Tech's Day 20 in Black History: The first Black Hero in the Marvel universe; Blue Marvel

Taking it back to the comics as my cuz suggested I do the super hero known as Blue Marvel; the first black hero in the Marvel Universe.  Now you may be saying, Tech, I thought this was Black Panther. Well in creation, yes, but in the Marvel universe Blue Marvel was the first black person to have super powers and be a super hero.  In fact he was the most power superhero during his time and is still one of the most powerful in the current universe.

Kevin Grevioux

Blue Marvel was created by screenwriter, actor, and comic book writer Kevin Grevioux.  You may recognize this name as the co creator of the Underworld film series and he played the lycan Raze in the first Underworld movie. He even wrote some batman and superman comics.  He came up with Blue Marvel as a teenager.  Grevioux was born in 1962 and grew up during the Civil Rights movement which shaped the story of Blue Marvel.  Kevin Grevioux wanted a black hero that, as he put it, could sit at the table with Superman Martian Manhunter, Shazam and the Century when it comes to power, but could also rival the intelligence of Reed Richards, Tony Stark, and Amadeus Cho.  Imagine  a hero with the power of Superman and the intelligence of Batman, no 5 batmen!

Blue Marvel, Adam Brasheer, was a child prodigy and is a former fullback at Cornell University where he graduated magna cum laude.  He has PH.D.s. in electrical engineering and theoretical physics.and was a veteran of the Korean War, a member of the Marine Corps with two Silver Stars for carrying two men to safety while under fire.  One of them is his best friend and who would later become his arch nemesis Conner Sims who would later become Anti-Man.  Conner was a Caucasian man who saw how Brasheer was treated in the Marines and by others because of his race.  His hatred for racism grew during their friendship, as he was always ready to defend his friend even protecting him from lynchings.

Adam Brasheer was born with the intelligence, but how did he get the power?  It started when he became the project lead on a scientific attempt to harness anti-matter through the creation of a "Negative Reactor" that would create a bridge between the Negative Zone and the positive universe.  If you know Fantastic 4 or even have seen that horrible reboot of a movie then you may know a little about the negative zone. Anyway that's a whole other thing, for you see this reactor would provide a clean source of energy, but the reactor exploded and Brasheer and his best friend Sims were hit with mutagentic radiation.  Sims body dissembled into energy while Brasheer became a stable "antimatter reactor" and gained super powers!  Now were talking super strength (He is on par with Thor and the Hulk! he can easily lift 100 tons!), speed, reflexes stamina, flight, senses, perception, invulnerability, regenerative healing factor, energy generation, molecular manipulation, and bio-luminescence ( he got that glooooowwwwww).

Blue Marvel fought as the first Super Hero in the Marvel Universe during the 60's.  He wore a full costume and a helmet that covered his face. All he wanted to do was to use his gifts to protect the world and keep everyone safe, but that all changed the day he had to fight his friend who was now known as Anti-man.  Anti-man's powers messed with his head and he set out to end racism by using his powers to make the world where everyone was equal, so that there could be no racism.  The problem was he did it through violence and Blue Marvel could not let his friend hurt people.  Blue Marvel defeated Anti-man saving the day, but his helmet was damaged and he was revealed to the world as a black man.

Now remember, this was the sixties and the people of the world where shocked that their savior, their hero was in fact a black man.  Now this brought on a fear in American during the Civil Rights movement because you had a black man who was the most powerful being on Earth.  Yes, they were afraid that he would join the Civil Rights movement and their was nothing they could do to stop him, but Brasheer had no thoughts of doing so as he wanted to protect everyone, no matter what their race. Even so, In fear of an uprising from the Civil Rights movement, President Kennedy asked him to retire after giving him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Even so, the president would have to call on him again to stop an alien invasion.

Blue Marvel vs Anti-Man

Afterwards Brashear settled into civilian life, but the government still feared him.  They asked Shield to watch him, but Nick Fury did not agree with them making him retire because of his race, so they had him watched by one of their agents, "Candice"  Now Candice was a Caucasian woman whose real name was Marlene.  Not only was she tasked to watch him, but yes she was asked to form a relationship with him to see his allegiance and to see if he would ever take on the government on behalf of the African American community. Well, ol Adam fell in love with Candice and the two even have three kids together, Kevin, Max and Adrienne...  Of course she was a spy who even studied African American life to prepare her for the role she did indeed fall in love with him.  Any time he faced a racist he did no harm to the person, which caused Marlene to love him even more. And thanks to the power of uh communion she aged just as slow as he did. Tragedy would strike the family  later when Adam and his son Keven, who was showing signs of intellect like his father, had to stop Doktor Skorpion form getting the time travel tech of Rama Tut... Yea, Tech dont know about them neither, but anyway to stop them they opened a portal to the neutral zone.  Adam was weak from the fight so Kevin took charge but was sucked into the negative zone with Skorpion who was vaporized, but to save Earth Adam had to close the portal leaving Kevin behind.  An event that caused his daughter Adrenaline nightmares and his son Max to grow distant...

