The Curious Case of the Racial Identity of one Detective Jared Morillo.
So as some of you may know I read a bunch of the the 1987 The Flash Volume 2 recently, aka I read a bunch of mid-90s comics up until its run ended in 2009.
In 2001, The Flash was given a slightly expanded supporting cast outside of his family, including some members of the police department. One of them was Jared Morillo.
Who I thought was black when I first read this in 2004. And honestly I’ve never been given a reason to think otherwise until I kept reading past where I read when I was middle schooler and started getting different artists who either were told something different or didn’t understand the assignment.
Because uh,
Hey, artist Alberto Dose, who is this guy and why does he have Morillo’s name and NONE of his features?
Hey there, penciller Howard Porter, I see we’re continuing the trend.
Val Semeiks understood the assignment. Or maybe they didn’t and maybe Semeiks got it wrong and Morillo isn’t supposed to be black.
WHO CAN SAY!
But it’s weird, right?
They get his partner old man Chyre relatively consistent but the only thing about Morillo they can keep are his awful suits and ties!
Is he black? Is he Italian? Is this whitewashing? Does he just have a tan because he came from LA, California?
WHO CAN SAY!
Scores of issues, 171 up until is last appearance (as far as I can tell) in 229 and 4 artists and you just can’t tell!
Hold up, hold up, I nearly forgot about the “Iron Heights” one shot from 2001, same year Morillo was introduced, drawn by Ethan Van Sciver
This is just a single character, drawn with multiple artists, over the course of years. With no consistency and it’s kind of insane.
Jared Morillo what the hell are you and why did half of the artists not know!?
