Project Superhero

by E. Paul Zehr

  * Sounds like a cool name. Red is a kicking color and tornadoes are powerful!

  * Sounds like an inspirational first-ever female comic book superhero!

  * Sounds like it might be too good to be true!

  Yes, before I got a chance to see Red Tornado, it SOUNDED like all kinds of good. Then I learned that Red was originally Abigail Mathilda Hunkel who debuted in the same comic title (but issue #3) in June 1939. She was pretty mobile and moved pretty quickly and powerfully — thus the Tornado name — but her costume was kind of lame.

  Her costume was basically a long underwear onesie. Red, of course, not that the name “Red Tornado” was a giveaway or anything.

  The best of the worst (or the least worst of the worst?) was . . . I am actually having a hard time writing this without giggling. OK. Phew. I stopped. Big breath. Better.

  The worst part was that she wore a cooking pot on her head. AS A HELMET. The cooking pot had eyeholes, of course. So that modification for sure made it better. (Sarcasm.)

  I can imagine the bad dudes talking among themselves. “Hey, that superhero has a cooking pot on her head. Easy peasy. I think we can do whatever criminal thing we want now.”

  But then they really look at the cooking pot and say, “Wait a minute, there are eyeholes in the pot! We had better be careful after all, she seems to have the power of sight.”

  Great.

  And her preferred nickname was “Ma.” Doesn’t exactly strike fear into the hearts of criminals (unless you’re afraid of your mother?). But, despite the downside of that bit of comic-book history, there are actually some pretty powerful women superheroes. Wonder Woman, Invisible Girl from Fantastic Four, Storm and Rogue from X-Men.

  Which brings up a question. There are lots of women on that team but they are still X-MEN — what is up with that? X-People does sound weird, I guess. Why not Team X or the X-treme Team. How come nobody ever asks me for ideas? No, seriously. That’s a real question, diary!

  Then there’s Black Canary from Birds of Prey (very cool name), Elektra, Power Girl, and Huntress. Ricki also mentioned Zatanna. Who has cool sorcery powers, but I am kind of not so much into “magical intervention” when it comes to superheroes. So Zatanna is definitely out for my project.

  After looking over all the contenders, surfing the web for random (and often finding really weird) commentary and fan factoids, and then bouncing some ideas off Ricki, I came up with my top 6.

  I was originally shooting for a top 5 but failed. Since this is my list though, I can have six if I want. The Spectacular Six . . . No! The SUPER SIX . . .

  Number 6: Wonder Woman

  She is mega-powerful and Ricki says Wonder Woman is only just slightly behind Superman in strength. She is a good fighter — Wonder Woman is a “Warrior Princess of the Amazon” after all — and can take a lot of fighting action without getting injured. It would be way cool to be Wonder Woman. EXCEPT she was born in a fictional Amazonian place called Paradise Island. Which is a bizarre reason to have superpowers, actually. Also, she has a WAY over the top outfit. Or under the top actually. Or a very sketchy top on top. My dad would so not approve. The boots are okay, but the shorts and top need work. As in, doing some work to get rid of them. Completely.  Seriously, who goes to a fight wearing a bathing suit? OK. Aquaman does. And so does Namor the Sub-Mariner. But they literally live in the ocean, so that makes sense. My main reason for saying no to Wonder Woman comes down to her powers basically being magical. In comics, I like it when the superheroes have to use their wits and skills to get out of trouble instead of just waving their wands (or magic lasso).

  Number 5: Invisible Girl from Fantastic Four

  Very cool. She can be, well, invisible. And put forcefields around stuff. Which is pretty neat. She got her powers from a big jolt of “cosmic radiation” while on a space mission. Well, the cosmic radiation thing doesn’t make sense . . . Shouldn’t all stewardesses have superpowers then? And every astronaut ever? Too bad. She has a rocking blue jumpsuit that I quite like!

  Number 4: Storm from X-Men (I won’t go off on the problem with this team name again)

  Very clever and tricky, Storm can control the weather. Why can she control the weather? Instead of a reason I can work with, well, this is where it all goes sadly wrong. Storm can control the weather because she was born in Africa and got some African sorceress powers along with her cleverness and stylish fashion sense. SIGH. Storm comes down to sorcery and magic like Wonder Woman. Plus, no matter how upset I have been in my life (and it must be mentioned that Mom has asked me to turn down the drama on occasion . . . OK, perhaps on a few occasions), I have never created any actual tornadoes. Not even despite my best (worst?) efforts a small hailstorm. And I certainly can’t TURN OFF the rain we get here during our Pacific Northwest fall.

  Number 3: Black Canary from Birds of Prey

  Unlike X-Men, I like the name Birds of Prey. A lot. Canary’s an awesome fighter. She also has a supersonic scream that can knock things down. As in flatten them like a shockwave from a bomb going off does. She got her scream from radiation or something back in the 1940s. They really had a thing for radiation in those days. Good thing they didn’t have microwave ovens back then. Everybody would be some kind of radiation superhero. Sadly I have to admit that the supersonic scream thing is a bit silly. I mean, even if she could have that scream, how come her head doesn’t explode? OK. OK. Yes, yes, yes, I know it’s a comic book. Fiction. But I notice this stuff! And I just looked it up in the GUINNESS BOOK OF WORLD RECORDS: in 2000 Jill Drake had the loudest scream recorded at 129 decibels. That’s almost as loud as a jet engine! But not loud enough to knock anybody over. Ugh. Four down and only two left to go. The field is narrowing.

  Number 2: Elektra

  Elektra really looked promising. She is a mega-skilled martial artist just like my Auntie G! And she has a cool red outfit. Elektra does, I mean, not my Auntie! AND she began training while she was barely a teen. She’d be a good female superhero role model to think about. If we stopped right here. But . . . Ding. Ding. Ding. Uh oh, are those alarm bells? Unfortunately, Elektra has this really bad habit of killing people. A lot of people. A ridiculously large number of people. And she kills them often. (Not the same people, of course, different people each time.) Elektra is basically an assassin. A very, very good assassin. And that isn’t Auntie G approved (thankfully). And that isn’t what I am looking for (also thankfully). So I am down to one more on my short list.

  Number 1: Batgirl

  Batgirl’s an awesome fighter. She is super well trained in acrobatics, gymnastics, and martial arts. She also got lots of training tips from Batman. Talk about training with the best! As part of the Bat-Family, Batgirl also has the same ethical code as Batman. No killing! She is also way smart. Ricki says in some versions Batgirl even has a doctorate — just like Mom! She is the most realistic superhero worth trying to be that I am likely to find. So, Batgirl it is. ☺

  This could get intense. Being my detail-oriented self, I’ll start with what I know. Also, my inner journalist-in-training always has lots of questions that need asking. Or, I should say, my inner journalist always wants answers to questions I ask!

  My dad’s the one who always says that I’m a little bit ­detail-oriented. He says he’s glad I “can see the forest and the trees,” but sometimes I do wind up “chewing on the bark.” Eww, Dad, really? My dad needs to get outside LESS.

  But he actually may have a point there. I’m pretty sure my grade 5 class presentation on ALICE IN WONDERLAND wasn’t necessarily helped by the 15 minutes I spent outlining the kinds of trees she would have come across. But I NEEDED TO KNOW, and I thought my classmates did too.

  I’m curious. I need to know stuff. I ask questions. (Can we say scientist?) I get answers. (Can we say journalist?) It’s who I am. (Can we say cool cat?) It’s my style.

  So there.

  Now to think about
all things Batgirl! I have so many questions. As Alice would say, I’m “curiouser and curiouser.”

  TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30

  For the whole time I’ve known her, Audrey has always liked building and making inventions and gizmos. What used to be wooden blocks in pre-school have now become ultra-funky engineering circuits. For Audrey, what’s truly amazing is what you can do with technology, and what she can do is make some crazy robots.

