美国国家公共电台 NPR Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez On Creating A Superhero For Puerto Rico（在线收听）

ROBERT GARCIA, HOST:

What's up, everybody? Please - just heads up. There may be some strong language in this episode - ooh (ph).

ADRIAN BARTOS, HOST:

Some bad words.

EDGARDO MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I identified in a funny way with Spiderman because he was - he had brown hair like me. So I thought he was Puerto Rican. Everybody that had brown hair when I was growing up I thought was Puerto Rican...

(LAUGHTER)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...You know?

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

BARTOS: Yo, yo, yo, mi gente. It's Stretch Armstrong.

GARCIA: (Laughter).

BARTOS: Que bueno?

GARCIA: (Speaking Spanish) Bobbito Garcia A.K.A. Kool Bob Love A.K.A (speaking Spanish).

(LAUGHTER)

BARTOS: Welcome...

GARCIA: He wasn't ready for that.

BARTOS: Welcome to WHAT'S GOOD...

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: (Speaking Spanish).

BARTOS: Hey. hey, hey, hey, hey, hey...

GARCIA: (Speaking Spanish) Chill. We don't talk that.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: (Laughter).

BARTOS: Come on. This is NPR.

GARCIA: Silence his mic, please.

BARTOS: This is NPR. You're stepping over boundaries here.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: (Laughter).

GARCIA: Today, we are talking with a friend, a homeboy, a seriously talented graphic novelist, Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez - boricua from New York or, if you don't know what that means, Puerto Rican from New York - wrote for Marvel and DC before creating the popular graphic novel series called "La Borinquena."

BARTOS: Yeah. "La Borinquena" is a fierce, environmentally conscious superhero who uses her superpowers to help her people, which is actually a lot like Edgardo. He put together a comics anthology called "Ricanstruction." One-hundred percent of the proceeds go to rebuilding Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma and Maria, which devastated the island last year. He blends art and activism in a really cool way. And he's here with us today. Stay tuned. We'll be right back with Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

BARTOS: And we are back joined in the studio with graphic novelist Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez. Welcome to WHAT'S GOOD, my man. That's you.

(LAUGHTER)

BARTOS: You need a script?

(LAUGHTER)

BARTOS: Take two - Edgardo, welcome to the show.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Line - line - line, Michelle - Michelle, line. What's up? What's up? Everything is very well. I'm very happy to be here with family. It's a very surreal moment. Growing up with you guys - I've known Bob for like 29 years when I was a freshman at Colgate. But it's something beautiful to actually be able to share this set of work I'm doing with actual family. And it starts with history.

GARCIA: Edgardo, I mean, you know, we know you dearly. But for our audience, how would you self-describe who Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez is in 2018?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I look at myself as a culmination of many things. First and foremost, I see myself as a father and husband. I'm raising two boys in Brooklyn with my wife. My oldest son Keyan (ph) has autism and has never held him back. And I've learned to become an advocate and an activist for his life based on my experience as a younger activist. I think the 20-plus years of living in New York City as a culture warrior has taught me to be where I am in my career now.

I've been working for myself for close to 20 years, running my own design studio, Somos Arte. But prior to that, I was an activist working with El Puente, the National Congress For Puerto Rican Rights, being mentored by Iris Morales, the late Richie Perez, many activists who are known for their work particularly in the Puerto Rican community around police brutality, around fair housing. And it's kind of like a long title to fit in on a business card. You know what I mean?

GARCIA: (Laughter).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: But I just see myself as an activist that really is engaging a larger audience through the arts.

BARTOS: Ed, you just referred to yourself as a cultural warrior. But you've also been described as an art-ivist (ph).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: That's a weird word (laughter).

GARCIA: I've never heard that before.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I've heard that. And I've heard many people call me an art-ivist and such. I like to actually use terminology that kind of, like, can appeal to a larger audience because oftentimes art-ivist is such a very niche kind of, like, adjective. But I definitely consider myself one that actually does bring in the arts with my advocacy because I see it as a real tool to engage. And it's what really woke up my consciousness when I was a high school student. It was actually like Little Stevie from the E Street Band when he pulled together the "Sun City" initiative, which was everyone from Ruben Blades to Run-D.M.C. to Kurtis Blow, Afrika Bambaataa, U2 - and they created a whole movement to boycott South Africa.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SUN CITY")

ARTISTS UNITED AGAINST APARTHEID: We're rockers and rappers, united and strong. We're here to talk about South Africa. We don't like what's going on. Tell it. It's time for some justice. It's time for the truth. Speak it. We've realized there's only one thing we can do. We got to say I, I, I, I ain't going to play Sun City.

