Index Number – 1162 - 1.0
Issue – Superboy 216
Cover Date – April 1976
Title – The Hero Who Hated the Legion
Characters – Brainiac 5, Cosmic Boy, Karate Kid, Shadow Lass, Superboy
Intruduction – Tyroc (Troy Stewart)
Villain – Beta Gang
Synopsis – When the Legionnaires track the Beta Gang to the isolated island of Marzal, they meet reisitance from the populace and from its hero, Tyroc, who believe that the Legion is racist. By the end, tyroc and his friends are won over and he considers Legion membership.
Writer – Cory Bates
Artist – Mike Grell
Cover – Mike Grell
Editor – Murray Boltinoff, Jack Harris
Reprinted – Legion of Super-Heroes Archive 12 – 2003
Comments – We’ll be climbing up on our soapbox, so if you have a low threshold for sermons, you might want to go to the bathroom now, and come back later in the post.
It was 1976. There were a very few Black superheroes in mainstream comics, and only a handful of Black supporting characters. American Indian heroes had been fairly common, but only in the western comics, which were dying out. Asian characters were usually villains. And I can recall no heroes hailing from Central America. Even Karate Kid, who had been a Legionnaire for many years, had only recently started becoming half-Asian. So a Black Legionnaire was overdue.
As a 24-year-old peace and love activist, I has disappointed with the introduction of Tyroc.
First, he wore a ridiculous costume. He looked like he stepped right from a discotheque. His silver/white suit had no sleeves and no pants, and no front. It was a big collar across his shoulder-blades attached to suspenders attached to a Speedo near his navel. It was accessorized with three rows of chains across his chest. And of course, he sported a huge Afro hair style. It struck me that the two characters with the darkest skin, Tyroc and Shadow Lass, wore the skimpiest costume to show off the most flesh. I must admit that a fellow comic book fan and classmate from Jamaica told me I was just expressing “Colonial Guilt”.
Second, the racists in the story were the citizens of Marzal. They were close-minded by refusing to join the diversified United Planets society. It wasn’t until later that it was revealed that the island disappeared for 200 years at a time, so the Marzalians were a bit behind the times.
Third, he had a super-power that was hard to understand and harder to integrate in a team book. He didn’t fight, he yelled (with big, colorful visual effects like EEEOOORR). His shouts could alter reality in limitless manners. He could do anything. And a hero that can do anything doesn’t need 20 losers hanging around with him. Which meant that he would be relegated to off-panel missions with Chemical King.
So, what good did it do to break ground with a Black character that who’s appearance was somewhere between a joke and an insult and who rarely was written into stories? At least, he didn’t have a French accent.
