I've grown up with comics.
Comics have been a part of my makeup for as long as I can remember. When I was young, I would typically pick them up at the local convenience store. Back then, they had tall wire racks that would display single issues near the front door, so that you could pick one up on your way out. They were normally in awful condition, but at that time, I wasn't a collector. I was a kid who thought that the Optimus Prime comic in my hand looked awesome.
I've grown up with comics. With age comes a changed perspective on these stories that I read when I was a kid. The titles I've followed shifted from Transformers and G.I. Joe, properties I was exposed to by the commercial excess of the '80s through Saturday morning cartoons, and moved more towards the superheroes that Marvel published, with who I began to identify. Specifically, I started reading the X-Men. The X-men is the perfect title for teenagers, and it's not surprising that most of the characters in the title started at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters as adolescents. The themes of the X-men, race, diversity, social justice and good vs. evil, all resonate with kids who are experiencing the pressures of the real world for the first time. I still love the X-Men, but as my library of comics expanded, so did my interests.
I've grown up with comics, and now that I'm an adult, I look back on these stories and recognize themes that have changed me. Lessons that my heroes had to learn on the page were lessons I had to learn the hard way in the real world. More than anything else in my world, I think it was these stories I love so much that molded me into the person I am today.
I wanted to share a few of the characters that have influenced me.
The Incredible Hulk | Let It Out
Bruce Banner was an only child whose abusive father killed his mother as he watched. A scientist, David Banner was convinced that Burce was some kind of monster because of experiments that he had conducted on himself prior to the birth of his son. As a result, he was at best, absent from Bruce's life, and at worst, fearful and violent towards his son. Despite this, Bruce was able to make a name for himself in the scientific community, eventually beginning work for the Department of Defense building gamma bombs. All that trauma and anger he had suffered through as a child was put into a safe inside his mind and sealed uptight.
But then, after attempting to save a stranger who had wandered onto a test site, Bruce was inundated with gamma energy. Interacting with his unique biology, the energy turned him into a giant, rampaging monster. When Banner got angry or aggravated, the monster smashed through that safe in his head, and all the rage is released, fueling the Hulk.
The Hulk is the hero that I identify with the most as an adult because his struggle reflects my own. I am constantly working on managing emotions, especially anger. As Mark Ruffalo says in Joss Whedon's Avengers, "I'm always angry."
My parents weren't abusive. We weren't rich, but we weren't starving. Looking from the outside in, we were alright. But I wasn't a happy child. I was alone for much of my life and never fit in. Being a family that was often split up and moving to new places didn't help me to adjust. When I grew up, bad attitudes had already been ingrained. I was anti-social, I was introverted, I was depressed. It took me hitting rock bottom to get me to come to grips with my own emotions and get them under control.
For the Hulk, all the pain and suffering that Banner experiences during his life is pent up, resulting in the violent release that you see as the transformation to the monster. He is constantly trying to build a dam that can't possibly hold back that torrent. Inevitably, cracks appear. The pressure builds and the feelings explode. The moment he addresses these emotions that he has buried is the moment he starts to gain an understanding of how to control his power. It's after he realizes that he has control over his emotions that he truly begins to heal. Instead of hiding from his problems, he confronts them head-on.
It's something I remind myself of every day.
The Mighty Thor | I Am Not Worthy
Thor Odinson is the son of legacy. He is the heir to the cosmic empire of Asgard, one that spans realms that cut across the universe. Odin, his father, has groomed him since birth to rule his people after he passes on into the afterlife. Thor is a born warrior who knows only glory.
Thor's story is one of a person who learns humility. His entire life he's never faced adversity. He is the god of storms who controls lightning and thunder. He is the son of a king who is all-powerful. All he understands is power. He's a selfish, vain, braggart who knows only privilege. It's not until he loses that privilege when he comes to know loss and fear and despair, that he realizes that glory for Asgard is worthless if his people suffer. When he loses his godhood, he learns what it's like to be someone who does not have that power; someone who is helpless. He learns that power in the wrong hands is a terrible thing.
In that state, he begins to empathize with others and learn what it really means to become worthy of the real burden that comes with leadership.