BARTOS: And we should say Sun City refers to the resort in apartheid South Africa that came to represent apartheid.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And that went from, like, music to young people boycotting Nike to boycotting all these companies that were not divesting in South Africa. So that kind of, like, sparked my consciousness. And in college, Ruben Blades, listening to his music, "Buscando America," that kind of like tied it in and balanced me as a Latin growing up in New York City.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BUSCANDO AMERICA")

RUBEN BLADES: (Singing) Te estoy buscando a America, y terno no encontrarla. Tus huellas se han perdido, entre la oscuridad.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: So that was kind of like the foundation that made it easy for me to say, I think this is the perfect opportunity for me to do my part and do it in the way that I can because I'm a nerd. I've always read and collected comics. But to a point, I think we're looking at comic books now as kind of like critical mass. It's everywhere. And it literally is synonymous with corporate branding. But I really thought that this would be an excellent opportunity to use it as social justice activation, as opposed to just - as opposed to only corporate branding.

GARCIA: You were a mentee of Luis Garden Acosta.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Yes.

GARCIA: A former Young Lord who founded El Puente High School in Williamsburg at a time when that community had the highest murder rate and the highest high school dropout rate in all of the five boroughs of New York City. You created the very first curriculum in the world - to my knowledge, I remember The Source magazine writing about it...

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Yeah, that was crazy.

GARCIA: ....that incorporated hip-hop. So you've been pulling and using popular culture, knowing what would attract the youth. What sparked that back then, you know, beyond the clear influence of your mentors?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I think the true answer to that is growing up poor in New York City, growing up with a single mother, growing up in tenements, literally living in buildings for less than a year because as soon as the rent would go up, we would move out because we just couldn't afford to stay. That actually taught me and gave me firsthand experience of the injustices that existed.

And as a child, I was always drawn to comics because I loved the escapism, but I also loved the narratives that were focused around combating injustices. One of my earliest childhood memories, I was possibly like a kindergartener or first grader, and my brother was walking us across a vacant lot because there were many in the South Bronx because so many of these buildings were torched down.

GARCIA: Your brother Axel?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: My brother Axel. Yeah, you remember Axel.

GARCIA: (Laughing) I love that dude.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And we're taking - (laughing) He was like, yo, Egg. My nickname is Eggy. So he's like...

GARCIA: I call Eggy. (Laughter) I told Stretch - Stretch is like, what do we call - I'm like, yo, just call him Eggy.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Exactly. (Laughter) Eggy, we're going to take a shortcut through this lot. And I'm like, brother, I don't need a shortcut, my hair's already short. That's how young I was. I wasn't even familiar with vernacular.

(LAUGHTER)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And we're taking this shortcut, and we get jumped. We just get jumped by knuckleheads who just want to mess with us for no reason because we got nothing to offer.

BARTOS: (Laughter) I wasn't the only one.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: (Laughter) We had nothing to offer, and I recall telling them you're in so much trouble because I'm reading comic books now, and I'm learning about my superpowers. I literally said that.

BARTOS: (Laughter) Wow.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And that was my way of saying I'm going to combat this injustice, as weird as that was. You see what I'm saying? But it was kind of like my existence, you know what I mean?

GARCIA: So did they stop at that moment and look at you...

(LAUGHTER)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: They kind of looked at me and was like, what? There was a moment when they kind of - (speaking Spanish) what did he just say? You know?

(LAUGHTER)

BARTOS: Hey, Bob, you mentioned the Young Lords. And I don't know if you could speak on that briefly because I think a lot of our audience would not know who or what the Young Lords are.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Sure. Well, the Young Lords actually came from Chicago. There was this young brother named Cha Cha Jimenez at the time who was incarcerated with Fred Hampton. While they were incarcerated, Fred Hampton schooled him.

GARCIA: And Fred Hampton was a member of the Black Panthers.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Fred Hampton, original member the Black Panthers, right? And he was, like, saying, you need to come out of this institution better than you came in, but not only for yourself, but especially for your community. And when he came out, he transformed his gang, the Young Lords, into what would become the Young Lords Organization. And he actually inspired a group of college students here in New York City to actually create a New York City chapter, and they took it to a whole other level. And they created it as the Young Lords Party. And they rocked the purple berets. They opened up abandoned storefronts as kitchens for breakfast programs. And mind you, this is like before New York City was offering free lunches, free breakfast.

