Forget Police Brutality, Check Out the Superhero Footage on YouTube!

Two recent big budget movies emphasize the potential risk to the ethos of a superhero of the video-sharing service YouTube, since they show an embarrassing side to law enforcement when the agents of order are subject to venal appetites. In Hancock, the superhero is seen behaving in a crass and callous manner, while in Hellboy II compromising videos of the unlikeable superhero must be quashed by the governments. It is interesting that two separate Hollywood scripts incorporate the same trope about the small-screen competition in which anxiety about the sousveillance made possible by mobile devices undermines the authority of the state.