social injustice with only a handful of superpowers(initially he could not fly, but only leap great distances)

and a sparse backstory, over the years, Superman hasseen fluctuations in the amount and intensity of his

powers, his stories aimed more at children, and afleshed out history and supporting cast (De Haven

devotes most of his attention to the roles of Super-man’s arch nemesis, Lex Luthor and his longtime love

interest, Lois Lane).Not only does De Haven provide a thorough

account of the Superman property but also a history of

the men behind Superman. These men include thosewho have worn the famous “S” emblazoned costume,

but also the editors, and prominent artists and writers(as there have been hundreds who have drawn Super-

man and written his stories by now). De Haven givesmost attention, however, to the heartbreaking saga of

Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster.Throughout the book, we learn of the two young men

who created Superman and penned (Siegel) and drew(Schuster) the original comic books. While creativelytalented, the young duo’s inexperience in business

world led them to sell the rights to their creation for amere $130 to National Comics (now DC). After failed

lawsuit to get back rights to their creation, the teamwas fired and their byline on all Superman comics,

informing readers of who created Superman, waserased in 1948. What followed was a series of more

failed lawsuits and hard times for the Superman cre-ators until a groundswell of support from the comicbook community and fans at the time of the first

Superman film caused the creative byline to bereturned to Siegel and Schuster at the end of 1975.

While De Haven provides a thoroughly interestingand enjoyable journey through the history of Super-

man, the author’s stated that the intent of investigatingSuperman’s lasting appeal goes largely unfulfilled. The

vast majority of the book encompasses the aforemen-tioned history lesson that synthesizes previous writ-

ings on Superman with some of De Haven’s owncomments. In addition, De Haven seems to stop theSuperman timeline with the release of the first theatri-

cal film in the late 1970s, giving Superman stories andadaptations (such as the television hit Smallville) of the

last few decades only passing mentions. It is not untilthe last chapter that De Haven returns to his goal of

attempting to explain Superman’s lasting appeal inAmerican culture. Superman, the very first comic book

superhero, has lasted over seventy years as an Ameri-can icon because he does his great acts of heroism not

because he is obligated, but because he enjoys being ahero, as De Haven concludes, “…what he needs, all he

needs, is the freedom to act in ways that are satisfyingto him. That’s why he’ll ‘never stop doing good.’ It

makes him feel good, dammit. Our hero” (206).

–-Corey Call

Virginia Commonwealth University

Racial Stigmatizing on the Hollywood

Screen fromWorldWar II to the Present:

The Orientalist Buddy FilmBrian Locke. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

This book is primarily concerned with the repre-

sentation of Asians in Hollywood films from 1945 tothe present. Locke argues that they are portrayed as

abject, monstrously inhumane or even non-human(extra-terrestrial). This strategy helps directors “create

an illusory unity between former white mastersand former black slaves,” and thereby resolve the

contradiction between the nation’s democratic idealsand white America’s persistent domination of AfricanAmericans (5). The Asian becomes the demonized

other, whereas whites and African Americans harmo-nize with one another.

Locke exemplifies his case with close analyses of aseries of films from different historic periods including

Bataan (1943), Pork Chop Hill (1959), Flash Gordon

(1980), Blade Runner (1982, 1992, 2007), and The

Matrix (1999). Despite changing conditions of produc-tion, Locke maintains that the representation of Asianshas seldom changed. The propaganda film Bataan de-

monized the Japanese while portraying whites andAfrican Americans as equals. This flew in the face of

recent history: until the outbreak of war, where morethan 2500 African Americans were lynched by whites

(31). In Bataan, the lynch mob is Japanese rather thanwhite. In Blade Runner, Rick Deckard’s (Harrison

Ford’s) voiceover portrays an ideal world where raceslive in harmony with one another as brothers—except

for Asians, who are portrayed as “sewer rat people”crushing individuality in a “brutish world of corporateconsumerism” (127). The Matrix brings in the charac-

ter of a virtual Asian, a non-human figure that “line[s]up exactly with WWII stereotypes of the Japanese

enemy” (152). By such means, the film displaces theresponsibility for white racism against African

416 The Journal of American Culture � Volume 34, Number 4 � December 2011

Americans onto a body that is neither white nor black,but vaguely Asian.

