Stephen Mayer: Sidekicks (the teenaged kind, not the Jonathan Brandis and Chuck Norris taking down asthma and Joe Piscopo, respectively, variety) are one of the oldest elements of the superhero tradition, but aside from Damian on the Boy Wonder, they're almost absent from modern mainstream comics.
Just from checking out his piece above, you can tell Cliff Chiang digs 'em.
In the broadest sense, what's the deal?
Gregg Schigiel: Well, the first deal is that technically, Mary Marvel's a sidekick in the sadly-soon-to-conclude MAGIC OF SHAZAM series.
But technicalities aside, I'd say the absence of sidekicks in modern mainstream comics is another...symptom's the wrong word...effect of the past 10 to 20 years of “comics aren't for kids” rhetoric.
It's a drum I/we've banged a lot in these conversations, but in so many ways so many of these subjects track back to that idea.
There's been, over the years, the tendency to downplay those things that one could perceive as childish, adolescent, or not sufficiently mature. Sidekicks fall under that umbrella (as do thought balloons, colorful costumes, and unrealistic morality, etc.).
And this shying away from sidekicks comes from an old idea. You say sidekick and you think, sure, Robin, but also of Bucky, Speedy, Kid Flash, Aqualad...all very chipper, excitable young helpers. You yourself define sidekick as “the teenage kind”. But couldn't you say in many ways Falcon has been a sidekick to Captain America? Tonto to the Lone Ranger? Chewbacca to Han Solo?
On top of that you have “adult ideas” that otherwise mar the sidekick, especially teen variety, ideal. From Wertham's assertions of homosexual subtext in the Batman & Robin relationship to the Catholic priest scandals that have cast a shadow on any circumstance involving an adult male of authority and a younger ward, if you will.
That's a lot of stuff to overcome, sadly.
I get the impression you're looking to champion the sidekick concept, or at the very least are a fan of the idea?
Stephen: I'm definitely a fan of the idea.
I would say that the success of TINY TITANS, even thought it's an all-ages title book, at least partially can be attributed to the desire of folks both young and old to see those characters in a classic, more wholesome form. Raph's cousins were in the shop the other day and they were using the Alex Ross DC: SECRET ORIGINS posters that we have to name all of the characters' sidekicks and their secret identities.
It's depressing what they would get if they opened a current, Earth 0 DC comic. Arsenal beating his girlfriend with an extension cord, having sex with her, getting high and killing some hobos in one issue. Damian Wayne trying to kill Tim Drake. Tempest as a Black Lantern. Terra as a Black Lantern. etc. etc. etc.
Just exerting my preferences, but I think that Marvel has been much more kind to their sidekicks. Rick Jones is revered by pretty much every hero in the Marvel U. and they haven't even seen the end of his involvement in AVENGERS FOREVER or INCREDIBLE HULK: FUTURE IMPERFECT! Where is that guy right now, anyhow?
I didn't really count any of the adult pairings that you mentioned as being "hero and sidekick" because I don't think, and here's getting way out there, they would consider themselves in that category one way or the other. Cap and Falcon share a mutual trust and respect for one another that I don't think is present in the more adult/adolescent relationships.
Gregg: If I'm not mistaken, Rick Jones is the Blue Abomination in the Hulk books, right? At least, that's what I remember from when I read the first few issues of the Red Hulk storyline. It's entirely possible that's no longer the case as I've not kept up.
And to be fair, Terra was never a particularly good character, ethically and behaviorally (which isn't to say she's not a good character, as a character in a story).
But yes, it's no longer news that there's a wide berth between what's in the “kids” comics and what in “real” comics.
And I'd like to think Batman and Robin or Flash and Kid Flash shared mutual trust and respect, if only because in the heat of battle you better trust and respect the person you've got by your side, regardless of age.
But like I said, for the purposes of this discussion we'll stick to teen/adolescent sidekicks.
Stephen: It has been nice to see some of those classic duos develop from the latter to the former (I hope I used that phrase correctly, it has always confused me). The main ones that come to mind are Kitty and Wolverine, Dick Grayson and Bruce Wayne.
Wolverine has had for the majority of his superheroing career a sidekick, be it Kitty or Jubilee in the 90s or most recently Armor in ASTONISHING and Pixie in UNCANNY. Why are these characters always female and why does Wolverine, the mutant that's the best he is at what he does, need them?
To that end why does Wolverine need to be a member of nearly every superhero group or team in the Marvel Universe?
