Question (character)

The Question
The Question
	Cover to The Question (Vol. 2) #2 (2004).; Art by Tommy Lee Edwards.
Publication information
Publisher	DC Comics; (Originally Charlton Comics)
First appearance	Blue Beetle #1 (June 1967; Charlton Comics)
Created by	Steve Ditko; Revamped by:; Dennis O'Neil; Denys Cowan
In-story information
Alter ego	Charles "Charlie" Victor Szasz
Team affiliations	Renee Montoya, L.A.W.
Notable aliases	Vic Sage
Abilities	Genius intelligence, Brilliant detective with superior inquisitive mind and deductive reasoning, Master martial artist

The Question (Vic Sage) is a comic book superhero. Created by Steve Ditko, he first appeared in Blue Beetle #1 (June 1967). Originally created for Charlton Comics, he was acquired by DC Comics and has been incorporated into the DC Universe.

The Question is one of the more philosophically complex superheroes. As a tireless opponent of societal corruption, the Question expounded Ditko's belief in Objectivism, during his career as minor Charlton hero (much like Ditko’s later creation, Mr. A). In an acclaimed 1987-90 solo series from DC, the character developed a Zen-like philosophy.

Character origin

Based in Hub City, Vic Sage made his mark as a highly outspoken and aggressive investigative journalist with a reputation for obnoxiousness. Not long after starting his TV appearances, he began to investigate a Dr. Arby Twain.

Sage was approached by a scientist named Aristotle Rodor, who had previously been Sage's professor, and Rodor told Sage about an artificial skin called Pseudoderm he co-developed with Dr. Twain. Pseudoderm was intended to work as an applied skin-like bandage with the help of a bonding gas, but had an unforeseen toxicity which was fatal when applied to open wounds. Rodor and Twain agreed to abandon the project and parted ways, but Professor Rodor discovered that Dr. Twain had decided to proceed with an illegal sale of the invention to Third World nations, regardless of the risk to human health.

Sage resolved to stop him but had no way of going after Dr. Twain without exposing himself. Rodor suggested that Sage use a mask made of Pseudoderm to cover his famous features. Armed with information, and more importantly a disguise, Sage eventually caught up with Dr. Twain, stopping the transaction and extracting a confession, and then leaving Twain bound in Pseudoderm in an ironic twist. On television, Sage reported on Dr. Twain's illegal activities.

Sage decided that this new identity, partially inspired by The Spirit, would be useful for future investigations, and partnered with Professor Rodor, who supplied the Pseudoderm and eventually modified the bonding gas to change the color of Sage's hair and clothing. The two men became good friends, with Sage affectionately referring to Rodor as "Tot".

The Question in DC Comics

The Charlton characters were acquired by DC Comics after the former company went out of business in 1986. DC finally gave the Question his own acclaimed solo series in 1987, which was written by Dennis O'Neil and primarily drawn by Denys Cowan. The series was published for thirty-six issues and two annuals. In Question #1, the Question was defeated in personal combat first by the martial arts mercenary, Lady Shiva, beaten near to death by the hiring villain's thugs, shot in the head with a pellet gun, and thrown into the river to drown. Lady Shiva then rescued him for reasons of her own and gave him directions to meet Richard Dragon as soon as he recovered enough to get out of bed. Once there, Sage learned both martial arts, and eastern philosophy. When he returned to the city, he resumed his journalist and superhero careers with adventures that tended to illustrate various philosophic points. [1] To further illustrate those ideas, Dennis O'Neil had a reading recommendation in the letters page of each issue.

In the O'Neil ongoing series, Victor Sage is an investigative reporter for the news station KBEL in Hub City, who uses the identity of the Question to get the answers his civilian identity cannot. Unlike other vigilante superheroes, O'Neil's Question is primarily focused on the politics of his city, and rather than hunting down the perpetrators of petty theft, he tends to fight the corrupt government of Hub City. O'Neil's Hub City is noted as being "synonymous with venality, corruption, and violence", perhaps even outranking Gotham City as the most dismal city in the DC Universe

For the majority of the series, he is covertly assisting the goodhearted Myra Fermin win the seat of Mayor. His interest in Myra extends beyond admiration, as the two shared a relationship before his near-death experience with Lady Shiva, and his training under Richard Dragon. Upon his return he discovered that she had married the corrupt, drunkard who idolized former president Teddy Roosevelt, Mayor Wesley Fermin. Despite losing the election by one vote, Myra's competition was found dead as a result of what was called "the worst tornado in history." At her victory speech, her husband Wesley shot her for supporting what he believed to be Communist beliefs, putting her into a coma and sending Hub City further into chaos. Sage donned the guise of the Question, acting as the city’s only form of justice for a short while, before the Mayor woke from her condition. The gang warfare in the weeks following the election led Sage to Lady Shiva, first as a combatant, and then enlisting her help as an ally of sorts to get in a position to talk to the gang-leaders. As Myra adjusted into her role as Mayor of Hub City, she and Sage began to rekindle their relationship, although Myra told Sage that she would not act on her feelings until she left office. Despite their long-term friendship, she never connected that Sage and “the man without a face” were one and the same until the very end of his time at Hub City.

