The Defenders #111

Review: And again, J.M. DeMatteis focuses an issue on a single Defender, Hellcat, and things get theological. The beginning and end are quite nice, with Patsy looking for her long-absent father to fill a hole in her heart—and she finds him! The guy wasn’t all that missing after all. This part of the issue touches the heart even of someone like me, whose father was always around for most of my life. This doesn’t need any explanation.

It's the center section where things go off the rails. Satan, apparently sorry that he lied to Hellcat when he claimed to be her father, now tells her more than anyone really wanted to know but DeMatteis wanted someone to listen to his explication of the character of Satan in Marvel Comics. This Satan explicitly denies being the Biblical enemy, just stealing his identity, as it were. This Satan is the personification of the dark side of mankind’s psyche, always there to afflict the human race. But there is another, more dangerous devil: each person’s dark side which they must overcome to live a full life. Again, Satan explicitly distances himself from the Bible and its teaching on human nature and the means to salvation by claiming each person has the power to defeat his/her dark side if only they would try. As I’ve often said: don’t take your theology from a comic book. But then DeMatteis is aware he is only sketching a comic book character; if he made any truth claims, he’d be running a cult in California—or maybe authoring self-help books. The hardest thing to follow in this section is Patsy’s frequent questions as to why Satan is telling her all these things. She doesn’t understand the answers and frankly, neither do I but she’s the only Defenders character who makes sense. After all, Daimon Hellstrom already knows all of this and perhaps Dr. Strange. No one else would care.

Comments: Part two of two parts (Nighthawk story), part one was in issue #109, prologue to the story in issues #112-115. Satan claimed Patsy was his daughter in issue #100, also suggesting he could have been lying. The Squadron Supreme universe is Earth-712. Letters page includes one by Mike Sopp who is still contributing to comics fandom.