GARCIA: Yeah.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: That's so, like, common. But there was an era in New York City where if you were poor, you just didn't have any food to go to school with, and you didn't have any food when you came home. And the Young Lords stepped in and created these programs. And they also didn't just provide food, they provided clothing. They provided programs where they were literally decolonizing minds to help young people and families understand what their rights were. And they were doing this from 1969 into the early 1970s. And they're very, very progressive. They stood for gay rights. They stood for women's rights. They're a very, very historically progressive group of Puerto Ricans. I called them the original Avengers, you know.

(LAUGHTER)

BARTOS: You mentioned your early love affair with comics as a kid, which may or may not have gotten you out of getting stomped out.

GARCIA: (Laughter).

BARTOS: What was...

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: That actually led to being stomped a couple of times.

GARCIA: (Laughter).

BARTOS: Who were some of the characters that you most identified with?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I identified in a funny way with Spiderman because he was - he had brown hair like me, so I thought he was Puerto Rican. Everybody that had brown hair when I was growing up I thought was Puerto Rican, you know?

(LAUGHTER)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And at the time in the '70s, like, we had we had, like, Freddie Prinze on TV. And I'm like, oh, Peter Parker got to be, like, short for, like, Pedro Parqueo (ph) or something like that.

GARCIA: (Laughter).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: So it was actually Spiderman. And I loved Batman for his character design and such. But I wasn't too, kind of, like, keen on the, you know, I'm a billionaire so I'm going to save the world because that doesn't really happen.

(LAUGHTER)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: That doesn't really happen. But what I also liked about Spiderman that he came from a single-parent household. He was raised by his aunt. He grew up in Queens, so he was working-class poor. He didn't have the billions to have all these gadgets or a secret lair. And he literally hand-made his own costume and such. So that was actually one of the characters that I loved the most, and also because of his sarcasm. I was never an athletic cat. I was never a - whatcha-ma-call-it (ph) - a vertically-enhanced individual (laughter). I was a scrub.

GARCIA: (Laughter).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And I would always get picked on. And oftentimes, I turned to sarcasm to kind of like, you know, get myself out of, like, situations, you know. And oftentimes, it did.

GARCIA: Clearly, you know, you're growing up. Your brain is wide open on Marvel. You're now working there. That's got to be like a kid who likes basketball, and one day, he's a teammate with Michael Jordan.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Oh, my gosh. Imaginate. That would be - that was a - it was an amazing moment. And it's kind of like - Joe Quesada and the previous editor-in-chief, Axel Alonso, were the only Latinos who were actually working at Marvel. And the first, like, two Latinos back-to-back, they were editor-in-chief at Marvel. So an idea I came up with about 10 years ago was to actually curate an exhibition, which at that point, had never been done.

And I just found that, like, remarkable. I was like, why would no one actually curate an exhibition of comic book art? That's crazy. And I curated Joe Quesada's first solo art show, "Santerians," the art of Joe Quesada. And I recall him telling me, I've never had my work in an art show. I've had, like, maybe one or two pieces, but never a whole exhibition about my actual career.

And then a couple of years later, Axel Alonso reached out to me and said, you should do another show. And so I did Marvelous Color, which was a tribute to Marvel's superheroes of color. Because of that, I was actually able to bring D.M.C. from Run-D.M.C. into the doors at Marvel and able to use that kind of connection to help us start what would become "Darryl Makes Comics!", the imprint that D.M.C. and I started.

And that actually led to actual writing for Marvel. And Darryl loosely came up with an idea of pairing Groot and Thing. And I took that idea, and I developed it into a full-blown script. And it was an opportunity to kind of, like, write for Marvel in a way that Marvel inspired me, but also to kind of reflect what New York City really was to me. So when I was writing a story and I got to write with - about Groot and The Thing, I was like, well, Thing is probably the most authentic New York City character out there. Like, he's literally LES. But...

GARCIA: (Laughter).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...The Thing's Lower East Side is really Jack Kirby's Lower East Side, which is, like, early 1900s - literally. So I'm thinking like, well, if it's now and he's like - and The Thing is, like, a 30-something-year-old character, that means he grew up in the '80s. So if he grew up in '80s in the Lower East Side, then he grew up around a lot of Puerto Ricans.

