Rider of the Spaceways

As part of an occasional series on superheroes, this is extracted from an essay I wrote some time ago (not sure where) that concerns the moral effect of some comic books.

The Silver Surfer was one of Jack Kirby’s inventions for Stan Lee's Marvel Comics, a silver-skinned alien on a flying surfboard endowed with the “Power Cosmic” (the ability to play around with – reshape and transform – matter and energy). This meant he could generate really big explosions if needed, and was basically much more powerful than most other Marvel characters, if he used his full strength. But what made him interesting was that he usually didn’t. The Surfer was a victim. We’ll come back to that.

Why a surfer? True, it was the era of the Beachboys (the Surfer made his first appearance in 1965). It also looked very cool when he summoned his board while jumping into the air and soared away. The theory behind this
was that the cosmos is a great sea of energies, on which the Surfer could skim and navigate. His original role was that of herald to the planet-eating predator, Galactus: a giant in an emblematic, hi-tech purple costume who needed to consume large amounts of life-energy to survive. In Kirby’s mythopoetic imagination Galactus was “Power”. Kirby saw the Surfer as a being of pure energy created by Galactus, his task being to search out planets for his master to devour. For the original 18-book series devoted to the Surfer, which appeared without Kirby (who returned only for the final episode), Lee developed the back-story of the character further. Instead of being created by Galactus, the Surfer had volunteered to serve Galactus in order to save his home planet Zenn-La. The story was told in the first issue of the new comic book in 1968.

In his first appearance, the Surfer brings Galactus to earth, but out of pity for the humans turns against his master – for which crime he is sentenced never more to roam the spaceways, but to be confined to earth behind an invisible barrier. His compassion, coupled with the enmity of those he tries to save and his longing for his beloved Shalla Bal back on Zenn-La remained consistent features of the series. Like Spider-Man, only more so, the Surfer has few, if any friends. His weird appearance and immense power causes him to be feared and misunderstood. Every superhero comic has to contain at least one battle, but most of the fights in The Silver Surfer are due to his being attacked through some misunderstanding, and having to defend himself.

The character of the Surfer has nobility, despite his occasional bursts of uncontrolled anger and the frequent recourse to self-pitying monologue. In the third issue, the spiritual dimension comes to the fore, with the appearance of the devil himself, Mephisto, who uses Shalla Bal as bait in a trap for the Surfer. He gives his reasons on page 20: “SINCE THEDAWN OF TIME – SELDOM HAVE I SENSED SUCH GOODNESS OF SOUL – SUCH PURITY OF SPIRIT – AS I SENSE WITHIN THE SILVER SURFER. ALL THAT YOU ARE – ALL THAT YOU STAND FOR – IS ABHORRENT TO THE LORD OF THE LOWER DEPTHS! SO LONG AS YOU EXIST, MEPHISTO’S SCHEME SUPREME WILL EVER BE IN JEOPARDY!” It seems that mankind is near to complete submission to the devil’s will, and the Surfer stands in the way as a beacon of uncorrupted moral goodness.

The Surfer descends into hell, unafraid of anything Mephisto can do to him (“YOU CAN DO NO MORE THAN SLAY ME!”), and unmoved by the temptations he offers (wealth, women and power). Implanted in Mephisto’s brain for a battle of wills, the Surfer is victorious. Even the temptation of being reunited with Shalla Bal is ineffective, since as they both know, “HOW CAN LOVE HAVE MEANING IF IT COSTS YOUR VERY SOUL??” Separated by a universe, they will belong to each other forever, and this bond Mephisto cannot destroy.

The Surfer thus has saintly attributes, but he is far from perfect. In issue 15, after jumping too quickly to the conclusion that the Fantastic Four have betrayed his trust, the Surfer muses: “WAS I TOO HUMAN…OR…NOT HUMAN ENOUGH?” The story and dialogue of the classic Surfer comics were always concerned with the ambiguity of human nature and existence: a humanity that tears itself apart with war and greed, that fears the stranger and inflicts pain without thinking, yet rises to great heights of virtue and wisdom, as though yet to “come of age” as a species. What is of interest about the comic is not just the artistry of the pages, and certainly not the quality of the writing, but the Big Questions raised about our existence in a majestic, unpredictable, beautiful cosmos. Despite all the alien species encountered, somehow humanity always remains special, our freedom and our inviolable conscience the pivot of every story.

