art from dc comics’s hitman, #48. words by garth ennis, art by john mccreaShorty, I’m there for you anytime you need me
For real girl, it’s me in your world, believe me
Nothin’ make a man feel better than a woman
Queen with a crown that be down for whatever
There are few things that’s forever, my lady
We can make war or make babies
–Method Man, “All I Need” (ain’t that a classic joint right there)

I mean, you, you and these guys who drink here– you’re killers, all of you! …and yet you show more love and care and loyalty for each other than any group of people I’ve ever known. You and Natt are like brothers. You look after the big stupid one, and that thing behind the bar. And Sixpack… I watched Sean last night, sitting with you ’til dawn and tending your wound, and I saw the fear in his eyes…

And “My God,” I thought. “No father ever loved his son more.”
–Deb Tiegel

What’s a ride or die chick? Deborah Tiegel is a perfect example, I think.

Tiegel, or Deb, was a Gotham City cop. Correction: she was a Gotham City cop who was a) female and b) not corrupt. You can imagine how well she got along with the get along/go along types in the GCPD. She made some noise about doing the right thing on the wrong day at the wrong time and caught a suspension, and then firing, for her troubles. She went on to become a zookeeper for a while, until she finally left Gotham City for good.

In between all of this, she met Tommy Monaghan. Originally, they were on opposite sides of the law. Tiegel was chasing him down for his crimes until circumstances forced them to ally. That blossomed into a rocky, but loving, relationship. She slowly began to accept the fact that he killed people for money, though it was a constant source of consternation for her.

Tiegel was kind of our window into Tommy’s world in a way. She illustrated the fact that, yes, these people are murderers. They have killed kind of a lot of people. But, at the same time, they’ve got their own code. They have their own relationships. They are people, not monsters.

Some would see Tiegel as kind of naggy with that sort of thing. But, no– she’s necessary. She keeps the reader grounded, as well as providing some quality relationship drama. Tommy and crew are just barely anti-heroes.

Tiegel serves another purpose, too. She was a cop who only ever wanted to do right. She suddenly finds herself hanging out with guys who kill bad guys, have tons of guns, and live by something of a moral code. She’s in a position to do more right than she ever did with the GCPD.

In the scene above, Tommy’s been stabbed. The first three pages are most of their conversation. The fourth page comes a scene or two later, when the bad guys have found where they’re at and come ready for war. Tommy is out of commission with his wound and all, and Sean Noonan offers his friends a way out. What’s Tiegel do?

She picks up the gun like, “This ain’t no thing.”

It’s like a wise man once said… “All I need in this world of sin, is me and my girlfriend. Down to ride to the bloody end, me and my girlfriend.”

That’s ride or die.

art from dc comics’s firestormThis is besides the issue that some white comic creators create bland African-American characters.

Where is the African-American Guy Gardner? Where is the African-American Batman? Where is the African-American Joker? Booster Gold/Ted Kord Blue Beetle? Oracle? Wolverine? Spider-Man?

DC’s African American characters are either created to be the only person of color on a team (JSA, JLA, Teen Titans, Green Lantern Corps), or by editorial fiat to fill a diversity need (Firestorm).
–Valerie D’orazio, Three From WWII: The Twelve #2, JSA #12, Project Superpowers #0

When I was born, I was black. When I grow up, I’m black. When I’m ill, When I die, I’m black. But you – When you’re born, you’re pink. When you grow up, you’re white. When you’re ill, you’re green. When you go out in the sun, you go red. When you’re cold, you go blue. When you die, you’re purple. And you have the nerve to call me Colored?
–Malcolm X

I’ve got a habit of getting into arguments on the internet regarding race. I can’t help it, man, someone says something dumb and I feel compelled to respond. Next thing I know, it’s a week later and I’m waking up in a ditch.

Anyway, this post is about something that bugs me to death. I’m sick of hearing the word “token.” I don’t mean that I’m sick of “token” black characters.

I’m sick of people using it to describe black characters.

Token, quota hire, affirmative action case, all these words have the same root and work to the same point– the black person did not work for his position, he is less qualified, and he should not be where he is because he doesn’t deserve it. He’s only there because it’s politically correct, or editorially mandated, or because the team has to have a black character, doesn’t it?

