Justice, Like Lightning . . .

In 1997, Marvel Comics was struggling. The market was in a slump, sales were down, and some of its marquee series were on the verge of cancellation. The company had spent hundreds of millions of dollars acquiring companies like Fleer, Panini, and Heroes World only to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Things looked bleak, to say the least.

In this midst of its financial meltdown, Marvel made the decision to cancel such long-running titles as Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Captain America, and Avengers due to lackluster sales. The characters themselves, along with a few others, were licensed out to Image Comics founders Jim Lee and Rob Liefeld, who relaunched those titles under the banner of Heroes Reborn. The X-Men-led event Onslaught led the way by seemingly killing off those characters to make room for four new series set in an entirely different world. For a full year, those characters were written in their own shared universe, separate from Marvel’s main line of comics, in the hope that Lee and Liefeld’s modern style of art and writing would boost sales.

Ironically, this led to one of the most memorable innovations in comics history.

Into this void stepped Kurt Busiek and Mark Bagley with a new ongoing series titled Thunderbolts with a tag line, “justice, like lightning” borrowed from a 17^th century poet named Thomas Randolph. Six new heroes stepped forward to take up the burden of protecting New York and the world in the absence of the fallen heroes. Citizen V, Meteorite, Atlas, MACH-1, Songbird, and Techno were featured in existing titles for a few months before the premier of their own book, generating a level of excitement and attention from readers that Marvel hadn’t enjoyed in years. When the new series debuted, it was an instant sellout and had to be reprinted to meet the demand.

But there was a catch that only added to fans’ fascination with the new characters: they weren’t really heroes at all. They were villains in disguise.

At the end of the first issue, Citizen V reveals himself to readers as none other than Baron Helmut Zemo, one of Captain America’s most memorable villains and leader of the Masters of Evil. The other Thunderbolts are revealed as long-established (but mostly B-level or C-level) villains: Moonstone (Meteorite), Goliath (Atlas), Bettle (MACH-1), Screaming Mimi (Songbird), and Fixer (Techno), all of whom are loyal soldiers for Zemo.

As the series progressed, it became clear that this was more than a simple, one-dimensional story about a villainous plot. Zemo was so evil he was all but irredeemable, but gradually most of the other Thunderbolts began to question their own life choices. A few issues later, Busiek and Bagley introduced a new character: Hallie Takahama, a teenage girl who eagerly joined the team under the impression her teammates were legitimate heroes. Her enthusiasm and purity of heart rubbed off on many of her fellow Thunderbolts, and when the story climaxed with the revelation of Zemo’s ultimate plan for world domination they were left with a choice: follow the plan like the bad guys they had always been or betray Zemo and save the world.

What made the series to remarkable was the depth with which Busiek and Bagley portrayed so many characters who had previously been considered little more than jokes. All of a sudden, they all had pasts, motivations, hopes, fears, and internal conflict. Many of them looked at themselves and decided they liked the people they had become while posing as heroes than the criminals they had been for most of their lives. Being celebrated and respected was a heady experience for people who had always lived in the shadows of society, and they weren’t eager to give it all up.

Busiek’s focus on writing his characters as people instead of just the costumes they had always been had a lasting impact on the comic book industry. The human conflict of people who choose to risk death against overwhelming threats is echoed in modern comics, films, and animation. He and Bagley deserve a lot of credit for that, among other things they’ve achieved in their careers. I’ve loved so many other titles they’ve worked on, including Avengers, Ultimate Spider-Man, Marvels, and many more. But I’ll always remember them most fondly for what they did on Thunderbolts.

Writing Prompt #8: Come up with a mathematical formula to express something you know/believe. (Example: Long Saturday run + Frappuccino = Happiness.)

Logic + values = wisdom

“Logic, logic, logic . . . logic is the beginning of wisdom, Valeris, not the end.”

-Spock

Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991)

I’ve long argued that logic does not exist in a void. There is no such thing as pure, objective logic. Logic has to start somewhere.

In scientific fields, that starting point is relatively easy. Logic begins with observations. Sir Isaac Newton studies Johannes Kepler’s laws of planetary motion and used logic to deduce that those same laws must apply to the Moon’s orbit around the Earth and also to all objects on the Earth, such as the (possibly apocryphal) apple that fell from the tree. Jean-Francois Champollion used logic to compare the Greek text on the Rosetta Stone to the Egyptian hieroglyphics on the same stone to decipher the ancient Egyptians’ written language. Logic is a method of drawing conclusions from observations, but it always needs something to start with.

