Saving Your Child
Today’s ramble has a common theme running through it. I don’t always do this, and it just kinda happened, but I think it worked out.
The theme centers around the concept that a parent will do almost anything to save their child, and we can see similar behaviors in comics and television shows. In Cyborg we see Silas Stone using every part of his scientific ability to save the life of his child while in the first episode of The Stand we see Charlie Campion breaking medical and military protocol to race home to protect his family.
More Human Than Human?
With the secrets Victor discovered in Cyborg: Rebirth #1, he enters his series proper and Cyborg #1 with lots of questions. First and foremost is what exactly did his father do to him to keep him alive? Did he graft machine parts onto his human body, or did he take what human parts we left alive and attach them to a machine? And what’s this about alien technology?
I’m not sure Cyborg will be getting his questions answered too soon, but the search for that knowledge could be pretty interesting.
A “date” with Sarah could also be interesting as the two head to a jazz bar to feel the music.
I enjoyed the depiction of Blue and his band, and the explanation of the concept of jazz was pretty cool, too, and I think this may have been the highlight of the book for me.
I’m still not sold on the series, but my curiosity is piqued, particularly when something named Kilg%re comes after our hero.
The Plague
With all the quarantining, COVID-19 testing, and social distancing, I felt it was time to jump into the way-back machine and rewatch The Stand miniseries. Apparently, there is supposed to be a new version coming out this year starting Teddy (James Marsden) from Westworld, but I wonder if it’s gonna make it to the small screen now that we have reality to deal with.
In any case, The Stand is a four-part miniseries that aired back in 1994 based on the Steven King novel of the same name written in 1978. King wrote the screenplay for the show, and when compared to the book, events are pretty close. Of course, you can’t do everything on TV that you can do in a book and in some places that detracts from the miniseries.
The overall story is about a superflu that infects the world, kills off most of the people, and prompts the survivors to congregate in either Las Vegas or Boulder, Colorado. It’s kinda like the Walking Dead but without the zombies and a little more purpose.
I’ve read the book, and as usual, the book is better than the show, but when I first watched the show (prior to reading the book), I really enjoyed it.
And apparently, I remembered a bunch of the scenes in the miniseries even if I forgot that Molly Ringwald and Gary Sinise were two of the main characters.
Regardless of how much I recalled, I found myself enjoying reliving the story as it unfolded in the first episode. A seal fails at a biological testing lab, and instead of locking down immediately, one of the guards races home to save his family. Sadly, he doesn’t save his wife and child, but instead releases the infection that will kill off 99% of the population (at least in the U.S. since we don’t see anything about the rest of the world – the 70s/90s were kinda focused on our country).
With current stories about the possibility of the China Flu being related to a medical lab in Wuhan being investigated, I kinda feel like King might have been on to something back in the 70s when he wrote this up. It only seems logical that people would try to save their family if an outbreak was happening.
Anyway, I enjoyed the episode and am looking forward to the next 3.
It’s a Wrap
What’s more human than trying to save your family? In Cyborg #1 we see Victor questioning his humanity because his father grafted him to a machine. Wouldn’t anyone with the power to save their child do nearly anything to enact that saving? We certainly see that same behavior in the first episode of The Stand, and while the consequences in Steven King’s story are much more substantial, I’d say the initial, very human response of trying to save your child is the impetus for both stories. And I’d say it’s a very human thing to do.
Ramble 2020.01.49 | Saving Your Child