Title pretty much sums it up. Watched a video recently where someone was asked to name a black superhero that didn’t have lightning based powers and while I could name a few it made me realize just how prevalent the trope is.
But why?
Edit: Y’all I’m not asking for examples of black heroes that don’t have lightning powers. I’m asking why it’s a trope to begin with 😮💨
This article does a pretty good job of explaining the history of black superheroes with electrical powers.
To summarize, the popularity of Black Lightning along with copyright issues lead to the creation of a few copycat heroes (ex: Black Vulcan in Super Friends, Juice from Justice League Unlimited). There’s also the possibility of electricity being a versatile power and the popularity of Storm from X-men and Static.
Someone in the comments section also noted that it could also be an artistic choice since the colors of electricity would contrast better with black characters than lighter skin characters. That seems like a stretch to me but that is another theory.
A pornstar from my country (decades ago) said that she preferred working with black men because of the contrast on screen. Totally unrelated tidbit, but it makes sense to me that the same goes here.
Big Black Contrast.
New bit idea: guy who insists he doesn’t have any internalized racism to confront, since he doesn’t have a sexual preference for interracial scenes, he simply believes they are better from a composition and cinematography perspective
This sounds like how Bill Maher would say it, immediately followed by like, the most blatant racism.
Great article!
I also think the contrast reason is very plausible for the early designs as colors and contrast are a massive part of design in comics.
Started really with Storm in 1975, although, yeah, her powers are weather control, not specifically lightning, but lightning is definitely her power move.
Before Storm, you had Black Panther, Black Goliath, and Luke Cage, not electrical powers.
But AFTER that…
Black Lightning - 1977
Black Lightning is a great character, but Tony Isabella holds the rights to him so it gets complicated doing stuff with the character.
As a result, you get Black Lightning knock offs that can be used without the rights entanglement.
Black Vulcan - 1977 (Super Friends animation)
Static - 1993 (comics), 2000 (animation).
Frozone
Edit: There’s a 2-year-old thread on that other site that asked the same question and received lots of examples. I get that tropes and stereotypes exist, but I’m not sure black superheroes and lightning fits the bill.
https://www.reddit.com/r/comicbooks/comments/1gpxcn2/black_superheroes_without_electric_powers/
I personally think that it started with the fact that the contrast of the yellow lightning worked really well against black skin in the comics.
Then I’m assuming that it became a trope.
Hey I watched a video on this years ago :3
I think it basically boiled down to they all have lightning powers, because the first black hero did, and then everyone copied it (and also good contrast or something)
Ink contrast?
Probably not the worst explanation.
That’s high praise on Lenny
It probably also helps that the dense clouds appear black, and dense clouds mean a more severe storm. I wonder if the ink contrast is more of a perk than the primary reason, compared to darkness being a convenient power metaphor for storms.
It’s really not worth that much thought.
Strong disagree. Prevalent literary tropes are always worth dissecting, because they reveal a lot about the cultures that construct them, and provide us with insights into how to be better people.
In this case, the quantity of black lightning heroes may indicate that non-white skin color is / was perceived as such a defining feature of the character, beyond any potential personality facets, that any other power simply wasn’t considered.
If nearly every white comic hero were The Hulk, it would also be shit, and worth raising questions about.
It’s not prevalent and the hulk is green.
Oh yeah. And it rarely leads to “better people” lol
hulk is green.
That’s Hulk’s brother, Culk.
The question may be better phrased as the complimentary of what you asked.
Not why do all these black superfolk have lightning powers, but instead why are so many superfolk with lightning powers black?
I suspect the answer is kin to why so many characters with fire-themed powers have red hair, or why so many superheroes with facial hair are wizards.
Because of Usain Bolt
Probably
Black panther Like Cage Miles Morales Green Lantern
Miles Morales has the Venom Shock.
I’m not asking for examples of black superheroes who don’t have lightning powers. I’m asking why it’s a trope to begin with.
