The story: In this edition of The Mask, Lieutenant Kellaway has been looking for a killer named “Big-Head”, but his search ended because he was blamed with the death of 11 colleagues and the escape of the killer. After being fired from the police department, he hears a blip on his cop radio and rushes to the scene of a restaurant where “Big-Head’s” henchman were sent to attack again. Here, he enters the building and then magically, The Mask appears and starts killing the enemy. After all has finished, and s seemingly good deed of stopping murderers has occurred, Lieutenant Kellaway is confronted by his chief. He is told that he is no hero because killing is never an act of justice for a cop. He is then terminated for good. In the very last scene, the comic shows us that Lieutenant Kellaway is in fact, The Mask!
In this comic, strong ideology seems a bit tough to tease out, as the story is quite short and is more of a highlight than an in depth story. Although this is the case, the ideology that I would like to talk about is the power structure that is very visible within the story. In our culture, especially in the work place, if we have a boss, they act as just that, our superior. In the case that we as individuals want to challenge this power held by our boss, it may be a very complicated to change the mind of these superior people.
In this story, Lieutenant Kellaway (also The Mask as we find out at the end), does what many might think of as a heroic act. He puts his life on the line to end a battle that was his to begin with, but in the end, he is said to have betrayed the police force by doing things that were unacceptable for their image. Although both of these peoples’ opinions can be easily understood, it leaves me wondering, as a reader, “what is the right way to handle this situation”? “Would I let the bad men hurt innocent people, or would I do everything I can to keep them safe, even while hurting my companies reputation?”
I think most people would choose the latter if they had a choice in the matter, but still our societal ideas about power structures tell us that even if we do right in our own mind, if we are against “the man”, he will always win. There is always a person above us in rank, and this means that we must always deal with power structures in everyday life.
You are correct, this particular story seems like a challenge to deal with ideologically. Clearly, notions of hierarchy are closely tied to the way that I approach ideological analysis, so that seems like a good starting point, but I’m not convinced about the details of your argument. Perhaps one way to move the conversation forward is to invert the presumptions about power. In this narrative, the chief is actually the less-powerful figure, we might say, since he is not able to exercise lethal force. Meanwhile, The Mask has that power, and has a veneer of legitimacy, since the reader tends to support the rightness of his killings.
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