The Redemption of Miriam Sharp? Fear Itself - The Homefront #2

[icon_uk]

I found these uninked, unlettered pages from "Fear Itself - The Homefront" over at Mike Mayhew's CAF page and thought it'd be interesting to share them. Besides I LOVE seeing pencil art.

A new team of villains, who look like some sort of revamp of the Force of Nature, or at least some form of elemental loons (I don't recognise them, but that might be Whirlwind leading them, and one of them might be the Living Laser) arrive in Sanford and start laying waste to anyone who gets in their way. It's a rather blatant murder-fest, and given their powers, no one dies easy...

Robbie Baldwin, being the upstanding guy he is, switches to Speedball in front of Miriam Sharp and goes out to confront them. Given their powers include fire, ice, lightning bolts, lasers (Is that Living Laser?) and superspeed spinning, he does well against them, up to a point, but when they all attack at once...



Oh that's nice, some good Samaritans come to assist the exhausted hero who just saved their asses...

Oh wait, of course they're not, these guys are MU civilians, and so decide to take revenge on Speedball for the criminal act of Nitro... but I'd rather not go down that rant-laden path again on a Friday evening...

After some minor beating the crap out of him whilst he's down (I'm guessing he used up his power reserves fighting the bad guys) they decide to move on to the next step, a bit of lynching....

Now given Speedball's powers, ways to kill him aren't easy to come by, since most forms of assault require kinetic energy and his powers tend to trigger if enough energy to harm him comes into contact with him. Clearly though, these guys have been pondering how best to murder him should the chance arise, which is a deeply bloody disturbing thought.



Speaking personally, deliberate asphyxiation would be one of the most horrible ways to go I can imagine.... Looks like Robbie agrees.



Mr Generic Angry Faces 1 2 and 3 are enjoying themselves a little too much, and then....



Now I'm not a fan of the character for the most part, but damn if that ain't a badass way to make an entrance.

I'm hoping this is her coming to realise that Speedball is NOT the embodiment of all evil that she's been presuming him to be all along, and that trying to save strangers from being murdered is actually kind of a noble and admirable thing, especially since, in her own way, that's just what she's doing here herself!

Comments

[arilou_skiff]

I think it actually touches on a really interesting problem for superhero stories: All our institutions are based on the fact that, despite what some might say, *people are mostly the same*.

That is, our capabilities are *relatively* similar, difference in power largely comes due to difference in organization and position rather than difference in any inherent quality of the person per se. That's the basis of not only democracy but pretty much any other system of government too.

Superhuman beings (not perhaps Spider-Man, but someone like Superman, Charles Xavier or whatever) would totally throw this equation out of the window.

[baxter2814]

I know, which is part of the reason why I find human society in superhero comics fascinating. So many superheroes are people who are completely devoted to humans, feel human, grew up human, consider earth their home, are absolutely loyal to humanity, and would be human without their powers, but are undeniably "extra"-human and the only things keeping them in check are a) other superheroes, and b) the fact that they feel they belong in human society, so much so that they will endue keeping a secret identity in order to maintain a normal human life. You can't compare it to anything else in human history, and it's just so cool to me (especially as I'm a big history/politics/sociology geek).

[arilou_skiff]

The thing is, in a situation like that I don't find it at all strange that people would try to find ways of levelling the playing field (humans aren't exactly known for taking challenges like that lying down)

And remember, if they know that superheroes care about what people think of them, that is a lever: Something that can be exploited.

[baxter2814]

And superheroes are perfectly willing to help humans find ways to level the playing field, (they don't want humans to be completely dependent on them, and I know that Superman at least has helped with scientific experiments) except when it's more likely that the Luthors and Osborns will co opt it for their own gain. So many nice catch-22's that box the characters into sticking to a reader-friendly status quo ;D