Scott Unfried
Instructor: Gutierrez-Jones
Science Fiction
9-11-08
Untitled Comic Book: A Work in Progress
In this paper I will be presenting
the comic book storyline that I have conceived in response to this assignment
and the class material in general.
Furthermore, I will explain the relevance of my comic book concept to
the course material, and material as seen in other works designated as science
fiction. I will include character
descriptions of the three pivotal and main characters. I will also describe the origin of the hero
character. I have one short, yet
complete scene which is found at the end of this paper.
Premise
and Context:
My story is to be set at a
speculative point of time where a merger between shamanism and science has
taken place, although still controversial among some peoples. Genetic engineering has advanced to the point
of being able to control the conceived child (Incidentally: I acknowledge being
inspired by Gattaca, which I finally
viewed recently, due to the instructor’s recommendation of the film). Furthermore, all paranormal and supernatural
phenomena are being regarded with more support by the scientific
community. Paranormal psychology is just
as credible as more traditionally accepted areas of specialization, such as
clinical and evolutionary psychology.
This has led to various experiments, and exciting new developments in
the paranormal sciences. These
experiments are done by a scientific community who are committed to
humanitarian values. In fact, the
primary goal is to provide leaders, who are great, and ideally non-violent, and
they are making progress. By
implication, the distinction between normal and paranormal is fading in and of
itself. One particular project, which is kept secret, even from the corporate
arena, due to its sensitive and controversial nature, is the genetic
modification of Hitler’s DNA, which was discovered using a futuristic,
speculative technology, to create a perfected form of Hitler.
Genetic engineering and the determination of traits and
features are in part determined by the influence of a shaman; as science has come to realize that there is
a necessary interplay of physical material as well as psychic/paranormal
influence, which science still has no direct control over, and perhaps never
will. Genetic material sets a physical
precedent for traits (a seed), which then is subject to the forces outside the
direct control of science. Hence,
shamans are used to ensure that the genetic manipulations have the intended
effect. Indeed, shamanism is lucrative
for those who possess the ability.
The hero will be described in the character profiles
section: however, he turns out to be an unusually successful experiment, who
has a very close relationship with his shaman, as unintended effects can still
occur if the influence of the shaman is absent for too long (as of yet to be
determined). Additionally, shamans can
have minor influence from great distance, but they must be in close physical
proximity in order for the more crucial continued protection of the individual
in question. By implication, shamans
have the power to abuse their influence as they are the only insurance that
such an individual won’t transform into some abominable state. Hence, there is ample possibility of creating
very powerful conflicts with the loss of a shaman (probably the primary hero’s
weakness in my story). Additionally,
shamans may become abusive of their powerful positions, and there may be rival
experimental individuals who turn bad, while the hero provides one of, if not
humanity’s only hope.
I don’t necessarily conceive this work as being
serialized: however, as mentioned above, there are plenty of opportunities to
maintain a serialized narrative. In the
plot, beyond the origin, I have conceived thus far, an incredibly wealthy
villain, who’s recently acquired his status due to as of yet undetermined
circumstances. He begins to keep close
attention on the experiments in case of any more threatening developments. He
decides to set up his own project, hiring his own shamans and scientists, which
he will use to create a superior army that he will control to protect his
interests. He also starts a research project, in search of ways that will
potentially make him as superior as those in the threatening experiments. Capitalism is still perverting society’s
moral fabric, partially because capitalists are abusing the new understanding
of such phenomena to their own advantage.
Eventually, the villain launches a massive attack on the
facilities of the project, and kills most, and disables the rest of those
onsite. However, not even he knows of
the top secret Hitler modification and his shaman. The hero and his shaman, who were elsewhere
at the time of the attack, are emotionally devastated at what happened. Wisely,
the shaman manages to piece together the evidence and determine the primary
person responsible (the villain) for the attacks. The shaman, after moral deliberations,
concludes that he must coach the hero to use violence and harness some of the
darker elements of the hero that have thus far been kept completely dormant. Specifically, he trains him in astral
projection and uses his influence to hone certain demonic abilities inherent in
the hero. However, the hero once
prepared for his mission realizes that he is incapable of reaching the villain,
due to the fact that he has hired around-the-clock security force of shamans
which render him immune to other threatening paranormal forces, a decision made
to protect against potential vengeance, which happens to work against the hero
in the villain’s favor. Largely a social
loner, he turn to a girl, in hopes that she can appeal to the villain’s vanity
in an effort to somehow manipulate a breakdown of the villain’s shamanistic
defenses and allow the hero to gain access.
Meanwhile, the hero becomes a vigilante, in response to a
general increase in crime, and most criminals don’t have the power to maintain
shamanistic security as does the primary villain, including many of the
villain’s own forces. He begins to be a
ray of hope, but one that reinforces the violence that is used by the
villain. Nonetheless, his intentions are
true. Fortunately, as mentioned above,
the hero is an extremely successful and secret individual, one that the villain
does not anticipate. Eventually, his
dream girl agrees and tries to work her way into the villain’s life, through a
class he’s teaching at a university in his home environment of futuristic Santa Barbara. Eventually, he becomes suspicious of her and
her life becomes endangered. A struggle
ensues that will test the abilities of the shaman and the hero. What happens next…?
