Hmm, late responding I know but I found this intriguing. I don't necessarily think the revenge/avenger scenario says as much about us as watchers as it does about us as participants.
We're supposed to identify with our heroes to a certain extent and well, for the majority of us, it take something lifechanging, or earth shattering to make us give up what we know and devote our lives to something like that. Even in real life terms-eg activists, et al.
Even Buffy had to have something to motivate her-fortunately nothing as bad as the others, but we all know there are bad things out there-just most of us aren't gonna wake up one day, sell our belongings and go hunting them. Even Clark Kent at this point of Smallville isn't ready to give up his chance at a normal life to be a superhero.
In a way, most of these characters do this because they don't think they have anything left to lose. The chance for a 'normal' life has already been taken away from them.
Monk did do what he does before Trudy's death-he was a cop, we just never got to see it. Now, though it has become the lifeline that Trudy was.
In the Winchesters case, I have enough issues with John raising the boys the way he did. The only saving grace is that he was grief stricken. So yeah, I'd have major problems with someone that uprooted their children and raised them in a violent lifestyle unnecessarily.
I'm actually trying to think of heroes that do what they do just because, and the closest I can come probably would be either cop shows, or in the Whedonverse. On BTVS, it was Buffy's calling, but the others were there because of the bad guys. Watcher's and Slayers lives were devoted to fighting evil just because it was out there. The initiative as well. (Oh and most of the justice league)
This is not nearly as coherent as I'd like it to be, and I'm going to be pondering this for a while now.
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We're supposed to identify with our heroes to a certain extent and well, for the majority of us, it take something lifechanging, or earth shattering to make us give up what we know and devote our lives to something like that. Even in real life terms-eg activists, et al.
Even Buffy had to have something to motivate her-fortunately nothing as bad as the others, but we all know there are bad things out there-just most of us aren't gonna wake up one day, sell our belongings and go hunting them. Even Clark Kent at this point of Smallville isn't ready to give up his chance at a normal life to be a superhero.
In a way, most of these characters do this because they don't think they have anything left to lose. The chance for a 'normal' life has already been taken away from them.
Monk did do what he does before Trudy's death-he was a cop, we just never got to see it. Now, though it has become the lifeline that Trudy was.
In the Winchesters case, I have enough issues with John raising the boys the way he did. The only saving grace is that he was grief stricken. So yeah, I'd have major problems with someone that uprooted their children and raised them in a violent lifestyle unnecessarily.
I'm actually trying to think of heroes that do what they do just because, and the closest I can come probably would be either cop shows, or in the Whedonverse. On BTVS, it was Buffy's calling, but the others were there because of the bad guys. Watcher's and Slayers lives were devoted to fighting evil just because it was out there. The initiative as well. (Oh and most of the justice league)
This is not nearly as coherent as I'd like it to be, and I'm going to be pondering this for a while now.