Star-Spangled Kid
| Star-Spangled kid | |
|---|---|
 The Sylvester Pemberton incarnation of the Star-Spangled Kid as depicted in All Star Comics #64 (February 1977). Art by Wally Wood. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics |
| First appearance | Sylvester Pemberton: Star Spangled Comics #1 (October 1941) Courtney Whitmore: Stars and S.T.R.I.P.E. #0 (July 1999) Miss Martian: Teen Titans #37 (August 2006) |
| In-story information | |
| Notable aliases | Miss Martian Courtney Whitmore Sylvester Pemberton/Skyman |
| Abilities | Sylvester Pemberton
Courtney Whitmore
Miss Martian To view all abilities click here: Miss Martian’s abilities or White Martians |
The Star-Spangled Kid is the name of several superheroes in the DC Comics' main shared universe.
Fictional character history
[edit]Sylvester Pemberton
[edit]The original Star-Spangled Kid was Sylvester Pemberton, a Golden Age character, created by Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel. He adopted the identity to battle Nazism during World War II, and was unique in being a child with an adult sidekick, Stripesy a.k.a. Pat Dugan.[1][2] Both he and Dugan were superb acrobats along with having sufficient training in hand-to-hand combat, but the pair regularly bickered about which of them should get top billing.
Decades later, he changed his name to Skyman and led Infinity Inc.[3] He was later killed by Mister Bones's cyanide touch.
Courtney Whitmore
[edit]Courtney is Pat Dugan's stepdaughter, who found Pemberton's gear in his belongings and donned the Cosmic Converter Belt, with a costume of her own design. She begins her career as the second Star-Spangled Kid to annoy Dugan as partial revenge for him marrying her mother and supposedly forcing the family to move from Los Angeles to Blue Valley, Nebraska. Dugan, a skilled mechanic, designs and builds S.T.R.I.P.E., a mecha which he rides in to accompany and protect her. Eventually, she joins the JSA and, after being given Jack Knight's cosmic rod, changes her identity to Stargirl.
Miss Martian
[edit]A third Star-Spangled Kid appears in Terror Titans #1 and is subsequently captured by the Terror Titans team for the Dark Side Club. The Star-Spangled Kid is forced to fight in a tournament against other meta-humans, going on to win the tournament. During the course of the storyline he appears to have a much stronger resistance to brainwashing than the other fighters, although he does eventually succumb. Later, it is revealed that he is the shape-shifting Miss Martian, who is immune to the brainwashing and gradually frees the other combatants.[4]
Other versions
[edit]- An African-American child based on the Star-Spangled Kid, simply named Stars, appears in Kingdom Come. This version wears a leather jacket, an American flag bandana, a T-shirt with an inverted American flag, and a cosmic belt in addition to wielding the Cosmic Staff. Additionally, he is accompanied by a muscular older man called "Stripes".
- The Star-Spangled Kid appears in Tiny Titans #38.
In other media
[edit]- The Sylvester Pemberton incarnation of the Star-Spangled Kid appears in the Smallville two-part episode "Absolute Justice", portrayed by Jim Shield.
- The Sylvester Pemberton incarnation of the Star-Spangled Kid appears in a photograph depicted in the Stargirl episode "Brainwave".
References
[edit]- ^ Green, Paul (2017). Encyclopedia of Weird War Stories: Supernatural and Science Fiction Elements in Novels, Pulps, Comics, Film, Television, Games and Other Media. McFarland & Co. pp. 165–166. ISBN 978-1476666723.
- ^ Benton, Mike (1992). Superhero Comics of the Golden Age: The Illustrated History. Dallas: Taylor Publishing Company. p. 184. ISBN 0-87833-808-X. Retrieved 1 April 2020.
- ^ Markstein, Don. "The Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy". Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Retrieved 2 April 2020.
- ^ Terror Titans #6 (2008)
External links
[edit]- DCU Guide: Star Spangled Kid
- Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy at Don Markstein's Toonopedia Archived from the original on March 16, 2017. Additional WebCitation archive on June 4, 2017.