The Job Is Never Done

As someone that reads comics pretty regularly (or, at least, I used to and I’m slowly getting back into them again) I am used to the beats of the superhero genre. Characters show up, they have a bit of friendly interaction, and then some big danger shows up that forces them to drop what they’re doing and go off to be “big damn heroes”. Comic book plotlines are directly focused on the next adventure, the next world ending problem, the next villain that the heroes have to fight. People don’t want to see heroes just being normal people, going about their days while adventures happen elsewhere, right?

But what if comics could be about that, too? That’s the guiding principle of Astro City, the comic book series created by Kurt Busiek, Brent Anderson, Alex Ross. The goal of the comic is to show stories of superheroes, and their world, where every tale isn’t about the next big danger, the next major villain, the next world ending event. Instead it’s an anthology comic looking at the daily lives of the heroes, and the citizens around them, all while exploring the world of the titular city as it is laid out on the pages. It makes for a very different, and very interesting read, one that feels unlike anything else of its era (and still very different from most comics coming out today).

The first volume of Astro City was published from August 2005 through January 2006, and was then collected later in the trade paperback “Life in the Big City”. It told one off adventures about superheroes and the city, letting us slowly settle into the kind of (smaller) adventures we’d be getting. And it started off perfectly with “Samaritan”. This is an issue about Astro City’s version of SupermanThe first big superhero from DC Comics, Superman has survived any number of pretenders to the throne, besting not only other comic titans but even Wolrd War II to remain one of only three comics to continue publishing since the 1940s. (effectively, although the comparison isn’t that direct once we get more of his backstory). Samaritan dreams of flying, it’s his favorite thing to do in the world. But Samaritan also has a mission: to do all that he can to save everyone and fix every problem the world is having. So he flies as fast as he can every second of every day, stopping earthquakes, foiling bank robberies, and saving people. He gets home exhausted, counting up the few seconds of time he got to fly that day, only to fall asleep to dream about flying once more.

“Samaritan” sets the tone so well because it gives us a side to this kind of superhero that we rarely see. When you have all these powers, and you have a code you follow, you can’t waste your time on yourself. So you rush and speed and fight, never worrying about your own mental health, and then when you get home, exhausted and sad, all you have are your dreams before you do it all again. It’s a tragic tale, one that sets a somber tone for the hero, but it also makes us appreciate him far more than we would any other generic, over-powered hero. It’s the kind of story that puts us into the mind of the hero in a way most books published by DC and Marvel rarely can, and it shows why Astro City is so special.

From there we get a few “life on the street” type stories. The first is “The Scoop”, a story about a journalist who once got the scoop of a lifetime. He was there when a cult raised a demon, and he got to witness all the heroes of the world coming together to fight this cult and stop their demon-shark (yes, really) invasion. And then he had to toss the story out because he couldn’t prove any of it. Just because unbelievable things happen, that doesn’t mean you can just write about it (seemingly a direct contrast to all the stories of Clark writing about his own adventures as Superman without any references to back it up).

The next is “A Little Knowledge”. Here a low-level criminal, Andrew "Eyes" Eisenstein, accidentally sees the secret identity of one of the major heroes in the city, Jack-In-the-Box. Once he figures out who it was he saw, Andrew has dreams of selling that information and becoming filthy rich. But then he gets worried, thinking he sees Jack-In-the-Box around every corner, sure that the hero is after him specifically. And if he sold the knowledge, who’s to say the criminals that bought the information would keep him alive? Andrew eventually leaves town, looking for greener pastures, simply because the knowledge was too much for him.

This was one of the weaker stories in the volume, if I’m being honest, because it really didn’t have much to say. It helped to flesh out the world, yes, showing us more heroes and some of the criminal elements, but as far as telling a story that commented on superhero media, like the way the first two issues of the series did, this one feels pretty hollow. A guy learns something, and then realizes that knowledge is too much to bear, isn’t really a fresh or new story, no matter the setting, and Andrew isn’t likable enough that we want to see him succeed. His story doesn’t affect anyone or change the course of anything in the city, leaving it a narrative dead end.

Issue four gives us “Safeguards”, which is about Marta, a young woman who works downtown but lives in Shadow Hill, the part of the city with all the vampires, werewolves, and other monsters. The monsters aren’t that bad, though, because she has crosses she’s put up, plaques on doors and rituals she performs all to keep them out each night. Still, she dreams of moving downtown and being in the city… right up until she’s almost killed in an attack from a villain and realizes that each part of the city has its dangers and being on Shadow Hill isn’t any better or worse than other parts.

Like with “A Little Knowledge”, it doesn’t feel like Marta’s story is all that important to Astro City, at least not yet. A part of the town populated with monsters and beasts sounds interesting, but when they remain secluded there and don’t leave the rest of the town, it also keeps their storytelling impact minimal. These creatures don’t get out in the final two issues of the book and, possibly, they don’t get mentioned again after, leaving this feeling like another narrative dead end. The only reason why it isn’t is because of Marta, a nice girl who genuinely just wants a better life. She’s a heroine we can care about and she also gives us a perspective we need: that of someone living their day-to-day life in this crazy town. She makes this issue feel immediate and needed even if her part of town may never show up again.

“Reconnaissance” is another odd one, especially because of what it promises that may or may not ever get fulfilled. It’s about an alien that pretends to be human, living in the city and studying the human populace. He wants to know if the Earth is worth invading and conquering, but he also feels something for the people of the planet that he can’t quite explain. It leads him to put off sending the invasion signal for far longer than he should have. But a chance encounter with a superhero, Crackerjack, and the way the people around the character react to them when they realize someone they knew is actually a superhero, drives the alien into a rage and he sends the signal.

It’s hard to know, just from the first six issues, if this storyline of an alien invasion ever plays out. Considering Astro City is focused on the more mundane lives going on between the adventures, it’s entirely possible that we never see a direct story based on this, with the invasion being mentioned later or shown in a background panel and that’s the extent of it. I get that the point is to show that humanity is messy and people are unreliable, and the issue tells that story very well… but even that story isn’t that fresh, and without knowing where the alien plot thread is going, it’s hard to know if this issue is really that essential. Still, it is fun world building, and it’s interesting to see all the little narrative loops and whorls that are possible with this series.

The final issue of the first volume also acts as a bit of a book end from “Samaritan”. The story, “Dinner at Eight”, is about how the two busiest heroes, Samaritan and Winged Victory, are forced into a date by their colleagues, with all the various heroes stepping up to deal with the problems of the world so that these two heroes can have a night off. And all throughout, both heroes constantly have trouble unplugging and not listening to what’s going on in the world beyond them. It’s a nice way to cap the series because it does give, as the story puts it, “a little hope” that these two heroes, and others, can find some happiness even as they devote most of their lives to the public good.

While not all the tales in “Life in the Big City” are showstoppers, they all largely flesh out the world and show how life is different for people between the adventures. It gives a fresh perspective on the genre and shows the potential for tales set in this world. Maybe this first book isn’t perfect, but its high points are so high that even its flaws can be easily set aside. This first volume of Astro City is solid, and I certainly look forward to continuing my read through the whole series.