Our Gods Wear Spandex (16 page)

All superheroes are essentially savior figures. Unlike religious saviors, however, superheroes offer salvation as a tangible, unambiguous event. They exist, quite simply, to save others from physical danger—which explains their enduring appeal. Tales of their exploits address real anxiety and satisfy a deep need. The childhood need for a father or big brother to shield us from harm and solve our problems is an impulse we all feel. That is why superheroes traditionally enjoy greater popularity—with children
and
adults—in times of national stress. Children are remarkably sensitive to existential threats and they often internalize their parent's anxieties. And adults often feel as vulnerable as children when confronting the fear of war or economic hardship.

Young children have a magical worldview. Because they don't understand the physical processes of the everyday world, they tend to perceive their environment
as supernatural. This is true even in older children, though many may deny it if pressed. Because superheroes were originally aimed at an audience of children, they are all essentially
magical
, with no basis in science or ordinary reality. Even if heroes like Spider-Man or Green Lantern draw their powers from technology, the actual scientific explanation for those powers is simply window dressing. If you are bitten by a radioactive spider, chances are good you'll get a horrible rash, go into toxic shock, and then die—not wake up the next morning and start climbing up walls. Themes of mutants, androids, and cyborgs speak to social and spiritual impulses, not science.

As America struggled to emerge from the Great Depression, the symbols and stories of the old gods reentered American culture. In the comic books, these gods and heroes of antiquity truly came alive and helped inspire America to regain its strength. This return of the old gods collided head-on with huge leaps forward in science and technology. At the same time, genetics prompted scientists to ponder the possibility of improving the race through genetic manipulation. Credible ideas about space travel were propounded to a public many of whom still believed there was intelligent life on Mars and Venus. Science, philosophy, religion, and the occult all merged in a general yearning to overcome intractable human problems and improve mankind's future.

This yearning also had a dark side, however, that manifested in ethnocentric politics, racial hatred, and fascism. These dark impulses turned the occult striving toward the “New Man” into murderous political movements that, unfortunately, claimed justification from the same texts that gave rise to the modern superhero. The parallels have not gone unnoticed and some social critics today feel that the superhero myth is irredeemably fascist.

It was this yearning that inspired the young writers who created the superheroes from antecedents in the pulps, mythology, religion, and folktales. In fact, most superhero figures fall into a handful of archetypal categories drawn from origins in the ancient mysteries.

Wizard archetypes are as old as fiction itself. Thoth, Egyptian lunar god and patron of magic and science, was perhaps the first Wizard archetype. Thoth
was also the patron deity of Aleister Crowley's
magnum opus
on the Tarot, which he called
The Book of Thoth
. The melding of Thoth and his Greek counterpart Hermes gave the world Hermes Trismegistus, Thrice-Great Hermes, the patron of all magical arts and sciences in the pagan world. This tradition, known simply as Hermeticism, was powerful and influential enough to survive centuries of brutal and bloody suppression by the Catholic Church and enjoy a revival among the alchemists of the Middle Ages, who saw themselves as heirs to the Hermetic tradition.

Few people realize, however, that explicitly magical characters are actually the earliest examples of modern superheroes. In fact, it can be argued that all superheroes are essentially magical, since most of their powers have no basis in real science. Early superheroes like Captain Marvel, Phantasmo, and Green Lantern were unambiguously magical in origin, drawing on themes taken directly from the pulps.

Wizards functioned as shamans and medicine men, teachers and priests, and often as chieftains in ancient tribal societies. Three of the most famous sorcerers in Western culture are the Three Wise Men, from the Gospel of Matthew. These magi were Zoroastrian astrologers said to have prophesied the coming of Christ, whom they found in the manger at Bethlehem. The most famous sorcerer of all time, however, is Merlin, the mage from the King Arthur myths.

Merlin is usually portrayed as the wise wizard of Uther Pendragon's court who raises and tutors young Arthur to be King of the Britons. Many of the Arthurian romances are told from Merlin's point of view, and Merlin seems to be the archetype for both Gandalf the White in J.R.R. Tolkien's
Lord of the Rings
trilogy and Obi-Wan Kenobi in the
Star Wars
dramas. A less-acknowledged inheritor of Merlin's mantle is Q, the master of technological wonders in the James Bond films, whose role is very much like that of Merlin in the Arthurian tales—a scolding paternal figure who is also the source of the ingenious tricks and gadgets that regularly save the day. Likewise, Obi-Wan Kenobi can be seen as a Christlike, sci-fi Merlin who sacrifices himself to save Luke and Leia and their companions. Obi-Wan and Q (like Gandalf) are both members of a brotherhood—in Obi-Wan's case, the suppressed Jedi, in Q's, the Secret Service.

