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Comic book masculinity and the new black superhero
African American Review, Spring, 1999 by Jeffrey A. Brown
"I told you, you changed my outlook," Lenny tells Icon as they stroll along the city's waterfront. "But now the funds ain't what they used to be, so me and my girl Susan been fighting. I found out she's seeing Caesar, down the block. He's not 'on-the-straight-and-narrow.' Of course we broke up, but . . . I don't know, man. The so-called right thing ain't so easy."
Icon tells Lenny a little about his own past experiences: opportunities lost, loves lost. "Uh-huh. What's your point?" Lenny asks. "Life on Earth is too brief to let us lick our wounds," Icon explains. "Only by confronting this sort of problem will you overcome it." "Ha! You can say that . . . you got everything going for you. I'll bet life never sneaks up on you. You told us to have faith in our abilities, but one rich man who can fly don't mean I can fly too," replies Lenny. "You know better than that," Icon responds. "There are enough hardships for each of us. I've had first hand experience. But we were discussing your abilities, and what you make of them. I can only encourage you to live up to your own potential." "Hey, I'm not going back to my old habits, if that's what you mean," a dejected Lenny says. "It's just . . . not easy . . . ya know?"
A couple of pages later we see Lenny trying to live up to his own potential. A collage superimposed over Icon's masked face shows Lenny being all he can be [ILLUSTRATION FOR FIGURE 4 OMITTED], a virtual one-page self-help manual for readers. We see Lenny resisting the lures of gang life, excelling in school, caring for younger children, developing his body in the gym, playing wholesome sports, and even helping a little old lady with her groceries. "It ain't easy," Lenny narrates over the following pages. "Here I am, an upstanding, Icon inspired, strong black man . . . but staying on the right track helps keep my mind off my problems." Eventually, Lenny is applauded as a hero when he helps Icon and Rocket save a little girl trapped in a burning building.
Back along the waterfront, Icon tells Lenny, "I'm proud of the way you've been handling yourself. Your community is looking up to you . . . for all the right reasons. I wouldn't hesitate to say that you are something of an 'Icon' yourself." "Listen, I got a date with a new lady," Lenny says. "So all I wanted to say was . . . thanks for being there." "You deserve all the credit," Icon smiles as he shakes Lenny's hand. Lenny smiles proudly. "Be good, brother."
Despite the fact that Milestone's founders have discussed their preference for avoiding the "ABC Wednesday After School Special" type of preachiness in their comic books, Icon stories such as the one recounted above veer dangerously close to this pattern. Other issues of Icon have dealt just as directly with issues of social responsibility, from a child's hero worship to teenage pregnancy. That these stories can be fully recognized by many fans as "a little preachy sometimes" but still enjoyed is the strength of the Milestone books. I do not want to suggest here that the Milestone message is incredibly well-concealed propaganda that serves a specific agenda; rather, I believe that it forthrightly admits - and is recurringly interpreted as - an alternative to the traditional patriarchal masculine norm that has recently, in other comics and other media, become increasingly skewed toward absurd heights of hypermasculinity. That these books also so consciously use black heroes as simultaneously masculine and thoughtful characters further emphasizes the novel reconstruction of masculinity and ethnic identity based on less traditional notions of gender roles and limiting racial stereotypes.
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