Now let's jump to present day, Adam is a tenured professor of physics as the University of Maryland living a normal life until Anti-man returns defeating the Mighty Avengers.  The version of the avengers included Iron Man, Wasp, Wonder Man, Ares, Hank Pym (actually a skrull here but not important now) and Sentry. Now if you know any of these heroes you know Anti man had to be one bad man to defeat them and luckily for them with his power he can not stay in the physical word long.  As he defeated them he kept repeating, Blue Marvel could not stop me so what can any of you do?

And if you you know Tony Stark aka Iron man he had to find out just who Blue Marvel was.  Tony was director of shield during this time so he had access to all secret files, but Blue Marvel's was still restricted.  This didn't stop Tony as he discovered the cover up and why Blue Marvel had to retire.  His search lead to Blue Marvel's wife who called her husband saying they were looking for him.  Now, here is when she confesses and decided to tell her husband the truth about their life and their relationship.  Adam responded just as in man would, in anger he realized his marriage was a lie and he left her even with her confession that she did fall in love with him.  Adam then decided to go and meet with Tony Stark.  Tony takes it upon himself to apologize for the government and that the current president wants him back. Now, after some talk  Adam leaves angered by some of the comments.  Hank and Tony are basically like slavery is over things are better now, so Reed has to explain to them how things still are and he uses mutants as an example.


After a talk with Namor who used the Tuskegee airmen as an example on how they went in to battle fighting no matter what the world thought of them, Adam decided to suite up again as Blue Marvel and go help Tony, Reed, and Hank, but before he can Conner, Anti-Man confronts him. Anti-man now sees that all life must be ended since they can not be equals since some must be racist.  Blue Marvel tries to reason with him, telling him that the world is like it was,even though there will always be racism, more and more people are becoming more open.  Anti-man doesn't listen and winds up knocking Blue Marvel out.

Later Adam joins the Mighty Avengers to come up with a way to stop Anti-man.  Adam comes up with a plan to merge his power with Anti-Mans that will cause a large explosion which he says he can contain.  The Avengers don't agree saying it to risky but Adam insists. Adam looks saying again the man is asking him to sit out. So we get Blue Marvel vs the Avengers and he whoops their butts easily his toughest fight was with Sentry who talks during the battle about racism and doing the right thing.  In the end one punch from Blue Marvel sends Sentry out into space (Sentry is as strong as the Hulk in his angriest form)  Jamn! Sentry is able to come back and muster all of his power to knock out Blue Marvel.

So, later Sue Richards aka the Invisible woman decided to bring his Adam's wife to see if she can get him to listen to the Avengers.  The two talk and have sore of a reconciliation where Adam realize that his anger is not at her but at himself for just hiding where he could have been an inspiration, because Candice tells him that the world wasn't ready for a black man with so much power and that it never would be.  The two kiss and Blue Marvel goes to fight Anti-man with the Avengers.

Later in the battle, Anti-Man attacks Blue Marvel with his energy.  Blue Marvel absorbs it but its so much that it expels from his body.  Well, Candice decides to show up at the battle worried about Adam and she is burned to death.  Her death is the last straw that shows Adam that there is no saving his former best friend and that he must be stopped.  So he takes Anti-man up to the edge of the ionosphere and siphoned off his reaming anti-matter energy which caused his him to permanently decohere and collapse.

Blue Marvel is invited by Tony to join the avengers.  He doesn't turn down the offer but leaves to gather his thoughts and learn to live in a world truly being himself.  He goes home to see a box from Candice that holds a new uniform.  He puts it on and returns to the present day Marvel Universe!

Ok, that was a lot but i wanted to tell the whole story of Marvel's first Black hero.  A hero with so much power and intellect who lived through the Civil Rights movement  but had to or chose to hide it instead of getting involved.  Something he later regretted... Ok, Marvel Cinematic Universe, your giving us Black Panther, but i think Blue Marvel deserves his own movie!

Oh you may be wondering about his kids.... Well... that's another story....

And some more Blue Marvel...

Tech's Day 19 in Black History:So much more...

Through school, TV, and other media we usually hear the same names during Black History like Martin Luther King Jr, Harriet Tubman, Malcolm X, but there is so much more. 

 While at the home of the 2016 National Champions the Clemson Tigers, I had a professor, Dr. Henry Lewis Suggs, in college that made us read and study about others in Black History, the ones that weren't taught in schools, churches or the media. The names you commonly hear and the ones I listed above were excluded.  Dr. Suggs established the African American Studies Program (AAS) at Clemson where he was then inspired to publish four scholarly books and dozens of scholarly articles.  So, thank you Dr. Suggs for inspiring me to look deeper and to study  to learn about these great people in African American History.

 Today at church, our youth were presented by three teachers; who presented a male and female African American in history that they may have yet heard about like Claudette Covin who refused to give up her seat on the bus nine months before Rosa Parks or Carter G. Woodson who was one of the first scholars to study African American history.  Why wasn't Tech invited? Anywho...

