Interview

Hey guys. Back with another blog! This time, I interviewed someone, Salvador Jr. Lopez last Tuesday this week. Starting at 17, he began to become infatuated with comics. I decided to interview him because of the close proximity and the fact that he has, more or less, experience and knowledge comic books and its history. Here is a transcript.

Interviewer: Joseph Lopez

Interviewee: Salvador Jr. Lopez

Questions:

At what age and year did you start reading comic books?

-It was during my teenage years I started reading and becoming interested into comic books. For age, I have to say I was about 17. It was hard to get them because of the lack of money I had. When I got job, that was when I started buying and reading them.

What was your favorite comic book? Comic book character?

-My favorite comic book character has to be from the X-Men Sitcom series. He name is Gambit. He was awesome because of the way he would use kinetic energy into any object he came into contact with and use it as a bomb. I also liked the way he used his deck of cards. He was also suave and was like a Casanova.

At the moment, do you own any old comic books? If so, which ones?

-As of now, I own a variety of them. I own a few from Superman, X-Men Sitcoms, Thundercats, Robotech, Spiderman, Fantastic Four, Gambit, and Wolverine. For the Superman comics, I own the one where Superman dies.

Have you recently read any modern comics? How do you feel about them?

-At my work, I recently read a comic called Chew. My friends introduced me to it. It is about a detective who solves murders and looks into the past by biting the person. As for how I feel about them, I feel as if they are too graphic and have changed the stories from the original series. The author spices things up to appeal to the new generation. Scarp for new generation essentially. 

How do you feel about comics of the past?

-Love them. Love the story, action, and romance. To me, it was amazing back then. Typical good guy catches bad guy and bad guy gets thrown in jail. Comics represented the current situation they were in, like propaganda.

Have you seen any changes with comics and with comic book based movies recently?

-I feel like the movies are more different than the comic. It’s more interesting but short. They usually alter the movie from the book to make it better with explosions and such. Most of the time, they are accurate.

How do you feel about certain Superhero characters becoming more diverse?

I don’t like it. Ruins the originality of the Superhero’s.

Do you agree with the idea of Superhero’s becoming more diverse or do you think it ruins the tradition of having white males and females endorsing those roles?

I’d rather keep it old school. For me, I’d rather have it stay the same.

Do you feel that comic books in the past had reason to only have predominant white characters?

Yes. During the past, there was segregation, war, etc. To me, it didn’t really matter.

Growing up with comics, did you feel appalled that you hardly saw any other race in comics?

The only thing that got to me or that I was afraid of was the stereotypes. For example: seeing Hispanics as gardeners as such. I just accepted it.

After being showed this comic book cover, how do you feel about it? (Captain American punching the Japanese emperor Hirohito).

-I personally thought it was cool. It’s a classic and it’s Captain America. ß Emphasis on Captain America. I feel like it represented the American people and it was a personal matter.

Now taking this into an American perspective, do you feel that it was acceptable during the time period? Do you think it appealed the American sense of pride and nationalism?

-Yes. It appealed to the nationalism and pride of the American people. It instilled confidence and used this as weapons against the Japanese and Germans.

Would you say that it was just propaganda and not racism?

-I say it was just propaganda.

Throughout the crisis’s the U.S. have experienced, the comic books have often alluded to these national instances. For example; WW2 propaganda against the Japanese and Cold War depicting Vietnamese as hateful and ugly people. Do you think that when the U.S. is experiencing these types of moments, it’s ok to do this?

-Today, it is wrong to be that descriptive about a certain race. However, considering what was happening at the time, I view it as acceptable. There always going to be deep meaning with this kind of material. Makes you think of the moment you have when you discover what its true intent was for.

Finally, do you feel that comic books of the past are justified in having comic characters being predominantly white?

-I agree. They were written back then for a specific audience and written because of the incidences happening back then.