Protip: Shut up. All you’re doing is reinforcing those ideas. Having one black guy on a team does not a token make. An editorial creation is just as valid as one from talent. It’s in the execution.

I’m gonna be honest and say that Val’s post up top there is what prompted this one. I had one all lined up about Deb Tiegel from Hitman (the best half german/half black character in comics), but I’m pushing it off for a day so that I can get this done.

In her post, she reviewed JSA #12 and said this:

The sequence with John Irons was also in need of some editing/quality control; John’s opening dialog with his wife sounded like pure exposition devoid of any human quality.

John Henry Irons is not in JSA #12. That is Jefferson Pierce, a black man with no facial hair and a wife and a grip of kids apparently (welcome to NEW EARTH). Irons is single, has a goatee, no wife, and no kids. He’s got a niece, though she’s already an established heroine in her own right.

When called on it, she said this:

I think the problem is that Johns wants to make the JSA the catch-all group that every other DC team is rolled into/connected with. Actually having Irons & the Infinity Inc cast make an appearance would make sense to me, as the two titles were historically linked to each other. But to bring not only JLA but Batman and the Outsiders…you need to have a realllly skilled hand to work within such a scope. I’m thinking a little past Johns and more like Busiek.

I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt. She didn’t confuse the two. It’s just that the book would have been better with John Irons, right? ’cause he is in a book with a cast of all new characters who don’t actually have a connection to the JSA. Also Geoff Johns is a bad writer and Kurt Busiek would write this story better.

Okay.

The conversation continues and we get the gem above about bland black characters created by white dudes, and how we need the black Spider-Man, Wolverine, Joker, and so on.

The bland thing stuck in my craw. What is that about? White people can’t create interesting black people? This means that DC’s blacks all suck? Editorially created characters are bad? Yeah, sorry– no. Not the business. She closed the thread when Pedro from FBB asked her questions, which meant she didn’t get to answer any of mine.

However, I have a blog of my own and I just did my taxes tonight so I’m in a raw mood so I decided to do this post. Pedro responded to her earlier, but that kid is just trying to get some e-cred so don’t read his blog at all. He definitely doesn’t make any good points about re-appropriating characters, writers of a different race writing characters, and comics quality.

Let’s go down the list.

John Henry Irons (TV’s Not Jefferson Pierce): He’s about as editorially mandated as it gets, isn’t he? He started out as the only one of the four replacement Superman to not claim to be Superman. He was carrying on in his name because it was the right thing to do. He graduated to being one of Superman’s best friends, an integral member of the JLA, buddies with Plastic Man, and one of the foremost thinkers in the DCU. Here’s his blandest moment:

Did I say blandest? I lied. Dude has not only fooled an enemy who has taken over a decent portion of a city, but he has picked up on a plan from a teammate with little prompting, and come up with a way to take out that enemy.

DC’s African American characters are either created to be the only person of color on a team (JSA, JLA, Teen Titans, Green Lantern Corps), or by editorial fiat to fill a diversity need (Firestorm).

Blow by blow:
JSA: Jakeem Thunder is a member, and I guess Amazing Man is now, too. Jakeem is a kid with a magical wishing genie who didn’t have the benefit of a Bruce Wayne or Hal Jordan upbringing. He’s got an attitude, a rough edge or three, but he’s also trying to do right. That’s bland?

Mr. Terrific is a guy so smart that Batman copied some of his designs and regularly treats as an equal. He’s apparently the third smartest man on earth, too. Having trouble seeing the bland here.

Teen Titans: Ain’t no black people on this team.

JLA: I already went over Steel. John Stewart and Vixen are I guess who she was referring to? John Stewart is an equal GL with Hal, Guy, and Kyle. He’s portrayed as the most level-headed and may even have more willpower than his buddies according to a scene in GL where his willpower is too much for his ring in GL last month (month before last?). A guy with a wishing ring and that kind of skill? That’s pretty interesting, innit?

Vixen? She’s a question mark right now. Meltzer’s slipshod plotting left the story of what’s going on with her powers to Dwayne McDuffie, but suddenly she can duplicate the powers and skills of any superhuman she’s nearby. She can fake a Green Lantern ring. That’s a big deal, isn’t it?

Finally, Firestorm.