GARCIA: That's right.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: He grew up with a lot of black folks. So his connection with the Lower East Side has to reflect that. It can't reflect this kind of, like, pseudo kind of, like, frozen-in-time Jewish experience when that doesn't actually exist anymore. So I wrote the story, and I actually tapped into the projects on Avenue D. I'm like, they're going to fly in on a ship. It's going to crash land in East River. They're going to walk right through the projects. And people are going to pull out their phones.

And I was, like, very clear with the artists. We're going to throw in as many brown and black faces in the crowd because that's what the crowd looks like in that part of the neighborhood. And the coolest thing that came out of the comic book was actually having some Spanish in there and actually getting permission from the editors to have Groot say, yo soy Groot.

GARCIA: (Laughter).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And that - honestly, that was the jump-off for "La Borinquena" because I just thought that was going to be kind of, like, the first of many things I would do with Marvel. And then the buzz started exploding from that one little story that I wrote for them. I recall going to the comic book shop. And my wife was like, let's take a picture with you and your first issue with Marvel. And, you know, I'm, like, cheesing with it. And I post it on my social media.

And the next thing I know, my cousin in Puerto Rico's like, (speaking Spanish). And I'm like, I'm in the papers? What are you talking about? And I Google myself. And there I was. My selfie was in Primera Hora, one of Puerto Rico's newspapers. And all of a sudden, everyone's proudly talking about this Puerto Rican writer working for Marvel. And all these, like, groups start reaching out to me.

GARCIA: And wait. Were you freelance? Were you a work for hire?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I was on contract. No, I was on contract.

GARCIA: Oh, you was...

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I signed a contract with them.

GARCIA: ...Official?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Yeah. I was an official writer for them.

GARCIA: OK. OK.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: But the way that - you know, the way that - the way Marvel works is, like, you sign with them. And you kind of, like, have this open contract with them, so you got to still pitch them stuff. So even though you're in the system, you still have to consistently - constantly pitch and get rejected. You know what I'm saying?

So I made - I recall doing one pitch, got rejected. And I was like, (speaking Spanish). This is going to be how it's like? And all this buzz started happening. And one institution that reached out to me was the National Puerto Rican Day Parade. And they were like, we want to honor you and give you a sash. And I was like, that's a little premature. I've only written, like, one story for Marvel.

GARCIA: (Laughter).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: You know? I'm like, you got so many people in the industry.

GARCIA: Yo soy Groot.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: You know? I mean, like, shout out to George Perez, who was, like, one of the first Puerto Ricans in the industry who has created close to 70 characters for Marvel and DC, including Marvel's first Puerto Rican hero, White Tiger. So when they hit me up, I said, you know what? Let me get back to you. I got an idea. And I started working out this idea, these sketches. And I came to them with this proposal. And I said, you know what? I want to debut this new comic book that I'm working on called "La Borinquena."

And then I didn't think that "La Borinquena" was going to be this big thing. I just thought it was going to be at the parade. They'd gave me a platform to talk about the debt crisis affecting Puerto Rico. And then that was that. But then it exploded. And I've been so busy with "La Borinquena," like, literally, independently producing and then publishing myself, that I've never even pitched or even went back to Marvel with anything because the last thing I expected was my own stuff to end up being bigger than anything that I could actually do at Marvel. But, you know, that's the way the universe works.

BARTOS: I was never into comics as a kid. I'm a little bit...

GARCIA: Where's the eject button?

(LAUGHTER)

BARTOS: Yeah. I know you were into comics as a kid, right?

GARCIA: Oh. I had - I was - I just moved recently. But I had a stack of "Silver Surfers" from the '60s and '70s...

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Oh my god.

GARCIA: ...And "Daredevils." Those are my two favorites.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I remember you texted me a photo of you holding, like, a...

GARCIA: "Man Thing."

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah - like, an old picture. And you were, like, studiously looking at this comic and such.

BARTOS: So I'm just curious, as an outsider, right? - I read recently - I think I was reading about - maybe on Pete Rock's Twitter feed - he was talking about African-American comic book characters. And I'm not really aware of how much diversity has been in the comic book realm.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I think of it as a chocolate chip cookie. Is the whole cookie dark brown, or do you just see a couple of, like, little brown specks on it? And just because you see a couple of, like, you know, brown specks doesn't mean the entire cookie is going to be, like, a dark chocolate experience. And that's really the case with diversity. And there is backlash also because there are, like, purists that don't want their characters to intermingle with anyone that isn't, you know, Aryan.

