Spawn - A Characterization

Table of Contents

1 Introduction

2.1 The Diabolic Origin of Spawn
2.2 The Human Origin of Spawn
2.3 The Fusion of Both Fiabolic and Human Roots in Spawn

3.1 Spawn, the Defender
3.2 Spawn Joins Forces with Other Superheroes

4.1 Spawn's Violent Behaviour

5.1 Evidence for Spawn as an Existential Character
5.2 Spawns Ability to Change

6.1 The Villains Opposing Spawn
6.2 The So-Called Good Guys Opposing Spawn

7 Conclusion

8 Bibliography

1 Introduction

Are you sure you know the difference between good and evil? As you race around or put food on the table or pass your exams or make love. Are you confident, that you could distinguish the forces of life from the forces of evil.

I am Todd McFarlane, creator of Spawn and to me there is nothing, nothing out there in life that is all black or all white.

Good always has a germ of Evil inside it and Evil just a touch of Good. Take Spawn: An assassin's life, a Hellzone-Soldier and death, not exactly Boyscout-material. But if you consider he made his choices for love, the love of his country and the love of his wife; well, you begin to see, he's a little like you and me, just another poor schnook, walking on razors edge; all Hell pushing one way and Heaven pushing the other, and him stuck in the middle, trying not to get cut.¹

As Todd McFarlane said, to differ between Good and Evil isn't easy. Especially not in the real world, but the topic of this term- paper concentrates on fiction or better the fiction in comics, and which other genre is better equipped with stereotypes for Good and Evil as the comic-genre. At least it has been, since Spawn. Spawn was one of the first, probably the first, comic-character, whose intentions are not so easy to interpret, whose personality is a very ambiguous one and definitely doesn't fit in the existing "comic-characterisation-rules."²

On the following pages, I want to examine the character of Spawn, set forth the good and evil sides of his character and try to give Spawn his place within the structures of Good and Evil.

2.1 The Diabolic Origin of Spawn

One major part of any character whether in comics, 'common literature' or even real life is his origin. The place where he comes from, where he has been raised, where he has been taught the way he has to behave and what his purpose is.

In Spawn's case this place is Hell, strictly speaking the "8th sphere of Hell,"³ where Malebolgia, this part of Hell's master, dwells. This Malebolgia is creating Hellspawn's for only one purpose, to lead the armies of Hell in the final battle between Heaven and Hell on the dawn of the Apocalypse. That's the way this Spawn was created, as well. Al Simmons, assassin in the name of the government of the USA, killed by treason, has been resurrected into a Hellspawn and sent back to earth to be trained by his "[...]guardian demon, the Clown[...]."⁴

2.2 The Human Origin of Spawn

The Hellspawn's purpose should now be clear, it is definitely an evil one. It was created to destroy Good. Spawn was created for the same reason, so it is now not easy to handle the character of Spawn in relation of good and evil, because it lives for only one reason. There is of course the other origin of Spawn as well: Al Simmons. Al Simmons was a hero as written in books; always loyal to his country and his commanding officers, never failed to accomplish the goals of his missions and always fighting in the code of honour, "a man of courage and integrity."⁵ He loved his wife above all, in fact she was the reason why Al Simmons agreed to the bargain with Malebolgia, ⁶ a circumstance which makes the character Al Simmons more sympathetic and likeable.

2.3 The Fusion of Both Diabolic and Human Roots in

Spawn

The former-life-qualities of Spawn should be irrelevant for a Hellspawn, because Malebolgia erases their memories, which he has done in the case of Spawn too,⁷ but he left him a "handful of images darting in [his] mind."⁸ These images are getting stronger, and throughout the whole series of Spawn his memories are coming back again bit by bit. So this fusion of diabolic and human characterises have created a unique Hellspawn: Spawn. A Hellspawn not just executing its masters wishes, and following its forecast way, but thinking of its own, questioning its existing and its purpose.

3.1 Spawn, the Defender and Protector of the Innocence and Weak.

If you want to characterise an ambiguous character like Spawn, you have to work out both good and evil sides of its personage. I want to work out his good sides first.