Poor, beleaguered Jason Rusch. First he’s seen as a ghetto-bound drug-dealing quota case and now he’s bland. Except… he’s a college-age kid who may be the most powerful metahuman on the planet. He’s got father issues, he’s inexperienced, he lost his best friend because of his powers, and now he’s searching for the mentor to the old Firestorm so that he can better learn how to take care of himself. He’s Spider-Man meets Phoenix.

Yeah. I’m not seeing the bland, boring, editorially-mandated black characters here. All of these people have been blessed with quality writers lately. Even before the past year or so, these characters never sunk to “token” status beyond what mouthbreathers on message boards had to say.

I’m not even a DC encyclopedia. I barely even like most DC books. I’ve read enough to know a little bit, though. I’m not talking out the side of my neck here. You can look all this up with a minimum of time on Google or in a comic shop.

This isn’t the first time I’ve had this issue with somebody. Around a year ago, I got into an argument with a different blogger. I’d link it, but she’s since updated her layout and that hosed the 140 comments across two posts where the relevant part of the conversation was. Long story short, she came out with the line that “all black characters are mandingos and cannot be rescued from their horrible origins.”

I wish that comments thread was still there so, so bad. You don’t even know.

Her reasoning is terrible and horrible in a few ways. First, it supports the idea that you can’t reclaim or improve something. Going by her logic, I got some family members who’re gonna be hoodlums their whole life and are going to be worthless because of that fact. You go to jail and come out a different man? Who cares, dog, you’re still a criminal.

Get outta here with that. You’re gonna look at Bendis’s Luke Cage and tell me he isn’t an improvement, in terms of realistic representation and suchlike, than the one from the ’70s? Falcon is always gonna be a sambo? Bishop is just there to make white women scared? *smh*

When you get down to calling black characters bland, mandingos, tokens, or whatever, and you aren’t naming names? You’re doing wrong. You’re painting a whole bunch of characters with an ugly, ugly brush.

I’m having trouble coming up with some tokens who still appear in comics. Triathlon, I guess? I’ve read like half a comic with him in it, so I don’t even know there. Honestly, who are some “token” characters?

You think that there are “some bland/token/boring/racist black characters?” Call out names. Otherwise, some of us get to play “Guess who” while the rest of us are just going “I knew that Luke Cage was a token! What’s he doing on the Avengers anyway?”

Leave the subliminals at home and call out names. Be specific and know what you’re talking about because someone (probably me, at this rate) will call you on it. At worst, you might learn how he isn’t a token. At best, you might gain a new appreciation for a character you never paid attention to.

Stop looking at them as “black characters.” Treat them like characters instead of pieces in your “This Is How Superteams Should Look” puzzle set. Superman isn’t a white character, why is Steel a black character? Why is Priest painted as a “black writer” instead of a “writer?”

But just know that when you’re calling someone a token, you’re denigrating their skills, their past, and their accomplishments. You’re treating that character as inherently lesser than his teammates, due solely to preconceived notions and the make-up of his team.

Be specific or don’t speak up at all.

pictures taken from comics.org and GIS.Fifth–hold on, turn the beat off
I had to turn the beat off for this
You talking ’bout you an eighties baby?
You thirty seven years old!
You was born in 1968!
And I open the Daily News…
How is the “King of New York” rockin’ sandals with jeans?
Open toe sandals, with chancletas, with jeans on
How is the “King of New York” rockin’ sandals with jeans when he 42 years old?
Back to business!
–Cam’ron, “Gotta Love It”

In those days, your whole ave was the spot
The scene locked with Lee patches, Cazal glasses
Suede Pumas and rumors of rap not lastin
–Buckshot, “Think Back”

Honest to goodness, man, it’s time for some real talk. Enough is enough! I guess no one gave Cheryl Lynn any love for this a while back, ’cause I’m probably gonna end up reiterating a bit.

Stop making black characters look bummy. Honest to goodness, man. There’s just no excuse for that to leave your house looking like you just woke up. Let me go down the list up top there.