Main
Characters: Unnamed Hero, Unnamed
Villain, Unnamed Heroine, and the Unnamed Hero’s Shaman
Character Outlines
The
Hero: A creation of an extremely secret
experiment, conducted by a not so secret community of scientists and
shamans. He is a genetically modified
version of Adolph Hitler, who has blonde hair, blue eyes, and many features
consistent with Hitler’s master race propaganda, yet he appears very innocuous
and blends in quite well as a normal individual. He knows that he is a modification of Hitler,
although society does not; nonetheless, he experiences great internal conflict
due to the stigma of Hitler. He
experiences troubling psychic connections to Hitler, manifested as dreams and
trances, in which he has a connection similar to that of monozygotic
twins. Hitler’s angst is a driving force
behind his darker impulses. The shaman
cannot prevent such experiences as they are intrinsic to the hero; the shaman
can only keep the hero away from a destructive path that might be taken
otherwise.
However, due to Hitler’s surprising empathic abilities
and his shrewd manipulations he has a predisposition toward great strategy and
tactics. The shaman occurs in multiple
manifestations of intensity, of which there are four: a neutral intensity that reflects
relatively normative inhumanity, a bright intensity that reflects the passions
of society’s most sadistic, a darker intensity which reflects more psychopathic
evils, and worst of all, he possess a death intensity that reflects complete
inhumanity. Furthermore, his different
intensities are accompanied by varying levels of dissociation. His normal
intensity is the least dissociated state, his brighter and darker intensities
are equally dissociated states, and his death intensity is the most
dissociated. Ironically, the hero is
aesthetically far more villainous in appearance than the villain, and arguably
less charming in character, something which inheriting Hitler’s genetic
material greatly handicaps him as a person to like, yet this only helps him
become invisible and discounted as a shy person. In terms of a villainous looking hero, I was
very influenced by Ghost Rider and Spawn, and he’s like a Nazi version of
them. Furthermore, if spawns and
creations of the devil can be heroes, even popular, then why not Nazi spawned
or related characters.
The
Villain: The villain is an eccentric
trillionaire, who recently acquired his humungous fortune under undetermined
circumstances. Many people are asked
what they would do with large amounts of money, and he opted to pay off the
national debt, which earned him great respect and influence beyond the mere
power of his wealth, which easily extends into the hundreds of trillions. He is a sadistic, egomaniacal personality
that takes pleasure in using the powers of capital to defy any regard for
humanity and social standards. In fact,
he got himself into teaching classes, despite lacking adequate credentials,
through his capitalistic influence. He
teaches classes so he can humiliate the students and condescend to them with
his financial power.
Some of his more controversial, yet
unique actions were to have the Empire
State Building
transported cross-country and situated in the ocean at the end of the Goleta State
Beach pier, not far from
the UC Santa Barbara campus. He also
arranged for the cross-country transportation of the Statue of Liberty from New York City and
situated it in the UC Santa Barbara lagoon.
He’s even surmised erecting a mid-rise building with the appearance of a
gargantuan piece of coffee cake. The
joke was whether or not the cake would have icing or sifted powdered sugar, or
only streusel: would there be a secret ingredient? Naturally, the only secret ingredient was
money, and he knew this. He amused
himself at his defiance of society and enjoyed shocking people, humiliating
people, and simultaneously being greatly respected when he was screwing up
people’s lives. Oddly, enough, the
villain is more seductive in some ways than the hero, as his money-bought
confidence imbues him with a certain malevolent charm.
The
Heroine or Dream girl: She has fallen
victim to many of life’s uglier sides, although fortunately not it’s more
physically destructive elements. The
hero encountered her through his own isolation, and he sees something kindred
in her, yet crucially different in important ways. Indeed, her tragic life story has influences,
both conscious and unconscious, that mirror the hero’s own psychic connection
with Adolph Hitler’s tragedy.
Furthermore, as long as she can resist the demons, he is made hopeful
that he can as well. He also wants to
help her, as he wants to help himself and needs
to be helped by her. The devastation
of the destruction of the humanitarian project has created an especially
traumatic period for him and a need for a new attachment that can relate to him
on some basic levels, hence another reason why he needs somebody like her. Their idiosyncrasies provide a beautiful
framework that represents a very promising set of future possibilities.
Furthermore, the heroine is the
hero’s “dream girl”, eerily consistent with the fact that she fits Hitler’s
dream, and in the ways that he is Hitler he cannot resist her charms. In fact, he occasionally has fantasies and
beautiful dreams of her clothed in the uniforms of The League of German Girls:
hence, Hitler’s place for the more effeminate prizes of society. However, for the hero she is far more than a
prize, as she is a necessity - a symbol of salvation. She, like the hero has many styles, although
they lack the deeper significance of the hero’s. Nonetheless, her changes of hair color, hair
style, and other aspects of her person are similar to the hero’s and can be
used as a weapon, blending sex appeal with a penchant for disguise. In fact, she may develop and lead a
complimentary force, which would be aesthetically patterned after The League of
German Girls, but with the motives of the hero and the humanitarian genetic
modification project.
