I don’t agree with your view of superheros. I think they work as a metaphor of any person brave enough to stand up to evil. People never imagine they are the powerless population. The films focus on the heros and people personify with them - it’s inspirational. There has also been a big stress on heros needing to team up lately. The movies did nothing wrong. I agree with everything else though.
Super heroes are an individualist power fantasy. In the real world , real power comes from groups and collective action. Super hero stories imagine a world where the power to do good resides in the individual.
I believe it’s a reaction to our powerlessness in the face of things like this.
But even to take action in a group, you have to make the individual decision to join. You have to chose for yourself, which takes individual bravery, because even if you’re part of a group, the responsibility and potential repercussions will be yours to deal with. A group always consists of individual people. I read superhero stories as stories about finding the bravery in yourself (the superpower) to go and join the good cause despite the terrible danger.
I agree with what you’re saying, philosophically. A group is just a framework we put around individuals. That’s how it works in the real world.
But the idea of being able to have an impact on my own has a special appeal for me personally. It’s not a practical thing, which is why it’s escapism.
You can have impact personally. That’s why many people hesitate to join a group and actually do something - they don’t understand only if they are personally active they can matter. Not doing anything because a person feels like activity is not realistic makes people resigned and idle.
Edit: I do understand your feeling of needing to have an impact. It’s important to understand what kind of activity is worth devoting ones self to. I personally feel motivated to be active when I watch superhero movies, so I guess it can have different effects on different people. As always, things are not black and white.
I think superhero movies, as well all the many movies where a team of misfits overcome their difficulties to save the day when the USA faces disaster, are just American self-mythologizing. Americans like stories that show how deep down they are strong and sensible and when the chips are down they come together as a team to take care of the world, but in reality they’re not that at all. The problem is they believe their own myths.