DC Comics heroes tend to be regarded as classic “good guys.” Superman has a reputation as a “Big Blue Boy Scout.” Wonder Woman is seen as a role model to girls and women everywhere. Even Batman adheres very strongly to a personal code of ethics and a no-killing rule (usually). Still, not all superheroes adhere to such a strong code of ethics – including DC’s Greatest Hero You’ve Never Heard Of – Booster Gold!
Who? Although his profile has become more well-known in multiple media sources lately, most people don’t know about Booster Gold. Even his fellow superheroes regard him as something of a second-stringer – and that’s the way he needs to keep things. You see, while heroes like Superman and Batman tend to tackle high profile rescues and saves, Booster Gold’s activities are much more covert as he helps police the time stream and keep it safe from rogue time travelers attempting to rewrite reality and erase important events (and people) from existence.
Sounds like an important job – and it is – but the truth is, Booster Gold’s poor reputation among superheroes isn’t entirely undeserved either. Unlike upstanding superheroes like Superman or Batman, Booster didn’t start out as an idealistically minded young man striving to make a difference in the world. By contrast, he fully admits that when he decided to become a superhero, he was already a washed-up loser and an ex-con who got his powers by – committing more crimes!
Born in the 25th century, Michael Jon Carter seemed to have it all. A football star at Gotham City University, he seemed to be on the fast track to fame and fortune. Unfortunately, when his gambling addict father wandered back into his life, Michael was persuaded to lose some games on purpose and bet against himself to cover his father’s gambling debts and save his life. Other versions of his origin show that he used his dirty money to pay for his mother’s operations – but when everyone learned what he was doing, however, Michael was disgraced, disowned by his mother, and forced to work as a night watchman at a museum at the Metropolis Space Museum.
During those lonely nights, however, Michael learned all about the superheroes of the 20th century and realized that if he traveled to the past, nobody would know about his lousy reputation in the future and regard him as a great hero once more. Although the museum’s flying security robot Skeets tried to stop him, Michael just shut him down – and then proceeded to ransack the museum for his superhero gear. This included taking an alien invader’s strength-enhancing power suit, energy rods, a forcefield belt, a Legion of Superheroes flight ring, and Rip Hunter’s time machine.
Thus armed, Michael went back in time to the 20th century (later the 21st as comic books matched up the “real world’s” timeline) and used Skeets’ library of knowledge about past economics to invest in good stocks while building up a reputation as the superhero “Booster Gold.” (originally, Michael wanted to call himself “Goldstar” but got that name and his football nickname “Booster” mixed up, creating his unique alias).
If all this makes Michael sound like a con artist… well, he is – but it also turns out that he had the makings of a decent superhero as well. Despite the fact that he used his knowledge of past disasters to build his reputation as a major superhero when he stopped them, he did save multiple people both in front of the camera and away from them. Moreover, when he knew terrible things were coming, he didn’t run away from them – as evidenced when he took on Doomsday, knowing it was the monster that killed Superman.
Nevertheless, Booster could also be a grandstanding show-off obsessed with regaining the fame, love, and wealth he lost in his own time. He embarked on multiple money-making schemes to build his bank account, but kept running into bad luck (and corrupt agents) and losing his fortune over and over again. Things got even worse when his twin sister Michelle also traveled back in time to become a superhero herself – and subsequently died in an explosion.
Later, however, Booster learned that even he didn’t know the whole truth about his origin. Although it seemed like he had ripped off a bunch of superhero gear at random from the museum, he later learned that he was also uniquely qualified to use it. His flight ring, for instance, was normally only reserved for the wills of Legion of Superhero members, yet Booster – a non-Legionnaire – still somehow qualified. Most remarkable of all, however, was that the time machine Booster used to go back in time belonged to time traveling hero Rip Hunter – who turned out to be Booster’s future son!
Things got even crazier when Rip Hunter himself recruited Booster Gold to travel to different points in the DC timeline and prevent disasters from happening. Rip told Booster that he had to keep up his “loser superhero” image and pretend to be a second-rate hero so no one – hero or villain – would suspect that Booster Gold was secretly keeping the entire timeline from falling into chaos. In return, Booster would become “The Greatest Hero You Never Heard Of.” Although Booster was reluctant to give up his dreams of fame and fortune, when he realized how many of his superhero friends could die if he didn’t accept this responsibility, he took on the mantle of DC’s “time cop.”
As hard as this job was, however, Rip made it a bit easier by rescuing Booster’s sister (and his aunt) from being killed by the explosion so they could be together once again. Rip also received visits from his father – an older Booster – who revealed that he had taught Rip everything he knew so that Rip could return the favor by training his younger self. Everything seemed to come full circle and it truly seemed that Booster was meant to rob the museum so he could save all of time and space…
Except he was still a criminal. And eventually, those past crimes caught up with him when Booster realized he had to turn himself in for stealing from the museum and serve five years in a maximum-security prison. Thanks to time travel, he was still able to return to his friends and family in a few seconds as if no time had passed – but his experiences while in prison were very traumatic (although he endured them admirably).
Thanks to all the reboots the DC Universe has gone through since then, Booster Gold’s origin has gone through some additional changes – although as a time traveler, Booster is actually uniquely able to appear as both his past and alternate selves. And while he may still come across as a self-important grandstander, but those who follow his career know there’s a lot more to the man than just that.
