Tea Krulos - Heroes in the Night: Inside the Real Life Superhero Movement

Copyright 2013 by Tea Krulos

All rights reserved

Published by Chicago Review Press, Incorporated

814 North Franklin Street

Chicago, Illinois 60610

ISBN 978-1-61374-775-9

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Krulos, Tea.

Heroes in the night : inside the real life superhero movement / Tea Krulos.

pages cm

Summary: Tracing the authors journey into the strange subculture of Real Life Superheroes (RLSHs), this book examines citizens who have adopted comic book-style personas and have hit the streets to fight injustice in a variety of ways. Some RLSHs concentrate on humanitarian or activist missionshelping the homeless, gathering donations for food banks, or delivering toys to childrenwhile others actively patrol their neighborhoods looking for crime to fight. By day, these modern Clark Kents work as dishwashers, pencil pushers, and executives in Fortune 500 companies, but by nightthey become heroes for the people. Through historic research and extensive interviews, this work shares not only their shining, triumphant moments, but also some of their ill-advised, terrifying disasters Provided by publisher.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-61374-775-9 (pbk.)

1. Community activistsUnited States. 2. Crime preventionUnited StatesCitizen participation. 3. SuperheroesSocial aspectsUnited States. 4. Social justiceUnited States. I. Title.

HN90.C6K78 2013

303.372dc23

2013022099

Cover design: Sarah Olson

Cover photos: (clockwise from upper left) Phoenix Jones, photo by Lucien Knuteson, http://lucienknuteson.com; the Watchman, photo by Jerry Luterman, http://jerrylutermanphoto.com; Zetaman, photo by Pierre-Elie de Pibrac, www.pierreeliedepibrac.com; Terrifica, photo Michele Abeles Interior design: Jonathan Hahn

Printed in the United States of America

5 4 3 2 1

Dedicated to the Watchman-Keep fighting the good fight.

Introduction
Meet Your Friendly Neighborhood Real Life Superheroes

American Superheroes

Boy Scouts and Batmen

Early Prototypes

Great Lakes Alliance

The Secret City

Coming Out of the Phone Booth

A Tapestry of Evil

The Man in the Green Skull Mask

International Justice Injection

Challengers, Assemble!

Brooklyns Ex-superheroes

Mr. Jones and Me

People Fighting and Superheroes and Pepper Spray and I Dont Know

An Age of Heroes?

Epilogue
Masking Up

Index

R eal Life Superheroes, I had told my friends at the bar. Whats the worst that can happen, right?

We all had a good laugh over that one.

The scene crossed my mind in a fleeting moment as I ran through the intersection of Alaskan Way and Columbia Street in Seattle. I had spent the night patrolling with a man who calls himself Phoenix Jones, the Guardian of Seattle. Phoenix Jones and his team, the Rain City Superhero Movement, dress up in masks and body armor and patrol the streets, looking for crime to fight. Hed had some successes and some failures, but at this moment he was in big trouble.

At closing time, we had observed a group of menRussians, as it turned outfighting in the street near a bar. Phoenix Jones had brazenly run into the middle of the group of fighting men, yelled for them to break it up, then pepper-sprayed them. The men, and their girlfriends, became very angry, and soon we were running for our lives to escape them.

Fall back! Cross the street! Phoenix Jones yelled at me, videographer Ryan McNamee, and his teammate, Ghost. I looked at him across the street and determined that standing next to him wasnt safethe Russians wanted to stomp him into the ground. One of their girlfriends had already beaten Jones repeatedly on his cowled head with a high-heeled shoe; the men made an effort to rush and tackle him before he blasted them with pepper spray again. Ryan and Ghost had been slammed into a wall and I had been punched in the face by an angry, confused Russian while I breathlessly tried to explain the scene to 9-1-1 dispatch.

I decided instead to stand on a little concrete island in the middle of some railroad tracks and an oncoming lane of traffic. If the Russians tried to attack me, I figured, I could kick them off the island into the street and run up the train tracks. But Phoenix Jones ran over to join me.

Sorry about this, brother, he said, surprisingly calm. Are you OK?

I nodded, putting a hand on my right cheekbone. My eyes were blurry from running through a fog of pepper spray.

I got punched, but Im OK.

I dont know where the police

Rrrrrrr! Rrr! Rrrrrrrrrrr! A loud revving cut Jones off.

We looked across the street. Some of the men were pointing at us and shouting angrily in Russian. One of them was in the drivers seat of a giant Escalade, and another one yelled and jumped in the passenger seat.

Phoenix! I said, Theyre going to try to run us over! The Escalade squealed out of the parking lot.

Take cover! Phoenix Jones screamed, running back across the street. Protect yourselves! Take cover! I ran to hide behind the concrete pillar of a nearby parking garage. I figured the pillar would shield me from the rampaging vehicle.

Welcome to the comic-book-turned-real-world lives of a growing group of people who call themselves Real Life Superheroes (or It is a secretive subculture that I spent over three years getting to know. I found them to be alternately amusing, hysterical, inspirational, disappointing, andin situations like this oneabsolutely terrifying.

My introduction to the RLSH movement was in February 2009 after I read a short blurb in Chuck Shepherds syndicated column, News of the Weird, that said a growing number of men and women around the country were adopting their own superhero personas. Excited about the possibility of finding a local Milwaukee RLSH, and perhaps freelancing a short article on the subject, I began a search engine scan on Milwaukee RLSH. I soon turned up someone who had named himself the Watchman. He had a MySpace page, which was my first clue that RLSH varied drastically from their comic book counterparts. But I went with it, and sent him a message. He replied and we set up a late-night meeting at a city park near my house.

The night of March 1, 2009, was a freezing 9 degrees Fahrenheit. A frigid wind violently blew the pages of my notepad. I rubbed my mitten-clad hands together to keep the feeling in them and wondered if the story was worth the frostbite. The streets of the neighborhood were abandoned; only two people were crazy enough to be out in that weather, and one of them was me.

The Watchman might be called crazy for other reasons.

I forced my frozen hands to reach for my cell phone and stiffly dialed a number. The phone rang once, and a mysterious voice said, This is the Watchman.

Hi, Watchman, yeah, Im in the park near the playground equipment, I said in a frozen cloud of breath. A swing creaked behind me in the wind. The Watchman told me he was pulling into the parking lot.

He rolled up to the park, not in a high-tech Batmobile but in a pretty normal-looking four-door tan Pontiac. He left his car and walked through the empty park toward me, and for a few strange moments I felt totally unprepared to interview a costumed crime fighter.