When Tobe Hooper introduced movie audiences to the bizarre super-psychopath Leatherface (an eerie chainsaw-wielding cannibalistic ghoul) in the groundbreaking American horror film The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, humanity was introduced to a new kind of terrorist/criminal: the hobbler.
A hobbler is someone who intentionally cripples someone so as to make coordination, motor skills, and muscular control much more difficult and perhaps even impossible.
Leatherface runs at you with a chainsaw, intent on using the deadly tool to basically rip you to shreds after he perhaps cuts off one of your legs.
Leonardo da Vinci's iconic man-proportion sketch the Vitruvian Man examined the incredible symmetry in the evolved physique of modern homo sapiens.
When you are audited by the IRS, you may feel your finances and resources have become hobbled. Perhaps the modern world of high-tension traffic (i.e., Wall Street) and gridlock (i.e., Internet viruses) creates artistic imagination about anti-social 'hobblers.'
If comic book characters such as Aquaman (DC Comics) and The Thing (Marvel Comics) capture a modern age curiosity about incredible flexibility, then comic book characters such as Green Goblin (Marvel Comics) and Carnage (Marvel Comics) capture a modern age curiosity about body control impairments.
That's where Hooper's Leatherface comes in --- a comic book styled super-maniac whose relentless intention to hobble you signifies a human curiosity about general dilapidation.
It seems, therefore, that the graphic themes in modern comics and cinema reflect a new age interest in complete body control (i.e., Eugenics).
Should this make us more interested in comic book villains?
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