Luke Cage: How a Black Boy Became a Superhero

By John Metta—Oct 10, 2016

My memories of that long ago are like found photographs, all sepias and faded greens.

A cold, silent room. Bright white lights and blue sheets that smelled like my grandma’s house. A sewing needle and scissors on a steel table. A man who lied and a woman who held the hand of a scared, 10-year-old boy.

I don’t remember how many stitches I got that day, but I remember being disappointed that it was terribly few. Less than 10. Not a heroic number at all. A hero would have hundreds or, more likely, none at all.

The series of events that led me to the emergency room at Erie County Medical Center that September so long ago has never struck me as particularly memorable. Like so many of the myriad events of childhood, the images were forgotten in a dust-covered box in the back of the closet of my mind. There they sat until I stumbled upon them at the end of this past September, some 36 years later.

For many people in Western New York State, the end of September 1980 was a terrifying time. The week immediately before my trip to the emergency room was filled with news stories of a serial killer, prowling a three county area and stealing the lives of the innocent with utter impunity. He preyed on our souls and fed our fears. No one was safe.

Reading over the news stories with 36 years of context, it’s obvious that not everyone was afraid – the serial killer was exclusively preying on black (and later Hispanic) people – but the perspectives of children are wonderfully myopic. The 10-year-old me knew that everyone was consumed with fear that The .22 Caliber Killer was coming for them. The 10-year-old me also knew that I could not be afraid. I knew I had to be a hero.

Of course, being a hero was new to me. I was a child in The Projects. Like any kid, I had dreams of what I wanted to be: an astronaut, a scientist. But the realities of life often descend early upon the the poor and, despite my dreams, I knew that the destiny of a poor kid in The Projects was to remain forever poor and in The Projects.

My only real escape was books, and comic books were particularly special to me. But escaping into stories was temporary. After I read the last page, I knew I had to come back to the same reality.

Until one day when, browsing around the “heavily used” section at the back of the comic book store, I discovered a black superhero. I was forever changed.

Read more at Al Jazeera.

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