This Magazine Kills Fascists

In the wake of a shocking election, much of the world is stunned that a man as hateful as Donald Trump could be elected President of the United States. In this This Magazine Kills Fascists, we’ll look at times comic books and superheroes have dealt with tyrannical, corrupt and outright fascist world leaders — not because we think we can find a solution, but because art can provide inspiration in the face of oppression. This week we’re going to the far future to see what happens when hatred, fear and xenophobia can corrupt the ideals of a utopia in Geoff Johns and Gary Frank’s “Superman and The Legion of Super-Heroes,” which ran in the pages of Action Comics #858-863. The storyline not only showed the effects of gaslighting an entire population, but just how quickly a new regime can become the new normal.

Captain America was created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby to fight Nazis, but by the '70s the kind of threats the world faced were more subtle and complex than the time he was created. In 1974’s “Secret Empire,” by Steve Englehart, Mike Friedrich and Sal Buscema, Captain America and The Falcon learned the hard way how easily swayed a populace can be, and how high a corrupt politician can rise through the ranks.