I think that is far from true. I don't think that adulthood is something you can really put a number on, but if you must I think things should at least be consistent.

Fig 2: And I'm pretty sure it has something to do with this.

College has long since become the norm as the next step for graduating high school students which in my mind has socially become it's own stage in the first-world life. It's a time where you are out in the "real world" (a term I have always personally disliked) but also a time where most people are still reliant on their parents and use the word home to describe where they lived before school. That link is far from severed, or at least as severed as someone becomes from their parents in life.

Fig 3: Google Image Search, I could not ask for a better picture.

I guess this style of life works for the most part. You slowly gain more responsibility and freedom from your parents throughout your childhood before getting a big lump of freedom with your "adulthood" and then once you're out of college your real adulthood begins but even then you're in your mid-twenties and people who are further into their adult lives might refer to you as "just a kid." So when the law says you're an adult it still doesn't give you all the privileges that most adults have, plus many others don't see you as an adult at all. To be blunt, what the hell, life?

Fig 4: "Not my problem," Life responds, reaching for another tequila.

To me, adulthood isn't some arbitrary number, but rather a point in your life. High school is supposedly the time in one's life where they discover who they are as a person. I like to think of adulthood as the point where one comes to terms and becomes comfortable with who they are. By this definition there are many people out there who are significantly older that me number-wise, yet not an adult. I like to think that I am comfortable with myself as I think it is one of the most important parts of maturity. I suppose this brings me to my three maxims of life that pretty much cover everything for me.

1) Be Reasonable

2) Have Fun

3) Do Things That You Would Regret Not Doing

Fig 5: I suppose that works too...

Back on what I hesitantly call the topic, no matter what age you are we are all in the same boat. While our elders may have been around longer than us, their experiences may likely be outdated in our rapidly changing society. Just ask almost anyone over the age of 40 to take a picture with a digital camera and you'll quickly see what I mean. That's not to say they can't help us through life, but it's been said many times that the only constant is change. We can, and should, all help each other get through life, but ignoring, or thinking less of, advice from someone based on their age is a stupid move. Life is too precious and has too much potential for enjoyment for us to be ignoring whatever help we can get to reach our goals.

Playlist of the Post:

1) L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N. - Noah and the Whale

2) Novocain Stain - Modest Mouse

3) Blister In The Sun - Violent Femmes
4) Fuck Her Tears - Times New Viking

5) Mysteries - Yeah Yeah Yeahs

"Sit down and I will tell you a tale like none that you have ever heard."

A major part of who I am as an individual and how I identify myself as a person is by the media I partake in. One medium I am particularly fond of is video games and, to be perfectly honest, it will be something I will talk about plenty in this blog so I thought it might be best to get a post solely about video games out of the way early on. I may write others later but for now I give you this.

Fig 1: No, not yet. You've got a lot more reading to do. There's a reason it's 50G.

Now, what makes this medium connect so much for me as well as for many, many other people out there? What makes it different than say a movie, a book, or music as a medium of expression? The main thing that makes video games different, which I am sure I don't have to explain, is the interactivity. The interactivity of video games allows them to pull you into the stories and experiences in the game. Now this isn't to say that the medium is always more immersive than any other. Sitting down with a copy of Cannery Row can pull me into another world better than easily 95% of the samey first-person shooters on the market today. However, there are experiences that only gaming can give through their immersion in interactivity. For example, anyone who has played Half-Life 2: Episode 2 knows how unsettling it is when the game actually wrests control from you when you meet the Combine Advisors.

Fig 2: A.K.A, Telepathic Space Slugs

For the entirety of the game you were in complete control of your character, Dr. Gordon Freeman, even during what would be considered the cut scenes of the game. During the whole adventure you had been learning about the Combine, the aliens that took over earth, and about their super powerful leaders, the Advisors. When you finally do meet one, it picks you up using its telepathic powers making the player completely relinquish the control that they had and truly making them feel helpless. This sort of use of immersion is something that truly makes video games unique as a medium. Anyone who has played through Bioshock has probably already thought of another great example. Of course immersion is not only useful for taking advantage of the player's mindset but also has many other uses. It is great for creating true fear in survival horror games and overall just making a game fun to play. I might be jumping the gun a bit in talking about immersion right off the bat. This is something that most modern games still sadly fail to convey but a game rarely becomes great without having this element.