And recently, there was an attempt by the previous editor-in-chief to very much diversify the roster. And like, Kwame - hip-hop artist and producer Kwame Holland - I like quoting him a lot. It was the comic book industry's attempt to dip in chocolate. And they took a lot of established characters and re-introduced them as characters of color. They did that with Iron Man. They re-introduced her as an adolescent black woman. They took Captain America. And they took Falcon's costume off and made him Captain America. The publishing side of Marvel - their sales started to decline. Even though they're still leading, they weren't leading as well as they were probably the year before, you know, previously - the previous year. So there has been the diversity, but that just isn't enough.

You have a character like mine. And there have been maybe a couple of, like, Latino characters. But none of them have ever been unapologetically patriotic. You know, they kind of - like, the first Marvel superhero that's Puerto Rican is White Tiger. But he was actually, like, steeped in Eastern mythology. It was nothing Puerto Rican about the character except for his, like, horrendous, like, Spanglish. You read the old comic book - (speaking Spanish) - like, really, like, poorly, like, written in terms of the Spanish. But there it was. And that is the history of that.

GARCIA: We're going to get into your character La Borinquena. But first, let's talk about "La Borinquena," the Puerto Rican national anthem.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LA BORINQUENA")

FANIA ALL STARS: (Singing in Spanish).

BARTOS: You guys aren't going to sing along?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I don't like this version. There are actually two different versions of "La Borinquena." And this is actually the second version that was created. The original version was actually written by Lola Rodriguez De Tio, a woman. And the second version was written by a Spaniard that was commissioned to rewrite...

BARTOS: Oh, so different lyrics?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...The original version - completely different lyrics.

BARTOS: Wow. And what's the consensus? Which one is the one that gets...

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Well...

BARTOS: ...Gets sung?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...There's a history to that. Like 70 years ago - literally, to this year - there was - the U.S. gag law was introduced to Puerto Rico which - it literally outlawed the Puerto Rican flag. And prior to that, the Puerto Rican flag was actually created in New York City in 1895 by a group of Puerto Ricans living here in Chelsea in exile. So they got together with a bunch of other...

GARCIA: And also in solidarity with Cubans.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: That's exactly - they were meeting with Cubans who were also living here in exile. That's why the two flags...

BARTOS: You guys are giving me goosebumps.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And that's why the two flags are so similar. That's actually the same poet - Lola Rodriguez De Tio - wrote the original lyrics to "La Borinquena" - also wrote a poem saying that Cuba (speaking Spanish) Puerto Rico (speaking Spanish)...

GARCIA: (Speaking Spanish).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: (Speaking Spanish) - right? - Cuba and Puerto Rico are two wings of the same bird. And the original anthem of Puerto Rico had lyrics that were very revolutionary. They were very much about liberty. They were very much about fighting for what's yours. And then this new anthem is introduced which is pretty much saying, wow, Christopher Columbus is so awesome for discovering us.

BARTOS: (Laughter).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And look how beautiful these beaches are. It was a completely different song. And what happened is we're indoctrinated with this song. I remember as a child in New York City that was one of the songs. It was the national anthem, "Lift Every Voice And Sing," and "La Borinquena" - the second version. And I thought that was the only version. And when I learned its history, I was like, oh, my gosh. That is crazy.

There's a really great singer. His name is Danny Rivera. He actually sang a different version of "La Borinquena." And he sings the original version, which is (singing in Spanish). Now, you know, refrain from the high note at the end because I don't want to crack.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "LA BORINQUENA")

DANNY RIVERA: (Singing in Spanish).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: But that was the original version.

(LAUGHTER)

BARTOS: You've got your homework cut out for you. Seriously, I want to hear you do that by this time next year.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I'll do the hip-hop version of that.

(LAUGHTER)

GARCIA: (Imitating musical beat).

BARTOS: So Puerto Rico's current flag is dark blue, but the original flag is light blue. Do you see young active people donning the original Puerto Rican flag with the light blue?

GARCIA: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

BARTOS: Yeah.

GARCIA: There's also a whole other flag that represents Puerto Rico, El Grito de Lares.

BARTOS: So there's a third flag.

GARCIA: Well, there's - a flag predates the...

BARTOS: Right. Of course. Sure.

GARCIA: ...the light blue one, which was in solidarity with la Republica Dominicana. And it looks like the Dominican flag. But basically, there was a rebellion in the town of Lares, September 23, 1868. And they created a flag to commemorate the - at that point, we weren't colonized by the United States. We were a colony of Spain.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And I actually incorporate a lot of that into the comic I wrote because the character's costume actually comes from the original Lares flag itself because I wanted to kind of figure out how to tie in real history to connect that to a new generation because that history has been lost. It's completely - And if there's no context to kind of revisit that history, nobody will have any interest to even discuss that history.