It is only in recent years with films such as EdwardZwick’s The Last Samurai (2003) that attitudes have

changed a little: the Japanese is represented here as thewhite hero’s buddy. In the post 9/11 world, the United

States and its filmmakers “can no longer afford toalienate such an important ally in the war on terror”

(155). Now, it is the Muslim rather than the Asian whois represented as the scapegoat.

While Racial Stigma proves a diverting read, it

rehearses the kind of stereotyping that overlooks thecontribution made by Asian and Asian American film-

makers in Hollywood to an understanding of inter-and cross-cultural differences. It would have been fas-

cinating to contrast Ridley Scott’s representation ofracial politics in Blade Runner with the work of

Wayne Wang or Ang Lee. More damagingly, Locke’sessentialist perspective takes no account of the com-

plexities of racial and ethnic identity construction inthe United States since 1945. This is particularly sad, inthe light of the author’s subject position as an Asian

American scholar.

–-Laurence Raw

Baskent University

Reinventing Richard Nixon: A Cultural

History of an AmericanObsessionDaniel Frick. Lawrence. Kansas: University Press of Kansas,

2008.

Does the country really need yet another book aboutits obsession with the only president to have resigned

the office, Richard M. Nixon? Daniel Frick believes itdoes, and has immersed himself in all thingsNixon.

Frick, who teaches the English language at Franklin

and Marshall College and directs its Writing Center,presents an exhaustive analysis of the cinema, cartoons,

drama, jokes, novels, verse, and other cultural artifactsthat emerged from the life and career of this most fasci-

nating president, who was at once so attractive and sorepellant. As a result of the groundwork that Nixon’s

administration constructed, and the influence thatNixon had upon his party and those it elected as hissuccessors, Frick is correct. To understand the recent

past, one must also understand the Nixon years, andthe Nixon effect upon subsequent Republican presi-

dents and their administrations. Certainly Nixonchanged America and the world.

Central to Nixon’s character was class conscious-ness and the bitterness of a victim. As Frick notes,

“churning underneath the surface” of one of Nixon’spolitical biographies, “the seemingly complacent opti-

mism of Six Crises”, there was “a festering, resentfulanger that prefigures the mentality that created the

Watergate scandal” (45). It was Nixon who preparedthe way for the “win at any cost” strategy so evident in

so many of the subsequent political races.It is illustrative to compare two powerful and suc-

cessive presidents, who each came from modest back-

grounds. Lyndon Johnson developed a burningresentment, as did Nixon, but it was a resentment

against poverty and discrimination and against outcastsand the powerless. For all his faults, he concentrated

his energies on eliminating poverty, and creating TheGreat Society. Nixon, too, developed a burning resent-

ment, but the result was quite different. Nixon’s deter-mination was to “screw his enemies,” or those who

had scorned (or even worse, defeated) him.Ironically, the boy who made his way from nothing

to the top—as Nixon presented himself—came to

identify with the wealthy and powerful, yet he echoedthe George Wallace refrain that conservatives have

used so effectively ever since; the refrain that theiropponents are “elitists.” It was not power or wealth

that Nixon saw as elitist, but rather style, as was sonotable in the debonair John F. Kennedy, who

defeated him. His party’s concern grew through theyears to include those who are educated, who value sci-ence and reason, who might be “liberal,” and thus by

(their) definition “look down upon” the average voter(while conservatives chortle quietly in private). The

conspiracy theories, the ire directed at welfare moth-ers, and the assertion that the country’s “Christian her-

itage” is being undermined by political opponents,grew so that, as Frick puts it, today (or now, one

hopes, it is yesterday), in the “rhetoric of some in theRepublican right wing,” the “extremist poison” of the

Nixon years was threatening “to go mainstream” (71).The unrest that Nixon used so skillfully led first to arebellion against taxes, and ultimately (as Frick quoted

Carter pollster Pat Cadell) to a “revolution againstgovernment” (73).

The consequences of this reaction against govern-ment are now becoming clear. They are not limited to

the inability to deal with natural disasters (such asKatrina), with national security (such as the attacks on

9/11 or the still unsolved anthrax attacks), or even withthe presumed strength of the conservatives, their

Book Reviews 417