It's taken me years to get where I am now and looking back on it now, I would not have traded those years for anything. All those failures and those setbacks, all that time facing adversity and experiencing hardship, have helped me to get to a place when I can put myself in another's shoes and be open to their ideas. I learned that my intelligence is a gift, but it doesn't make me superior. I know enough to know that I am not infallible and that I can't go at it alone.
We are not worthy because we are strong. We are worthy because we understand that others are worth more than us.
Iron Man | Make It Better
Tony Stark is your typical cis white male who thinks he is god's gift to the world. He is the entitled son of a billionaire industrialist who grew into an engineering genius. He used his brilliance to grow his father's company into a worldwide powerhouse, manufacturing weapons that are used in conflicts all over the world. But then, he is kidnapped by terrorists who want those weapons, and he sees the destruction that his inventions bring to the real world.
It's there that the direction of Tony's life shifts. Saved by a stranger, he begins work on the first Iron Man suit in a cave, with scraps of tin and wire, building a way out of his prison. In the end, Ho Yinsen's sacrifice was what wins Iron Man his freedom, and he realizes that he needs to live to make the world a better place and that to do it, he needs to be a better man.
That's what I take away from Iron Man's story. His title was not one of those that I had many of in my collection. I may have come to the character after the advent of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but Tony has come to represent growth mentality for me - he invents, he improves, he innovates. He has the ability to understand that you can learn to fix things that are broken. He understands that we make all mistakes, but it's important to learn from them and do better tomorrow.
Captain America | Stand Up
The story of Captain America isn't like Tony Stark's or Thor's. He wasn't a strong man. He was a scrawny kid from Brooklyn who studied Fine Arts and who wanted to draw comics, something that I dreamed of doing when I was young. Then World War II started. Steve Rogers heard about the war in Europe, about the Nazis, about Hitler, and about countries being invaded, people dying, concentration camps. Steve saw a bully and he knew he had to stand up.
Like Iron Man, I wasn't a big fan of Captain America until the movie and Chris Evans' portrayal really made the character real for me. The comic panel that best represents what he means to me is from Amazing Spider-Man, Vol. 1 No. 537 which was published at the start of 2007 as part of the "Civil War" crossover. His speech in the issue, written by the prolific J. Michael Straczynski, was later adapted for the Captain America film sequel of the same name but attributed to Peggy Carter.
Doesn't matter what the press says. Doesn't matter what the politicians or the mobs say. Doesn't matter if the whole country decides that something wrong is something right. This nation was founded on one principle above all else: the requirement that we stand up for what we believe, no matter the odds or the consequences. When the mob and the press and the whole world tell you to move, your job is to plant yourself like a tree beside the river of truth, and tell the whole world -- 'No, you move.'
There are certain lines that just ring true to people and this is a passage that has been embedded in my brain since I first read it. It gives me chills. It moves me to tears. It reminds me that you need to stand up for what you believe in.
Just like Captain America.
Spider-Man | Never Quit
Peter Parker is the Marvel 616's everyman. He was created specifically as an audience surrogate, the "regular" guy with "regular" problems, who still goes out of his way to save people because he was gifted with amazing powers, and with great power comes great responsibility. This is something that helped Spider-Man become Marvel's most recognizable hero, and something Stan Lee fought to keep as the character moved from high school to college in the books. Peter never became the strong, popular man that he could have been with his powers. He remained the brainy science nerd who had ordinary issues like money, being late for class, or girl problems. And despite all the ordinary stuff that Peter Parker had to deal with, he never shirked the responsibility he had as Spider-Man.
It would have been so easy for him to give up. When J. Jonah Jameson ran story after story calling him out, he could have laid low. When the public hated him, he could have stopped being a hero. After he lost people close to him, he could have said, "fuck this." and hung up the tights. But Peter Parker, Spider-Man, never quits. He knows he's got a job to do. He knows people are depending on him. He's a hero.
And heroes don't quit.
2020's been hard on everyone, in different ways, and reading comics has been one of the ways that I've been coping with the isolation and the overwhelming anxiety that the pandemic's brought us. I started this article several months back, and I've found it hard to really articulate some of these, but I needed to get it done before December 31st. There are so many more stories out there, and I'm sure you all have heroes of your own. But these are the ones that really resonate with me and I wanted to share them before the year ends.
These panels continue to give me hope and direction. I want to be less angry, less afraid. I want to be a better person. I want to stand up.
In 2021, I want to be more like these heroes that I admire. I hope we all can.