Superhero
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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In modern popular fiction, a superhero (sometimes rendered super-hero or super hero) is a type of heroic character possessing extraordinary talents, supernatural phenomena, or superhuman powers and dedicated to protecting the public. A female superhero is sometimes called a superheroine (also rendered super-heroine or super heroine). Fiction centered on such characters, especially in American comic books since the 1930s, is known as superhero fiction.
By most definitions, characters do not require actual supernatural or superhuman powers or phenomena to be deemed superheroes, although terms such as costumed crime fighters or masked vigilantes are sometimes used to refer to those such as Batman and Green Arrow without superpowers who share other superhero traits.
Some superheroes use their powers to counter day-to-day crime while also combating threats against humanity by supervillains, their criminal counterparts. Often, one of these supervillains will be the superhero's archenemy. Some long-running superheroes, such as Superman, Batman, Spider-Man and Iron Man, have a rogues gallery of enemies. Superheroes sometimes will combat such threats as aliens, supernatural entities, and even ideological enemies as such as Nazis.
See also
- Hero
- Real-life superhero
- Science hero
- Superhero film
- List of actors who have played superheroes
- List of superhero debuts
- List of comic book superpowers
- Supervillain