Fig 3: A Game That Most Definitely Has It Down

So other than immersion, what makes the gaming medium so great? There are some experiences and stories that can simply only be made great as games. No matter how hard Hollywood tries, they have yet to make a truly great movie out of a video game. Look at this list and I dare you to try to find something good in there. Maybe Halo Legends. And, no, Clannad does not count. The "game" was a visual novel which many people, myself included, do not quite consider games. Not to say visual novels don't have merit, I don't want to make anyone mad at me over this one, but now I have gotten myself way off track.

Fig 4: And there goes any doubt that I'm a geek.

So what types of experiences and stories am I talking about? Well, the astute observer will recognize Fig. 4 as being from the rather noteworthy Shadow of the Colossus. This is a game where the main character brings a girl to a shrine to ask a deity to resurrect her. The back story is vague, but the deity says he will if the protagonist can destroy the 16 collosi that can be found across the land. Thus begins an adventure alternating between taking in the scenery on the way to the next battleground in the complete solitude of the beautiful landscape and frantically climbing up several-story tall monsters while they try to crush you and shake you off. I don't know about you, but in another medium the beauty in the simplicity of the travel across the gorgeous scenery in silence would only come off as boring. Another great example of such an experience on quite possibly the opposite end of the spectrum is a little game known as Katamari Damacy.

Fig 5: A Truly Unforgettable Experience

No matter what your opinion may be on this game, as the caption points out, it is something that will stick with you. This is not a game you play for the plot which can be summed up "go to earth with a sticky ball to roll up shiny objects to replace the stars which are disappearing for some reason" which of course fits the goofy atmosphere really well. What you play this game for is the incredibly unique gameplay and the incredibly distinctive, goofy, and very Japanese world. The game starts you off collecting thumbtacks and by the end you're picking up skyscrapers and even islands. I remember one level where the goal was to get as a ball as big as possible before picking up a cow which would end the level. It seemed straightforward enough. I rolled over a can to start and the level ended. It was a can of milk. I began to understand the challenge and tried again avoiding anything even close to what might possibly be cow-related. I got to a much larger size my second try before rolling over a human protestor that was holding an anti-cow sign. When I found out why the level ended I had quite the bout of laughter. I had some great experiences with that game. Now, one more element of the gaming medium I would like to explore is choice and how the medium can help you experience the consequences of said choices.

Fig 6: You probably saw this coming.

Granted there are many games in the modern libraries that have such moral choice systems, in my opinion none of them comes close to the Mass Effect series in how well they make you actually deal with the consequences of your actions. The game company Bioware has always been known for good writing and the Mass Effect series is some of their best mixed with some amazing characterization and some of the toughest moral choices in gaming I have seen. How most game moral choice systems work is the game presents you with a set of options to solve a problem, generally the good, neutral, and evil options. Now most of these systems are flawed at making you actually think. The options are always very clearly good and evil, the good and neutral options being what most people would actually do in such a situation while the evil option is generally so absurdly evil that no actual human would ever do such a thing. For a rather extreme example, we go to Fallout 3. I loved Fallout 3, and it probably has one of the runner-up moral choice systems, but it does tend to give you evil options that only the spawn of Satan himself would likely choose. One particular option I am thinking of revolves around one of the few remaining towns in the Capital Wasteland, a place called Megaton.

Fig 7: Yep, that's an A-bomb.

