Supermano

 

“Arriving on the scene, ready to lend a helping hand! It’s Supermano!”

 

“No, no, my friend. When you strike with your fist, you must also strike with your soul. Like this! YAAAAA!!!”

 

Jose Garza is one of the most celebrated superheroes south of the border. A comic writer and artist, he was critically acclaimed for his science fiction series Perros de Guerra, a grim story about a team of powersuit equipped mercenaries waging a hopeless guerilla war against the Vogel empire, which conquered their entire galaxy.

Through the multiversal miracle of Fox harmonics, the events depicted in Perros de Guerra closely mirrored the real-life history of a galaxy in universe Gamma Beta, and the real-life ruler of the Vogel empire was greatly displeased by Perros de Guerra when his multiverse scouts came across a copy at a Fairy goblin market. He disliked how the comic depicted him as the ruthless tyrant he was, but it enraged him that the comic depicted all his sordid affairs, all the times he cried to his concubines and begged his advisors for help. He could stand being depicted as evil, but not weak, and so he invested all the vast resources of his galaxy-wide empire into discovering the universe of the listed writer, Jose Garza, and kill him.

 

It was not easy for the emperor to pierce the dimensional barrier around universe Gamma Beta, but with the resources of a universe, he was able to send a small group of assassins to our world to hunt down Jose Garza. But as Drazok, deadliest bounty hunter in Perros de Guerra, prepared to kill his writer in his studio, Jose underwent the miracle of hyperstasis. He held out his hand to protect himself from Drazok’s lasersword strike, and saw a fist of white energy knock Drazok’s block off.

 

What happened specifically was this–the presence of Drazok combined with the presence of the latest issue of Perros de Guerra on Jose’s desk to create a zone of pluripotent multiversal energy. When Drazok approached him, Jose put his hand on the comic. His hand was the hand that drew the galaxies of Drazok’s world and plotted its history. Jose’s hand touched the energy field of the multiverse and created a third hand for Jose, one made of floating white energy.

 

The event also gave Jose an invincible body and the ability to fly. These abilities may seem unconnected to the manner in which Jose underwent hyperstasis, but men have developed these powers under odder circumstances.

 

With the most badass villain of his comic world knocked out, Jose wondered if he could go on to beat up some of the villains of the world he lived in, and thus was born Supermano, or Superhand in English.

 

Jose became a very flamboyant superhero. In terms of the “bright vs dark” superhero dichotomy, he ranks as bright as the sun. He’s always confident, always smiling, and always has something to say when he arrives at the scene, usually some sort of joke about “lending a hand.” He uses his skills as a comic artist to help his bright persona. He leaves bad guys tied up for the police with a quickly scribbled comic detailing the battle taped to their bodies. When he rescues people from danger, he leaves them with an autographed picture. Jose always has paper and pen hidden in the folds of his cape–and candy, for the real little kids.

 

One would never think he makes a grim war comic when he isn’t saving the da.

 

Jose has the the standard “Captain Marvel” set of powers–flight, superspeed, superstrength, and superdurability, but his true power is in his ghostly “mano,” his hand. The hand is made of pure odic energy and attacks both physically and psychically. It can, as one might expect, fly around and punch bad guys (or slap them, if Jose really wants to make them feel thwarted), but it also has a few more complicated abilities.

 

The hand can empower beings. When it touches a person, it can turn into a white aura that covers them from head to toe. Jose uses this empowerment ability to both give himself an extra boost of power as well as enhance teammates. The hand can also cover a persona’s hand like a glove. In this “glove form,” the hand can fire bolts of odic energy. The hand can empower objects as well as people. For instance, it can empower the air to form an unbreakable white barrier, a good trick, as even opponents that know the hand can empower objects assume it can only empower solid objects. Famously, Jose once saved an ocean liner from a sea monster by having his hand empower the surface of the water, which prevented the sea monster from surfacing until it had completed its tantrum.

 

Due to their similar powers, Jose has become one of the mentors of Martin’s student Adam Brigham. His advice to him–don’t be afraid to mix it up. Jose knows that Adam doesn’t want to be a frontline fighter and is training to be a supporthero, a kind of superhero who supports his team over a distance, but he still stresses to Adam the importance of knowing how wade into a melee and mix it up. Sometimes a helping hand needs to take an active hand!…As Jose says.

 

Jose is a good friend of the Morelli family and has assisted them in combating renegade elements of Xibalba. One might not think that such a bright superhero wouldn’t get along well with the brothers Vampiro and Diablo, who were known to be frightening avengers of the night, but somehow a friendship was formed between them. Personal differences have a way of evaporating once one shares a combat experience with another. He has also been an active superhero ever since he underwent hyperstasis. He loves being a superhero and is determined to be one until the day he dies. He’s made himself a persistent nemesis of Mexican supervillains and has defeated the likes of Campeona Tarjeta and the Aztec Gillman. But his most persistent nemesis will always be the Vogel Empire of universe Gamma Beta. Many superheroes would become discouraged at the thought of an interdimensional empire spending vast amounts of resources on their assassinations, but not Jose. Jose, as always, looks on the bright side–unlike a lot of other superheroes, he knows all the secrets of his nemesis.

 

(Behind The Scenes Inspiration)

 

Supermano is another flash of inspiration that came to me while going on a deep dive through knock-off and bootleg action figures. During my aimless quest to know more about plastic men than is likely healthy for one individual, I came across this fellow, as I’m sure some of you have:

 

 

I am 70% certain Supermano wasn’t an actual bootleg and was instead a joke about the prevalence of Mexican bootlegs in the toy community (though honestly, I’ve found that most bootlegs come from Europe and Asia), but I couldn’t help but fall in love with the idea of taking finishing joke and turning Supermano into Super “hand.” Because mano, you see, is Spanish for hand. So I turned the S shield into a hand and gave Supermano similar powers to Adam Brigham, and Supermano being a proud Mexican patriot allowed me to flesh out a little of the Mexican corner of Capeworld explored by Martina Morelli.

 

I think what convinced me to go through with Supermano was his powers. I find the psychic energy hand quite fun. Just imagine all the cool combos Superman could pull off if he stole an option from Gradius, or, if that’s too deep a cut for you, a funnel from Gundam. It’s a cool enough power on its own that I probably didn’t even need to add the empowerment aspect, but I did anyway.

 

Man, poor Adam. I think I ended up giving the cooler version of his powerset to the bootleg…