  Audrey has made some major stuff with her circuits! You can program her little robots to do all sorts of amazing things. She made a kind of plate-holder-with-wheels robot that would take her empty snack plate and cup from her room all the way to the kitchen.

  Of course, she still had to go into the kitchen and put the plate and cup into the dishwasher. But — and this is pretty important — she did it LATER. When she felt like it. So there.

  If only we could harness Audrey’s powers for the true forces of good! Like putting MY dishes away. Or my laundry. Or both actually . . . and maybe it could do some of my math homework for me. Come here, little robot, come on now, I’ve got some algebra for you. It won’t hurt you at all . . .

  Anyway, I let Audrey in on my plan today.

  Me: “So, I am going to be a girl superhero. And then I’m going to beat Dylan. I’m going to actually try and do some of the training myself. It will be awesome!”

  Audrey: “OK. Cool! But don’t you think this is getting a little personal already? It’s just Dylan after all.”

  Me: “No, after that Billie Jean King throwdown, he’s got this coming. And maybe it is personal. Dylan’s superpower is clearly to annoy me. He’s like some kind of annoying kryptonite to my supergirl-ness.”

  Audrey: “I don’t know why you’re making more work for yourself. We already have so many projects!”

  Me (kind of mumbling and trailing off): “. . . the training and research will help me prepare for the Slam.”

  Audrey: “I’ve decided I’m going with a superhero I could make.”

  Me: “Um, please tell me you don’t mean ‘make’ as in Frankenstein or some other kind of zombie apocalypse reject?”

  Audrey: “Interesting, but no. ‘Make’ as in make a robot suit of armor. ‘Make,’ like, as in robots and machines — did I hear someone say Iron Man? Or maybe Iron Woman? But instead of an Iron Man suit for fighting the good fight, mine will be for helping people. For my bonus marks in Science, I’m going to sketch out plans for a real armored exoskeleton.”

  She then went on to describe her exoskeleton design as a kind of “power pack for people” (her lingo). I think this is probably what happens when your mom is an engineer.

  Her “people power pack” or “the big P3” (my lingo) idea is actually pretty amazing. Audrey got the idea when we were watching a TV show where a guy got robot legs to help him walk. Audrey looked it up and you can actually buy those legs. If you have enough money.

  It is way expensive. Like $100,000. Which is apparently quite an awful lot of money. I just worked out that I could buy almost 35,000 comics with that amount of cash. I could just sit and read in my room forever!

  The thing is, Audrey wants to help people. She’s considerate and compassionate like that. She thinks she can make robot legs a lot cheaper and then more people could use them.

  Despite her being awesome though, we don’t completely agree here on this issue of making a superhero.

  I think training and enhancing your innate abilities is the way to go. Hello, Batgirl. Audrey argued that the only way to true superhero-ness (or superhero-dom, or superhero-ocity; we couldn’t decide which word is correct) was through technology. “Technology triumphs over training,” she said.

  Audrey even said she’d prove it to me one day. She dreams of building a full-on Iron Man exoskeleton to help people who can’t move very well. While I am totally in favor of helping people, I think it’s more important to be able to help yourself. By doing push-ups.

  So the Jessie-Audrey Superhero Battle Royale is on. Winner gets bragging rights and the loser . . . well, we didn’t really come up with anything opposite for that. So I guess the loser gets not bragging rights. We will have to come up with something to spice this up.

  We’ll see who (me) is right in June! I’m not even a superhero yet and already I’ve got so many battles to fight! Bring it on.

  But before then, I’ve got a lot of work ahead of me. I need a real plan here for some first-hand Batgirl training!

  WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 8

  My little exploration of the real life of Batgirl means my list of superhero skills and abilities includes some very specific physical training.