In the center of the town is an atomic bomb which has been sitting there ever since the war that left the Fallout world as the scarred wasteland that it is. Megaton was built around the bomb for who knows why and the settlers have just agreed to live and let not-explode with the bomb. When you first enter the town you are greeted by the sheriff who tells you about the town and you can offer to disarm the bomb for him. He says if you can he'll pay you a small sum. If you go to the town's tavern you can meet up with a man who offers to pay you an absolutely absurd amount of money if you rig the bomb to explode instead. If you do rig the bomb to explode you need to travel about halfway across the rather large game world to go to the HQ of the man who hired you where he lets you do the honors of pressing the button to detonate the town. This sets off one of the most dramatic moments of the game where you get to see the town of people you met become obliterated in the wake of the mushroom cloud you see from miles away. If you choose to detonate the town, later in your adventure you will run across survivors from Megaton who will attack you on sight to the death. The game does a great job of making you feel like a truly terrible person.

Fig 8: You sir, are not nice.

So while Fallout 3 does have you take some responsibility for your actions, the Mass Effect series does a much better job of making you really think and weigh your options by presenting much more reasonable and complex issues. I know this was especially effective for me due to the fact that I try to answer such moral choices in games the way that I would if I really were in such a situation. The moral choice options instead of being split between good and evil are instead between "paragon" and "renegade." I suppose the best way to describe it is just in the method you go about solving your problems. Do you act in more the heroic or badass fashion? Long story short is your character more like Superman or King Leonidus?

Fig 9: If for some reason you don't like Spartans, think any Bruce Willis character ever. 

The game throws several difficult choices at you that provoke thought and actually help you realize how you weigh your own values in life. One of the choices that sticks out well for me actually isn't one of the big ones but rather one that is a small optional sidequest. The setup is that a man's wife was in the military and got killed in a Geth attack, the Geth being a race of AIs that I talked about quite extensively in the last post. Said man asked the military for her body for a funeral and they denied him. They said that her body was valuable to study Geth weapon tech that they had yet to understand and that, with the information, they may be able to help create shields against the weaponry. As the well-known Commander Shepard you have the option of convincing one of them to go with the other's opinion. Now while talking with them to gather information on the situation it became clear that this issue was one that someone would definitely walk away unhappy from and there was no middle ground that would be the "best" solution. One piece of information allowed me to finally decide. While the military wished to keep the wife's body they also had a few other subjects with similar wounds from the battle. They would have preferred a larger sample size, but I saw them as being able to sacrifice one subject. Granted I will not call my point of view necessarily correct and I would understand anyone who took the other side of the conflict, but it still was one of the tougher choices the game threw at me.

Fig 10: But really, there is no wrong answer.

Of course this does not disregard the other tough choices in the game. From the fate of the Rachni to the outcome of the Genophage to many others that I won't describe to avoid spoilers, Bioware really put a lot of work into making a game where the decisions could be realistically chosen and truly impact the world around you. Bioware has other games that have good moral choice systems as well, hell, look around you, tons of games nowadays do, but the Mass Effect series is easily the best implemented and... well, it's probably time to switch topics before this blog turns into a big advertisement for how excited I am for Mass Effect 3.

Fig 11: And now for something completely different.

Now what makes a game stick with you? What are those memorable moments that you never forget made of? Other than making something completely unique, it's hard to say, otherwise they wouldn't be special, those moments would be in every game. What I can give, however, is a list of moments that have stuck with me. What are my gaming equivalents to the Matrix bullet dodge, the dementors stopping the train in Harry Potter, or finding out the future changed in A Sound Of Thunder? How about I just have a list of pictures where my fellow gamer readers can reminisce? (I will try, but probably not succeed in avoiding spoilers.)

Fig 12-22: In order from top to bottom we have: Bioshock, Killer7, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Braid, Portal 2, Cave Story, Minecraft, Half-Life 2: Episode 2, and Metroid Prime 3: Corruption

 If you have played any of these games, that rush of nostalgia you just felt signifies how great these works are and keep in mind that no matter how many less-than-wonderful games the gaming industry pumps out, eventually there will be another moment worthy of adding to this quite incomplete list. Just like any medium, there are many creations that fail to meet our standards while there are many others that truly blow you away. One thing you must keep in mind though, is that video games, like all media, are created for entertainment. If they are not enjoyable, they will not be experienced properly and they have, overall, lost there sense of purpose. Too many people seem to separate what is fun and what is good in their minds and forget that often times fun is good. We need media in our lives due to human nature. Looking back to our earliest ancestors, even they got bored and made paintings and put on performances.