Spock’s statement at the top of the page has its roots in a Biblical passage, Proverbs 9:10, which states “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,” but its use in Star Trek VI is in many ways the opposite of its use in the Bible. The passage in Proverbs calls the reader to look to the Lord, first and foremost, for knowledge. However, in the context of the film, Spock’s use of the phrase is an admonishment to his protégé, Valeris, to regard logic as only the beginning of the path to wisdom, and to look beyond logic for further enlightenment.

Logic does not exist in a void.

Logic springs forth from observations in the scientific world, but in terms of a society, logic springs forth from values. Every society, consciously or not, makes decisions about what it values and holds dear. Every society is based on a set of beliefs, sometimes religious in nature and sometimes now.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed . . .”

-Thomas Jefferson

The Declaration of Independence (1776)

This was how Thomas Jefferson, on behalf of the brand-new United States, answered one of the most important questions of anyone’s life: “Who are you?”

The answer to that question is what we base our logic on. What we believe and what we value sets us to reach logical conclusions, but those conclusions can be wildly different from one person to the next depending on how they answer that question. There is no such thing as pure, perfect logic because there is no such thing as a pure, perfect person. That’s why it’s so important to think carefully about the decisions we make and the conclusions we reach; it’s vitally important that we reach them based on the values that are truly important to us.

The Intellectual Devotional

Because of my alcoholism, I’ve spent a lot of time over the last ten years or so among evangelical Christians. That’s because most recovery programs (the kind that don’t cost tens of thousands of dollars, anyway) rely heavily on faith rather than therapy, mostly Christianity. Say what you want about it—and there’s plenty to say—but that approach does work for some people. There are significant numbers of people out there who are searching desperately for something to believe in, something with the potential to change their lives.

Unfortunately, faith is something I’ve always struggled with. Maybe it’s because of my education or my intellectual curiosity, maybe it’s because of Star Trek and sci-fi in general, or maybe it’s because of my own stubbornness, but I’ve never been able to bring myself to wholly believe in something on faith alone, especially if it runs contrary to logic or reason. I may love my stories, my TV shows and movies, my comic books and novels, but I don’t believe in the literal reality of them. They’re metaphors, thought experiments, goals to strive for, but not actual reality. They’re something I need to reinforce every day, like someone devoted to their faith needs to reinforce their belief every day, but they’re not objective fact and they’re not always terribly well-written or conceived. (Some of them can be quite bad, in fact, and it’s important to be able to judge each individual story on its own merits, rejecting the bad ones and embracing the good ones.)

In Christian circles, daily devotionals are very popular. For those that don’t know, devotionals are typically small books containing individual entries for every day of the year. Each entry contains a brief passage from the Bible followed by a few paragraphs written by the author (usually a pastor) expanding on the day’s scripture and providing analysis. Devotionals are meant to be read one entry at a time, every day, and then prayed about by the reader with the goal of receiving true insight from God.

As someone who has never been able to fully embrace faith, I’ve never been crazy about devotionals and, when I’ve been asked questions about the day’s reading, I’ve always reflected on them from a more academic or historical perspective than a faith-based one. The Bible really does contain a great deal of historical fact, even if I do believe parts of it are embellished to a greater or lesser extent. That’s the nature of writings that have been around in one form or another for hundreds or thousands of years.

One day, in a large, chain bookstore, I came across a small book titled The Intellectual Devotional. In the upper corner of the cover, it boasted “365 DAILY LESSONS FROM THE SEVEN FIELDS OF KNOWLEDGE”. Intrigued, I picked it up and paged through it. I had never seen anything like it, but sure enough, it offered brief, daily lessons on topics like history, science, and the arts, one for every day of the year.

I ended up buying it that day, and I proceeded to read it every day just as faithfully as other people read their Christian devotionals. It was great, actually, to get a little bit of education every day and to feel like I was exercising my mind a little. I’ll admit that I also got a little bit of amusement out of reading about academic subjects that most of the other people I was with would have laughed at. I can be disagreeable like that sometimes.

But my point is that personal fulfillment comes in lots of different forms. Contrary to what some people who have you believe, there is no one, universal right answer for everyone. That’s why it’s so important to understand Who You Are, so you can then find what fulfills you and how that’s different from other people.

We can’t live anyone else’s truth. All we can do is live our own, but to do that, we have to first know what it is.

Who Are You?

My family never attended church. My father is a devout atheist and my mother is, at best, a non-practicing Catholic. The only times I remember being in a church before my thirties were weddings and funerals. Religion was an alien world to me, one that I felt little need to dip my toe in.