O’Neil’s Question is also very conflicted on how far to go in enforcing justice, often feeling tempted to kill. He resists this temptation as he realizes that part of his want to go so far is just to see what it feels like to take a life. His relationship with his mentor, Aristotle Rodor, is one of many things that keep him from going over the edge and back towards the darkness he had shown in his youth on the streets of Hub City.

Eventually, during a massive hallucinogenic trip, his subconscious told him through his mother that he had to leave Hub City to ever be able to live happily. Around the same time Richard Dragon came to see Victor as he had sensed that he was on the verge of a major turning point in his life, and convinced him that living in Hub City was killing him. In an agreement with Richard, Lady Shiva arrives with a helicopter to usher The Question and Aristotle Rodor away, at which point she decides to stay in Hub City and embrace the chaos. He nearly convinces Myra to come with him and escape the chaos of the city, but she is unable to leave. She gives her only daughter, Jackie, and wanders back to the city alone to meet her duties as Mayor and do her best to stand for what she believes in.

The Question Annual #2 retroactively altered the character's origin by revealing that Victor Sage was originally Charles Victor Szasz, an orphan who had a reputation as a troublemaker. Szasz prided himself in defiantly enduring the physical abuse of the Catholic orphanage where he was housed. He eventually managed to get into college where he studied journalism. However, his higher learning did not mellow his violent tendencies, such as when he beat up his pusher for giving him LSD which caused the frightening experience of doubting his own senses under its influence.

The 2005 Question mini-series suggested that the Question's long experience and practice with meditation had led him into shamanic trances, and later into a more permanent state of shamanic awareness, in which he was able to interpret coincidences and thus "talk to the city." In this state, he was also able to sense chi, or life force. He is now able to "walk in two worlds" for an increased awareness of his surroundings and of any disturbances in a city's natural order.

52

Template:Spoiler Currently, The Question is appearing in DC's expansive weekly series, 52 as the protector of Gotham City while Batman disappears for a year following the events of Infinite Crisis. The Question's storyline surrounds his partnership with ex-Gotham police detective Renee Montoya and an investigation into an invasion of Gotham by Intergang. A sub-plot is the appearance of a new Batwoman in Gotham. As of Week 14 Montoya and the Question have gone to Khandaq to further investigate Intergang, and been arrested by the local authorities.

The story is ongoing. Template:Endspoiler

The Dark Knight Strikes Again

The Question was featured in Frank Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Strikes Again as a right-wing, anti-government conspirator. This version of Sage—a nod to Ditko and Alan Moore (see below) —is Randian and preachy, at one point going on television for a series of humorous "Crossfire"-style exchanges with the liberal archer Green Arrow. Additionally, he is shown as a technophobe monitoring the dark conspiracy Batman and his allies must face.

The Question in other media

File:Questionfull.JPG

The Question in Justice League Unlimited.

The Question has been a major recurring character in the animated television series Justice League Unlimited, with his voice performed by Jeffrey Combs, and in that time has become one of the series' most popular characters - this renewed popularity and interest in the character are likely contributors to his return to the spotlight in current comics. Like his comic book counterpart, he uses a special mask (bonded to his face by a gaseous chemical) to conceal his identity. He is portrayed as a conspiracy theorist, a blend of Rorschach (see below), Fox Mulder of the popular X-Files series and (in professional and libertarian aspects) Alex Jones, although it has not been revealed whether or not the animated Vic Sage is, or ever was, a member of the media.