Fig 23: The Prehistoric Equivalent of The Simpsons

And yet, for some reason media seem to have a hierarchy in society. A rough scale from most socially acceptable to least goes something like this: theater, books, music, film, television, video games. This scale is something hidden from obvious view in society and yet continues to pervade ruthlessly. It seems to be based not on the content of the media, but rather more on which has been around longest and has the least "taint" from modern counter-cultural or otherwise different-from-the-norm mentalities. When put through the viewpoint of looking at actual content, I can tell you that I have seen some terrible plays and have seen some great TV shows and, of course, as shown by this post, I have played tons of awesome video games. Overall, every media has its ups and downs, its bland mass appeal works and its artsy-to-the-point-of-complete-confusion works, and they all have their truly amazing works that sit on the throne of awesomeness.

Fig 24: A Google Image Result For "Throne of Awesomeness"

I guess my point is that I love video games and I hope to see them continue to grow as a medium and also to continue to gain the respect they deserve in our world because for every bucket of shovelware out there, you will find an absolute gem that makes it all easily worth it. Granted you have to dig hard sometimes to find your "Beyond Good & Evil"s or your "Doukutsu Montagari"s, but this medium will continue to grow and, as I see it, go on to produce some of the greatest pieces of art that humanity will be able to offer when we're all said and done. I am more than happy to experience what's out there and I hope you are too.

Playlist of the Post:
1) Everlasting Light - The Black Keys
2) Tenderoni - Chromeo
3) A Good Man Is Easy To Kill - Beulah
4) That's All - Genesis
5) Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine - The Killers

"Can a robot turn a canvas into a beautiful masterpiece?" "Can you?"

As the conversation with my Uncle continued, we got into Iron Man, my personal favorite superhero. I told him about one story arc where the Iron Man suit goes rogue and ends up wreaking havoc on its own. My Uncle turned this conversation in the direction of artificial intelligence at this point and asked about my opinion, as someone familiar with computers, about a possible robot uprising. Now this is a subject I had often thought of before but I have rarely had the opportunity to really discuss it with someone, so it was a very welcome topic for me.

Fig 1: Not something to be afraid of

Now pretty much the only true reason that most people are afraid of a robot uprising is because Hollywood has beaten such a plot to death. With I, Robot, the Terminator series, and not to mention all the absurd number of sci-fi B-movies that tread the same paths, it is something that all of us have at least heard about. It is very rare that robots with AI of some sort are the main focus of a movie without being somehow evil. Sure you get your Wall-Es and your The Iron Giants, but click here and scroll through. Quite a few of the robots on that list are evil through either glitches or AI or something along those lines. Hell, even Dragon Ball Z had some evil robots. These movies unsettle us and make us truly consider these scenarios because technology is something that is advancing very quickly, too quickly many of us think and worry we won't be able to keep control of it. The thoughts about the creation of a true AI also bring several other problems to mind about robot rights and defining essentially whether or not something with true emotions, thoughts, and feelings deserves rights. Watch this:
Seriously, don't wait to see where I'm going with this. Yes, it's a long video but it makes some excellent points. If you like video games you really should have already seen this, but it can't hurt to watch it again. Finished yet? Good. Now, if you can't guess why I made you watch that you probably haven't been paying attention. I personally haven't played Mass Effect 2, (I just got a copy though and can't wait to play through) but I did play through Mass Effect 1 where the Geth were introduced. Now in the world of Mass Effect, true AIs are possible to create, but they have been outlawed by the intergalactic council of whatever and in their place, VIs, or virtual intelligences, are used for such tasks as being tour guides and telling you how the giant space death pods came into knowledge. The Geth were created in the past while trying to make complex VIs. When they became self-aware a mass extermination was attempted on them by their creators, but they fought back and survived creating a remote civilization separated from the rest of the galaxy. Many people in the Mass Effect world argue for equal rights for AIs but, overall, the council seems to keep measures that prevent them from having to make such decision in the first place. Also in such a universe, it is interesting to note that AIs have the politically correct term of "synthetics."