I have been writing only of the classic Surfer. Of his more recent appearances I know much less. He appeared in one truly dreadful film (Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer.) There was a decent enough animated series that can be found on YouTube. The 18 issues I referred to have become collectibles. In 1987 he was given a new series, presaged in 1978 by a Kirby-Lee graphic novel in which he regains the freedom of space in the service of Galactus. For this novel, the whole story was revised somewhat, but the great Surfer themes remain. As Lee explained in his Preface, “Ever since I first saw our gleaming sky-rider, when Jack placed the initial drawing on my desk, I felt he had to represent more than the typical comicbook hero. Somehow or other, Jack had imbued this new, unique, totally arresting fictional figure with a spiritual quality, a sense of nobility, a feeling of almost religious fervor in his attitude and his demeanor.” The closing words of the comic are these: “ONLY TRUTH IS CONSTANT! ONLY FAITH ENDURES! AND ONLY LOVE CAN SAVE THEM – BUT WHERE CAN LOVE BE FOUND?” “FOR ONE SHINING SECOND OF ETERNITY, THE WORLD KNEW SUCH A LOVE! BUT WHAT A PRICE WAS PAID!”

I wonder if anyone has written a thesis on Stan Lee as a moral influence on our times. His perennial themes are the goodness and uniqueness of the human person, the supreme importance of self-giving love, the challenge of making moral choices in a fallen world. In the recent spate of comic-book movies based on some of his most popular characters he appears in a series of cameos. In Spider-Man 3, the conclusion of a trio of films about the battle between good and evil (finally in the soul of the hero himself), he appears alongside Spider-Man’s alter ego Peter Parker looking up at a billboard praising Spidey’s achievements and comments, “You see, one man can make a difference.” It is the message he wants to get across in all his work, a message he managed to convey in coloured pictures. We don’t have to despair in the face of overwhelming evil or the impersonal scale of modern society. Life will be a struggle, but it is worth fighting for purity, for nobility of soul, for justice, for kindness. Chivalry lives. The greatest heroes are ordinary people like us. Grace can strike anyone, like a gift of superpowers from the bite of a spider or a burst of radiation; the question is how we will respond to it. Will we become a hero or a villain? In the words of Spider-Man, “You always have a choice.”

Kids around the world have received a moral education from Lee’s comics. It is just a pity they often haven’t had it from anyone else.

PS. The Surfer dropped into the Atomic Pizza cafe in Oxford recently, where I snapped this picture. He looks hungry enough to eat the whole place. In the window I could see Robin (from rival comics company DC) already getting up to leave. Wonder who else was there?

Comic book salvation

… Stand up and keep your childishness:

Read all the pedants’ screeds and strictures;

But don’t believe in anything

That can’t be told in coloured pictures.

Chesterton would not have liked many of the stories told in coloured pictures by American comic books, which these days tend to dystopia and sado-eroticism – an all-too predictable reflection of the present state of our culture. But some he wouldhave liked, and I dare to think I could show him my own comic collection without (much) embarrassment.

My personal golden age of comics was in the late 60s and 1970s, when I would roam the streets of London looking for the latest American imports: Batman or Green Lantern, The Fantastic Four or The Mighty Thor, and a dozen other titles, illustrated by such artists as Neal Adams, the Buscema

brothers, Jack “King” Kirby, or Jim Steranko. Kirby it was who, in partnership with Stan “the Man” Lee, gave us most of the great Marvelheroes, including the Hulk, Thor, Captain America, and the Silver Surfer, and his heavily emblematic and dynamic style influenced generations of later artists. A quick scurry through Marvel-related entries in Wikipedia will explain what I am talking about, if you don’t already know. You’ll find plenty of coloured pictures, too.

True, nearly all the comics I’m talking about featured punch-ups between costumed heroes and villains, and yes, there was an assortment of buxom females in tight costumes, but the appeal of the comics went deeper than that. It was the brilliance of the artistry (despite the muddy inks on cheap paper), and the way the caped crusaders tapped into archetypal, almost mythic stories, not the display of anatomy, that appealed most to me. Honestly, it was. Kirby in particular mined ancient mythology without apology to construct pantheon after pantheon of super-powered beings, ending up (at Marvel’s rival DC, publisher of Superman and Batman) with a race explicitly called the New Gods.