One of your youth said he wanted to make video games, so now Tech was asked to mention Gerald A. Lawson; the man behind the first video game console that was mention in the previous blogs Techs in Black History....

GERALD A. LAWSON



Do you own any of the X box, PlayStation, or Nintendo systems? Or have you every played on a friends? Do you call yourself a gamer? Well, you can thank Gerald A. Lawson, a self taught engineer who created the first home video game system with interchangeable parts!! That's right, gamers, his work paved the way for Nintendo, Xbox and PlayStation.

It all started in 1976 with the Fairchild Channel F Home Entertainment System that became the bases for modern systems. Lawson was the director of engineering and marketing for Fairchild Semiconductor, where Apple's Computer's co-found Mike Markula had headed Marketing. Lawson also founded and rand Videosoft, a video game development company that made software for the Atari 2600. He also made one of the earliest arcade games, Demolition Derby, which debuted not to long after Pong.

In the 1970s he joined the Silicon Valley's Homebrew Computer club where at the time he was the only black member. While he was with the club, he met Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. Lawson was born December 1, 1940 and died April 9, 2011. It was until March 2011, that Lawson was honored as an industry pioneer by the International Game Developers Association shortly before his death.


Check out the African American Tech Inventors  blog post by Clicking Here!

Tech's Day 10 in Black History Black Heroes in TV: Vixen

Hellooooo, Vixen. Ah, a black hero in the DC universe more like her comic book counter part; yea I'm still looking at you Mr. Terrific. Anyway a bit of history from the comics. A warrior in ancient Ghana known as Tantu asked Anansi the spider (remember him from the Static Shock episode clip?) to create a totem that would give the wearer all of the powers of the animal kingdom, only if it was used to protect the innocent. The totem made Tantu Africa's first legendary hero. The totem was then passed down through Tantu's descendants eventually making it to the McCabes family and to the current holder Mari Jiwi McCabe, well current in the present time line but her grandmother Amaya Jiwi also holds it on Legends of Tomorrow. Confused? Me too. We will get to all that in a bit, but first lets talk about Mari McCabe.



Now the interesting thing as seen here in the picture Vixen of the DC TV universe had her back story told in animation that was shown for free on the the CW Seed (where you can watch season 1 and 2). Here we see appearances by the Flash, Arrow, and the legends of tomorrow with their actors doing the voices. Then later Vixen appeared in live action on Arrow with her voice actress playing her... well seems her hair has grown since the animated season one and then season two the hair is back short... Maybe she does have something in common with ol Curtis...

Now after she appeared on Arrow, Legends of Tomorrow season two wanted Vixen on the team, but her actress was not available full time so, whats the next best thing. Go back to the 40's and recruit her in her prime grandmother Amaya who was a member of the hero team the JSA aka the Justice Society of America. She only joins the team because the reverse flash kills her then boyfriend hour man. This makes me wonder because Mari was born in Africa where her parents gave her the totem before they were both killed when their village was taken over and Mari was sent to America and was raised by her foster dad.

So, Amaya was with the JSA young and fine and in America in the 40s with no signs of an African accent. So I wonder after her JSA days does she go back to or decided to go live in Africa? Who knows, they haven't explained it yet. Now we have Amaya time traveling and going on adventures, even being in the Invasion team up where she fought along side all the other DC TV heroes in the present time, but Mari was nowhere to be seen and the Flash, Arrow, and the other heroes didn't acknowledge that this was a different woman (yet equally attractive) with the same name and powers.

Ok, fine they look similar but still, where was Mari? I have a theory since Amaya seems to not care about changing her future or the timeline where in the latest episode she sleeps with fellow team member Citizen Steal. Now you may ask whats wrong with that? One, they were in the past where the legends had to stop former team member Rick Hunter from killing George Washington. Two, team member heatwave had been kidnapped along with Washington. Citizen Steal found himself falling in a freezing river so Amaya needed to warm up. Ok I was like she will use the totem hold on to him and create a super hero warmth by summoning the power of animal with some body heat, oh no, no, no. They got it on. Keep in mind Heatwave and Washington are still in trouble and being in the past I am sure they didn't have protection... wait Citizen Steal's power is to cover himself in impenetrable well steal. Maybe he... never mind the fact remains she already changing her future. What if poor Mari isn't born? Oh and after they did the do, the slept for an hour! You have a team mate and America's first president in danger, in danger of messing up America's itself future! Oh no we good lets sleep it off... Anyway through T.V magic they make to them but after Heatwave and Washington pretty much rescued themselves...


Ok, rant over.  Vixen both versions have the power to call on the strength and attributes of every animal in the animal kingdom.  Like gaining the power of a bear, or breath under water as a fish, or fly like an eagle and so on and so on. So,  I wonder if the two Vixens will meet or will any other team members or heroes of the DC T.V universe say anything about it.  I recommend watching season 1 and 2 of the animated series to get her full backstory that has great action story and some soap opera twist.  Vixen has always been shown in media as part of a team with no story of her own until now so check it out to see Mari and you see Amaya not care about the time line every Tuesday on the CW after the Flash which airs at 8 p.m. Easter time.