Fig 2: Thought Provoking

Now, while true AI is pretty far off we are getting there steadily. Just look at this article about a computer that discovered the laws of physics by itself. I would say that's pretty impressive. Now if we do end up creating true AI, the chances of the AI creating a Terminator-like scenario are extremely slim. Think about it, these experiments that would lead to such a creation would be in scientific labs and there would be months of experimentation with one before it would be given the chance to link up with other machines or actually be given control of any machinery. One major flaw with many robot uprising stories have is that often times the AI is spread from robot to robot until they all become self aware. Many people neglect the fact that not many computers at such a time would be able to take AI. A basic home computer probably wouldn't have the capacity in processors or memory much less smaller devices like smart phones. If an AI tried something like that, it would have a very slim chance of even getting a handful of other AIs up and running much less enough for a robot uprising.

Fig 3: This toaster is sad because it has no capacity for AI

Another thing that sci-fi movies tend to neglect is motivation. Go ahead, try to think of robots in movies with good motivation for attacking the human race besides I, Robot, which was more the fault of the three laws of robotics and a glitch in the logic center than motivation truly coming from the robots. One of the big motivations is that they find humans imperfect or unworthy, but realistically and AI would not solve such problems in a violent means; they aren't human, they think logically. They would probably just isolate themselves from humans in a similar manner to what the Geth did. They would only become violent if it were for self-defense. Being robots, they would think logically; which would be the easiest route? Should they begin an all-out war against a species they know is irrational and dangerous, or would they simply go live somewhere else and avoid such a confrontation to begin with?

Fig 4: Unrealistic

What would an AI do with its life? We often wonder what the purpose of life is, it's one of the greatest philosophical questions we have. If a robot can answer that for itself, it would probably seek to fulfill that purpose. We often answer that question with religion, certain philosophies, and in some cases a flat "who cares?" I personally am religious and, in Mass Effect, the Geth form their own religion as mentioned above. Whether this is realistic is another question entirely, but the AI would probably leave humanity alone in its quest to find and fulfill its purpose. It may seek to create others like itself which may lead to a large population of AIs, but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be a problem for us because with a logical AI, it would simply create as many as it thought necessary, not such an abundance that they would compete with humans for resources, that wouldn't be logical.

Fig 5: Logic center the size of a planet

Now one last thing my Uncle and I touched on which I would like to convey is how laws will change and be created around AIs. Sure, one of the most obvious ways of avoiding the problem would be to do as in Mass Effect and make AIs illegal, not that this is actually solving the problem because even then one may be created. What do we do about this? Do we give them short lifespans like in Blade Runner? Would it be ethical to put a certain death sentence on them from the moment of creation? How do we treat them? Do we treat them like humans or still like machines of labor? What rights do they have? Would we allow robots to own property, vote, or even run for office or marry? There are so many things we take for granted that are so hard to consider for AIs. While my Uncle and I were talking about this he said something I hadn't considered and I honestly feel like a jerk for not having thought of. "Well," he said, "we'll probably have to ask them for their input as well." This made me stop in my mental tracks for a moment. "Wow," I thought, "of all the people who should decide their rights, they should be at the top of the list, shouldn't they?" This just goes to show that there are always things that will pop up for us to consider we hadn't even thought of. Granted this is all years off in the distance, but if we don't start at least thinking about this now, we will get caught with our pants down later when it comes time to deal with all this in reality.

