You probably clicked this link and are wondering ‘Who the hell is Grey Scherl and why am I reading an article by him?’ I mean, I know I’d be asking the same question in your shoes. So who is Grey? He’s a twenty-three year old from St. Louis, Missouri. He’s someone who quit cigarettes cold turkey when he was smoking a pack and a half a day. He’s a pop culture fanatic in need of remembering to donate to NORML. He’s been watching wrestling since 1998, and reading comics since 1992. An aspiring writer with an objective outlook on most subjects, and a guy who can’t hold down a steady relationship. Not to stereotype his fellow fans, but he’s always seen himself as typical.
Why is he writing an article on Comics Nexus? Because he loves comics, just like he loves pro-wrestling. He’s been a regular reader, as well as a lurker since the 411mania days, and he’s always loved the writers and the site. So one day he woke up and said to himself ‘You know what, I’m tired of just reading. I want to write. I want to give back.’ And here he is, and here it is.
The Gold Standard? Is it because he’s a Shelton Benjamin mark? Well, yes, he is, but that name honestly has nothing to do with it.
The name comes from his all time favorite comic book character, the greatest hero that you’ve never heard of.
Booster Gold.
But wait, how can anyone be a Booster Gold fan boy? Must be a hanger on from his recent push from DC! Not true! I’ve been a devout follower of the Booster man since I first saw him be defeated by his greatest nemesis back during the Death of Superman…..the almighty car door!
I think you can see where I might be going with my first column. Today is all about Booster, but who knows what next week (if you guys will have me) will hold?
Now to continue setting the stage, let me list a few of my other favorite characters so that you might get an idea for where I, as a reader, am coming from. I loved James Robinson’s Starman, and consider it one of the greatest books ever written. Kyle Rayner is my favorite Green Lantern, and when I started reading comics again at the end of high school the first book I bought was Green Lantern #150 because I made myself a promise that I would come back for it. I LIKE Ben Reilly, but hated how long the Clone Saga dragged on for. Y: The Last Man is an all time favorite of mine, as well as New X-Men, Alias, Ed Brubaker’s Captain America, and Geoff Johns run on Flash.
In other words, I like a VERY wide variety of things.
Why Booster?
He’s the everyman hero. He’s what most people would actually do if they found a way to get super powers. I mean, stopping evil and saving the innocent. That’s all well and good, but would it pay your bills? As nice as it would be to be Superman, the worlds greatest hero as well as mild mannered reporter Clark Kent, would you actually do that? Or would you whore yourself out for endorsement deals?
Don’t be shy, or afraid to admit it. What would be better then to fly around, save the day, be loved by the people, AND to get paid for it. Sure it would be cheesy, and again, you’d be whoring yourself. But given the situation? Would any of you not humor the thought?
Michael Jon Carter didn’t. And while his reasons may have been shallow, that doesn’t mean he didn’t give it his all.
Some of Booster’s accomplishments:
In his debut as Booster Gold he saved the President.
His sister came back in time to join him, worshiped the ground he walked on. And she died, and a piece of Michael did along with her. He never forgot that loss, and he did everything afterwards in part to make right by her.
He joined the Justice League, and alongside Ted Kord, spent most of his time trying to find ways to make money. But he still helped to save the world. In fact, the man even joined a corporate sponsored super hero team and resigned from it because they were encroaching on their values as heroes.
Booster took a blow from Doomsday, a villain he knew would kill Superman. He named him for the history books, and put himself in the line of fire. He was beaten mercilessly by an enemy he could have evaded. Sound like a man driven more by fame then heroism?
During the fight with Overmaster he lost an arm and DIED. And yet when the dead rose (as a side effect of the battle), he fought the good fight knowing his demise was only an inevitability at this point. He wanted to go down saving the world. Sound selfish?
I’m going to skip over the Extreme Justice days, and those of you who read it can probably guess why. Ugh. Hated that book. And despite my love for Formerly Known as the Justice League, and it’s follow up, I Can’t Believe It’s Not the Justice League, I don’t think either are canon, and thus have little to do with this.
Countdown hit shelves, and we see Booster proving himself again, through a very subtle method. He’d retired after Sue Dibny died, because with all of his knowledge of the future he never saw it coming. His friends wife had died, she herself being his friend, and with all of his knowledge of the future he never saw it coming. But he knew what would happen to Ted Kord, how and when he was supposed to die. Booster took that blow to save Ted. And when Ted died regardless…..Michael gave it his all. His gear was destroyed, he watched his friend Dmitri, Rocked Red #4, die. And worse? Maxwell Lord, the man that brought Michael into the JLA? He’s the man who puts the bullet into Ted’s forehead. He took off his goggles, and he went home. Would you have done the same? Would you have called it quits?
That’s what a weaker man would have done, but Booster came back. And beyond that, he changed the course of history by leading Batman to Brother Eye and bringing about its destruction. And while doing so may have disrupted the time stream to the point where his true goals became impossible to achieve, he still did it. Booster wanted to join the greatest Justice League in history, something foretold by the history books, and yet the changes he made during the Infinite Crisis left that League a memory held only by himself.
And then he fell back to his old ways. Whoring himself. Hocking products during interviews and using knowledge of the past stored in his little buddy Skeets to line himself up to be a big time hero. But historical inaccuracies such as his Justice League not coming to pass, led him to Rip Hunter, and a quick fall from grace as it was revealed that he’d stooped low enough to pay off a guy to dress as a villain for him to fight.
And then he died….again. Saving Metropolis from an exploding nuclear submarine. In an instant redeeming himself to those who cared to think about it. He saved a city at the cost of his very life.
And while it was a hoax, and he spent that year saving lives as the mysterious Supernova. Doing what was right without looking for recognition, the last place anyone would look for him.
At the end of 52, let it be known that Booster did something that I doubt anyone else can claim. He didn’t just save the world, or the universe. No, he saved fifty-two of them. And he couldn’t tell anybody.
He finally got his ticket to join the Justice League, and he turned it down to be the greatest hero in history. A hero so great that in order to maintain his mission, would have to go down as the single biggest idiot the super hero community would ever see.
And a few road bumps along the way aside, where is Booster right now?
What is Michael Jon Carter doing?
He’s repairing the time stream, saving the world, saving history. And nobody can find out. Even one person finding out about his mission could lead to time traveling enemies traveling back in time to wipe him out of history.
He started as a man seeking nothing more then fame and fortune, but morphed into the greatest, most selfless hero of them all. Even when he gets upset that he can’t take credit for his actions, he still keeps going. He never submits, he never backs down, no matter what the odds, no matter what the outcome. Michael Jon Carter is a super hero through and through, the greatest one you’ve never heard of.
The Gold Standard.
