it's interesting when as an adult you go and look at something you liked as a kid.
I did this recently when I reread the issues I have of cloak and dagger (minus there stunt in strange tales) and man was I shock at all the stuff I didn't really pick up on as a kid.
for those who don't know Cloak & Dagger are Marvel Comic book characters that where two teenage runaways who get kidnapped and have a drug tested on them that ends up giving them superpowers.
Cloak is a guy wearing a cloak, he is basically a door way to a dark diminison where those who enter it are force to confront their greatest fears and/or the worst thing they have ever done and he can also teleport
Dagger shoots out daggers of light that basically make people feel shame and she can also heal people.
Cloak happens to be an African-American guy and Dagger a white girl.
the first thing I notice rereading these comics is that even thought the character are both around the same age (teenagers) Cloak is drawn to look much older (he looks like a guy in his 40's or 50's instead of being 16 or 17) which makes it look creepy that he is hanging out with a 16 year old even though the characters are the same age.
Next looking at there origin story, both kids are runaway who ended up in new york at same time and place, when Cloak first sees Dagger his first thought is that he should rob her because she looks rich (which she was) this only changed when someone else mugs her and he decides to rescue her.
and the racial uncomfort doesn't stop there. the title is full of saying things like dagger being pure of white light of good and cloak being said to be an evil force. basically white is good and black is bad, which doesn't come of well giving the race of the two characters.
as a kid I think I over looked all this because Dark characters are cool, and that was what Cloak came off as.
another thing as I pointed out Dagger's power is to make people feel shame (or to be correct over powered by it) in the book it is written that she is attacking people with goodness and that the bad people she attacks just can't handle it. But as I said the only thing that happens in the book is that those character feel guilt over what they did, but from the issues I read it doesn't look like anyone started to become a good person because they where hit by Dagger's daggers. So really even thought the book tries to play these characters powers as being connected to good and evil, it's really about fear and guilt.