And that's really why a lot of the work I do goes into the book, and it's really kind of like - it's a lot of visual representation of historical moments and a narrative that has kind of like a contemporary feel and swing to it, by bringing in a younger character, who's literally like more than half my age, you know. Marisol Rios De La Luz, my character, is a...

GARCIA: Great choice on the stereotypical super long-ass name...

(LAUGHTER)

GARCIA: ...of Boriqua people. I saw that. I was like, oh, he nailed it. I got mad cousins like that.

(LAUGHTER)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And I also like - but even her name, I intentionally, like, selected it because it translates into like sea and sun, rivers of light. It's kind of crazy to talk about it, but the first book came out in December of 2016. That's when the first book comes out. Hurricane Maria happens nine months later, right? But the first book ends with her just getting her powers, and then the island is hit with a massive tropical storm that leaves it in a blackout...

GARCIA: Crazy.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...and she flies across the island to help people in Aguadilla when the storm is first hitting. And as she's helping them by actually creating, you know, a dam from some of the fallen trees, they see her in her red, white and blue, and automatically start singing the national anthem, but they're singing both national anthems to her. So it's kind of like this fusion of both, and they are actually the ones that name her La Borinquena. Because she just called herself Marisol. But when they see her, they go oh, my - La Borinquena. La Borinquena.

BARTOS: All the comic books, 100 percent of the comic books I've ever read in my life feature a Latina superhero. I've only read one.

(LAUGHTER)

BARTOS: And that's "La Borinquena" Number 2. I actually really enjoyed it.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Oh, thank you, bro.

BARTOS: What I found intriguing about it was how she's not fighting a villain, right? She's dealing - she's focusing her energies on actual real-world issues like climate change and gentrification and whatnot. I thought that was really intriguing and different from I suspect most - most characters.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Well, I'm a dude. We're all dudes here. And when I was writing this, I didn't want to fall into the traps of writing from a position of patriarchy because it's super easy and comfortable to do that. And I thought to myself, I've been mentored by a lot of incredibly strong women - my mother, my cousin Lillian (ph), Dr. Marta Moreno Vega, Iris Morales. And I thought to myself, they've done wonders to kind of undo this patriarchy that I've been raised in and give it - and infused me with a sense of matriarchy. So I thought to myself, how could I write this book and undo the patriarchy that's synonymous with comic book storytelling or storytelling in general?

For the most part, comic book storytelling is almost like the complete wish-fulfillment, the complete personification of male fantasy - incredible super-muscular bodies, punching out bad guys, et cetera, et cetera, right? And I thought to myself, well, the women that I was raised and mentored by, there was never a clear and present threat. There was never a bogey. There was never that villain. And I thought to myself, if I'm going to create a character, then I'm not going to follow that formula that predated this, as well.

And also, most characters in comics are always defined by their rogues' gallery. And I thought to myself, she's not going to be defined by her villains. She's going to be defined by her people. She's going to be defined by her heritage, by her culture. That's intentionally why I wrote it that way. And a lot of times, you have so many tropes that are kind of like persistent and prevalent in storytelling, like these kind of corporate entities, these big governments and such like that. But when you're talking about Puerto Rico, that's not a trope. That's a reality.

BARTOS: So, Eggy, out of all this came your idea to make a comics anthology called "Ricanstruction." The full name is "Ricanstruction: Reminiscing & Rebuilding Puerto Rico." What does reminiscing mean to you? Why did you use that word?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Because it's important to know where you come from to know where you need to go. It's important to acknowledge the history, whether you agree with it or not, whether it upsets you or not, whether it inspires you or not, to kind of like take that and move from there, so that you don't make mistakes again. And it also is to remind people that there is a history, a very rich and diverse history, infused with literature, infused with struggle, infused with music, infused with arts, infused with resilience. And that's why the alliteration exists in the titling.

And the concept of the book came to me literally two weeks after Hurricane Maria when I was at the New York Comic Con, already overwhelmed with the majority of people who were coming to my table crying, asking me about my family because they had not heard from their family. And then the co-publisher of DC Comics approached me because his fiance is a fan of my work. And he's online. And I'm thinking to myself, oh, snap. This is one of the big two publishers right now physically coming to me.

