Heroism is a tricky thing. People have their own little individual preconception of what a hero is. For me, there are multiple kinds of heroes. There are the every day, unsung heroes. They are those who go about their daily lives and give all they can, even though it might not be appreciated. They are the people like teachers, policemen, etc. These people go about doing a basically good thing. They want to give of themselves, and don’t expect a whole lot in return. Instead, they make sacrifices in one way or another (i.e. pay, long hours) so that they can give back to their communities.
In V for Vendetta, the character of Finch displays some, although not all, of these qualities. Finch, I argue, is a basically good character. He’s not setting out to do malicious or evil things like Mr. Creedy or Helen Heyers. All Finch is trying to do throughout the novel is solve the case of whom V is. Finch is doing his job. That is all he doing, nothing more, nothing less. Finch gives of himself in the hope that England will be a better place. Perhaps Finch is a little bit misguided in what constitutes a “good” England, but that is neither here nor there. What matters is the driving force behind Finch, and that is to be a good detective in service of his nation. That is the basic principle of heroism, to do what is right.
The movie The Dark Knight then serves to remind the difference between a thing being good or right and a thing being necessary. It’s a very paradoxical statement, and it is one that is hard to grasp. It would seem a good thing would be necessary, but that’s not true. Throughout the movie there is this idea of, “the hero Gotham needs, but not the hero Gotham deserves” or vice versa, coined by Lt. James Gordon . In the movie Harvey Dent was viewed as a champion of Gotham, he was their hero. Through the course of events in the film the Joker manages to corrupt Harvey enough to kill in cold blood. He becomes an immoral person. Batman eventually stops The Joker and Harvey, but Batman takes the fall for Harvey’s crime. Harvey was not a good, moral person. He did terrible things. But Batman and Lt. James Gordon know that in their hour of darkness that Gotham needs a hero to believe in. Even though the right thing to do would be to let Harvey’s crime be known, Batman does a necessary thing instead for the people. And James Gordon knows that it isn’t a good thing for a hero like Batman to be punished, he knows it is needed for Gotham. It’s a strange thing, but there is a very fine distinction that must be drawn between the two.
What V for Vendetta, The Dark Knight, and The Grand Inquisitor do is show how important it is for a hero to have a limit to their power. In V for Vendetta, V kills with reckless abandon, or, at least there seems to be no check to his murder. Early on in the novel, Evey helps V take out the Bishop (47-54). Immediately afterward, she questions him about how killing is wrong. V really pays no mind and uses his ends of a “free” England to justify his means, and when no one is there to stop him, it takes Evey to decide to cling to the ideology of “ave atque vale”, Evey decides to “hail and farewell” (263). No longer will she use the Roses V favored to justify the end results. In my mind this makes Evey as much of a hero as V ever was, and perhaps a better one.
Similarly in Batman’s case, he has near unlimited power. He has such an extensive reach that he can tap into every single person in Gotham’s cell phones to create a sort of Sonar like vision. It’s an incredible amount of power for one man to have, and Lucius Fox even comments on this. He’s reluctant to help Batman use the system because of how immoral of a thing this is. But again, Fox knows that it is what needs to be done. The thing, though, that separates Batman from V is his knowledge of how far power should go. After Batman has won his battles, he has his computer system self-destruct from Fox’s code. He knows that there is something innately wrong about that device and as thus limits his use of immorally immense power.
Then in The Grand Inquisitor, the Inquisitor himself has too much power that he wields in a terrible way. The Inquisitor isn’t set up to be a hero to the reader, but he proves the point that “absolute power corrupts absolutely”. But it is fair to say that the Inquisitor is a hero to the people in his religion. He has as he says, “freed them from the burden of choice”. And he does what he thinks he has to with Christ to keep his people happy and safe. The Inquisitor has let his own power go to his head so much that he thinks he has more of a right to lead than Jesus Christ, the Messiah. He got so full of himself and his power that he lost sight of a gracious, saving faith.
For me, to be a hero is not an easy thing at all. It’s an almost impossible thing to do. Heroes have to know when to do the good thing, and when to do the right thing. And their motives need to always be for some greater good, because if it’s not for the greater good, is it really heroic? True heroes know when and how to limit their power, or at least how to share their power with others who can keep them in check. Heroism is not an easy thing, but it is certainly something to aspire to.
Nolan Schad 