Dashikis: It isn’t 1988 any more. Seriously though, I’m not trying to be a hater, and I’ll admit that a young David Brothers had a leather Africa medallion or two back in the day, but the height of all that was almost twenty years ago. I realize that Amazing Man (awful name) is trying to be all about black empowerment and Katrina and all that, but he’s leaving the house dressed like he got into a fight with a bedsheet. You could probably get away with a kufi, but that’s it. The dashiki is way, way out of date. If you aren’t from Africa, you probably shouldn’t be wearing one. Just FYI.

Mohawks: I shouldn’t even have to explain how stupid this looks, because you should already know. Storm rocking a mohawk? They used to call her Super-Perm in elementary school. How’s her hair stay up? She isn’t Grace Jones, man. Don’t go there ever again, seriously. It looks ridiculous.

Mullet and jheri curl/perm: Bishop looked ridiculous when he first appeared and he didn’t stop looking ridiculous until he shaved his head. What in the world possessed Lee/Portacio/whoever else to give him that look? I have never in my life seen that. He’d have been better off with a rat tail, or maybe an M cut into the side of his box fade on some Kid-n-Play tip. He works better as a bald head, anyway. Shut ’em down.

Afros: My mom had an afro back when they were cool. That was a few years before I was born. I get that we need the old nostalgia blaxploitation thing… but c’mon. Afros are stopping points on the way to braids now. If you see a dude with a fro, his hair isn’t long enough for cornrows. This is also generally true for women. Do you know why this is? It is because afros are incredibly tough to take care of. My hair is short right now. A quick brush and I’m gravy. With an afro? You’re looking at twenty minutes in front of a mirror and hoping that you picked out the back of your head so that you don’t leave the house looking like you just woke up. Then you spend the rest of your day hoping that you didn’t dent your afro with the handles on the bus, by walking under that low hanging branch, or by doing anything ever, basically.

Jakeem Thunder: Oh man, we are gonna fight. You mean to tell me that a sixteen year old black kid from Keystone City, which is basically Detroit, who was a straight up latchkey kid is going to leave his house looking bummy? When he’s on a team with like four females?

Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan. You gotta be kidding.

First, Jakeem would not be coming with those smedium shirts and short jackets. He looks like an idiot. Where are the always fashionable Polo shirts? You buy jackets a size up if you’re wearing shirts that are a proper size.

And the backwards cap? Whoops look at me I’m Jakeem Thunder I live in 1996 also I wear K-Swiss and Saucony instead of Pumas or Timberlands.

No on the backwards cap. That’s not how anyone wears it any more. It’s all about the tilt. Example:

If you’re going to wear a baseball cap (and you shouldn’t to begin with), you’ve got it facing forward and at an angle. It might be bent, it might not, but it isn’t gonna be so bent it’s broken. In reality, Jakeem would have either a fleet of hoodies or a skull cap. See below.

See that? Shirt a proper length, white undershirt (or wifebeater) underneath but not showing under his sleeves, jeans crisp and properly fitted. Loose, but not ridiculously loose… I’m not feeling the glasses, but hey, do you. Find your look.

It’s not hard to make a character look right. Khari Evans does it. Adrian Alphona did it. Before drawing people, at least check a fashion or pop culture magazine! Look at The Source or Vibe or XXL! Give us something up-to-date to relate to!

’cause man, cool kids don’t dress like Jakeem Thunder. Maybe they did ten years ago, but not now. It’s like Clinton Sparks says… Get familiar!

art from dc comics’s suicide squad(Guest article ahoy! My buddy Pedro from Funnybook Babylon wanted to talk about one of the single best black characters in comics, and who am I to say no? I’ll take a few more guest articles if anyone has any good ones in mind. Throw me an email. Thanks to Pedro for the guest article!)

Before that Christmas, just like my older sister, I was into Marvel Comics. She used to blow her cash on X-Men, and the moment I got an allowance, I would save my daily dollar to get Uncanny X-Men and whatever Spider-Man I could get my hands on. This growing pile was supplemented by those 3 for $1 bags of comics that never had any DC issues. It was when someone gave me a near complete collection of Giffen/De Matteis Justice League comics that I was introduced, along with many other things, to the Wall.

The big crossover during this time was Invasion. The forces of earth–human, hero, and villain alike–allied together to stop the alien attackers. And in charge of villainous forces, which was made up of some of the nastiest guys I had seen, was a Black woman?!