There is one thing which makes Spawn definitely a good guy: his instinct of protection the weak. The first occurrence of this behaviour was his saving of a young girl from a group of rapists.⁹ However this occurrence was more or less accidental, which is not the case in "Spawns Alley."¹⁰ Here Spawn is some kind of protector and sometimes even a patron¹¹ for the bums living in this particular alley. The bums "[...] have more or less become Spawn's best friends [...]".¹² Spawn even endangers his own well, sort-of-life, by jumping in the line of fire, pointed on a girl engaged in combat, he doesn't even know.¹³

Another good example of his virtuous character is the occurrence of Spawn helping his meant-to-be archenemy, the counterparts of the Hellspawn's, the Angels.¹⁴ He brings himself in great danger by even showing up in "Elysium,"¹⁵ and nearly got slaughtered by an army of angels.

3.2 Spawn Joins Forces with other Superheroes

Not to be neglected are the times he joined forces with other superheroes to fight for a greater good or to destroy evil forces. There was his battle where he joined forces with the WildC.A.T.S -team against an evil, some kind of 'mirror-Spawn' from the future in an alternate universe;¹⁶ or (sort of) side by side with the Batman rescuing New York from being nuked;¹⁷ or his medieval editions crusade alongside the medieval version of the Witchblade, against Cardinale and his Army of Darkness;¹⁸ and last but not least, when he joined forced, although it lasted not very long, with the Spawnhuntress Angela while they where escaping the trial of Angela in the "Elysium",¹⁹ and trying to find a way out into the world of men.²⁰

4.1 Spawn's violent behaviour

One thing that marks Spawn's evil side is his violent and rageous behaviour towards his victims. Although his victims surely have deserved their punishment, Spawn doesn't just kill them, he, in the case of Billy Kincaid, hangs them on chains and impales their bodies with blunt, wooden ice-cream-sticks.²¹ According to Frank Miller in his introduction to the first Spawn Trade Paperback, "Spawn is a berserker[...],"²² and with this statement he is absolutely right. When Spawn is engaged in combat, he gets into a battle-frenzy, and his fury doesn't stop, until his last enemy has fallen. This behaviour could be attributed to his former life, where he was an assassin in the name of the CIA. Here he killed hundreds of terrorists and other public enemies in the name of his country, without mercy or regret for his victims. In fact, this was one reason why Al Simmons has been chosen by Malebolgia to become a Hellspawn, because he was "a government-trained assassin, who would kill without thinking."²³ This ruthless and violent behaviour can be found in all Spawn- Series, and has become some sort of trade mark of him.

5.1 Evidence for Spawn being an existential character Spawn's very

existence is based on his very own choice. Malebolgia gave him the choice of dying in peace or to stay in his service and get the chance to avenge his death and to see his wife again.²⁴

Since his arising from the pits of hell, Spawn has to make choices. In fact he has exactly three choices: "[...]the choice of doing nothing with his new powers or using them for good or for ill."²⁵ At first he chose to do nothing, just sitting in his alley, whining in agony about his existence. However, later in the storyline of Spawn, he became more and more active. He stopped sitting in the shadows of his alley, doing nothing. He changes from being a pitiful creature not knowing what has happened to him, to a self-conscious protector of the weak and innocence. On the contrary of Malebolgia speech, where he said:

And it was your choice. I don't have the power to turn people away from God. They have to do that willingly. But once they do I need to seize that moment and make them mine. Once I have them, my powers can and will control them forever.²⁶

Spawn does not let himself control by Malebolgia. He changes of his own free will, not to follow the path Malebolgia has led out for him.

5.2 Spawns Ability to Change.

One situation, where the importance of Spawn being an existential character becomes clear, is the one between him and Angela. Since Angela realised, that Spawn is "[...] not like any of the others."²⁷, she doesn't pursue him anymore, which is eventually better for Spawn, because she is over 100.000 years old, which means 100.000 years more training. On their first encounter, he escaped more or less out of luck.²⁸ Not every Hellspawn has had such luck, the Medieval Spawn did also fight against "hell's machinations"²⁹, but nevertheless has been killed by Angela without ever fully comprehending what he was.³⁰ Another example, where his ability to change of his own will , saved his life, was the encounter with Heartless John, a Vampyre Lord. By his choice of picking up his cloak again, from which he was separated, because "[he thought] it uses [him] to kill people"³¹, and then be able to beat the Vampyre, which he definitely weren't, if he hadn't worn the cloak.³²

6.1 The Villains Opposing Spawn.

A figure in any sort of fiction also characterises itself through its opponents. Their behaviour towards the protagonist influences him throughout the story. The reason is, there is a actio-reactio- relationship between protagonist and antagonist, and the harder the one side acts, the other side reacts. With these facts one can assume, that if the one side is the obvious evil side, the other side must be the good side. But this isn't the case in Spawn, here the antagonists are both good and evil. The villains are also not all the time pure evil, there is always more behind them, sometimes they are even victims on their own. Take Cy-Gor, in former life an agent of the CIA, who looked up to Al Simmons. It is now a failed experience of the agency, Al Simmons worked for, and is now in pursuit of Spawn, because it was Al Simmons who stole the prerequisites for the experience which made him.³³

