Adapting Superhero Comics for the Big Screen: Subculture for the Masses

Abstract

This essay follows Henry Jenkins’ definitions and examines how adaptation is part of convergence culture and essentially an instance of transmedia storytelling. Focusing particularly on filmic adaptations of superhero comics, it intends to demonstrate how media convergence may actually trigger the integration of the traditionally ‘subcultural’ comics into the mass cultural film and potentially result in the former’s erasure. Although extinction seems to be inescapable, especially because the entertaining industry and its craving for profit are also involved, the two media are actually revealed to be interacting in more complex ways. This relationship is illustrated with examples drawn from Batman films, which eventually prove that filmic adaptations of superhero comics may actually defy stereotypical ideas about audience involvement in mass cultural entertainment, while also enhancing convergence, as they motivate audiences to engage in the hunt for further information in the comics and/or in other media.