Johnny Saturn By JGray

My love for superhero comics goes back a ways. In fact, “Crisis on Infinite Earths”, the twelve part masterpiece by Marv Wolfman and George Perez was my introduction to the concept of multiple universes; something heavily explored here on Mysteries of the Arcana.

In the last several years, though, the big publishers have done a lot to tick me off. I won’t go into my laundry list because I could rant for hours. Instead, I’m just going to be thankful that Scott and Benita Story came along and took up the challenge of creating new heroes as the centerpiece of their webcomic, Johnny Saturn.

The series starts off with the death of the title character. Johnny Saturn has been fighting the good fight for over a decade, using only his fists, his wits, and the sort of body armor you can order from the back of Soldier of Fortune. From there, things get really exciting. The archive is worth spending time with. Better yet, order the print version so you can lovingly thumb through it.

I won’t give away the plot. Instead,I’ll explain some of the things I love about Johnny Saturn.

Thing #1

My favorite scene involves Johnny Saturn battling a group of powered villains. We get to see what he’s thinking as he fights. The mental narration is terse, almost like a checklist. Speedster? Telegraph your moves so you know where they’ll hit, then hit them. Problem neutralized. I love it, because in my opinion characters like Johnny Saturn (and Batman and other mystery men) aren’t amazing because of their fighting skills or detective abilities but because of their sheer tactical genius.

Thing #2

There’s a phenomenon in comics known as“Women in Refridgerators”. Female characters are often raped,beaten, murdered, depowered, and stereotyped as bitches or sluts. In some cases it seems like the writer has some sort of axe to grind with women, in others ancillary female characters are used as plot devices to promote the “growth” of male characters. The phenomenon was named after a heroes girlfriend was murdered and stuffed in his fridge. The hero then tracked down her killer and, at the last minute, decided to deliver the villain to justice rather than go the old eye for an eye route. Thus, the hero grew, proving he was just and noble and all it took was the brutal murder of a woman.

Johnny Saturn isn’t like that. The female characters are interesting. The costumes can be a bit revealing, yes, but the women have character. They aren’t two dimensional. They aren’t there to make the men look good, and they aren’t there to satisfy the writer’s craving for revenge on all the girls who rejected him in high school. In fact, the most powerful and(in my opinion) most intelligent superhero in the Johnny Saturn universe is a woman named Staff of Life. I can’t wait to see more of her in action.

Thing #3

There’s a whole lot to explore. The comic’s well written and focuses primarily on Johnny Saturn but the other heroes are just as interesting. The world, too, holds a lot of promise and begs to be explored. Truth be told, the setting deserves more than just one comic. If I could get an artist and permission from Scott and Benita I think I’d jump at a chance to crack open a secondary story there.

Let me be clear. This isn’t a goldenage or silver age comic. There’s plenty of blood and violence and Johnny Saturn’s body bears the realistic consequences of a decade offighting crime. However, it also isn’t a Frank Miller-esque, over the top splatter comic either. Instead, Scott and Benita have found a way to balance the need for realism that marked comics in the 80s/90s and combined it with the need for escapism that marked comics in the50s/60s.

Go read Johnny Saturn. You won’t be sorry.