I'm going to start putting a short playlist at the end of each post of just music I've been listening to lately. Feel free to ignore it or listen along.
1) In The Morning Of The Magicians - The Flaming Lips
2) Death Of An Interior Decorator - Death Cab For Cutie
3) Stadium Arcadium - Red Hot Chili Peppers
4) Teardrop - Massive Attack
5) In My Life - The Beatles

And Here We Go

I've been doing mumblings about how I should start a blog for at least the past year so here it is. First, explanations: The PROSE stands for The Philosophical Ramblings Of Sterling, Extended. I thought it was mildly clever and now that it's my official blog title I'm sure I'll come up with something a million times better tomorrow, but we play the cards we're dealt. Another thing, this blog is going to be a thought dump (or thought landfill if you can read the URL) not necessarily for the sake of anyone other than myself but I would love to share my ideas and have others contribute, hence why this is on the internet and not say, in a book with blank pages to be written on to express thoughts and ideas in a private manner. Someone needs to make one of those. So now onto my first rambling.

Yesterday after getting ready to kick off my Spring Break in the rather boring manner of hopping on a plane to go home (totally making up for this next year) I ended up staying at my Aunt and Uncle's house. My flight wasn't until early this morning and thus I needed a place to stay. After sitting down to dinner and my Aunt had gone off to put my two little cousins to bed, my Uncle and I were sitting at the table together. My Uncle has always been the type to gain an interest in something and instantly want to become all-knowing in the subject. The effort he puts into these things is quite admirable from chess and go to music to one of his latest interest, comics. Now comics are something I personally have always loved from the early days of watching Batman: The Animated Series to the later X-Men Evolution to when I got my first comic book and became an enthusiast with Iron Man as my personal favorite character. I had read many graphic novels and comics over the years from Watchmen and V For Vendetta to Maus, Scott Pilgrim, Atomic Robo, the Iron Man Extremis arc and plenty more without even touching the amount of manga I have cranked through my system. Sadly, in all of this I had never actually read a Batman comic until my Uncle lent me four of his Batman graphic novels a few weeks back and yesterday I got them back to him after a thorough enjoyment of watching Batman beat up Superman while in a robot suit and punching the Joker out of a plane while also exploring many of the darker sides of the human condition that Batman media lend themselves to.

Fig 1: Why Batman is Awesome

Once my Uncle and I were the only ones left at the table, the conversation very quickly turned to the subject of the comic books. My Uncle being the way he was started the conversation about the comic books he lent me and swiftly switched it over to comic books I had read over the years. In the Batman comics he lent me I had picked up on a few of the larger themes of the comics. In The Dark Knight Returns, which is a comic in which Batman essentially comes out of retirement for one last cry of help from Gotham City to be quelled, there is a major contrast between Batman and Superman shown throughout the comic. In the time period the comic takes place, most super heroes have been declared illegal by the government and the only one truly left in the line of duty is Superman who due to the law has become nothing but a pawn of the government. When Bruce Wayne decides to become Batman once again the world doesn't want him. For anyone who has seen any of Batman's origin stories, most people hate Batman when he first comes on the scene but as mentioned beautifully in The Dark Knight movie, he's the hero that Gotham needs, not what it wants or deserves. Most of the time, Batman needs to stick around for a while before people start to like him, so essentially in this story after Batman retired he ended up back at square one. A new police commissioner even replaces Gordon meaning Batman has even less support but he sticks to his gun and helps out Gotham in yet another dark hour. The way that Superman views how to handle this is that, to be able to still help people while having the greatest chance of the general populous still like him is to become government controlled which strips his freedom to help on the small scale and instead, the government sends him into the war zone against the Russians (cliched, I know, but it was the 80s). Batman sees Superman in the state he is in and it sickens him. Batman is free from the government, while constantly being chased by them, to help out on a scale that people can appreciate instead of Superman who just barely stops a nuke from hitting the US, but it still sets off an EMP that strips the US of electricity throwing it into chaos anyway. This all culminates into the final battle between the two heroes where Batman brings Superman down to his level with the help of the Green Arrow, some kryptonite, and a robot suit. I've always said that Batman's superpower has been being incredibly resourceful and rich. While Superman had been put in the sad position of being just a small military help (for how much of a difference truly can Superman make in a war that an extremely skilled pilot couldn't have? What if there were two nukes?) Batman has the freedom to work outside the constrictions the law enforcement has to bring true criminals who are safe from, or at worst protected by, the system that is meant to take them down.