However, there are nevertheless a hole bunch of really bad guys opposing Spawn, who make his survival not so easy, and who force him to react, pushing him to act like the hero he was probably meant to be. There is, above all, Jason Wynn the man responsible for Al's death. Spawn swears from the beginning of his new existence that he would "[...] find him. The one who framed [him]."³⁴ Jason Wynn, is some sort of 'Main-Villain', he is the one who controls everything, he is the one who pulls the threads. And there is of course Malebolgia and his diabolic pet and most humble underling the Violator. Malebolgia has all the trumps in his hands. For him it doesn't matter whether Spawn does nothing, and "[...] let the evil and ugliness prosper here on earth,[...]"³⁵, or "[...] killing the so-called bad guys, which helps build [his] army that much faster[...]."³⁶

6.2 The So-Called Good Guys Opposing Spawn

As if these villains were not enough opposition for one man, another fraction of opposing characters are on the hunt for Spawn. In any other comic, those would be the good guys: Angels, superheroes, the law, and of course, God, the One big good guy (In Spawn -comics He is actually an old woman).³⁷ However, this isn't any other comic, and here Spawn is forced to fight against Angels, at first Angela and later Tiffany, when Angela realised that Spawn isn't the evil Hellspawn he supposes to be; or other emissaries of God, like the Redeemer, an antispawn, "subcontracted by heaven to redeem or destroy Spawn on Earth."³⁸

Not to forget the superheroes Spawn had to face and who were not very friendly on their first encounter. There is for example Batman, Gotham City's very own protector, who opposes Spawn from their first encounter to the last. Even in the end, when they rescued New York, Batman is still on the attacking side, and responds to Spawn proposal of burying their hostilities by throwing his batarang, some sort of lethal boomerang, towards Spawn with the words: "bury this."³⁹, or there is the Team Youngblood, who puts Spawn in the "bad-guy-drawer," when their leader said: "Time to show the bad guys what happens when you try to mess with us"⁴⁰, which was related to Spawn, shortly after they have attacked him.

Last but not least, there is the law, always searching for the "extranormal hazard[ous]"⁴¹ creature dwelling in the back-alleys of New York. The law in form of either the round characters of Sam & Twitch, two police-officers that are even given their own comic-series this fall, or in form of dozens of policemen, officers etc. without even a name.

7 Conclusion

Now, after all what is written above, it is not easy to arrange Spawn in the structures of this comic-universe. On one hand, Spawn is the superhero, the protector, the one who fights for the innocent and the weak. On the other hand Spawn is a butcher, a fighting-machine, on more than one occasion wreaking havoc. On one side, he doesn't want to counterstrike when he's being attacked, as seen on his first encounter with Angela, when he said to her: "Hey, Lady. I don't want to hurt you."⁴² On the other side he responds to attacks with brute force and remarks like: "I'm the one here in the position to kill."⁴³

In spite of his evil sides, I have come nevertheless to the conclusion, that Spawn is one of the most virtuous characters in his universe. He is a crusader, on a mission to cleanse the world of villains like Tony Twist or Jason Wynn. But he's not some stereotype hero without flaws and always doing the right thing. He is a superhero, that's for sure, but he does not fit in the usual type of one. He makes mistakes like any other human being, he is emotional and filled with rage. That is exactly what makes us sympathise with him, and his behaviour.

This is exactly what Frank Miller ment, when he wrote his opinion of Spawn:

Spawn is a chunk of comics history, and an important one.

Spawn is a Boston Tea Party, a loud, rude act of defiance against a bad, broken system built on abusing its finest.⁴⁴

Former heroes, in the days of the early Superman, Batman or Spiderman, where always in control, never ever made any failures and always won in the end. That is exactly what Spawn is not. This cliché-system of invincible superheroes, who are impossible to beat. To broke with these old ideals, was risky, because loosers are not what you call a million-seller, but Todd McFarlane did it anyway - fortunately.

8 Bibliography

Baumgärtner, Alfred Clemens. Die Welt der Abenteuer-Comics. Bochum: Verlag Ferdinand Kamp, 1979.

