Northern lights

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/11/2018 (2525 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Comic book fans throughout the world are mourning the death of the legendary Stan Lee, the creative dynamo whose fertile imagination gave birth to Spider-Man, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men and many other Marvel superheroes.

In the True North, however, fans have taken pride in news reports that, in his final years, Lee had been trying to drum up support for a proposed Canadian-set TV series about an Indigenous police officer with special powers.

Kevin Gillis, creator of the animated series The Raccoons, told The Canadian Press that in recent years, he had worked with the man considered the father of the modern comic book on a live-action version of an unrealized comic idea revolving around an Indigenous man who leaves his reserve for a job as a Toronto cop.

When the character’s father dies, Gillis says, he learns he is next in line to be a shaman and has powers inherited from his ancestors. Marvel’s late publisher and charismatic ambassador had thought Manitoba-born actor Adam Beach would have been ideal for the role.

“Stan was very clear, he didn’t want him (the character) to fly, he wanted him to have vulnerabilities… the one gift that he (had) was he could see things a few seconds before they happened,” Gillis is quoted as saying. “We’re still trying to get it made.”

It’s unclear whether the project will get off the ground, but this country has a superheroic heritage as we see from today’s high-flying list of Five of the Greatest Canadian Superheroes in Comic Book History:

5) The homegrown hero: Sasquatch
His hometown: Vancouver

Up, up and away: OK, Marvel comics are produced in the U.S., but what could be more Canadian than a federal government scientist who can transform into a super-strong, orange-haired version of Bigfoot?

We got our first look at Sasquatch in 1979 when he was a member of Alpha Flight, the fictional federal government team of superheroes that first appeared in the pages of The Uncanny X-Men — originally trying to repatriate Wolverine, arguably the most famous Canuck superhero, to his home and native land.

Before all that, according to his origin story on Marvel’s website, Sasquatch was Walter Langkowski, who attended Pennsylvania State University on a football scholarship, where he met Bruce Banner — yes, the guy who transforms into the Hulk — and becomes interested in gamma ray research. Walter graduates, plays for the Green Bay Packers, makes a million bucks and returns to school to get his PhD from MIT. He moves on to teach at McGill University in Montreal and, after getting divorced, takes a position with the government’s Department H, where, in an effort to replicate the accident that created the Hulk, he bombards himself with gamma rays. Instead of creating a green behemoth, “the rays open up some sort of mystic barrier that exposes him to “The Realm of the Great Beast,” which essentially transforms him into a big old, hairy Canadian Bigfoot.

Unlike Banner, who lost control of his own mind in the form of the Hulk, Langkowski was able to maintain his own personality and intelligence while in the form of Sasquatch,” according to MentalFloss.com. In his Sasquatch form, he has super-strength and stamina, resistance to injury, sharp claws and the ability to leap incredible distances. He has gone toe-to-toe with the Hulk, pulled a naval destroyer ashore for repairs, and held a DC-10 against the thrust of its engines before flinging the plane 1,000 feet backwards.

We assume he’s also super polite.

 

4) The homegrown hero: Nelvana of the Northern Lights
Her home territory: Nunavut

Up, up and away: In a bid to preserve the country’s economy during the Second World War, the Canadian government banned the import of U.S.-made luxury goods, which (gasp!) included comic books.

This prompted a number of Canadian publishers to begin pumping out hundreds of original comic book characters to fill the pop culture void left by the abrupt departure of Batman and Superman. They churned out thousands of copies of so-called “Canadian whites” — black-and-white comic books printed on newspaper with coloured covers — where heroes from the True North Strong and Free battled with Axis powers.

Which is how Nelvana of the Northern Lights came into being. Dressed in a fur-trimmed minidress with knee-high boots and a cap, Nelvana was arguably Canada’s first national superhero and was one of North America’s first female heroes, predating DC Comics’ iconic Wonder Woman by a few months.

Making her debut in an issue of Triumph-Adventure comics in 1941, Nelvana was created by artist Adrian Dingle, who was inspired by tales of Canada’s far north brought back by Group of Seven painter Franz Johnston. According to her backstory, Nelvana was the daughter of a mortal woman and Koliak the Mighty, King of the Northern Lights. It seems the gods were miffed by Koliak’s marriage to a mortal, and so his spirit could only be manifested in the form of the northern lights, from which Nelvana drew her powers. Speaking of which, her powers included turning invisible and travelling at the speed of light along a ray of the northern lights. She is also telepathic, can change her physical form and has the ability to melt metal and disrupt radio communications, all of which comes in handy when you spend your time battling superpowered Nazi agents in the North.

Although she gave us a hero to call our own in dark times, not even a Canadian goddess could compete with Superman. When American comics returned after the war, she was done, making her last appearance in 1947.

In 1995, she was featured on a Canada Post stamp, and in 2013, a Kickstarter campaign raised cash to successfully republish her exploits in a single volume.

 

3) The homegrown hero: Northstar
His hometown: Montreal

Up, up and away: You have to hand it to the folks at Marvel — they really know how to create cool Canadian superheroes. Northstar’s alter ego, Jean-Paul Beaubier, is a member of the subspecies of humanity known as mutants, born with superhuman abilities.

