Kick Ass

Last night my daughter and I watched the movie Kick Ass. On one level it's a story of a young man who wonders why no one in real life ever tries to be a super hero - right wrongs and fight the injustice and exploitation he sees in his neighborhood daily. This boy decides to don a costume and do something about the bad guys.

On another level the story is about what happens when the desire for revenge consumes one's life. This thread follows a more serious "super hero" who calls himself (I think) "Big Daddy" and his daughter "Hit Girl". Big Daddy was a police officer framed on a drug charge and jailed for five years. During that time his pregnant wife committed suicide. Their surviving daughter "Hit Girl" was raised by Big Daddy's partner until he was released from jail. Big Daddy decides to go after the organized crime family responsible for his pain.

While Kick Ass uses a couple of things that look like billy clubs to fight the forces of evil, Big Daddy and Hit Girl fight crime with guns, knives, spears, anything lethal that will get the job done. They're really killing bad guys.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. I found it very diverting. I like seeing bad guys get their asses kicked. I found myself cheering as Hit Girl shot, stabbed, and beat up scary gangsters. There is something very right and very wrong about it, though. It's right that evil is defeated - to see those who've set a snare for someone else fall into it themselves. It's wrong, however for a ten year old girl to kill - and to kill with such obvious relish. It's especially wrong that a father's hatred and bitterness be channelled through his child.

I won't tell you more than that things do not end well for Big Daddy; and maybe that's a good thing... Fighting crime and injustice is good. There is something in all of us that wants to see evil defeated and the right asses kicked. A consuming desire for revenge, however, makes it impossible for real justice to be done. The good is tainted by a hatred that comes from (if possible) an even darker place than the heart of gangsters.

The daily Lectionary is moving through Revelation right now. For several days I've been reading about the wrath that is being stored up by God for the "gangsters" of history. Unlike our own anger, God's wrath is rightly directed and administered. It is held off until the last possible moment, because unlike us, God would prefer to administer mercy and grace - even to gangsters. Some things are better left in His capable hands.