  To experience real Batgirl training, I need to learn:

  * Martial arts

  - Punching and kicking

  - Throwing

  - Using martial arts weapons, like sticks

  - Falling (and getting up)

  * Running

  * Jumping

  * Gymnastics

  - Acrobatics

  - Leaping

  - Climbing

  * Detective stuff

  Looking over my list, falling seems quite important. Actually, getting up again seems the most important bit. The good news is, I sure have loads of experience in falling (and getting right back up) from all those hours of figure skating! Of course, I was only falling by myself after another failed attempt at an axel, not being thrown by somebody. But those are just details, really, right?

  Batgirl also tends to rip around on a motorcycle. Technically that should be on the list too. But I am going to pass on that seeing as how I don’t have a driver’s license. Or a motorcycle. Yet.

  The Bat-Family is also super smart. And they almost always use brains instead of fighting. So Mom would definitely approve of anything that involves using brains over fists! To figure out my plan, I still need more info. That means reading some more comic books, surfing the internet a bit, and chatting with Ricki.

  Dad says Auntie G has been doing karate since “Santa Claus was a young boy.” Which is supposed to mean a long time, I guess. I wish Dad would just come right out and say exactly what he means sometimes!

  Anyway, she was doing karate (empty hand fighting) and kobujutsu (fighting with weapons) way before she even had an email address! Back in the time of the dinosaurs. She loved it when I told her that. Not really, she didn’t. But I’m her ­favorite (OK, oldest) niece so I can get away with some things. I admitted she was way younger than 65 million years old, back when the dinosaurs all died out!

  Funny story about Auntie G and that email thing. Back when I was 10, I was begging all the time for an email address. I wanted one and wanted it now. This went on for weeks and months.

  It came up again one day Auntie G was over. She’s a graphic artist and got me into sketching and art. We share a lot of interests and she is usually on my side for things. She’s an auntie, after all! So I shouted, “I should get an email address at the same age as Auntie G did!”

  Immediately Mom and Dad said “OK, sounds good.” I should have realized something strange was going on, but I plunged on. I was expecting something like her getting an email address at age nine or 10. Or even 11. Some reasonable age.

  Nope! It turns out it was when she was 27! She is way OLD. Then they told me some stuff about how the internet wasn’t even invented when she was a kid!

  After that I didn’t dare ask how old she was when she got her first cell phone . . . or how big it was. Too funny!

  But it also really hit me that Auntie G has been training for SO LONG. Auntie G’s got awesome skills from all those years of training. How far can I get in only a few months?

  MONDAY, OCTOBER 20

  Today I’m still feeling kind of sore from all the punching, kicking, and falling down practice I did with Auntie G on Saturday. She is very agile and a really good teache
r. She is really tricky, actually, when she moves. When I tried to punch towards her, it was kind of like she disappeared and then reappeared ready to do something!

  Then Sunday’s rock climbing was very cool. Audrey is a total little monkey. They had a bell at the top of one of the climbing courses. You’re supposed to ring it when you get up to the top. So there Audrey and I were, getting ready. You have to put on a safety harness and clip rope and a spotter runs the rope while you climb up the wall.

  I finished all my clipping and tightening and I was right beside Audrey. Or so I thought. Somebody didn’t wait for me.

  Me (looking at my own harness and thinking my friend was still there): “OK, Audie. Let’s do it.”

  Me (turning to look around where Audrey was supposed to be): “Audrey?”

  Sound from above: “Ding ding ding.”

  So I looked up and saw this crazy girl laughing her head off up at the top already. It was like something out of a cartoon. Audrey shot up the wall and rang the bell before I had even grabbed one of the “rocks” on the indoor climbing wall.

  I am not sure if there is a “climbing gene,” but if there is one, Audrey would explain the 95% genetic DNA overlap we have with chimpanzees.

  It was really great that Audrey could meet up with me. I’ve been missing Audrey. She’s been MIA lately. She was away from school last week and kind of off the grid. Her sister Melissa’s been super tired lately and lots has been going on. She has had a bunch of blood tests and medical things done. Her whole family is really worried about her.

  Audrey said today that they finally figured out Melissa has depression. Melissa’s doing okay and Audrey’s family is super supportive — they are all (almost) as cool as she is. It’s been hard for everybody but they are getting through things.