Lion Man: The First and Greatest Black Superhero by Demetrius Sherman

Lion Man: The First and Greatest Black Superhero by Demetrius Sherman
Publisher: Self-Published
Genre: Non-Fiction, Historical
Rating: 4 Stars
Reviewed by Astilbe

When no Black comic book heroes existed, he battled the most dangerous villains in the world.. He was Lion Man. Discover the fascinating history of African American journalists and cartoonists. Learn why Lion Man was the first and greatest Black superhero.

World War II changed the world in many ways…including when it came to what people expected from superheroes!

One of the many things I learned from this novella was just how much some adults fretted over comic strips in the 1940s. There were fears that children would prefer this style of entertainment over reading novels, so some parents tried to discourage their kids from picking up comic strips at all. I have seen some modern parents share similar concerns about what their children are reading and whether graphic novels should be counted as reading time at all. The solution to this dilemma that Evans came up with made a great deal of sense for his era as well as for our own.

It would have been helpful to have more examples of how the last few sections were intended to tie into Lion Man’s groundbreaking accomplishment. While I understood that they were giving other examples of how African-American artists and creators were producing all sorts of toys and content beginning in the early 1900s, it did feel a little disjointed to me to suddenly leap to this topic after spending so much time on Orrin C. Evan’s career specifically. As much as I wanted to give this a full five-star rating, I needed stronger connections between these sections in order to feel justified about doing so.

I appreciated all of the time Mr. Sherman invested in explaining the historical context for Lion Man and the other African-American comic book characters that Orrin C. Evans invented. There were some scenes from these strips that could be read in very different ways today due to how much American culture has changed over the last eighty years, so knowing the original intentions behind them was as educational as it was interesting.

Lion Man: The First and Greatest Black Superhero made me smile.