Jameson

Old Jolly J. Jonah Jameson, the happiest report in all of Marvel, is an interesting character, to be sure. One of the few characters from the comics who isn’t a superhero who is a staple of the whole Marvel universe. Consistently brought up and a mainstay. This is likely afforded because he is an active character whose actions affect the main storyline so often. He propels storylines so frequently in Spiderman comics. Not to mention the amazing performance J. K. Simmons gave in the Sam Raimi Spiderman movie. There is one thing that I have noticed about how adaptations of the character have been portraying him. The recent PlayStation games and the Disney Spiderman movies have made him a kind of Alex Jones analogy. Now, I do have an issue with this. While early Jameson would definitely fit the bill over years of comics he has a more complex character. The first created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko Jameson was a penny-pinching curmudgeon who was meant to represent all the bad parts of Stan Lee and or Fredric Wertham a child psychologist who demonized the medium of comics for the American public. However, as time passed, the character became more complex. He would be written as someone who really did care about his employees and even put his own life at risk for others. During the civil rights movement in America Jameson was used to support activism of the time. And this is where we get my favorite characterization of Jameson. He is a lovable curmudgeon who always does what he can to do what is wrong. His protestation against Spiderman means he doesn’t approve of vigilante justice and thinks that people who take justice into their hands should be held accountable, which is a sentiment I can get behind. My issue with this new characterization is that to me it makes figures like Alex Jones live on in our media and public consciousness and make them lovable since Jameson is meant to be lovable. I want to see my complex character and not a caricature of them.