Gregg: I'd say those young, female sidekicks, at least in the forms of Kitty and Jubilee, served the function of showing us the human side of Wolverine, who, more classically, constantly struggled with the animal/berserker inside of him. He was loathe to let rip lest he lose control...and these relatively innocent sidekicks were a way to keep him in check...and gave him something immediate to care about. But again, this was when he was a big time loner. Seems he's changed over the years.
The best person, really, to ask would be Chris Claremont, who's the man behind both of those dynamics. My theories as to why are just that, theories, and he could have been going for something else entirely.
I haven't read these more recent stories, so I can't speak to them.
I do know at one point I questioned it and thought it odd that he was always pairing up with teenaged girls. I even had that as a joke in my never-to-be-published Starfox humor one-shot. I also wondered how it was that no villain ever used that against him...use a teenage girl to get close and then execute some fatal blow or something (in as much as Wolverine could be dealt a fatal blow).
How have the examples you've pointed out, Armor and Pixie, played out so far?
Stephen: Armor came from Joss Whedon's initial run on ASTONISHING and she was more thrust into a focal situation as the student that wasn't really endeared to any particular X-Man, but found herself amongst the fray because her best friend died in circumstances surrounding the mutant cure. She ended up protecting Wolverine when he thought he was a little boy and I guess she had some blackmail on him from that. Warren Ellis has kept her around in his current run, but it seems like it's more to put her in Suicide Girls merchandise that any team or duo dynamic.
Pixie has been closer to the Kitty/ Jubilee model, taking sage advice from Wolverine and really being used as the underaged student that takes umbrage with being relegated to the kid's team (like when Kitty was reassigned to the New Mutants).
Another pretty unique example to the superhero trope is in INVINCIBLE where Mark Grayson's half-human, half-alien half-brother Oliver has become his sidekick Kid Omni-Man. Invincible is definitely NOT an all-ages book and as we touched on in Regarding: Comics! #50, Kirkman has been pretty adept at straddling the line of his own treatise in ways such as these.
And then there's Hit Girl from KICK-ASS.
I'm really surprised Deadpool doesn't have a sidekick yet.
Gregg: Not that he needs defending or explaining, but (a) Kirkman's never pitched or sold INVINCIBLE as an all ages book, (b) lots of blood during a war storyline doesn't necessarily make a book not all-ages, and (c) the sidekick concept can be used and used well in non-all-ages books (Brat Back, Dark Knight Returns, etc).
I didn't read all of KICK-ASS, but was Hit Girl a sidekick, or just an adolescent superhero? Like, she and Big Daddy fight side-by-side, or was she off doing her thing while he did his? I think there's a distinction there. A character can be both; Robin certainly has functioned as Batman's sidekick AND leader of the Teen Titans.
Back in the day, Deaadpool had a cast of characters, some of which could have been sidekick material...the guys that hung out in the mercenary bar; I think of Weasel in particular. I guess the cast of Deadpool Corps doesn't count as a bevvy of sidekicks, huh?
But in the case of the hypothetical Deadpool sidekick or Hit Girl, you're getting into that redefine and reinvent or otherwise mock or use sidekicks as a thing to goof on, which is counter to what I'm seeing as your initial thesis: why don't kid/teen sidekicks get proper due?
Stephen: Have you ever read Dead Trippe's BUTTERFLY comic, about a sidekick of a sidekick?
Gregg: I've read a mini-comic here or there; nothing upon which I could hang any expertise on. I found it fun and cute and certainly reverential and referential to the ideas and ideals of superheroes, sidekicks, and superhero comics in general.
But it wears its inspiration on its sleeve as it's very obviously a Batman Family pastiche, which is fine, I'm very fond of Batman myself. But having that very clear through line, and often clear references/parallels to the DCU, could limit it in certain ways. On the flip side, you'd think that familiarity should make it more popular than it is.
Do you follow it? Or on a similar track, John Gallagher's BUZZBOY, also about a sidekick?
Stephen: I've read more Butterfly that Buzzboy. If I'm not mistaken there was a Buzzboy Free Comic Book Day special a few years ago that I quite enjoyed.
Is it time yet to role out our own fantasy ideas for sidekicks?
Gregg: You know, thinking about it, I don't know if I have any fantasy ideas for sidekicks. There's the notion that the sidekick serves the role of avatar for the reader...that by having Robin there you, as young boy reading the comic, can imagine yourself in his place alongside the hero Batman. I never got that. I liked Batman. When I played superhero I was Batman...I never chose to be Robin. When I bought toys I never sought out a Robin figure. But that's me. It's possible that identification does work.
But that said, I'm not sure I've given much thought to sidekicks beyond those that exist or those stories I've read with or about sidekicks.