That’s not to say that I didn’t find ideas and philosophies that influenced me and continue to influence me to this day. They weren’t what anyone would call “books of faith” or anything like that, but they were important to me and gave me a lot to think about. They helped me find my way and establish something firm to stand on in a world where the people I knew all seemed to have conflicting beliefs and convictions, and where I had a hard time deciding who was right and who was wrong.

In 1989, I was eleven years old when I bought my first comic book and really discovered Spider-Man. Actually, if I’m being honest, my first comic book was an issue of a licensed Real Ghostbusters comic that I found at Stater Bros. while my mom was grocery shopping. I begged and pleaded for her to buy it for me, as only an eleven-year-old can, and she finally relented. I loved it, but there were only a few issues available on the spinner rack at the time, and once I finished those two or three comics I was hungry for more. Not knowing much about the other titles on display, I picked a character I at least recognized from Saturday morning cartoons. Outside of a children’s read-along book I had when I was younger, The Spectacular Spider-Man #150 was what I consider my first “real” comic book.

That started a lifelong fascination with superheroes. From Spider-Man, I learned that with great power comes great responsibility. For those who don’t know, Peter Parker at first squandered his powers trying to make a profit and looking out for himself until, one day, he refused to stop a mugger he could have easily apprehended, a mugger who shortly went on to murder his Uncle Ben. As Spider-Man, Peter vowed to never look the other way again. He realized that if it was within his ability to help, he had a responsibility to do so, especially when people couldn’t help themselves. For an eleven-year-old, that’s heavy stuff. It goes deeper than just watching people in colorful pajamas beating each other up. It’s a way of life writ large. From Spider-Man, I moved on to other comics: Thor, The Infinity Gauntlet, The Avengers, Captain America and others. I found myself mostly drawn to Marvel characters, but I also collected a lot of comics from the Denny O’Neil editorial run on the Batman titles. One of the things I learned from all those writers, artists, and characters was that the differences between us all as human beings, whether they be ethnicity, nationality, language, religion, or any number of other differences were inconsequential. What mattered was that all people are important, all people deserve the chance to live in peace, to live according to what makes them happy and what they believe, and to be protected. Most of what divides us as people is trivial in the grand scheme of things.

Then came 1990. Over the summer between 6^th and 7^th grades, I was at a family event at my aunt’s house. I’ve never been a hugely social person, so I wandered into a side room and turned on the TV. This was well before the age of hundreds of cable channels, so the channel-surfing options were limited, but it just so happened that one of the local stations was airing a rerun of the most recent Star Trek: The Next Generation episode. I had never seen it and I was barely aware of the show in general, but that afternoon I was hooked. There was something about this group of people who were very clearly an extended family and their determination to do the right thing, save their father-figure, and protect the innocent people on Earth that captured me. I spent the whole summer watching every rerun I could and awaiting the Fall premier that would wrap up the cliffhanger that ended the previous season. It was the Summer between parts one and two of “The Best of Both Worlds” and the start of my attachment to Star Trek in general. Those themes of progressiveness, inclusion, scientific curiosity, and duty have been a part of my life ever since.

A few years later, Babylon 5 premiered, and provided me with a five-year run in which the stories and themes resonated on a similar level while giving me even more to think about: media bias, faith, fascism, good and evil, order and chaos, whether we are bound to follow one of two divergent paths or whether we have the freedom and responsibility to forge a third path, our own. It was J. Michael Straczynski whose writing first taught me the two most important questions in anyone’s life. “Who are you?” and “What do you want?” It was through his work that I realized it matters what order you answer those questions. Deciding what you want is much easier than figuring out who you are, but if you decide what you want before you understand who you are you can end up going wildly off-course and finding yourself in places you never thought you would and where you never wanted to be. That’s something that happens all too often in our goal-oriented, materialistic society. Wants are much easier to define than identity.

In the years since, I’ve been exposed to a lot of religion, mostly in the form of evangelical Christianity. That’s an entirely different ball of yarn to unravel, but one thing I’ve heard over and over again is that you have to read your Bible every day, every single day, to feed your faith and maintain your identity. And they’re right. They’re absolutely right. But it’s a broader truth than even they realize. I struggle every time I stray from the things that shaped me, that I truly believe in, even if I don’t believe in the literal, factual truth of the stories. I don’t believe superheroes are literally real or that Star Trek or Babylon 5 represent our actual future. But those stories don’t have to be factual truth to have power or for the themes and ideas they represent to resonate. If I don’t constantly reinforce those ideas in myself, I start to wander and forget what shaped me. But eventually, I always come back. I always come full circle. And I’m starting to realize how important it is to stay with those ideas in some form, to keep reminding myself who I am. Because that’s the first, most important question of our existence: “Who are you?” Without that, it’s all too easy to get lost.