Rapture (comics)

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caption= Rapture. Art by Adam Hughes
comic_color=background:#80ff80
character_name=Rapture
real_name=Sharona Jackson
publisher=Image Comics
debut="Savage Dragon" #4
creators=Erik Larsen
alliance_color=background:#ffc0c0
alliances=Special Operations Strikeforce, Freak Force
Chicago Police Department
aliases=
powers=can generate electricity, usually in the form of fork lightning|

Rapture (real name Sharona Jackson) is a fictional super heroine created by Erik Larsen for his Image Comics series Savage Dragon. Rapture was inspired by and named after The Knack's song "My Sharona." She debuted in a back-up feature in "Savage Dragon" (ongoing series) #4 and was killed in issue 43.

Dragon and Rapture first met in pages drawn exclusively for the "Savage Dragon: A Force To Be Reckoned With" collection, because the pages were not printed elsewhere, it caused confusion among many fans about when it happened.

Dark Ages Miniatures manufactured a large poster of Rapture, the second in a line of Savage Dragon posters (the first was of Mighty Man).

Character history

Original Rapture

Sharona Jackson, nicknamed Rapture even then, was a prostitute in Chicago, Illinois. She was unknowingly picked up by Dr. Nirvana, an old foe of the superhero Mighty Man, who was kidnapping people who he felt would not be missed and experimenting on them. His experiments on Jackson went awry and gave her electrical based powers. Nirvana was zapped, leaving him in a coma.

Because of the Savage Dragon's success, and because he was being loaned out to other police forces across America on such a regular basis, Police Captain Stewart started a 'freak force' programme to create a super-powered department of the Chicago Police Force. One of the candidates, Ricochet, though too young to join herself, accidentally caught Rapture about to murder her abusive pimp Brian and managed to talk her out of killing him. Brian pulled a gun, forcing Rapture to kill him anyway. Ricochet suggested Rapture for Captain Stewart's scheme and she, along with the other candidates were accelerated through the police training academy.

Besides The Dragon, all members of the programme left the Chicago PD after they were forced to work under strict restrictions, not the least of which were impractical police uniforms. The group soon became super-powered bounty hunters Freak Force.

Rapture soon became a bit of a maternal figure to the child-like Horridus. She also started dating the Dragon. After some false stops and starts, they became lovers. Rapture showed deep jealousy and became possessive.

Island. She became involved in the conflict after an old acquaintance of fellow Freak Force member, Superpatriot, drafted them into stopping the aliens for the U.S. Government. Her broken leg meant she could not physically fight the rampaging villain Bludgeon, who badly injured a number of her team-mates. However, it was Rapture who stopped the creature by bringing the phenomenally strong Joey Finklebarr from prison to kill him. Joey was a young man who had ended up in prison after his powers went out of control.

In the final issue of the "Star" mini-series, Rapture and Dragon learned that rock star Peter Klaptin had set up an elaborate scheme to convince people he was the vigilante Star. Actually, it had been Klaptin's bodyguard, Chris Robinson, who had been behind the mask. During a time when the Dragon was missing and presumed dead, Rapture met with Klaptin in a back room of the police station and bribed him to cover it up. A tape that was fried halfway through led Dragon to believe Rapture and Klaptin had sex, causing major breakdowns in their relationship.

Behind the scenes Erik Larsen held a public vote for fans to decide if Dragon should accept or refuse Rapture's proposal of marriage in the series' 27th issue, they voted for him to refuse. When the Dragon did refuse, Rapture revealed she was pregnant then threw him out of her apartment for asking 'is it mine?' Dragon was then sent to Hell by a villain called the Fiend and was missing for many months, during which Rapture went through her pregnancy. The baby was his and had inherited his super-strength. The child gave Rapture internal damage. Rapture was forced into premature labour and gave birth before the Dragon, busy elsewhere, could arrive. The baby was taken by the shadowy organization The Covenant of the Sword and replaced with a simulacrum to make them believe the child had died. After this the two split permanently.

had been voted out of the company by his fellow co-founders and his characters, including Youngblood, had been phased out of the 'Image Universe'.) Darklord had sought to replace his 'Darkworld', an alternate version of Earth, with the Savage Dragon's Earth. After he appeared to kill The Dragon and another S.O.S member Jennifer Murphy, Rapture insulted him and she was disintegrated by the villain's eye beams.

Later raptures

While escaping the doomed Darkworld, The Dragon did try to find that world's version of Rapture, but was distracted by finding the world's Debbie Harris. The Dragon World's version of Debbie had been killed in his apartment. The Dragon, Smasher and this Debbie fled in an alien spacecraft before Darkworld explodes. Rapture, and everyone else, was killed.

Later, she appears to return in the body of an old, prostitute friend. She joins the Special Operations Strikeforce as 'Lightning'. It is soon revealed she was actually the Covenant Of The Sword Operative 'Impostor'. This entity is later killed by accident while posing as Jennifer Murphy during 'her' wedding to Dragon.

An alternate time-line Rapture is kidnapped by Damian Darklord in order to raise the son of Dragon and the original Rapture, Malcolm. Damian is destined to grow up to be the entity who killed the original Rapture.

After issue 75, the Savage Dragon series takes place on a different earth, nick-named the 'Savage World'. The previous earth was destroyed in issue 103. Everyone on it, with the exception of a few characters including Rapture's son Malcolm, are killed. This includes the Rapture taken from the Alternate reality, who was raising Malcolm in Dragon's absence in the Special Operations Strikeforce complex there.

In the 'Savage World' Ricochet did not stop Rapture from killing her pimp in cold blood, and Rapture became insane. During the two year gap between issues #96 and #97, Rapture had become destitute, repulsive and overweight, foraging food from trash. Like other Freak Force characters Barbaric and Ricochet, Rapture has since been phased out of the book and the main cast, and has not appeared since issue 115 in a tongue-in-cheek Freak Force story.

Almost raped, she is saved by the restored hero Solar Man. However, he kills her in cold blood in retailation for her murder, enacting his twisted justice.

ee also

*Savage Dragon
*Freak Force

References

*Freak Force 6
* [http://www.savagedragon.com/ SavageDragon.com] - Official site