If anything, the one idea I've had is the one I mentioned about, about a new young girl sidekick who works with Wolverine only to learn she's got ulterior motives. Though as I type that sentence I realize it's quite Terra-esque.
Even looking back at characters I created in junior high school and high school, I'm not sure I ever came up with a sidekick. Hm. Interesting. Perhaps I have a subliminal bias?
Now you have me thinking to see if maybe I can come up with something to pitch as a Mermaid Man & Barnacle Boy story.
Oh, wait, I did have a sidekick-related idea once...but it's one of those I'd just as soon keep in my back pocket, you know, in case I ever get to use it. Hm. Something else to think about...
But seeing as you've got the jones for sidekicks, where does that put you in superhero sidekick fantasy camp?
Stephen: Haha, I thought this would be the easiest thing in the world, but now I'm stumped as well.
Not to let that stop me and to play off something else that you said, I actually found a copy of the Comicology Kingdom Come Companion at a store in Richmond with weekend and in flipping through Alex Ross's sketchbook I was surprised to see how many of his ideas were based on sidekicks and progeny of existing characters. The perfect example of how effective those teenage heroes were as a prism for Ross in his own youth.
Gregg: Yeah, like I said, I only know from my own experience that I wasn't one to identify so much with sidekicks on that level. Clearly others have and likely will continue to do so. A lot of folks, at least based on the internet, seem to really dig Damian Wayne, so, the sidekick ain't that unpopular, right?
But to the Kingdom Come stuff, I'd say it's hard to argue that the DCU has more invested in sidekicks than anyone else, no? They have, over the years, done quite a bit with building these “legacies” for certain lines and families of characters, most notably the Batman, Flash and Wonder Woman families. And now there's a new Aqualad... So what I'm saying is, in the case of Kingdom Come and the DCU, it makes sense to have sidekicks and progeny be a thing.
Since Marvel seems less inclined to have sidekicks, besides Captain America and his varied cohorts and assistants, who would you assign a sidekick to and what'd be said sidekick's deal? (maybe this is an easier way to approach the “fantasy sidekick scenario”)
Stephen: I liked Amadeus Cho as a sidekick for the Hulk, but I enjoy him more as a partner to Hercules right now.
I'd like Cyclops to take an obvious shine to one of the students, even if their relationship ended up being more like one of Wolverine's aforementioned tutelages. If Professor X had Cyclops, who does Cyclops have?
I'd like Molly Haynes from the Runaways to have a sidekick. She kind of does in Clara, who they picked up from the past in Joss Whedon's brief run on the book, but I think it would be great if Molly had someone even younger and more innocent, not necessarily just more naïve, than she is.
Ms. Marvel kind of had Araña for a bit and I would have liked to see that play out a bit more, perhaps in the pages of Young Allies.
What about you?
Gregg: My gut reaction is to have The Thing have a sidekick in the form of Li'l Thing...a younger, smaller version of himself...a la Kid Flash, Aqualad, Speedy, Toro, etc. Maybe more red or yellow in his coloration. Just seems perfectly ridiculous.
I had an idea years ago that can, by virtue of continuity, no longer actually happen. I was called Hollywood Heroes and it involved a group of younger heroes being brought together by a media conglomerate/focus group kind of thing. Ultragirl and Spider (from the '90s Wonder Man series) were on the team, as were some new characters – one of them a kid claiming to be the Mole Man's on and another who went by the name Falconeer, who was inspired by The Falcon. In my mind the team, after their first 6 issues or so, would reject their corporate masters and strike out on their own, with the Falconeer saying they should go to NY to find The Falcon and have him lead/train them...and then you'd get sort of a Batman & the Outsiders type team with Falcon as the leader. But file that under “comics that aren't going to happen” gang. That said, though, I guess that's a take on sidekicks, in a manner of speaking.
Of course, under the traditional model, the marquee characters would usually have sidekicks/spin-offs, so it would seem Iron Man, Thor, Spider-Man, Hulk and Wolverine should all have sidekicks.
Not for nothing, but I keep coming up with dumb jokes here...like Cable's sidekick, Firewire...Werewolf by Night's sidekick Werewolf by Night Lite (or is Werewolf by Bedtime better?). So, so, sooo stupid!
Gregg Schigiel is a cartoonist, illustrator, and writer. He's worked as a penciller, writer and editor for Marvel Comics and an illustrator and cartoonist at Nickelodeon. In addition, he's in various stages of cooking up new comics-related works, unless he's too preoccupied actually cooking. Check out his website at Hatter Entertainment.com.
Stephen Mayer makes his mama proud by eating his weight in crab legs and always watching out for Omar. Check out his blog at MayerMaeNot.com.