The Question of the DC Animated Universe is a completely obsessive, darkly comic loner — skeptical, paranoid, antagonistic and unpredictable. He's been shown humming pop songs while breaking into a building, claims the motives of aglets (the caps at the end of shoelaces) are "sinister" and believes in ominous links between boy bands and global warming, the Girl Scouts and the crop circle phenomenon, and toothpaste and spy satellites. In recent investigations, he also discovered that Baskin-Robbins in fact has thirty-two flavors of ice cream, and is concealing it for dubious reasons. He expressed a belief that these and many other events are tied to a single, vast conspiracy by a hidden cabal dating back to ancient Egypt, which has supposedly ruled the world from the shadows for millenia. This incarnation of the Question has been referred to as a "nutjob" by Wildcat, a "kook" by the Flash, and even Batman once noted that Sage was "wound a bit too tightly." However, there are hints that Question may be asserting his wilder conspiracy theories as a front, to throw off those around him (such as his attempted attack on Luthor, which he informed the billionaire would not discredit the JLU because "I'm a known crackpot"). In the episode "Fearful Symmetry", he claimed to regularly search through the garbage of everyone on the Watchtower. This extreme paranoia has often proved helpful, however. In an issue of the Justice League Unlimited comic, he became suspicious that a member of the League has been compromised by an enemy through mind control. He was able to expose the subverted mole and foil the plan, despite the fact that he himself was the one compromised.

The Question has become one of the most popular secondary characters in JLU, having been prominently featured in three episodes over the first two seasons, most often paired with Green Arrow or Huntress; he began dating the latter after the episode "Double Date", in which he helped track down her parents' killer.

In the episode "Question Authority", the Question discovers Lex Luthor's plot to instigate a full-scale war between the government and the Justice League. He also learns of an alternate universe (seen in the Justice League story "A Better World") in which Luthor has the Flash killed, becomes president and is murdered in the Oval Office by Superman, an act that eventually leads to the Justice League taking over the world. Convinced that the history in this alternate universe is destined to repeat itself in his, the Question decides the only way to derail the train is to kill Luthor himself, before he can become president. Furthermore, he was confident that his reputation for being paranoid would deflect any suspicion that he was doing this on the orders of the Justice League. However, Luthor, now augmented with super strength thanks to Brainiac (who, in the Superman episode "Ghost in the Machine", had planted a nanotech copy of his programming in Luthor's body), delivers a savage beating to the faceless vigilante while admitting that his presidential campaign was nothing but an expensive ruse, "a small part of a much grander scheme." Question is turned over to Cadmus for interrogation, but refuses to crack. After almost a week of torture, he is rescued by Huntress and Superman—despite the resistance of Captain Atom, who has been recommissioned by the government—and transported to the JL Watchtower for treatment. Although still weak from the torture when the Ultimen invaded the Watchtower, Question was able to subdue one of the clones by clocking him with a bed pan.

"Authority" has several homages to Ditko's Objectivist streak, as well as to Rorschach, Alan Moore's infamous Question pastiche for the critically acclaimed series Watchmen. As Sage recoils from the information he's downloaded from the Cadmus files, he begins to speak in sentence fragments, as Rorschach did. ("Not alternate reality," he quivers. "Time loop.") He appears to be living in shabby quarters (also very Rorschach) and was so absorbed by the Cadmus/Luthor discovery that for days, he never bothered to call anyone — or, apparently, take a shower (as noted by Huntress after she enters his apartment to check up. "It's rank in here," she groans. "Is that you?") In his room on the Justice League satellite is a poster warning of a global fluoridation conspiracy, a reference to the last page of Watchmen, which in turn references Kubrick's black comedy about nuclear war, Dr. Strangelove.

Later, as Question confronts Luthor at his penthouse office, he declares that "A is A ... and no matter what reality he calls home, Luthor is Luthor." This statement is an homage to Ditko's other Objectivist mystery man, Mr. A, whose name comes from "A is A", an algebraic statement of the Law of Identity.

The animated Question has been shown to be a highly skilled—if unconventional—detective, thief, computer hacker and evasive driver. In combat, the JLU version of Sage relies more on brawling and intimidation skills, as Ditko's version did, than martial arts. The DC Comics Question is regarded as one of the most formidable hand-to-hand combatants in current continuity; On JLU, he has used karate sparingly, usually in self-defense ("Fearful Symmetry", "Double Date") and was recently beaten by Green Arrow ("Double Date") during a one-on-one battle on the front lawn of a safe house where mobster Steven Mandragora was being held. Of course, said defeat by Green Arrow may have been misdirection in character with Question's unconventional means. When Green Arrow and Black Canary leave the defeated Question and Huntress, the Question reveals to his companion clues he had held back while the other heroes were there.

He is a very brutal fighter, but only for intimidation purposes. He's been known to throw two or three enemies in a small area, and then drop a belt of activated grenades into the middle of them (which didn't kill them, but forced them to abandon their assault on the Question and his allies and flee to safety).

Sage makes cameos in the episodes "Flashpoint", "Panic in the Sky" and "Grudge Match", as well as the series finale "Destroyer". In his last appearance to date in the animated universe, he is seen fighting Darkseid's Parademons by running them over with his car.