I had to pause and rewind that panel. Not only was this Amanda Waller character black and female, but she was the toughest person among an entire room of politicians, soldiers, villains, and heroes. Shit, Ronald Reagan, who was in nearly a quarter of these Giffen League comics, was in awe and a bit frightened of her. This was something even my 7th grade knowledge of history knew was crazy. You could tell that she was assigned to work with the villains because she was the only person tough enough to keep them in line. They were afraid to cross her because she seemed to have the resolve and determination to make them pay.

Thankfully, the pile o’ comics contained a Doom Patrol vs. Suicide Squad issue, which featured more Waller action. In this book, I saw the Wall at what she does best, politically outmanuvering everyone else in the room in search of what was best for the American people.

With the right words, she could do more damage than Superman’s heat vision, escape situations that would tax Mr. Miracle and his motherbox, and save the day better than Wonder Woman could. Sure, she was ruthless, did things that only benefitted United States, and worked with the worst of the worst.

And yet, I couldn’t help loving her as she did it all, because she was so different than everyone else I had read before.

No one else in comics is physically depicted the way Waller is. Very few heavyset characters, especially female ones, are portrayed in non comical roles, and the few that are taken seriously are explained as being secretly muscular. Waller seems to avoid needing to justify her weight either way, because she is too dangerous to not take seriously. The skills that make her so dangerous are unrelated to hey body type.

What makes everyone fearful of her is that she didn’t receive a magic wishing ring or powers from a bolt of lightning. Instead, she worked herself up from nothing, which has made every one of her accomplishments defined by what she is willing to do. It’s this drive to do better that also makes her a symphatetic character to me.

If you were to ask her why she goes to the extremes that she does, she would tell you that someone with the resolve has to go out there and do the awful things to keep the world safe. The closing episode of the Justice League cartoon series features a moment with an older Waller at the end of her life. She’s unapologetic and at peace with her decisions, prepared to face whatever punishments await her in the afterlife. That nails her perfectly.

When Waller is done right, she’s one of the most complicated and nuanced characters in all of comics. She’s neither villain or hero and does very little to benefit herself. Shit, one time in the cartoon, Brainiac showed up out of nowhere. What did Waller do, did she run away? No, she whipped out her gun and helped the same heroes that she had been working against all series long fight this common threat. Sometimes a character like her can be too much for the simpleness that people want in their superhero comics, but to me, comics are in a better place because of characters like her.

The world honestly can never have enough Amanda Waller.

i stole these images from wikipedia.You can’t drive a knife into a man’s back nine inches, pull it out six inches, and call it progress.
–Malcolm X

If you’ve been reading comics blogs at all, you probably know who Spoiler is. If not, the Cliff’s Notes is that she was a supporting character in Robin, was briefly promoted to being Robin for a couple issues, was fired, started a gang war, was tortured, and eventually died from her wounds in what was basically the worst crossover to hit comics in years. She was a supporting character for Robin for quite a while, and her shtick was basically being the daughter of a villain and trying to make good. “Do the sins of the father” etc etc and all that.

Something of a web movement called Girl Wonder has sprung up using her as a symbol, which campaigns in part to get a memorial case in the Batcave for Spoiler ala Jason Todd and fairness toward women in comics.

Orpheus was another supporting Bat-character. Cliff’s: He was an entertainer turned gang leader, but one who was trying to turn the gangs toward more positive directions. With his partner Onyx, they were Bat-sanctioned and doing a pretty good job of things. Literally right before Spoiler was captured and tortured, the villain who did her in stepped out of the shadows and unceremoniously slit Orpheus’s throat. Later on, the villain wore Orpheus’s face as a mask, because I guess people are so dumb that they can’t tell when somebody’s face has been cut off.

I’m leaving something out, though, aren’t I? What’s the difference between the two? Both of them were/are niche characters, though Spoiler appeared in considerably more books than Orpheus before she died. Both of them were sanctioned, though to varying degrees, by the Batman. Both of them were killed by the same guy in the same crossover, though Orpheus missed out on all the torture.

Oh yeah– Spoiler is a young blonde girl. Orpheus is a grown black man.

Orpheus is not the symbol of a group campaigning for right-making. He is rarely mentioned and has essentially been forgotten.

