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Love em or hate em, superhero movies are here to stay. Ever since the release of Iron Man, superhero movies have dominated the box office. Marvel alone has made over 20 billion dollars in movie ticket sales in the past 15 years.

Many avid film lovers and critics are concerned that this superhero craze is going to be the end of serious film. They blame our culture for raising up a generation of boys inside men's bodies that refuse to think. And yes, there is truth in that statement. But what they fail to understand is that the issue runs much deeper than a cultural fascination with superheroes. 

The problem is not cultural. It is historical.

Ever since Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit, humanity has been suffering from an incurable superhero complex. Our desire to identify with the superheroes we see on screen is not the result of cultural conditioning - it is the fruit of an incurable superhero complex, otherwise known as sin.

Sin causes us to become blind to our own need and inclines us to identify ourselves with the hero. The truth is, no one identifies themselves with the helpless masses in need of saving. And no one identifies themselves as the villain that needs to be punished.

Yet that is the message of the Bible. In God's great redemption narrative, we are the helpless masses that need saving; and we are the villain that deserves to be punished. But we are not the hero of the story. 

The role of hero is reserved for Jesus Himself.