American Superhero

I think that Gene Luen Yang and Sonny Liew have done a great job of bringing the early 1940’s superhero back to life. The story begins after the fall of the Ching Dynasty with four spirits arguing over the future of China. The spirits are: Dragon, Phoenix, Tiger, and Tortoise, these guardians of China are speaking with each other trying to find a successor from the common people of China to rise up to be Emperor and carry on the Chinese legacy of a great royal dynasty.
The main character the story is Hank, he’s the son of a grocery store owner that wants nothing more than to emulate his father’s life journey and serve his community through being a grocer. Hank’s mother has other ideas for Hank, after being involved in a bank robbery where she is ultimately saved by superhero by the name of the anchor of justice it is then that she decides that Hank should strive to become a superhero. Though Hank has no super powers like the anchor of justice and other caped crusaders in their city has, Hanks mothers determine for her son to become a superhero to rise above his station become someone great. After a few attempts to get him superpowers such as exposing him to toxic waste, or having them bitten by a lab animal that’s been exposed to certain scientific research experiments she eventually settles on him being trained by uncle
I do think that the book does a great job of showing that it doesn’t really matter your nationality or where you’re from and the world or even if you have superpowers, to me the underlying message in this comic is that we can all rise up to better our community, to help those around us and to make the world just a little bit better place for those that come after