Why is Orpheus forgotten and why is Spoiler an icon? Maybe it’s the cynic in me, but this sounds familiar.

I’m not trying to diss anyone here. It’s just an interesting little comparison that I thought of while I was mulling the two characters over in my head.

I think it boils down to this: Spoiler is much, much more marketable than Orpheus is. If vigilantes were real, and Spoiler went out like she did? It’d be a 24 hour news cycle with breaking updates from various talking heads, constant news tickers, and the whole shebang. She’d be Jonbenet Ramsey, Natalee Holloway, Laci Peterson, and Chandra Levy all in one, with a side of Patty Hearst.

Orpheus… not so much. History bears this out. Crimes against black people just don’t get a lot of media attention, unless it’s something either a) totally outlandish or b) talked about enough that the media can’t get away with ignoring it. Darfur didn’t just start when movie stars started talking about it. The Jena Six didn’t just suddenly pop up last summer. Do y’all remember Megan Williams (link one link two)? Beaten, tortured, and raped by six people over the course of a week? No?

I just went to CNN.com to look up a link for Megan Williams. Off in the sidebar where they keep the videos? Some reporter uncovered new info about (pause) Natalee Holloway!

I can’t make this stuff up, man. This is real life. Honest to goodness. I had to take a screenshot of it just to be sure that my eyes weren’t deceiving me.

Anyway, how do you combat this? You’re already starting behind the eight ball. You have to prove that you’re just as worth it, even though your starting line is a good 50 meters behind everyone else’s. Not to put too serious a point in it, this is the dilemma that many people face everyday. You’re a quota hire, a sports scholarship kid, or someone who gets bussed in to school because of tricksy zoning. People look at you like you’re not supposed to be there and treat you the same.

It’s that feeling you get when you have to work twice as hard for half the respect. You have to show and prove, not because it’s right, but because it’s the only way to get anywhere.

So, what do you do? You do for delf. You look out for yourself first and foremost. It doesn’t matter what the next man is doing. If you don’t look out for yourself, no one will. You can’t expect anyone to do anything for you.

This is how cynics are born. People who feel like the world is against them and the only thing they can do is fight back. If enough people spit on you often enough, you begin to feel like that’s the way things are and the only thing you can do is put your eyebrows down and ice grill everyone who comes along. Finding that balance between cynicism and pragmatism is tough. A lot of people fail to do it, with good reason. Sometimes you can’t tell how hard you have to push back.

If you don’t hustle and beat feet, you are going to get pushed off that Headline News 24-hour ticker. You are going to be ignored, minimized, and left out. Everything is politics and everything is popularity. You have to do it yourself.

I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know, though, am I? I’ve heard this speech ever since I was a kid.

I didn’t learn this lesson from Orpheus. It’s something that I, and millions of other kids worldwide, learned as children. Spoiler and Orpheus just provided a neat comics parallel. Equal situations, characters of a similar stature, and so on. Spoiler wasn’t poor (she was kind of decidedly middle class). Orpheus was upper middle class, but not Bruce Wayne rich. They both had chances, they both became heroes, but Orpheus never, ever got the attention Spoiler did.

You gotta hustle in life.

Don’t forget about Megan Williams.

art from image comics’s nine rings of wu-tang, by long vo i believePlay my position in the game of life, standin firm
on foreign land, jump the gun out the fryin pan, into the fire
Transform into the Ghost Rider, a six-pack
and A Streetcar Named Desire, who got my back?
–Method Man, “Triumph”

I smoke on the mic like Smokin’ Joe Frazier
The hell raiser, raisin hell with the flavor
Terrorize the jam like troops in Pakistan
Swingin’ through your town like your neighborhood Spider-Man
–Inspectah Deck, “Protect Ya Neck”

“It’s a blessing really, to know that I could potentially be this superhero,” he enthused. “Justice League itself is an honor, and Green Lantern is an incredible character to play. It’s a blessing to be associated with it.”

In particular, Common felt it was a special privilege to be the cast’s only black super.