GARCIA: Yeah.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: And he's looking through my book. And he's telling me, wow. This looks really beautiful. It's really great. And I respond by saying, what are we going to do for Puerto Rico? And out of that came this conversation that he and I continued to have through the course of the rest of that week and an agreement that led me to using any character I wanted, any of their talent that I wanted...

GARCIA: Nice.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...To produce this anthology so that 100 percent of the proceeds could go back to Puerto Rico. And my wife, Kyung, came up with the idea of developing a grants program. So she and my friend Nicole Rodriguez (ph) came together and created this program where we invited grassroots organizations on the island to apply. And then we're going to literally funnel small grants. And we'll be in Puerto Rico this September to personally award these grants from the money that we raised from the sales of "Ricanstruction." And it's not just to kind of, like, give them their money, and then there's that. It's just kind of, like, to use the buzz and exposure that I'm getting through my work to raise awareness to the work that these institutions are doing so that people can see that Puerto Ricans are lifting themselves up, working alongside each other to truly reconstruct the island.

GARCIA: My dude - I'm getting emotional here. Where do you see your comic books fitting in terms of the chamber of Puerto Rican activism, which you are part of a long legacy of at this point?

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I see this, honestly, as an evolution of the work that the Young Lords Party did in the '60s and '70s. I see this as an evolution of the work that Pedro Albizu Campos did in Puerto Rico. I see this as an evolution of the threads that Mariana Bracetti used to create the first flag of (speaking Spanish), you know? I see it as that. And just - I just feel that, given the world that we live in now, I think that in order to truly create a sustainable revolution, you need to invoke an evolution. And that's where the comic book comes in, you know?

GARCIA: Mic drop.

(LAUGHTER)

GARCIA: Well, I think it's time for the Impression Session. Let's go for a quick break. Why don't you grab some water? And we'll come right back.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

BARTOS: That means one thing it's time for the Impression Session.

GARCIA: Word up. So we basically going to play a track each. And you just respond to it however you wish - cool?

BARTOS: Yes, sir.

GARCIA: All right. Stretch, you go up front.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "TOGETHER FOREVER")

RUN-DMC: (Rapping) No way to rock me, no way to stop me. This seems quite shocking to those that mock me. And that's not all. MCs have the gall to pray and plan for my downfall. But I'm not running. I'm just stunning - smart not stupid 'cause I'm so cunning. MCs regretting - I'm upsetting. My recitals take titles, and dollars I'm betting.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: So Run-D.M.C.'s - what? - "Live From Hollis" - I think that's what that joint was called. The funny thing about that phone was being on the road with D for the last couple of years when we were touring Comic Cons across the U.S. promoting our graphic novel series "Darryl Makes Comics" - it literally kind of, like, having a constant behind-the-scenes of my childhood. Like, there was this one cool moment. There was a DJ at an event. And they started playing, like, Public Enemy - "Rebel Without A Pause." And the two of us are like, (rapping) yes, the rhythm, the - and I'm, like, thinking to myself, I'm, like, rapping along with D...

GARCIA: Right, right.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...Like just some regular, dude, you know? And so he told - and so one of the things I think about that song when I hear it is how he tells me that they recreated the live scene, you know, because they were such students of hip-hop...

GARCIA: (Unintelligible).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...Such students of the live - well, hip-hop was never vinyl. Hip-hop was never recorded. So they literally recreated that. And I remember thinking that that actually was a live song, and they were like...

BARTOS: I thought it was live when I first heard it, too.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Yeah. And he was like...

BARTOS: Oh, you're so silly.

(LAUGHTER)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: (Speaking Spanish).

GARCIA: What's the official title of that song, Stretch?

BARTOS: It's "Together Forever (Krush-Groove...)"

GARCIA: One?

BARTOS: (...No. 3 or 4.)"

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: In parentheses - yeah - in parentheses - yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

BARTOS: It's a lot of Krush-Grooves...

GARCIA: Yeah.

BARTOS: ...That evidently came before this.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: OK.

BARTOS: Yeah. It's funny. I was asked to interview D.M.C. in front of a live audience at (unintelligible)...

GARCIA: In Dubai.

BARTOS: So DXB in Dubai. And literally like I asked him one question, and then he went for an hour and told the most compelling, entertaining and just, you know, really b-side stories about the evolution of Run-D.M.C. that I had never heard before.

GARCIA: I would have my jaw open.

BARTOS: I mean, look, D, you're doing comic books, but I need the autobiography.