The Hero’s Shaman: The Hero’s shaman might be somewhat like
Professor Xavier from The X-Men, however more intimate as he only
focuses on one such relationship. He is
the most masterful of his kind, as he was entrusted with the most secret and
risky of the experiments. Hence, he is
good at psychically protecting the secret identity of the hero, particularly
from potentially unscrupulous shamans.
Inspiration and Connections to Class:
Recently this summer I read about a
handful of relatively obscure comics from the golden era of comics and pulp
literature that involved astral projection.
I first learned about the concept of astral projection through popular
television and video programs that have presented claims and account of such
abilities. In a fervor after high school
graduation, in which I became very passionate about all things paranormal that
defied evolutionary concepts of death, I encountered astral projection (or
out-of-body-experiences) and the phenomenon of near-death-experiences. I regard the potential reality of paranormal
phenomena, as being the only true hope for humankind, and any other sentient
mortal beings. I was interested that
none of these comics have carried over into contemporary pop culture and are largely
a cultural relic of the past.
I also am intensely interested in
stereotypes, stigmatization, and the discriminations that result. I have been amazed that Hitler remains one of
the premier targets of extreme antagonism and heated emotion, when there are
equally destructive forces, and arguably more so, at work today. Hitler has been stigmatized: the man, his
family name, and everything associated with him, including the swastika
symbol. Ironically, I believe the
tendency of extreme derision of Hitler shows only the same tragic mindset which
demonstrates an indoctrination and propaganda just as terrible as that of
Hitler’s influence over Nazi Germany.
Just as he stigmatized the Jews, he and his ideas are now the subject of
intense stigma, even when he is no longer a threat, and obviously nobody would
get far by championing his ideas. All
the while, the hero’s conflicted emotions about being derived from Hitler
remind the reader that in no way does the story condone Hitler’s own
transgressions.
The aggression of American
capitalism rivals Hitler’s own legacy in their ruthless protection of
interests, and abuse of the capacity for empathy paired with a startling lack
of sympathy. After all, America was not brought
into World War II out of humanitarian concerns for those oppressed in Europe,
nor was it about defending the country from Japan, as the attacks on Pearl
Harbor, were in fact prompted by American action as chronicled in Howard Zinn’s
The People’s History of the United States. No, the United States got involved in World
War II to protect the interests of American corporate interests (the corporate
elite). However, humanitarian motives
were used as credible and empathically justifications for war involvement.
Additionally, the influence of
gender and sex in society have fascinated me, particularly in the drawbacks
that men receive, the less politically correct focus. However, men are more at risk and victim to
certain kinds of discrimination themselves.
This is the less politically correct viewpoint, yet I have always been
in favor of politically unpopular notions, whether it involves unconventional
attitudes regarding Nazis, the structural system of one’s own country, or
gender roles among other things.
Unconventional attitudes may help to provide a limit to the power that
corporations have over us. Hence,
political incorrectness, if the intentions are true, may be the only way of
breaking the cycle of exploitation and manipulation.
Furthermore, this story incorporate
themes of feminism as represented by the heroine, obviously incorporates
genetic engineering and cloning, and in general probes society’s more troubling
issues through a fictitious and stylized lens.
Indeed, it’s no coincidence that the hero I have imagined uses astral
projection, and that shamanism and the paranormal represent a humanitarian
shift in science, and the paranormal abilities of the hero a ray of hope for
society. Nor is it arbitrary that Hitler,
arguably history’s most scorned villain, is ironically the source of the
hero. Nor is it arbitrary that the
heroine is destined to lead her own heroic network with aesthetic similarities
to The League of German Girls. Nor is it
arbitrary that the hero, representing spiritualism is pitted against a villain
representing fierce materialism and capitalism.
Ultimately the Nazis lost: the Americans
one, along with our primary capitalistic ally - the United Kingdom.
Issues of contact and discovery are
incorporated as well with the discovery of evidence supporting paranormal
theories. Other realms are contacted,
and Hitler’s genetically improved copy definitely a significant contact. My story is conceived in a very popular
style, that of comic books, and yet its ideas contrast and defy that
popularity, and challenge the reader to identify with Nazi-styled characters,
question capitalism, and all the views they hold for granted. Furthermore, I encourage the reader to
perceive the paranormal as more than mere fantasy. My concept also examines biases and
discrimination based on appearance, and the unreliability of such reactions. Lots of these ideas elicit fear and
uncertainty about me when I express them to other people: and instead of seeing
hallmarks of open-mindedness, they have a suspicious reaction brought on by
fear and a very unique form of discrimination and prejudice - discrimination
and prejudice against the discriminators and the prejudiced, even long after
the fact. This narrative draws upon many
of my strongest interests and fascinations, which I hope readers can be both
entertained and moved by.
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