“Just being a black person, a black man, playing a superhero is an honor in itself,” he smiled.
–Common, MTV Movies

What if I had the, power to gather, all of my favorite emcees
With the illest comic book characters, and they became arch enemies?
Inconceivable? Unbelievable? Yet as wild as it seems
The Emperor and Stan Lee would coach the two opposing teams
Keep it clean, no bats, no gats, guns, no interference
Comic book characters would go head up with raw lyrics
Now I take, whoever might be on break from doin’ tours
And have them signed up for the Last Emperor’s Secret Wars
–Last Emperor, “Secret Wars”

I walk past with a nod and a reminisce
Swear to God, hip-hop and comic books was my genesis
Respect the life and the fashions of the children
It’s the only culture I’ve got, exactly what we’ve been buildin’
–Atmosphere, “Always Coming Back Home to You

The secret is that everyone loves comic books.

from dc comics’s JLA #14. grant morrison and howard porter on words/art.
Unseen. Unexpected. I come by many roads.
–Black RacerWe all know that DC sucked at repping black characters until the ’80s, while Marvel was all up in your face by the mid-70s. But, you want to know about “unexpected?” Let me give you a list.

Gabriel Jones, Black Panther, Flippa Dippa, Vykin the Black, Black Racer, Sam “Falcon” Wilson, Princess Zanda, and Mr. Miracle.

That’s eight black characters, right? Spread out over maybe fifteen years from the first to the last. Every single one a Jack Kirby creation.

The man may not have been the greatest with names (Black Racer, Vykin the Black, Black Panther) but he had a sick visual style and a willingness to throw black characters into his books with no problem at all. His characters have legs, too. Four of these characters are still players to this day (Falcon, Miracle, Panther, Racer), Gabriel Jones appeared in the 65th Anniversary issue of Captain America (with no lines, sadly), Vykin bit the bullet with Death of the New Gods, and Zanda had a good cameo in Black Panther where she was described as the “Paris Hilton of Africa.”

Well, I guess Flippa Dippa gets no love, but that’s just because he’s too awesome for anyone to write.

But really, eight fun black characters? Eight black characters with different origins, various abilities, all without falling into the trap of “Oh, he isn’t a stereotype!” or “He’s from the hood!” Fully realized, treated as equals, and completely interesting. It’s good stuff.

from marvel comics’s the crew, art by jh williams iiiI’ma protect my family, that’s my word
My wife, child, my dogs, cat, and my birds
I got a happy house, homes, you can’t disturb
You might clapped in the dome, clack, now you heard
–C-Rayz Walz, “Protect My Family”

Most heroes suit up because it’s the right thing to do. Spider-Man, Batman, Superman, all those guys are just trying to do the right thing. The X-Men and JLA suit up in reaction to a threat.

Kasper Cole, the White Tiger, puts on the costume so he can feed his family.

He’s one of the Crew, Christopher Priest’s late, lamented series about a group of men who, if not trying to do the right thing, end up doing the right thing while going about their business.

Kasper’s got a pregnant girlfriend and a nagging mom at home. His cop’s salary really isn’t cutting it, but he lucks out when he happens upon the Black Panther’s costume one night. Now he can engineer big busts, get promoted, and maybe stack some cash on the way. Of course, the Panther doesn’t necessarily appreciate him wearing his colors. Instead, he’s given a new costume: that of the White Tiger. He’s got most of the abilities of the Panther, he taught himself to put on a Wakandan accent to throw people off, and he hits the bricks to make sure that his family can eat.

Kasper is a great character who honestly never should have went away. Where the original Marvel characters were characters who did good, but had flaws in their personal life, Kasper is motivated by his flaws. He’s easy to relate to– who wants to be hungry? Even worse, who wants their family to be hungry? Kasper is a dope twist on the old Marvel formula, and one that kids nationwide could instantly understand. “He does this because he has to do the hard thing to make ends meet.”

He provides a nice mirror image up to The Hood, as well, from the girlfriend to the mother. Talk about perfect enemies!

All Cole needs to be a hit is for a Bendis or Brubaker to remember him and bring him back. He’s a character that has legs, an edge, and a ridiculously awesome visual hook.

from marvel comics’s cage, art by richard corben and jose villarubiaWe don’t play with the lizards, we make phrases up and say ’em exquisite
–Jadakiss, “Welcome to D-Block”

I know you like the way I’m freakin’ it
I talk with slang and I’ma never stop speakin’ it

“Speak with criminal slang”
That’s just the way that I talk, yo
“Vocabulary spills, I’m ill”
–Big L, “Ebonics” (last two lines of the first verse, three lines of chorus)

The English language is a beautiful and malleable one. Sometimes you just have to sit back and listen to people celebrate it.