GARCIA: (Laughter).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: He's amazing. Me and my wife Kyung always call it the greatest hits because we went on tour with him, so we heard a lot of his stories. But he really truly is such an incredibly humble down-to-earth dude. An incredibly surreal, like, experience for me.

BARTOS: It's a trip. It's a trip. I mean, listen.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: I used to wear Run-D.M.C. Adidas gear in high school. That's how surreal that is, man. (Laughter).

BARTOS: I mean, Run-D.M.C., that's the pinnacle for me. In terms of groups? That's it.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: They are the group.

BARTOS: It's beautiful to see D in such a good space right now, it really is. He deserves it.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: What is amazing about seeing D right now is hearing D right now because his voice is back. And I've been working with D for the last five years, when his voice was just starting to come back, and to see how - and I literally mean his voice. For the listeners who don't understand, D.M.C. literally lost his voice for a while, and there was an entire Run-D.M.C. album that was created where he did not perform once because he did not have the voice to perform. And Run was doing all these duets with everyone from Kid Rock to anyone else on this album. And D was in the album as samples. You know, so to hear D's voice actually come back as the D.M.C. that we grew up...

GARCIA: It's a blessing.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: ...It's just powerful and beautiful, yeah.

GARCIA: All right. We're going to get to the next track.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "TOSCA'S INTRO")

PEDRO ALBIZU CAMPOS: (Speaking Spanish).

(APPLAUSE)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Cuando la tirania es ley, la revolucion es orden. (Translating) Because when tyranny is law, revolution is order. (Speaking Spanish).

GARCIA: That's a Tony Touch song off his album "Piece Maker." You gave that speech to Tony to use for the album.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Tony and I have a beautiful history, too. I recall...

BARTOS: DJ Tony Touch.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Tony Toca (Speaking Spanish).

(LAUGHTER)

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: He was still living in Bushwick at the time. And that's actually a song that was like very close to me because I literally saw the song literally being created in front of my eyes. And I recall at some point, one of the items that I got from Aguevoni (ph) was the biography of Albizu Campos, and I recall - this was actually on a time when Bob was coaching basketball at El Puente, and I handed over to you one of my - my only copy of Albizu's biography. And you were like, why are you giving this to me? I was like, because I want you to read this. I think it's important. I'm like, what's the whole point of me having this if I can't share this and so that you can share this? And I knew you had a much larger platform than I did.

GARCIA: Yeah, well, you know, growing up, we had a poster of Pedro Albizu Campos in our living room. And I had no idea of the significance of his work, both as a humanitarian as well as a leader for the independence and sovereignty of Puerto Rico. When you gave me that book, you told me something very profound. And you said, knowledge kept - I forgot what - you said...

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Knowledge kept is knowledge lost.

GARCIA: Knowledge kept is knowledge lost. And you handed me the book. And from there, that book has stayed with me. I probably should give it to somebody...

(LAUGHTER)

GARCIA: ...At some point. Because I...

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Knowledge kept, Bob.

GARCIA: ...Because I've read it and, you know, it's - But thank you for that. And thank you for giving Tony Touch, when he was making his "Tommy Boy" album, you know, the Pedro Albizu speech. You have been a conduit of knowledge and pride and cultural affinity for, you know, beyond Puerto Ricans. Now Stretch has read this book, "La Borinquena." Stretch knows about Puerto Rican history now. This is incredible. You know? He and I went to the island for the first time together in December.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Oh, Wow.

GARCIA: Three months after Hurricane Maria.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: Wow.

GARCIA: And we DJ'd together in San Juan. Cats were coming up to us like yo, we needed this. We needed music. We needed to escape the island. You brought us back to New York. It was like this surreal bond going on that night that music was the platform for. So anyway, so thank you for all that you've done. Eggy, I love you. (Speaking Spanish).

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: (Speaking Spanish).

GARCIA: And you've been a real friend, bro.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: (Speaking Spanish).

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

BARTOS: Well, that's our show. This podcast was produced by Michelle Lanz, edited by Jordana Hochman and N'Jeri Eaton. And our executive producer is Abby O'Neill.

GARCIA: If you like the show, you can hear more at npr.org. And bonus video content on Spotify on Fridays. Thanks to Spotify for their support. Please go to Apple Podcasts and rate, review and subscribe. That's how we know you're listening.

MIRANDA-RODRIGUEZ: You can follow us on Twitter @stretchandbob or Instagram @stretchandbobbito.

BARTOS: Hasta la proxima.

GARCIA: Hasta la proxima. Hey, Stretch, that was good. (Laughter).