Brother Power the Geek

Superherobox|

caption=art by Al Bare
comic_color=background:#800080
character_name=Brother Power the Geek
real_name=Brother Power
publisher=DC Comics/Vertigo
debut="Brother Power the Geek" #1 (October, 1968)
creators=Joe Simon
alliance_color=background:#ffc0c0
alliances=elementals
aliases=
powers=Puppet Elemental: (Pre-Vertigo): superhuman strength, electricity absorption, superhuman leaping ability, durability, somewhat higher intelligence, albeit limited in formal education. (Vertigo) ability to reside in any artificial figure resembling a human being, ability to change size, superhuman leaping ability, durability

"Brother Power the Geek" was a comic book character created in the late 1960s for DC Comics by Joe Simon. He first appeared in "Brother Power the Geek" #1 (October 1968).Citation | last = Wallace | first = Dan | author-link = | contribution = Brother Power, the Geek | editor-last = Dougall | editor-first = Alastair | title = The DC Comics Encyclopedia | pages = 62 | publisher = Dorling Kindersley | place = London | year = 2008 | ISBN = 0-7566-4119-5]

According to Simon, the concept behind Brother Power was derived heavily from Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein"Fact|date=April 2008, right down to reanimation with the use of lightning. At the same time, Simon was also attempting to capture the sort of "wandering outcast philosopher" characterization that made Marvel Comics' Silver Surfer a cult hit amongst the college student readers of the period.Fact|date=April 2008

According to Scott Shaw!, the character was originally supposed to be called "The Freak", but was renamed to "The Geek" due to concerns by DC Comics management over the possible drug reference "freak" implied at the time. [ [http://www.oddballcomics.com/article.php?story=archive2003-09-29& Oddball Comics - Brother Power, The Geek ] ]

Original appearance

The original series lasted only two issues. Brother Power was originally a mannequin abandoned in an empty tailor's shop. The shop was taken over by hippies Nick Cranston and Paul Cymbalist, who dressed up the dummy in Paul's wet and bloodied "hip threads" to keep them from shrinking, having been attacked by Hound Dawg and other war hawks. Forgotten for months, but eventually struck by lightning, Brother Power was brought to life and endowed with super power and speed.

Shortly after his creation, Brother Power was kidnapped by the "Psychedelic Circus". The freaks in the Freakshow at the "Psychedelic Circus" were all based on the styles of "Big Daddy" Ed Roth and Harvey Kurtzman, both of whom were good friends of Simon. After escaping, he was fixed up and given a face by another hippie named Cindy, and attempted to run for United States Congress. His misadventures with the establishment led to finding work and encouraging other hippies to do so, eventually getting hired by the J.P. Acme Corporation just as it was taken over by the wicked Lord Sliderule. Brother Power's ingenuity still made the assembly line run more efficiently. Brother Power was last seen being shot into space on orders from Governor Ronald Reagan, after trying to prevent the sabotage of a rocket launch by Mad Dawg and his gang, knowing it would be blamed on hippies.

While sales of the title were modest, Brother Power was not popular among the staff. DC Comics artist Carmine Infantino claimed in several interviews following his retirement from comics that Superman editor Mort Weisinger disliked the character very strongly, and petitioned DC publisher Jack Liebowitz to shut down the title. According to Infantino and others who knew and worked with "Unca Mort", Weisinger harbored an admitted dislike for the hippie subculture of the 60's, and felt that Simon portrayed them too sympathetically. It didn't help that Mad Dawg and his cronies appeared with uniforms and gadgetry evocative of Nazis in the second issue. According to Joe Simon, the third issue was canceled just before the finished artwork was to be set up for print duplication, and to this day Simon refuses to discuss exactly what the plot of this issue was about, nor release any of the original art.

Despite Mort Weisinger's concerns over the Hippie subculture and the level of drug abuse it represented, drug, substance and alcohol intake are not depicted.

Simon was not, in fact, the artist on the book's two issues. The actual artwork was by Al Bare, who had been working with Simon at "Sick". Simon had hired Bare to "ghost" the art, and was subsequently credited with the art as was custom for the industry at the time.Fact|date=October 2008

Three years after "Brother Power" was canceled, Simon created "Prez", a tale about the "first teen President of the US". In later years, Simon has hinted that some of the more "psychedelic" elements of "Prez" were recycled from plot ideas he had for "Brother Power" that were never used due to that book's sudden cancellation. Some comic book historians have speculated that Simon's idea of having a young adult as President was derived as much from the Geek's attempt to run for Congress as it was from the film "Wild in the Streets". Again, as Simon has been highly reluctant to discuss the Geek in recent years, this remains as speculation.

Later appearances

During the 1980s, several aspiring comic book writers attempted to pitch revivals for the character to DC Comics. All of these were rejected with the justification given that Steve Englehart, then-writer of DC's "Green Lantern", had plans to rescue the Geek and make him a member of the Green Lantern Corps.Fact|date=June 2008 This never occurred.

The character was revived briefly in the 1990s, first in a short story by Neil Gaiman in "Swamp Thing Annual" #5 (reprinted in "Neil Gaiman's Midnight Days"), and then a Vertigo one-shot by Rachel Pollack and Mike Allred titled "Corruption of the Innocent" or "Homeland of the Dolls". Gaiman was supposed to succeed Rick Veitch as writer on "Swamp Thing", but turned in this story, in which the title character never appears, in fulfillment of his contract, due to disgust that Veitch's story had been censored.Fact|date=June 2008

In Gaiman's story, Brother Power is revealed to be an imperfect elemental, similar to the Swamp Thing, and he is connected to all human simulacra. such as dolls, dummies, statues, etc. The story resumes with the rocket's return to earth, guided into Tampa Bay by Firestorm after an unsuccessful attempt to destroy it. His newfound ability to change his size at will led to a call to Batman, who deferred to Abigail Cable. Ultimately, a former hippie named Chester was able to calm him down. Pollack's story featured a brief return of Brother Power's adversary, Lord Sliderule, now in a business suit, and depicted Brother Power being forced to perform as a circus geek, eating live animals for the first time. Eventually, after more misadventures with the establishment, he is reunited with Cindy, now a prostitute, and is destroyed saving her life, but survives by possessing one of her dolls.

He appeared briefly in Tom Peyer's graphic novel "Totems", as a guest at John Constantine's 1999 New Year's Eve party.

In one issue of the crossover miniseries "Legends", a marquee in the background reads "Brother Power the Geek: The Movie".

Although more open to the topic for the first two decades after the book's cancellation, Joe Simon has been reluctant to discuss Brother Power in recent years. His official [http://www.simoncomics.com website] has no mention of the book, and his son Jim Simon responds to all queries about his father and "Brother Power" that "Joe prefers not to discuss that particular work".Fact|date=July 2008 He has also refused to comment on the two Vertigo revivals.

Alternate versions

An alternate-universe human-like version of Brother Power the Geek appeared in the Elseworlds mini-series "Conjurors".

In the 1997 Tangent Comics title "The Joker", there was a human character who called himself "Brother Power," but whom Joker called "The Geek."

References

Other sources

*cite book | first=Jeff | last=Rovin | year=1985 | title=Encyclopedia of Superheroes, The | pages=122 | publisher=Facts on File | id=ISBN 0-8160-1168-0
*cite web | title="Brother Power the Geek" | work=Don Markstein's Toonopedia| url=http://www.toonopedia.com/geek.htm| accessdate=2005-12-20
*comicbookdb|type=character|id=15661|title=Brother Power the Geek