Spawn, Shadowhawk, Bishop, Titan, Cyborg, Deathlok, War Machine, Steel, Blade, Cloak, Falcon, and Sunspot
What’s Misty Knight? Chopped liver?
I did not say this was an exhaustive list. Feel free to add to it.
Green Lantern can have lightning powers. It would just be green because yellow is evil. 🤷♂️
about your edit: Posting anything on social media is an invitation to contradict your premise, regardless of how emphatically you say what the real point of your post is.
The fact that you’re getting so many replies about other characters should be a sign the premise of the question is faulty. You’re asking people to stop giving you examples that contradict your confirmation bias.
It’s not confirmation bias but rather slight functional illiteracy from commenters. The original question is basically asking what’s the connection between black superheroes and having electrical powers; or in other words why is it a trope.
Nowhere in the title or the short note did OP ask people to name black superheroes without electrical powers. He only says that he saw a video that asked people to do that.
Even if you ignore the note, the title itself isn’t asking for examples of exceptions but rather for an explanation. It’s kind of like if someone asked why so many members of Congress are old and white, and the responses were just listing non-white and/or younger representatives.
Except I stated that I know other black characters exist that don’t have lightning powers. I know not all black superheroes have lightning powers but there’s enough of them that I’ve noticed it’s a trope.
TV Tropes has an article on this that probably does a better job explaining than I could.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ElectricBlackGuy
Nice, the first example given was naruto.
The first example given is literally called Black Lightning, but yes, the Naruto universe heads the Anime list
Naruto is spiritually black
Holy shit. How can a dot org site enshittify itself so much?
I don’t think the top level domain of the site has much to do with its platform decay, but yeah the ads are beyond obnoxious.
And it won’t function if you have AdBlock active. It forces you to allow the ads unless you subscribe.
Heh? I’ve never had issues on it with an adblocker.
This is on my phone. I actually don’t have an ad blocker extension installed on this browser, so I assume it’s mad either about me having Firefox set to default to private mode or about me using a VPN.
I’m on FF mobile and can access normally.
Are you using private mode and/or using a VPN?
Blade
I’m not asking for examples of black superheroes who don’t have lightning powers. I’m asking why it’s a trope to begin with.
I think there’s only a handful and can’t really be called a trope when you’ve had just as many examples of black superheroes without lightning powers.
There’s a few white ones too. Thor for example. Shazam. Flash. Wonder Woman
Not sure Thor counts as his origin is based on real world mythology that predates comic book superheroes by about 1000 years. Marvel may have fit him into their fictional world, but his powers and persona were established. Like DC using Lucifer. Their comic version isn’t quite the Biblical version but most readers are passingly familiar with the fundamentals of his character without needing a backstory.
Never heard of this trope.
Off the top of my head: War Machine, Black Panther, Blade, Cyborg, Bishop, Storm,
Spiderman (Miles).The only black comics character with lightning super powers I know is Electro from The Amazing Spiderman who also used to be white in old comics.
Is this really a trope? Can someone name 10 black superheroes with lightning powers?
Edit: Yeah, forgot Miles has some sort of electricity/lightning powers.
Can someone name 10 black superheroes with lightning powers?
Miles Morales / Spider-Man Storm (plus other weather, but lightning is there) Static Shock Black Lightning Thunder Black Vulcan
Off the top of my head, I can only get to six. But I don’t think I could come up with that many white heroes with lightning powers.
Found a list with bunch of superheroes with lighning powers. I see that most of top 10 are black-skinned heroes and heroines. But once you go down, most of them if not all are caucasians.
I feel that it is less of a “black heroes mostly have electrical powers” and more of a “heroes with electrical powers are more likely to be black”.
That guy from Mystery Men who could turn invisible if nobody was watching… he was black, wasn’t he?
Yes, Invisible Boy was black
Now if that isn’t a great metaphor for institutional racism, I don’t know what is
Except that he was only invisible when nobody was looking at him.
I don’t think clear is a skin color.