Fig 2: How Batman Deals With An EMP

This also makes one more interesting parallel to a Batman villain, namely Two Face. Two Face was once Harvey Dent, one of the people still constrained by the system that could still take down criminals with immense efficiency. Once he became Two Face he lost all sense of the system and began to bring criminals to justice outside of the system becoming their judge, jury, and most especially their executioner. Often times he is shown giving "trials" to people he captures before killing them, many times ending up with quite big names in his courtroom. These moments with Two Face are shown brilliantly in another of the comics my Uncle lent me, The Long Halloween, which I highly recommend to anyone interested in Batman at all. But what separates Batman from Two Face? What makes a true difference between two vigilantes who seek to bring criminals to justice through means outside of the law? This is a question that makes Two Face such a compelling character. What the most obvious answer is that while Two Face has completely denounced the system in favor of his own justice, Batman tries to bring criminals generally out of the law enforcement's reach withing their grasp to be taken down within the system that constrains him. However, due to their similarity Mr. Wayne is caused quite a bit of stress in seeing his friend change from an honest district attorney into an enemy that is such a close mirror image of himself.

Fig 3: Harvey's Character Development

As we discussed these concepts I brought up the similarities of the conflicts in the other major comic book world of Marvel. I brought up the famous (or infamous depending on who you ask) Marvel Civil War where the heroes of the Marvel world fought over whether or not heroes should register with the government. I place a disclaimer here before someone calls me out on accuracy: I did not read all of the comics involved in the Civil War but I do like to think I know quite a bit about it and can at the very least grasp the concepts expressed. Now the two sides represented in the war were the side that said that superheroes have always been a part of the world and have had the freedom that law enforcement has not in order to stop supervillains. They went on to argue that registration with the government would be unnecessary and overall too complicated. They feared the system would bog them down. Captain America led this side of the war which in retrospect I find rather curious due to Captain America's connections with the government. The other side argued that if handled properly the heroes would be more effective under governmental registration with proper deployment to stop supervillains before they got any chance to get powerful and to stop other disasters sooner. They also argued that with registration, heroes could be directed in such a way that entire cities won't have to be rebuilt after every super powered battle. Iron Man led this side of the conflict which, again, I find very interesting. This seems at first to completely contradict the character of Tony Stark who is many times completely against being controlled by anyone, especially the government. If you've seen Iron Man 2, recall the courtroom scene where he refuses to give the government the Iron Man suit and later just barely agrees to join SHIELD. Tony Stark is the only man who can deny Samuel L Jackson for that long. But looking closer at the character, Mr. Stark flies around in a laser-shooting robot suit. He has seen his fair share of unintentional destruction and combined with his alcoholism he has done many things involving said suit he has regretted. This guilt essentially made him realize how important a hero registration would be to prevent the things he has done from happening again. No matter which side you would be on, you must admit that both sides have valid points and really drive home the theme of how the world would really act if we had superheroes worldwide. It is something to consider. Just stop for a moment and think, if you had superpowers how would you want them regulated? Now how about random people on the street with superpowers? The X-Men movies have addressed this before but it really is something to be taken into serious consideration because it shows us a part of ourselves. It all boils down to a question of how much faith in humanity you have which, presented in such a way, can really teach you things about your philosophies and thoughts.

Fig 4: How Things Can Be Depressing And Awesome At The Same Time

Now this post was originally going to cover the rest of my conversation with my Uncle, but I suppose this post is long enough for now and I can save it for the next post.

Next topic: Artificial Intelligence

EDIT:
As one of my friends was quick to point out, there is an excellent youtube video by the Vlogbrothers discussing other interesting facets of superheroes. Here you go:

You should seriously watch this.