In his case, he develops the ability to travel at super speed, fly, and harness and project photonic energy blasts. His parents die in a car crash during his childhood, and he and his twin sister, Jeanne-Marie, are separated. Next, his adoptive parents are killed and, before he becomes a hero, he competes as a professional skier. When his mutant powers emerge, he is unbeatable, gets bored of the sport and becomes a rebellious youth who joins the FLQ. Disgusted by their tactics, he renounces terrorism and hooks up with Alpha Flight, a federal government-sponsored team of heroes that is essentially Canada’s answer to the Avengers. It’s there he reunites with his mutant sister, who takes the name Aurora.

Northstar made his debut in Uncanny X-Men in 1979 as a member of the Alpha Flight team that was trying to take Wolverine into custody. In 1983, that crew got their own Marvel comic, but Northstar frequently appears with the X-Men.

“Northstar was a self-centred ass but possessed a great love for his troubled sister. He was a roguish, charming rake of a hero who demanded the reader’s attention whenever he was on the page,” DenofGeek.com gushes. He made headlines around the world in 1992 when he became Marvel’s first openly gay superhero and again in 2012 when he married his husband, Kyle Jinadu. It was the first depiction of a same-sex wedding in mainstream comics.

According to DenofGeek.com: “It isn’t his sexual orientation that makes Northstar so great but his complex and sometimes troubling personality combined with his unique power set and loyalty to his friends and family that makes him one of Canada’s greatest superheroes.”

 

2) The homegrown hero: Wolverine
His hometown: Cold Lake, Alta.

Up, up and away: Chances are you already know more about Wolverine than you do about most of your relatives, because we’re talking about one of the most beloved fictional superheroes of all time, one who ranks near the top in every online poll of comic book characters. Best of all, he’s a Canadian, reportedly born in Cold Lake in the late 19th century, making him well over 100 years old, according to his backstory.

Despite being a Canuck, this anti-hero is not especially polite, with the character becoming famous for his brooding nature and willingness to use deadly force at the drop of a Canadian quarter. He’s the X-Men member who loves to snort “I’m Canadian, bub!” whenever someone mistakes him for an American. Along with keen animal senses, enhanced physical abilities and an incredible ability to heal, he has retractable claws in each hand, thanks to an unbreakable metal skeleton he was given by a secret Canadian government program.

He made his debut in 1974 in an issue of The Incredible Hulk, where he was the antagonist, and got his own solo comic in 1988. Best known as the surliest member of the X-Men, he has also been linked with the Avengers and the Canadian superhero squad Alpha Flight. Not to mention countless cartoons, video games and movies where he’s famously portrayed by steely-eyed Hugh Jackman.

DenofGeek.com gushes: “He’s the most popular member of the X-Men, and he has been the singularly most beloved badass of the past quarter-century, and stand up proud, our neighbors to the north, he’s all yours!… When the X-Men was relaunched as an international team of mutant heroes, Marvel needed a Canadian, and there was Wolverine just off his battle with Hulk, popping a Molson and ready to go. Wolverine’s Canadian (heritage) allowed Marvel to introduce Alpha Flight and that pretty much brought Canada into the wide tapestry of the Marvel universe. So here is a salute to Canada, the country that gave us a character that is responsible for half the books currently being sold on today’s market!”

 

1) The homegrown hero: Captain Canuck
His hometown: Winnipeg

Up, up and away: As much as we all love Wolverine, Captain Canuck deserves to be No. 1 on today’s list, and in all of our hearts. That’s because he’s super cool and was created in Winnipeg. OK, mostly that second thing.

The comic and its maple-tinged hero were created in 1975 by cartoonist Ron Leishman and artist/writer Richard Comely. The iconic cover of the first book features the captain dressed in his clingy red-and-white bodysuit, with white gloves and boots, red maple leaves on his belt buckle and forehead, standing with hands on hips in front of a fluttering Canadian flag. To be any more Canadian, it would have to be dipped in maple syrup.

Like most independent comics, its publication history is pretty sporadic. In its first incarnation, the captain was Tom Evans, a Canadian secret agent who gained (why not?) superhuman strength from contact with extraterrestrials. In his maple leaf costume, he patrolled Canada in the then-future year of 1993, when “Canada had become the most powerful country in the world.” The comic ran for three issues before going on hiatus in 1976.

In 1993, a second captain, Darren Oak, fought a global conspiracy in four issues. In 2004, RCMP Const. David Semple donned the Captain Canuck suit to tackle a biker gang called the Unholy Avengers in four issues. A new ongoing series was published by Chapterhouse Comics in May 2015.

Last year, Comely told the Free Press that Winnipeg was the perfect place to create his hero because of all the help he received.

“The printers I used were really behind the whole project, and they extended credit when maybe they shouldn’t have,” he said. “And the people in Winnipeg… I just felt it was a really good place to do it because of the local support.”

It apparently began in 1971 when he walked into the Hudson’s Bay and saw a sweatshirt with Superman emblazoned on a maple leaf. “I wanted your idealistic, heroic-looking athletic hero, with a swashbuckling kind of look,” he once said.

“I need a Canadian superhero. That first cover has been reproduced more times than I’d ever imagine. The character in front of the flag. No ambiguity. Ever.”

Canada Post released a Captain Canuck stamp in 1995, and it soon became the bestselling Canadian stamp ever. Recently, the Royal Canadian Mint issued a $20 fine silver rectangular coin, designed by Comely, showing the captain as he appeared on the first cover. A web cartoon series popped up in 2013.

If it weren’t for Gretzky, the captain would be the Great One.

doug.speirs@freepress.mb.ca