Brother Power the Geek is a comic book character created in 1968 for DC Comics by Joe Simon. He first appeared in Brother Power the Geek #1.
The concept behind Brother Power goes back to the 1952 comic "A Rag - A Bone and a Hank of Hair! (1952)". It features a tailor's dummy that comes alive by being soaked with all kinds of substances and by these substances being heated together, which is the same origin given to Brother Power. Only a lightning strike was added to justify Brother Power's super-strength. In the late 1960s, Simon was also attempting to capture the sort of "wandering outcast philosopher" characterization that made Marvel Comics' Silver Surfer a cult hit among the college student readers of the period.
Brother Power is not truly alive; rather, he is the result of some bizarre transformation of unliving material to living. He originates in the 1960's when a small group of hippies living in an abandoned tailor shop put on old suit on a dummy and the combination of rain, dust, the heat from a radiator and a lightning strike brought the dummy to life. The hippies later discovered the now almost alive dummy and named him Brother Power.
The hippies around Brother Power took an immediate liking to him and taught him to speak and sent him to school. Through the course of his adventures, Brother Power ran for Congress, was imprisoned as a circus freak, and forced to work on an assembly line by the villainous Lord Sliderule. While attempting to escape from Sliderule and the police, Brother Power hid himself away in an experimental missile and was launched into orbit around Earth. He was later discovered by a number of magicians and discovered that he is in fact a form of a puppet elemental. He has since been seen a few times in continuity and interacts with superheroes now, having crossed paths with the likes of Batman and The Phantom Stranger.
A version of him lives on Earth-47 in the DC Multiverse as part of the Love Syndicate of Dreamworld.
Peace, Love and Tropes, Man!
- Actual Pacifist: Raised and educated by peace-loving hippies, Brother Power tries to avoid physical combat at all costs, despite his awesome physical powers.
- All Bikers are Hells Angels: The hippies who raised Brother Power were constantly being hassled and attacked by a biker gang called The Mongrels.
- Based on a True Story: Rachel Pollack has admitted that what Cindy endured the night Dr. Abuse hired her was based on something someone she knew experienced at the hands of a British politician.
- Body Surf: The revived version of the character is a failed 'doll elemental' and is able to project his consciousness out of his original tailor's dummy body and inhabit the form of any other mannequin or doll.
- Circus of Fear: Brother Power was imprisoned as a circus freak at the Psychedelic Circus.
- The Corrupter: Dr. Abuse has deliberately been seeking Brother Power out and trying to destroy his innocence, as he's done to other people.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Brother Power's Arch-Enemy is Lord Sliderule. Lord Sliderule is the wicked owner of the J.P. Acme Corporation. He took over just as Brother Power was hired, and decided to use the cloth man help him run the company more efficiently.
- Darker and Edgier: The Vertigo Comics version of Brother Power, by Rachel Pollack and Mike Allred, features a brief return of Brother Power's adversary, Lord Sliderule, now in a business suit, and depicted Brother Power being forced to perform as a circus geek, eating live animals for the first time. Eventually, after more misadventures with the establishment, he is reunited with Cindy (the hippie who had given him his face), now a prostitute, and is destroyed in his original form while saving her life; however, he ultimately survives by possessing one of her dolls.
- Energy Absorption: If injured to the point of unconsciousness, Brother Power can revive by recharging himself with energy.
- Lightning Can Do Anything: Brother Power originates in the 1960's when a small group of hippies living in an abandoned tailor shop put on old suit on a dummy and the combination of rain, dust, the heat from a radiator and a lightning strike brought the dummy to life.
- Murderous Mannequin: Brother Power is a living tailor's dummy that's also a super-civilian possessing immense strength and agility.
- New-Age Retro Hippie: Brother Power is very much this, being a clothing store mannequin brought to life by a lightning bolt and befriended by a group of Hippies who dress him in "hip threads" and teach him all about Love and Peace.
- Nothing Is Scarier: Cindy recalls when she was hired as an escort for Dr. Abuse. He didn't physically torture her or rape her, but their night together was several hours of passive-aggressive dehumanization. Cindy was treated to a meal she didn't know how to eat, was told things about herself she didn't want to hear, and at the end she was given an actual diamond as payment. On the verge of tears, Cindy explains how she never wants to go through that again.
- Putting on the Reich: In #2, Hound Dawg and his war hawk cronies appear with uniforms and gadgetry evocative of Nazis.
- Shock and Awe: Brother Power can release some of his absorbed energy in the form of a burst of electricity. This is enough to light a lamp.
- Shout-Out: The freaks in the Freakshow at the "Psychedelic Circus" were all based on the styles of "Big Daddy" Ed Roth and Harvey Kurtzman, both of whom were good friends of Joe Simon.
- Sizeshifter: After returning from his long sojourn in outer space in Swamp Thing Annual #5, Brother Power gained the ability to alter his size at will.
- Super-Strength: The electrical charge that animated him also granted him tremendous strength.
- Super-Toughness: Being a cloth dummy that is filled with rags and supported by an internal wire framework, Brother Power is extremely pliable and resistant to pain.
