A little hope and optimism, via the mighty comic book.

It'd be nice to have a little hope, don't you think? Morrison's brain is so big it's scary sometimes. Plus, you know, all the drugs he took...

Comic Book Resources > CBR News: CCI: Morrison & Chropra on the Spirit of the Superhero:

"...Morrison discussed the ascension of the superhero in recent years: "The superhero is rising in the consciousness particularly in the West." He spoke about the need for the superhero in today's society, at a time when we're telling stories about our own destruction. “Recently our culture has been telling us a really dark, bleak stories and that story has brought us to the brink of disaster." "We need Superman to look up to," Morrison emphasized. The great thing about the superhero, said Morrison, is that "the superhero always finds an answer." The superhero might be the way out "of western culture's death lock. It's really important that we start telling new stories," as opposed to the bleak, apocalyptic ones we've been telling. Otherwise our culture is about to commit suicide."

Morrison then commented on the cultural shift that seems to have happened in the past year. "We could still be launching toward disaster, but I think something is actually happening. We're fed up!" Morrison declared. And he thinks the superhero--which he called "a jerry-built thing" is our "last little hope to get out of this trauma."

...Morrison emphasized, "Everything's one thing. We're all part of one thing." Then he referred to the renewed interest in "Star Trek" this year and said, "What the hell are we doing building bombs when we could be building the starship Enterprise right now!" The implication being we get caught up in negativity and infighting and don't accomplish what our stories tell us we can.

...Morrison then took some time to connect these philosophical ideas to something he's been interested with for years. He said anyone who'd read "The Invisibles" would recognize the ideas, which rely on a story of our existence that's different from the one that's been told to us in the past. "Imagine this was the story instead," said Morrison. "There's one organism on this planet. Everything that's in this room has been here for billions of years. Imagine all the bad stuff you've been told--we're not all here fighting one another--we're all part of the same organism." For a visual representation of the idea, Morrison held up his hand. "Imagine an arm with fingers painted different colors fighting each other," Morrison said. "That would be stupid." Morrison said we're all part of a single organism, just like the fingers are part of the hand. "We're the cortex of this creature and every part of it is experiencing its own existence."

"Look at a caterpillar on a leaf," continued Morrison, comparing our relationship to the planet. “A caterpillar seems to be destroying the leaf, just like we seem to be destroying the planet.” But Morrison said the relationship is different from what we've been told. The caterpillar isn't destroying the leaf; the caterpillar uses the leaf in "powering its metamorphosis. Imagine you're living on a planet that's about to give birth to a hyper-entity. The organism's here and it feeds on the planet earth." He said we don't need to worry about saving the planet. The planet is going to be just fine long after we're gone. "The planet shrugs it off and makes new things.” Morrison added, "stop being the hand that's trying to grasp itself and fight itself..."