He’s cool, he’s bad, that’s dope, she’s ill, she’s a dime, he’s a buster, let me borrow your jack (iPhones are Apple Jacks for that double word score), look out for lizards, he’s selling wolf tickets, stop tongue-kissing cobras, get it crunk up, get outta here with that dragon breath, what’s crackin’ youngblood, where’s your bird at, listen at this joint man…

You aren’t rich. You’re ballinnnnnnn.

It isn’t Warner Robins, Macon, the Bronx, Manhattan, or Staten Island. It’s War-town, Mack-town, the Boogie Down Bronx, Money Makin’ Manhattan, and Shaolin. You from New Jersey? Nah, you’re from Dirty Jersey. Newark? New Jerusalem. I’m from the Dirty South, about an hour south of the ATL. I’m on the west coast now, living in the Bay Area (Yay Area), but it’s still deuces up, A-towns down. Is it where you’re from or where you’re at?

Your friend is your brother, but you still call him “son” ’cause he shines like one.

Sweet Christmas.

“I don’t know how you all see it, but when it comes to the children, Wu-Tang is for the children. We teach the children.”
–Ol’ Dirty Bastard

There aren’t a lot of black youths active in comics these days. Just a cursory, generous, and off-the-top-of-my-head count comes up with Natasha Irons, Night Thrasher (II), Debrii, Patriot, Prodigy… who else? DC’s got a stockpile of fashionable pretty little indistinguishable blonde girls and dark haired male sidekicks and that’s about it. We’ve got a fistful of grown-ups, and Luke Cage is leading the Avengers and playing the Captain America role (whoa), but what about the kids?

I had some harsh words about Patriot a while back, and I stand by them. His origin makes him a sucker and a weakling on a team full of people who have overcome exterior problems without falling victim to interior ones. I recently reread Young Avengers after a friend gave away the two trades and I still can’t get into it. It rubs me raw.

Patriot is an interesting character, because a young black male wearing the flag, even (or especially) now is rife with story possibilities. In a lot of ways, it flies in the face of logic. In others, it makes perfect sense. Ed Brubaker did a good job briefly discussing those issues in his issue of Young Avengers Presents. How do you reconcile history and the ideal? Do you even bother trying? Patriot is the grandson of a man who was pretty much tortured and ruined by the government who is represented by the flag he wears. What about that?

David “Prodigy” Alleyne from New X-Men is a character that I liked a lot. He had clever powers and was kind of a modern-day non-irreparably lame Doug Ramsey type of kid. He could absorb the knowledge, but not the powers, of anyone who he was close to. Then House of M hit and Kyle and Yost took over the series and bodies started dropping and I stopped reading.

But, I mean, before all that? He seemed pretty cool, even if he was only ever on maybe ten covers out of fifty-nine of the New Mutants/New X-Men run. (Yes I counted.)

I want a spectrum of characters. I want to see that young black kid who is all about fighting the power and bringing down the man. I want to see that kid who might not have grown up as poor as his other friends and has some guilt over that. I want to see that black girl who had to fight twice as hard as everyone else she knows to get half as far. I want to see those kids who reflect the people I grew up with, who run the gamut from this, to that, and the third.

I started reading comics almost twenty years ago. (I am not that old I just started reading early, shut up.) Why is the landscape barely different at all? Milestone Comics was how many years ago now? I mean, can a Brothers get a black Teen Titan who isn’t a) Cyborg and b) a shrinky bee girl? This is the pre-eminent DC teen team, you mean to tell me that they can’t get a quota kid or two to fill out the ranks? Farm some kids out of the Boys & Girls Club? I mean, blonde girls got it made! There’s one with every power under the sun! Why can’t I have a spectrum of characters to look at and show my little cousins?

“Hey, check this guy out! He’s pretty cool, right?”
“What’s his power? He looks aight.”
“Um, he got beat up so he took drugs so he could get revenge on those guys, and then decided he wanted to be a hero.”

Yeah, that’s not the business.

We’ve got a few characters. Making more isn’t even hard.