Of course, the most popular magus today is Harry Potter, created by J. K. Rowling. In a time when most children can't be bothered to read anything, Rowling
has created a series of runaway bestsellers devoured by millions of young readers the world over. Sociologists have wasted volumes trying to explain Harry Potter's unprecedented success, when they need not have looked far at all. The answer lies in the hearts and imaginations of all insecure young children (and adults) who want to believe that they—like Harry, Ron, and Hermione—have latent magical powers that can help them negotiate the horrors of adolescence (and life). And as we'll see later, Harry has a direct ancestor in the comics.

The character generally seen as the comics' first superhero is Mandrake the Magician. Created by Lee Falk in 1924, Mandrake didn't find his way into the funny pages until a decade later. True to form, Mandrake studied with ascended masters in Tibet, and returned to the West to ply his trade as a stage performer. Along the way, he picked up a sidekick named Lothar, an African prince who acted as Mandrake's personal bodyguard, and is generally acknowledged as the first heroic black character in American comic strips.

In his early adventures, Mandrake is an occult magician who uses hypnotic suggestion to convince others he is a true conjurer. Falk incorporated many interesting occult themes into his storylines. Mandrake fights a death cult in 1935 in
Kingdom of Murderers
, and masters the arcane art of inter-dimensional travel a year later in
Mandrake in the X Dimension
. In
Mandrake on the Moon
(1938), the magician discovers that the ancient Atlanteans escaped and built a new civilization of domed cities on the dark side of the Moon. Starting in 1939, Mandrake strips were reprinted in magazine format in
Magic Comics
. Mandrake never hit the big time outside the funny pages, however, despite attempts at a movie serial (1939), a radio program (1940), a TV series (1954), a TV movie (1979), and a TV cartoon (1986).

Mandrake did, however, inspire a whole host of warlocks in both comics and the strips. The first costumed character that can be definitively called a superhero is the Phantom Magician, who first appeared in Mel Graff's syndicated comic strip
The Adventures of Patsy
in 1935. As comics historian Dick O' Donnell notes, the Phantom Magician “was clad in the outfit of tights, cape, and domino mask favored by so many later adventure heroes, including the Phantom and Superman
and Batman.”
⁹⁸
Although Phantom Magician appeared in only one
Patsy
story-line, he caught the attention of
Mandrake
creator Lee Falk, whose next hero also donned a mask and costume.

Another supermagus character inspired by Mandrake is DC Comic's Zatara, created by Fred Guardineer. Like Superman, Zatara premiered in the first issue of
Action Comics
. DC seemed to have high hopes for Zatara and allowed him to push Superman off the cover of
Action
for several issues. Like Mandrake, Zatara is essentially a hypnotist who casts spells by gniklat drawkcab.
⁹⁹
He vanished in a puff of smoke in 1950, replaced by his sexy, scantily-clad daughter, Zatanna. Perhaps seeking favor with some dark god, writer Alan Moore ritually sacrificed Zatara in the pages of
Swamp Thing
#50 in 1986.

Possibly the first female superhero to pop up in the funny pages is Fantomah, Mystery Woman of the Jungle. Created by Barclay Flagg, Fantomah first appeared in Fiction House's
Jungle Comics
#2 in 1940. Like so many other characters, Fantomah acquired her magical powers through a previous incarnation in ancient Egypt. She was a shape-shifter whose favorite trick was to transform herself into a blonde-haired, skull-headed freak when danger threatened. Apparently, Fantomah's readers felt threatened by this disconcerting and ugly metamorphosis, because she later morphed into a more sexy, kittenish character. Nonetheless, she is true to the type in that magic and the occult are crucial to her status as superhero.

Perhaps the clearest progenitor of the modern superhero is Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster's mystic hero, Doctor Occult, who first premiered in
New Fun
#6 in 1935. Doctor Occult started out as a traditional ghost detective, but underwent a startling transformation in 1936. As historian Les Daniels notes, the Doctor “developed immense strength and began flying around in a red and blue outfit.
He thus served as a prototype for the unpublished Superman.”
¹⁰⁰
For some reason, Siegel and Shuster later changed his name to the less-objectionable “Doctor Mystic.”

Here, then, is our missing link in the evolution from Theosophy and the Golden Dawn to Spider-Man and the Flash. In
The Comic Book Book
, Dick O'Donnell unequivocally declares that “students of the history of comics must regard the Occult-Mystic figure as a definite prototype of Superman, performing many of the feats Superman later performed, but doing so by supernatural rather than superscientific means.”
¹⁰¹
It is highly significant that the character who becomes the definitive archetype of the modern superhero is brought into the world by the same men who created the obscure “Doctor Occult,” and that Superman bears such a strong, if unacknowledged, resemblance to his mystical progenitor. In point of fact, the name of Superman's home planet, “Krypton,” stems from the Greek word
kryptos
meaning ‘hidden’ or ‘secret.’ The Latin translation of
kryptos
is “occult.”