Annotated 32-23
Pitch #10 of 10: I wasn’t going to put out any more superhero-ish ideas here, but Mogo’s idea for a period piece and Jason Rivest’s “something to do with time travel” reminded me of one more item on my shelf, The Legend of the Black Mask.
In 2029, the Black Mask’s century-long heroic career comes to an abrupt end on the shores of Indonesia. In 2030, a quartet of starry-eyed adventurers with access to limited time-travel technology hurl themselves into various eras, hoping to recruit the hero at some point in his development to avert the resource wars of their own age.
What they discover is far more sprawling and complex than they could have expected. In one version of the Black Mask’s story, his enhanced physique left him nearly unaging, which meant he was 127 when he died. Another version had it that the Black Mask is a family legacy, passed down from generation to generation, and that there were four men behind the Mask. In fact, there were nine people… not always men… who kept the “Mask” going, but each of them changed it profoundly, bringing in the moral perspective, technology, and approaches of their particular era and muddying accounts of the past to match their present.
The origin of the Mask, such as it is, was a scared rookie cop who smudged his face with charcoal one night, hoping not to be recognized by the mob. That set off a few folk tales and urban legends that a better Black Mask would use to his advantage, but the cop joined the mob a few years later. Two of our hero-hunters find a clear message in this troubled history, but the others aren’t ready to exchange nostalgia for forging ahead… and there’s only one set of time-travel controls between them.
I’d read that!
While I like these pitches, I can’t be the only one who is sad that we’re not getting commentary for these pages?
Especially a page like this that hints directly at the altruist conspiracy.
It’s not really a conspiracy as much as people being selfish and greedy, source of most problems.
I think it’s possible to comment on both things.
I really like this kind of legacy characters, like Lee Falk’s Phantom, but I think this Black Mask guy is even better, because (if I’m reading this correctly) each Black Mask adds his/her experiences to a communal pool that future Black Masks can use. Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbie created a legacy character named The Cobweb that’s not quite but kind of the same concept, albeit in a humorously kinky vein. That’s too bad, because it was a interesting idea and it could have been explored in a more serious manner
As for today’s comic, I wonder who is more frustrated: Ardaic, when he sees the Gastonian Heads of House behaving like kids who can’t wait to stampede out of school for the weekend? Or maybe Archmage Caneghem, faced with Dean Reynolds’ naivete?
No, you’re not.
And it’s interesting that Caneghem, a member of that conspiracy, is throwing shade at its self-description here.
I really like idea as a fan of other deconstruction super/pulp stories. If only because it reminds us where mask heroes come from and even after knocking them down a peg, reminds us why we still need them.
Hrmmm. I like this idea a lot actually.
One change I’d make, if it’s not out of line – the origin story being a face smudged with any kind of black material is not gonna play well from a racial sensitivity perspective. I would more generally avoid the disguise being makeup-based – improvised or otherwise – but would maybe go with an improvised disguise of another sort. Perhaps take some inspiration from the present time and consider contemporary face coverings?
“And by ruminating, I mean chewing. What’s for dinner?”
Hate to say it, but … if your hero’s backstory is essentially blackface … might wanna rethink that part of it.
The whole “who even was this guy/gal?” is good tho.