Literature / Justice Wing

Justice Wing is a series of short stories, serials and novels (both Web Original and published Literature) by Eric Burns-White. It is set in a Superhero universe and includes a significant amount of Comic Book Tropes Deconstruction. Though the stories contain plenty of Superheroish action, they tend to focus more on the reality of being a super hero or villain (its most famous story, Interviewing Leather, is literally a fictional magazine interview with a supervillain) as well as the increasing pressures between parahumans and unpowered prosahumans. Unlike most deconstructions of super hero fiction, Justice Wing takes the four color world of supers at face value (and its sequel Interviewing Trey), but several other stories have been written in the setting. The stories fit together, but cover several different eras. While it's intentionally kept vague, stories seem to be set anywhere from the early 1980s through to the present day, and seem to correspond to different comic book eras: Emergence (roughly corresponding to The Silver Age of Comic Books, Halcyon Days (roughly the The Bronze Age of Comic Books), the Apocalypse Agenda (a pastiche of Crisis-style events), and In Nadir (roughly the The Iron Ageof Comic Books). Some of the stories are set in single eras, while some novel-length works span several eras.

Current stories include:

• Justice Wing: Emergence: The origin story of Justice Wing and its related characters.
  • Justice Wing: Motivation: When Julia Kelly – the significant other of a superhero – is murdered by one of his enemies, her sister Emily and her fiancé Landon – aka the hero called the Artifact – have to try to put her affairs in order and find some way of moving on when the rest of the world seems fixated just on the Artifact himself, and how Julia's death affects his motivation.
• Vilify 5: Lady Velvet — a retired Super Villain — attends a convention for fans specifically of super villains alongside some old pros and at least one new villainous retiree
• Interviewing Leather : A music journalist named Todd Chapman gets an opportunity to interview a C-list Super Villain.
  • Interviewing Trey: Todd Chapman is kidnapped by one of the most notorious, deadly, and worst of all insane villains, the Jack O'Knaves — ostensibly to write a book about the Jack, but the Jack always has a plan.
  • Forebears: Years before Leather gave her interview, her parents (lawyer Mandalora Hartley Shapiro and philosophy professor Evan Shapiro) had adventures and secrets of their own, set at the end of the Halcyon Days era, and then the end of the Apocalypse Agenda.
  • Becoming Leather: Greenhorn: After a first tier supervillain takes an interest in Leather after her first arrest, Leather is recruited as a greenhorn thief in Anchor's Marines. But, with teammates who resent her, a profession where backstabbing is just part of the daily routine, and with the arch-villain Beguile taking an unusual interest in her, Leather has to prove her worth to the others during a huge heist.

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Trope Examples:

Justice Wing Emergence

• Alliterative Name: Many examples, including but not limited to Barbara Babcock, Cindy Calloway, Leonardo Lucas, Delilah Dare, Cordelia Chance, and so on....
• Badass Normal: Barbara Babcock is a normal reporter, but she takes down a professional mob enforcer in seconds in #2.
• Bad Boss: Leonardo Lucas. He berates his workers and literally imprisons one to play mindgames with him instead of asking him straight out about a potential planetary extinction event.
• Bus Fullof Innocents: Chad Keillor faces this in #1, when a tractor-trailer jackknifes behind several stopped cars full of people, meaning all of them need to be saved within seconds.
• The Cape: Chad Keillor, without any doubt.^note From Justice Wing Emergence #1: “I have been blessed with abilities. With or without those abilities, I have a responsibility to be a good neighbor to every one of my neighbors — and that means everyone on this planet. If that means bringing a guy’s pizza to his office so he can make an important phone call, that’s what it means. If it means exposing my abilities and potentially risking myself, that’s what it means. That’s non-negotiable. If that means we can’t live in the same apartment any more, I’m sorry. I really am. I love you and always will — you’re my best friend. You’re my sister as much as Kathy is. You’re the first person I ever loved outside my immediate family. But I will not let people suffer because helping them bothers you.”
• Captain Ersatz: Chad Keillor, one of the first protagonists, is clearly inspired by Superman. Similarly, Leonardo Lucas is inspired by Lex Luthor.
  • Barbara Babcock is cut from the Lois Lane mold, and her partner Teddy Porter could arguably be a Captain Ersatz for Jimmy Olsen.
  • Cindy Calloway could similarly be inspired by Lana Lang.
  • Captain Prestige and the Power of ZEUGMA is a comic book character in the Justice Wing Universe. Kenny Kirkland can call down an exploding comet by shouting the magic word Zeugma, transforming him into the mighty Captain Prestige. This is a full Captain Ersatz of Captain Marvel/SHAZAM — taking the public domain version of the character and changing the names to avoid trademark violation.
• City of Adventure: Crown City, Illinois seems to be a super heroic epicenter.
• Clark Kenting: Chad Keillor, perhaps predictably.
• Crimefighting with Cash: It is suggested that the Montreal family of Greystone City will fit this.
• Differently Powered Individual: Project Tangent Swan refers to super powered individuals as 'expressed.'
  • Generally people with super powers, regardless of source, are called 'parahumans.'
• Elaborate Underground Base: Leonardo Lucas's base — just called 'the Facility' — goes at least nine levels below ground.
• Energy Absorption: Chad Keillor uses this to prevent sonic booms and air-compression fireballs, among other things.
• Flight: Chad Keillor can fly at incredibly fast speed.
• Gadgeteer Genius: Mason Temple and Leonardo Lucas.
• Insufferable Genius: Leonardo Lucas
• Intrepid Reporter: Barbara Babcock and Teddy Porter
• Military Superhero: Lynette Hardesty was a United States Air Force officer before she joined Operation Tangent Swan — her parahuman abilities were part of the reason she was selected for the program.
• Most Common Super Power: Cordelia Chance is implied to possess this.
• The Paragon: Chad Keillor. To the point where his later superhero codename is literally Paragon.
• Secret Identity: At the start of the story, all parahumans are undercover.
• Secret-Keeper: Cindy Calloway knows about Chad Keillor's powers and argues that Keillor should be staying in hiding instead of using his powers even in secret.
• Spy Catsuit: Cordelia Chance wears one of these in red. Lynette Hardesty admits to preferring these in the field as well.
• Stock Superhero Day Jobs: There are a number of these in play
  • Averted with Chad Keillor — he works for a major metropolitan newspaper... as a fact checker. This lets him spend most of his time out of the office 'researching at the library' (he has a degree in Library Science) and gives him the chance to help people and still make a living.
  • Mason Temple — ubertech engineer
  • Sophia Montreal and the rest of the Montreal Family are Busy Socialites.
  • Astrid Bixby is an Attorney
  • Lynette Hardesty and Lillian Tartikoff are both secret government agents.
• Superhero Gods: Astrid Bixby dreams of rainbow bridges and Norse mythology... and is known to be the goddess Freya in later stories.
• Superheroes in Space: Chad Keillor was trained by an interstellar organization called Interplanet which seems to fit this mold.
• Superheroes Wear Tights: Even though he's not a public hero as yet, Chad Keillor wears a blue bodysuit when he's out helping people.
• Superman Substitute: Chad Keillor can fly super fast, is apparently invulnerable, can melt things, freeze things, is super strong and can lift up a car at super speed without snapping its axle off, apparently has super hearing and x-ray vision... there's really no question here.
• Supervillain Lair: Even before parahumans are publicly known, Leonardo Lucas has one of these.
• World's Strongest Man: Once again, Chad Keillor.
• X-Ray Vision: Chad Keillor has this.

Vilify 5

• Badass Normal: Fletcher Joan
• The Cape: Paragon — the greatest hero on Earth... as the ex-villains know all too well.
  • Refraction retired from villany after being beaten by Paragon.
• Clark Kenting: Subverted — one of the fans who attends Vilify 5 comes cosplaying as a blue-suited, glasses wearing mild mannered reporter for a major metropolitan newspaper.
• Code Name: Most of the ex-villains have these. Clinton Potifer — aka the Cipher — makes a point of insisting on his codename during the convention.
• The Cowl: The Nightwatch.
  • Other codenamed ex-villains include Fletcher Joan, Madam Hypnos, Refraction, the Hook, Leathertooth, and of course Lady Velvet herself.
  • Heroic codenames mentioned include the Beacon, the Centurion, Paragon, and the Nightwatch.
• Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Subverted — Refraction had started out making money legitimately with his engineering breakthroughs, only a market crash and bad contracts for his patents left him near-broke, so he decided to go into crime instead.
  • Lady Velvet is an alchemist. She started as a villain seeking wealth and luxury, but ultimately took to using her alchemical skills to make money — largely through artisanal makeup, bath, and body products... but with a few extras on the side.
• Dating Catwoman: Lady Velvet and Nightstick, back during the brighter days of heroes and villains.
• Fastest Thing Alive: The Beacon.
• Leotard of Power: Lady Velvet wears one of these in (of course) velvet, as does Janet Bailey, who staffs Lady Velvet's dealer room booth.
• Most Common Super Power: Lady Velvet herself, as well as her 'apprentice' (really her booth worker) Janet Bailey.
  • Fletcher Joan is implied to have similar attributes.
• Superman Substitute: Paragon. He's such a Superman Substitute that the Jim Croce song "You Don't Mess Around with Jim" apparently has the lyric "You don't tug on Paragon's cape" in this universe.