Two one-shots follow the final two issues of “Myra wakes up from her coma to find the city is totally in shambles and she’s gotta do something about it with a ridiculous idea” arc. We’re in the home stretch now and there’s no sign of things slowing down.
Spoilers ahead
Cover by Denys Cowan
and Michael DavisWritten by Denny O’Neil
Pencilled by Denys Cowan
Inked by Malcolm Jones III
Colored by Tatjana Wood
Lettered by Willie Schubert & Albert DeguzmanThe Question and Lady Shiva face off as the recovering Myra resorts to some unorthodox methods to prevent Hub City from self-destructing.
Of all the side-characters from “The Question,” my favorite has to be Lady Shiva, though if she were to hear me call her a side-character, I don’t think I would have use of my arm for quite some time.
O’Neil’s characterization of Lady Shiva is distinct and clear, consistent in her values and fluid in her role within the story. Sometimes, as with the first arc, she is both aligned with and aligned against our protagonist, Vic. Other times, as with the ‘Fables’ crossover, she is merely a passive observer. She is not a good person but neither is she a villain. Her morals are grey and unpalatable at times but neither malicious nor cruel.
She does not take joy in suffering but neither is it abhorrent to her. She, like The Question, is a creature of violence, though the goals of the violence and who it is applied against/why it is applied varies between the two. He has lines he flirts with and, if he crosses them, finds himself needing to atone. She does not have such lines, although she does have her own principles of honor.
Her code remains unchanged throughout the series. Shiva’s “morality” is an anarchic one, that one should do as they wish no matter what, and that conflict results when her wish contradicts what another wishes. Well, maybe not anarchic but you get what I mean. While it is true that she operates entirely out of her own self-interest, a term I use not strictly in a self-preservation or hedonistic manner, when The Question is in the picture, her actions are all reactive to, or prompting of, his. Viewing the two as being in conversation, both literally and figuratively, The Question’s morals provides a framework from which to understand Shiva and her motivations in “The Question” #29-30.
Why does she save Myra and Vic from random gang members in the shadows when she had previously wanted to fight him? Why is she willing to forgo violence at Vic’s insistence? Why does Shiva not simply take over? Is she good or bad? The answers to these questions are in the text, often verbalized by Shiva herself, but as for that final question, neither. She is not a neutral entity either but simply outside of that construction, as Vic is. However, while Vic’s actions are attempting to be good, goodness being another word for helpful, specifically to those who need protection from the powerful, be that power be institutional, political, or physical, aspiring to be on one side of that spectrum more than the other, Shiva doesn’t think in terms of whether or not her actions are “good” or “bad” nor whether the outcomes are “good” or “bad,” only whether or not they align with her current path.
It’s interesting to try to get into Shiva’s head because she isn’t the usual “I do what I want” ambivalent antagonist. She is cold but not emotionless. She is not selfish but she is self-serving. She is powerful but her ultimate goal is not to rule nor to wield that power. She has a personal sense of honor but that honor is not “goodness.” She will see a job through until the end, no matter the hire, but she is not a mercenary, valuing her personal motivations over that of the hire.
Why talk about Shiva now instead of the events of the issues, which are pretty important to both Vic’s past and Myra’s present? Well, I just like character and haven’t had much of a change to talk about her. Also, she is reflective of what the series does well and of the many faces an indifferent city can wear. Hub City is like Shiva, shaped by the people who “hire” — read, lead — it. Yet a city doesn’t care about the machinations of the people in power and will help or hinder their plans based on how it is treated. A city has conflict when its desire comes into conflict with a contradictory desire from others. A city can be cold but it is never emotionless.
Continued belowThe other reason is that I’ve touched on many of the questions raised by these issues, like with Myra’s ill-fated attempt at replacing the corrupt and now non-existent police department with essentially a militia made of criminals no better than the cops who left and the questions of what solutions can be taken without restructuring a city in decay. “The Question” #32 is the standout of the four, dealing with PTSD, the damage a fetishization of guns and war, specifically referring to the combat in Vietnam, can do, as well as a critique of the armed “neighborhood watch” phenomenon. That last point is particularly interesting because the set-up is within a city that needs the role of protector and helper filled, as the institution that is supposed to fill it has rotted, but shows the ineffectual, damaging, and scary nature of these kinds of unregulated groups.
That said, it leaves a sour taste in one’s mouth nowadays, as the final scene of the issue uses the shooting of an unarmed black kid by a citizen’s militia member as the emotional climax for the white main character’s journey. The kid is little more than a prop and while the issue is effective in conveying the tragedy of William, who, having never been given real treatment for his PTSD and should never have been placed in a position where he had lethal control over another’s life after making it clear he never wanted to hold a weapon, is dragged into a situation that triggers his PTSD, blurring the lines between reality and memory, as well as the tragedy of the unnamed child, reading it now, in the midst of a national reckoning of the institutional nature of (lethal) police violence against minorities, specifically brown and black Americans, makes the message muddled.
There is more I could critique about this issue and the others, as well as more I could praise, but I think I’ll leave it at that. Next time, the final four issues of this run and the second to last week of my look at “The Question.”
