LogFAQs > #967790419

Honorable Mention: Jack Knight
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The truth is that Jack Knight, former Starman, is probably on my top 52 if I start this ranking now, but as it is, he'll have to settle for a post-52 Honorable Mention. And I think Jack would be perfectly content with this. Perfectly content to not be on a list with heroes and villains stuck in the middle of a massive war. For you see, Jack Knight is a former Starman because he simply retired from the heroing business. Not for moral reasons, not out of a fight with people inside the community, but simply because he had a family to take care of, and heroing was becoming very risky for families of heroes, and Jack Knight, Jacky Boy, is a man of priorities. So he picked up his life, handed his Cosmic Staff to Courtney Whitmore, and left Opal City for San Francisco. That's how the story of this Starman ends.

Except what Jack perhaps didn't understand is that you never truly retire. Campaign 1 was built around this concept, for a young woman named Barbara Gordon hung up the cape of Batgirl and retired to live the life of a normal person. She was then forced out of retirement at the end of a barrel of a gun held by the Joker that left her paralyzed from the waist down, and suddenly her chances of any sort of normal life ended. Even if you hang up the cape, the villains will come after you, it's only a matter of time. So when the world fell apart, Jack Knight had a choice, wait for the villains to find him, or re-enter the community himself. He chose the latter, to attempt to help the Teen Titans hold off Society forces. They failed, and Jack Knight was sent to Alcatraz, until one of our field teams were also captured, and made a great escape.

The moment he entered Z'onn Z'orr, Jack Knight began working his magic, insisting that we go rescue his wife and son. And it worked, because the man is simply so charismatic. He's absolutely the most charming person, he's so unapologetically open with his emotions. His reactions to finding out his friends and family from Opal City grew more and more comical, more exaggerated, as he found out more and more good news. Sandra. Iron. Bobo. Black Condor. All of the O'Dare family. Even Jon Valor. How could we not go rescue the rest of his family?

He just draws positive feelings from so many different characters. He doesn't show respect to Waller, but he gets away with it because he's Jack Knight. He meets Susie, and Susie is a little endeared to him, especially after he gifted her a little sheriff's badge. He's just so good with everyone.

But perhaps his defining relationship is that with another favorite of mine, Richard Swift. Or as Jack calls him every single time, The Shade. Except Jack's wife Sadie calls The Shade, Richard. We call The Shade Richard. Basically everyone on good terms with The Shade calls him Richard. Except Jack Knight, who is immensely bothered by this fact. The only time so far Jack's been outright angry is when he found out we call The Shade by his first name. Why does everyone else get to, but Jack doesn't? Well, because he's Jack, and The Shade, former supervillain and current Ladlow-Dalt hunter, having this person whom he messes with without the single, slightest bit of ill will is its own unique, special bond.

We heard so much about Jack Knight from the Opal City residents long before we actually met the man. That sort of hype is hard to live up to, but Jack delivered on it.