Similarities to other comic book characters

Interestingly, the Question's specialized belt-buckle is similar to that of the Spider-Man villain Chameleon. In his initial appearances, which were drawn by Ditko, the Chameleon had used a device in a belt buckle which emitted a transformation-enhancing gas. It is possible that Ditko used that as inspiration for the Question.

Bibliography

Appearances

Blue Beetle #1 (June 1967) to #5 (November 1968)
Mysterious Suspense #1 (October 1968): "What Makes a Hero?"
Charlton Bullseye Vol. 1 #5 (July-September 1976) [fanzine]
Charlton Bullseye Vol. 2 #1 (June 1981)
Americomics Special #1 (August 1983)
Crisis on Infinite Earths #6 (September 1985)
Blue Beetle Vol. 2 #4 (September 1986) to #7 (December 1986)
Question #1 (February 1987) - Question #36 (March 1990)
Detective Comics Annual #1 (1988) "Fables, Part I"
Question Annual #1 (1988) "Fables, Part III"
Question Annual #2 (1989)
Green Arrow Annual #3 (1990): "A Walk in the Wind"
Question Quarterly #1 (Autumn 1990) - Question Quarterly #4 (Winter 1991)
- Question Quarterly #1 (Autumn 1990): "Any Man's Death"
- Question Quarterly #2 (Summer 1991): "Gomorrah Homecoming"
- Question Quarterly #3 (Autumn 1991): "Hell In Hub City"
- Question Quarterly #4 (Winter 1991): "Waiting For Phil"
Brave and the Bold Vol. 2 #2 (January 1992): "Chapter Two"
Brave and the Bold Vol. 2 #3 (February 1992): "Chapter Three"
Brave and the Bold Vol. 2 #4 (March 1992): "Chapter Four"
Brave and the Bold Vol. 2 #5 (May 1992): "Chapter Five"
Brave and the Bold Vol. 2 #6 (June 1992): "Chapter Six"
Question Quarterly #5 (Spring 1992): "Outrage"
Showcase '95 #3/3 (March 1995): "Homecoming"
Azrael #10 (November 1995): "Arena" [As Vic Sage]
Azrael Plus #1 (1996): "The Anger, the Terror & the Question"
Question Returns #1 (February 1997)
Steel #38 (May 1997): "The Gambler"
Batman Chronicles #15/3 (Winter 1998): "An Answer In the Rubble"
L.A.W. (Living Assault Weapons) #1 (September 1999): "Avatar Rising"
L.A.W. (Living Assault Weapons) #2 (October 1999): "The Way of the Warrior"
L.A.W. (Living Assault Weapons) #3 (November 1999): "The Past is Always Present"
L.A.W. (Living Assault Weapons) #4 (December 1999): "Martial L.A.W."
L.A.W. (Living Assault Weapons) #5 (January 2000): "To Serve And Protect"
L.A.W. (Living Assault Weapons) #6 (February 2000): "The L.A.W. ...And Order!"
Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood #1 (June 2000): "Cry for Blood, Part 1"
Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood #2 (July 2000): "Cry for Blood, Part 2"
Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood #3 (August 2000): "Cry for Blood, Part 3"
Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood #4 (September 2000): "Cry for Blood, Part 4"
Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood #5 (October 2000): "Cry for Blood, Part 5"
Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood #6 (November 2000): "Cry for Blood, Part 6"
The Dark Knight Strikes Again (2002)
The Question #1 (January 2005) - #6 (June 2005)
Justice League Unlimited #8 (June 2005): "The island"
Solo #5 (August 2005): "The Question: 'Al Kufr'- The Infidel"
52 Week 1-2, Week 4, Week 9, Week 11, Week 12, Week 14 (May 2006-)

Cameos

Crisis on Infinite Earths #7 (October 1985)
Guy Gardner: Warrior #29 (March 1995): "It's My Party And I'll Fight If I Want To"
Detective Comics #723 (July 1998): "Fight Back To Gotham"
Green Arrow Vol. 3 #16 (October 2002): "The Archer's Quest Chapter One: Photograph" [Flashback]
Batman: Gotham Knights #38 (April 2003): "Knight Moves, Part One: The Queen is Dead"
Batman: Gotham Knights #39 (May 2003): "Knight Moves, Part Two: Castling"

External links

VicSage.com: Fan site with forums, galleries, articles, and news related to The Question
International Catalog of Superheroes entry on the Question
The Unofficial Question Biography
Index to the Earth-4 adventures of the Charlton Action Heroes
Article on the history/legacy of the Question from the Comics 101 article series by Scott Tipton.
Alan Moore interview at TwoMorrows that discusses (among other things) the Question, Steve Ditko, and Charlton Comics.