Il Diabolik si nasconde nei dettagli. Tecnologia e “modernità amorale”*

The creation of Diabolik (1962) was marked by signs of modernity in various respects: the seriality; the graphic format; the typology of industrial production; the target audience. A genealogy that reflects the Italian modern times strongly desired by Giussani sisters. To analyze the storytelling of the comic series, this article tries to thematize the analytical key of “amoral modernity”, elaborated starting from some historicized categories of the social sciences, primarily Max Weber’s instrumental rationality and the Enlightenment critique of the Frankfurt School. A perspective that allows to look at the indissoluble “double criminal icon” in terms of ambiguity rather than pure negativity. The article intends to test this interpretative key by analyzing an “accessory” narrative element: the real and imaginary technology.