Ennis, Garth, Brandon Peterson and Batt. Medieval Spawn/Witchblade. Issues 1-3. Fullerton: Image Comics, 1996.

Gaiman, Neil and Greg Capullo. Angela Trade Paperback. Anaheim: Image Comics, 1995.

McElroy, Alan, Dwayne Turner and Danny Miki. Curse of the Spawn: A Fall of Doves. Issue 10. Fullerton: Image Comics, 1997.

McFarlane, Todd, et al. Spawn Bible. Fullerton: Image Comics, 1996.

McFarlane, Todd. Spawn Trade Paperback. Anaheim: Image Comics, 1995.

McFarlane, Todd. Spawn: Flashback Part 2. Issue 13. Anaheim: Image Comics, 1993.

Miller, Frank and Todd McFarlane. Spawn vs. Batman. Anaheim: Image Comics, 1994.

Miller, Frank and Todd McFarlane. Spawn: Home. Issue11. Anaheim: Image Comics, 1993.

Moore, Alan, Scott Clark and Sal Regla. Spawn/WildC.A.T.S. Issues 1-4. Anaheim: Image Comics, 1996.

Moore, Alan, Tony Daniel and Kevin Conrad. Spawn Blood Feud Trade Paperback. Anaheim: Image Comics, 1996.

Todd McFarlane's Spawn. Videocassette. Home Box Office. New York: Medusa Communications.

[...]

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¹ Todd McFarlane, Todd McFarlane's Spawn: Episodes 1 & 2, Prod. Home Box Office, Dir. Alan McElroy, 1997, VHS, 50 min. approx.

² Alfred Clemens Baumgärtner, Die Welt des Abenteuer-Comics (Bochum: Verlag Ferdinand Kamp, 1979) 25: "Diese Helden,[...], haben keine menschlichen Schwächen, Fehler und Unvollkommenheiten, erleben keine innere Versuchungen, Kämpfe, Niederlagen und Siege."

³ Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible (Fullerton: Image Comics, 1996), 1.

⁴ Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible 3.

⁵ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback (Anaheim: Image Comics, 1995) 3.

⁶ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 8.

⁷ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 10.

⁸ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 10.

⁹ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 17-21.

¹⁰ Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible 23.

¹¹ Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback (Anaheim: Image Comics, 1995) 11-12.

¹² Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible 23.

¹³ Frank Miller and Todd McFarlane, Spawn: Home, Issue 11 (Anaheim: Image Comics, 1993) 5.

¹⁴ Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback 3.

¹⁵ Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback 16-18.

¹⁶ Alan Moore and Scott Clark and Sal Regla, Spawn/WildC.A.T.S, Issues 1-4, (Anaheim: Image Comics, 1996).

¹⁷ Frank Miller and Todd McFarlane, Spawn vs. Batman, (Anaheim: Image Comics, 1994).

¹⁸ Garth Ennis and Brandon Peterson and Batt, Medieval Spawn/Witchblade, Issues 1-3, (Fullerton: Image Comics, 1996).

¹⁹ Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback 17-24.

²⁰ Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback 3-13.

²¹ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 130.

²² Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 1.

²³ Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible, 3.

²⁴ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 3-10.

²⁵ Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible 3.

²⁶ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 95.

²⁷ Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback 88.

²⁸ Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback 22.

²⁹ Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible 16.

³⁰ Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback 10-11.

³¹ Alan Moore and Tony Daniel and Kevin Conrad, Spawn Blood Feud Trade Paperback (Anaheim: Image Comics, 1996), 17.

³² Alan Moore and Tony Daniel and Kevin Conrad, Spawn Blood Feud Trade Paperback 103.

³³ Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible 19.

³⁴ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 11.

³⁵ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 96.

³⁶ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 96.

³⁷ Alan McElroy and Dwayne Turner and Danny Miki, Curse of the Spawn: A Fall of Doves, Issue 10 (Fullerton: Image Comics, 1997) 6-10.

³⁸ Todd McFarlane, et al. Spawn Bible 17.

³⁹ Frank Miller and Todd McFarlane, Spawn vs. Batman 51.

⁴⁰ Todd McFarlane, Spawn: Flashback Part 2, Issue 13 (Anaheim: Image Comics, 1993) 9.

⁴¹ Alan Moore and Tony Daniel and Kevin Conrad, Spawn Blood Feud Trade Paperback 14.

⁴² Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane, Angela Trade Paperback 20-21.

⁴³ Todd McFarlane, Spawn: Flashback Part 2 24.

⁴⁴ Todd McFarlane, Spawn Trade Paperback 1.