Superman, the progenitor of all these characters (eventually Kirby got to draw him too), was Samson and Hercules in coloured tights. After his debut in Action Comics in 1938, it didn’t take him long to become a cultural icon. If the “superman” of Nietzsche transcended conventional morality, Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster’s Superman, adopted refugee from the planet Krypton and avowed defender of peace, justice, and the earth itself, accepted and upheld the moral code taught by his adopted parents in Smallville, Martha and Jonathan Kent. Right up to today, he is one of the few superheroes who remain relatively untainted by moral compromise. He doesn’t even kill; he puts villains in jail.

It has taken until now for CGI to catch up with the comics. The new wave of superhero movies, especially those from the Marvel studio, boast special effects that make the earlier Superman films starring Christopher Reeve look like vintage episodes of Doctor Who, with monsters of cardboard and cellophane. One film in particular, the recent Avengers film (titled Avengers Assemble in the UK), is widely described as the superhero film that comic fans have been waiting decades to see. Anyone who sneers at it has simply never enjoyed a comic book. Up until now, superhero films have focused on one hero at a time; now the movies can do what has long delighted the fans of the comic: create teams of heroes and villains, and crossovers between one comic-book franchise and another. “The Avengers is what we call ourselves. Earth’s mightiest heroes type thing,” explains the billionaire genius philanthropist Tony Stark (a.k.a. Iron Man) to the villainous Asgardian god Loki, moments before being thrown through a skyscraper window.

The Avengers are assembled by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), Director of the secret agency S.H.I.E.L.D., with the aim of defending the earth against the alien army commanded by Thor’s brother. They include Captain America (Marvel’s moral equivalent to the early Superman), Iron Man (billionaire inventor in a flying suit), the Hulk (Bruce Banner, a scientist who bulks up big and green when angry), the god of thunder on assignment from Asgard, and two normal humans with heightened abilities, Hawkeye (archer with trick arrows) and Black Widow (former Russian spy and martial arts expert). The first half of the film shows our heroes squabbling, but the self-sacrificing example of a secondary (human) character, Agent Coulson, gives them the “push” they need to become a team capable of setting their egos aside and saving the world – represented, of course, mainly by Manhattan.

“There is only one God, Ma’m, and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t dress like that,” quips Captain America, in reference to the Asgardians. The line is a suitable one from the “old fashioned” Captain, who last saw action in World War Two (against a much worse villain than Hitler) and has only recently been thawed out of the polar ice where he was buried after saving the world the last time round. But, as Coulson says, “the world needs a bit of ‘old-fashioned’.”

We all need guardian angels. In fact the Catholic Church teaches that we each have one – a supernatural entity assigned at conception, not to dominate us, but to prevent us being dominated; to defend us against our supernatural enemies, giving us the space to live our human lives in a world that is much bigger and scarier than we think (what the Rangers do for the Shire in The Lord of the Rings). Comic-book superheroes and supervillains are the angels and demons of this cosmic spiritual warfare reinvented for the secular imagination, and they resonate with us because on some level we know that we need them. At the same time, they give us something to aspire to (the corresponding Christian doctrine is theosis or divinization by grace). These are not all protectors sent to us from outside – like the boy from Krypton, or Thor – more often they are ordinary human beings (Peter Parker, Bruce Wayne, Tony Stark, Hal Jordan) who by providential accident or brilliant design find themselves possessed of a power beyond the lot of mortals. And “with great power comes great responsibility”, as they quickly learn. These are flawed human beings who have to become heroes, fighting alongside the guardian angels for the right of human beings to live a meaningful life. (“I have come to set them free,” says Loki. “Free from what?” asks Fury. “Freedom,” comes the reply.)

The story that these “coloured pictures” are trying to tell us is certainly old-fashioned enough, but we never tire of hearing it. It is, as Chesterton would say, a fairy tale that holds more wisdom than most modern novels. Good and evil are real, and we define our identity and free our souls by becoming identified with the good.  Heroes are not made by a burst of gamma radiation or a fancy metal suit; they are forged in a moral struggle, and the true hero is the one who is prepared to give his life to save others. And there is another way in which the coloured pictures tell the truth. Alien hordes and false gods are out there, waiting for their chance; waiting for someone to open the door to them. There is a spiritual battle going on all around us, and everyday life is part of something much bigger, something cosmic. Avengers, assemble!