America Loves Manly Men Not Metrosexual Emos

***UPDATE: Ed. Note: After two years my worst nightmare came true and a post accidentally went up under my name (I have to load them in the system) in error for a long period of time. My apologies to the great Ben Shapiro who is the one and only author of this excellent piece. — JN

I am constantly bemused by the attempt to re-set Superman. The original comics are classic pieces of Americana. The original movie with Christopher Reeve was wonderful in almost every way – the first forty minutes of the original Superman is pure magic. And the movie is true to the comic book sensibility: Superman is conflicted about his identity, and wants to tell Lois the truth, but he’s also supremely powerful and uncompromising about his defense of truth, justice, and the American way.

One of my favorite moments in the movie comes when Superman utters that famous phrase:

Superman: I’m here to fight for truth, justice, and the American way.

Lois: You’re going to end up fighting every elected official in this country.

Superman: I’m sure you don’t really mean that, Lois.

He’s sincere in his belief in America.

Just as importantly, Superman is sincere in his masculinity. He doesn’t wax his chest, he doesn’t whine about having to do his job, and he will literally turn the earth backwards in order to save the woman he loves.

Fast forward thirty years. Now we’re hearing that DC Comics wants to reshape Superman. According to the New York Post, the Man of Steel will now be “a conflicted 20-year-old who’s trying to find his way in the world … He wears hoodies, has smoldering eyes and, as a lanky Clark Kent, wears low-cut pants and hipster skinny ties.” Even more disturbingly, according to CNSNews.com, the new Superman will be an emissary of the international way which presumably will be more in line with multicultural norms and practices. “I was raised in this country. I believe in this country,” Supermetroman will say. “Does it have its flaws? Yes. Does it have its moments of greatness? Yes. Bottom line is, it’s my home and I’ll always carry those values around with me. But if I do what I can do just for the U.S., it’s going to destabilize the whole world. It could even lead to war.”

Yeah, that has best-seller written all-over it.

But that’s the way our culture has been moving in terms of its heroes. Our movie stars are now metrosexual rather than men’s men. John Wayne is out. Jude Law is in.

It’s been a long transition, a transition that began with the androgynous heroes of the 1970s – testosterone-free actors like Dustin Hoffman and Jack Nicholson became pop culture icons, replacing the Errol Flynns and the Marlon Brandos. Now we’ve left androgyny and asexuality behind altogether, and we’re casting men who look like chicks (with the notable exceptions of Christian Bale and Russell Crowe). Slap a wig on Taylor Lautner and you’ve got Lea Michele. Johnny Depp can swishbuckle with the best of them because if he shaves, he looks a good deal like Kiera Knightley.

And yet these so-called stars can’t bring in audiences. Four of Depp’s last five films not involving pirates have underperformed at the box office (the lone exception was Alice In Wonderland, in which Depp played Jack Sparrow with red hair and slightly less coherence). Jude Law hasn’t headlined a hit in his entire career (Sherlock Holmes was Robert Downey Jr.’s show, start-to-finish). Leonardo DiCaprio makes hits because he works with actors directors who are more famous than he is – Christopher Nolan and Martin Scorcese and James Cameron don’t need DiCaprio, he needs them. And that’s not even looking at the worst of the lot: Ashton Kutcher, Robert Pattinson, Hayden Christiansen, to name a few.

This isn’t a rip on any of these men’s acting abilities (except Kutcher, Pattinson, and Christiansen, who suck). They’re all talented, particularly DiCaprio, who hasn’t yet fallen into Depp territory in terms of mannered performance. But Hollywood can’t seem to understand why it isn’t developing stars with actual appeal, even as it wastes cash on the next Michael Cera flick.

The solution is right before their faces. Sylvester Stallone rolls out of bed after making virtually nothing for almost a decade, then churns out Rocky Balboa ($155 million), Rambo ($154 million), and The Expendables ($257 million). Bruce Willis strolls through RED and Live Free, Die Hard, and the movies pick up a fortune. Clint Eastwood is still an enormous draw. America’s newest action star is Liam Neeson, who is 58 years young. More people will still shell out bucks to see Harrison Ford (as long as he stops the metrosexual post-Calista Flockhart crap) and Sean Connery than they will to see Robert Pattinson sans fangs.

It’s not because they’re old. It’s because they’re dudes. Men want to be them. Women want to be with them. They kick ass, take names, and don’t shave their chests.

Most of today’s male stars are douchefaces, in Greg Gutfeld’s terminology. They would never just ask a woman out on a date, romance her, and marry her, then provide for her and the children. Rather, they’re like Zach Braff: “the guy you shake hands with when introduced, and he smirks, or stares at your girlfriend’s tits. When you actually talk to him, you find out that he’s in a band. When you talk to him some more, you realize you want to kill him.” More precisely, they’re the guys who become best friends with a girl just to get to know her, subvert her boyfriend for two years, then when she breaks up with him, step in and provide a shoulder to cry on. In other words, Patrick Dempsey in the worst movie of all time, Made of Honor (and/or every other Patrick Dempsey movie).

Hollywood may think it’s time for the more sensitive male to take over the screen from their cavemen predecessors. As long as Americans have a say at the box office, however, there will be an enormous untapped market for male characters who actually act like dudes.