So. Namor. Easily one of my favorite Marvel characters. When he’s good, he the most noblest of heroes, yet when he is bad he can be the most vile being in the Marvel Universe. He is one of the better anti-heroes in all of comicdom. He began as a terror to humanity, then became a hero of the second world war fighting the Axis powers. Some of my favorite tales are of him teaming up with his fellow Timely heroes and sticking it to the Axis. Into the 50’s he began the propaganda style fight against “communism” then he faded away.
It wasn’t until his reemergence in the early pages of the Fantastic Four where he fell back on his role as menace to the surface world. He became a great foil to Marvel’s first family and grew into a frenemy of sorts. His role as villain and hero would ebb and flow like the tides, to serve the story’s narrative as needed. I am not much of a fan where he is a wholesale dick. My favorite version is where his valor and dickishness is well balanced with a well crafted story. John Byrne’s run on Namor comes to mind when think about those stories.
Quite often Namor has found himself at odds with himself and his dichotomy of being of both the sea and the land. When he is not in full brutal villain mode, you can see his inner conflict a lot clearer. Namor is more complex than just a bad guy who can do good, or a good guy who can be bad. He has layers, like an ogre. Now that we’ll be seeing the Prince of the Blood in the MCU, I can’t wait to see this complexity in action. With what Ryan Coogler did with Killmonger… I have very high hopes for Prince Namor, the Submariner.
Tenoch Huerta will play Namor in Black Panther 2, and I am ready to see what this actor brings to Marvel’s “First Mutant”. My mind is open, and ready to be transported into the world of make-believe… who am I kidding, I spend most of my time there but I want more 😉
IMPERIOUS REX!
~ Doc
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