Brother Power started out as a dummy left in an abandoned tailor shop inhabited by a bunch of shiftless hippies
March 15, 2006 1:13 PM   Subscribe

It's 1968. Hippies are everywhere, and they're reading underground comics. Your name is Joe Simon. You want to create a mainstream comic book with a hippie as a hero. What do you come up with? Brother Power the Geek.

It only lasted two issues. Of course, it did a little better than the Black Bomber, a white bigot who sometimes turned into an African-American superhero. That comic was never printed.
posted by Astro Zombie (12 comments total)
 
That's awesome Astro Zombie. I've never heard of the Black Bomber before, but it looks awesome. We need Black Bomber today!
posted by dios at 1:21 PM on March 15, 2006


I loved Prez's appearance in The Sandman.
posted by sonofsamiam at 1:23 PM on March 15, 2006


Oh man...

"Chapter One: A Thing Is Born"
posted by sonofsamiam at 1:31 PM on March 15, 2006


I highly recommend this writeup of Prez.
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:41 PM on March 15, 2006


The Prez and Brothers Power should fight.
posted by Astro Zombie at 1:44 PM on March 15, 2006


I associate Brother Power with Ambush Bug for some reason. There must have been a joke about him in there somewhere.
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 1:44 PM on March 15, 2006


"Nick Cranston as Paul.
Paul Cymbalist as Nick"

Awesome.
posted by Balisong at 2:01 PM on March 15, 2006


I can understand the reasoning behind not wanting the first black superhero in the DC lineup to be so...complex. But I think it sounds like a really interesting character, honestly.

[...] risks his own life to save another person whom he can't see clearly [...] and then reacts in racial slur disgust when he discovers that he risked his life to save a black person. He wasn't aware that he had two identities, but each identity had a girlfriend and the ladies were aware of the change.

Sounds a whole more interesting that the usual secret identity stuff...secret only to the character himself, who'd *hate* his hero persona if he knew about it. Rad!
posted by freebird at 2:02 PM on March 15, 2006


I remember reading about the Prez and Brother Power in the Sandman series (I especially liked the legend of the Prez story) and wondering where they had come from. I read a little bit about the Prez, but knew nothing else. Thanks for the background, Astro Zombie.
posted by jmhodges at 5:14 PM on March 15, 2006


Black Bomber sounds fascinating. Great character, as long as he ditches the basketball uniform.
posted by brundlefly at 8:41 PM on March 15, 2006


Time to pitch Vertigo an updated Black Bomber series...
posted by Dreamghost at 5:13 AM on March 16, 2006


Back when I was being a comics journalist in the early 90s, I had a bit of a bug for DC's forgotten heroes. Had both issues of Brother Power, the whole series of Prez, three original issues of Rex the Wonder Dog -- those were a hound to find -- plus Angel and the Ape and several others. Never got into the Marvel equivalents, apart from US1 the bionic trucker. The DC stuff was always more deeply weird and always, even when truly bad (lookin' at you, Prez) had a streak, a glimmer of genius.
posted by Hogshead at 2:59 PM on March 20, 2006


« Older cd c:\wolf3d\   |   popular artists Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments