Science's Less Accurate Grandmother: "One day, Grant Emerson was just an ordinary teenager—until he suddenly discovered that he possessed explosive powers that he could barely control [...]. Now Grant uses his amazing powers as the super-teen DAMAGE!"

02 May 2022

"One day, Grant Emerson was just an ordinary teenager—until he suddenly discovered that he possessed explosive powers that he could barely control [...]. Now Grant uses his amazing powers as the super-teen DAMAGE!"

Damage was a 1994-96 ongoing comic series, part of what was a bit of a "super-teen" boom at the time (e.g., Impulse, The Ray, &c.). I have only read one previous issue of it, its contribution to the Siege of the Zi Charam crossover, which also involved The Darkstars. My impression was not very flattering: I had the vibe that it was one of those Imageesque 1990s comics, lots of "attitude" and explosions and bulging muscles. I would never have read it if it wasn't for a comment on my review of The Young All-Stars, where the mysterious CE of Collected Editions asked if its Iron Munro appearances "address or tie up anything from Young All-Stars." Iron Munro appearances!?, I asked. And it was duly added to my ever-expanding reading list. (This series of posts has just about ended its second year, and is on its twenty-fourth regular installment; I currently estimate it will run at least twenty more!)

The series opens with some pretty typical teen superhero stuff: Grant feels awkward in school, mostly because his parents move around a lot for work (his dad works for the Symbolix Corporation*), so he's never in one place for long. There's a mean jock, a nerdy friend, and a hot girl all in his supporting cast. Then he discovers he has superpowers... and then his parents are killed... and then he learns they weren't his parents at all, but raising him as an experiment for Symbolix. Soon Grant inadvertently blows up his high school, plays a key role in Zero Hour: Crisis in Time, gets exiled from Atlanta, learns he's the result of a genetic experiment by Vandal Savage, and joins the Teen Titans! The seeming Spider-Manesque premise of the opening couple issues is nothing but a feint.

Unfortunately, I think I would have enjoyed the feint more than I did the actual direction of the series. It becomes too much about what Grant's origin was... a question that really does not matter to him as a character! I mean, once you know he was a genetic experiment from Symbolix, does it matter what character was his natural-born parent, or who his genetic donors were? Ultimately, we find out that he was the child of the Al Pratt, the Golden Age Atom, and his wife Mary; Mary died in childbirth and Vandal Savage spirited away the child Al never knew he had and infused him with the DNA he'd collected from about twenty other members of the JSA and JLA. This takes two different storylines to figure out, but it's totally irrelevant. Like, does it matter if he has Martian Manhunter DNA? How could it? Especially given Al Pratt died during the Crisis in Time, so Grant will never know his real parents.

On top of that, the origin is pretty distasteful in the way it disposes of Mary Pratt, turning her into a female victim to give angst to its male lead. This is something the series excels at, because Grant's would-be girlfriend is brutally murdered to give him something more to angst about. I was like, "Wow, this is textbook fridging"... and then a couple issues later Kyle Rayner turns up to commiserate about his girlfriend was brutally murdered to give him something to angst about! Don't worry, though, by the end of the series Grant has hooked up with her hot college-age sister! (The nerdy friend is also brutally murdered.)

I did like the character of Wyldheart, another Symbolix experiment who is implied to be a foundling from New Genesis, but she vanishes after issue #8. (The DC wiki tells me she will pop up over a decade later in a JSA All-Stars story, but that's it.) The last few issues have Damage having visions of a mysterious figure, but who this is is never explained. There was obviously a lot of stuff this series wanted to do that it never got to in its twenty-one issues.

Too much of the series is given over to long fight scenes, which I quickly found dull. There's also a confusing proliferation of mediocre 1990s "xtreme"-style villains. You know the type. I just ultimately found little in this series that interested me, despite a promising start. The issue I liked the most was #7, "Control...", where Grant is put on trial for the destruction he caused in his opening story arc. It's one of the few times this series slows down and examines Grant as a person and lets us see how events are actually affecting him without incessant boring fight scenes. I also liked the issue where Grant visits his (adoptive) uncle in prison... who turns out to be the supervillain Doctor Polaris! Again, we get some nice conversations that focus on the characters. More like these, and I would have liked this series a lot more.

As for Iron Munro, Arn Munro of The Young All-Stars? In the opening story arc, he's based in Tampa (where I live!), working as an agent for the U.S. government. He gets involved in Damage's problems, and Grant briefly thinks he might be the child of Iron Munro and the original Phantom Lady, who we learn eventually became romantically. (No mention is made of any of Arn's teammates, not even Helena "Fury" Kosmatos, who he was romantically involved with last we saw.) Both characters ran afoul of perennial All-Star Squadron and Golden Age Wonder Woman foe Baron Blitzkrieg, which was a nice callback. For a few issues, Iron Munro even gets a cover feature! I was pretty amazed that five years on, anyone remembered him enough to use him, even if just as a red herring. Given he's fifty years older than last we saw him, though, he's a pretty different person. It is a nice touch that his files are code-named "Gladiator."

* Not, as I thought based on the lettering in the first couple issues, the Symboux Corporation. A sloppy handwritten "LI" can easily look like a "U"! I figured they were French.

This post is twenty-fourth in a series about the Justice Society and Earth-Two. The next installment covers The Justice Society Returns! Previous installments are listed below:

All Star Comics: Only Legends Live Forever (1976-79)

The Huntress: Origins (1977-82)

All-Star Squadron (1981-87)

Infinity, Inc.: The Generations Saga, Volume One (1983-84)

Infinity, Inc.: The Generations Saga, Volume Two (1984-85)

Showcase Presents... Power Girl (1978)

America vs. the Justice Society (1985)

Jonni Thunder, a.k.a. Thunderbolt (1985)

Crisis on Multiple Earths, Volume 7 (1983-85)

Infinity, Inc. #11-53 (1985-88) [reading order]

Last Days of the Justice Society of America (1986-88)

All-Star Comics 80-Page Giant (1999)