Hard Time (comics)
Encyclopedia
Hard Time is a comic book
series written by Steve Gerber
and Mary Skrenes
and originally published by DC Focus
, a short-lived imprint
of DC Comics
. The aim of the imprint was to feature super-powered characters who did not follow the traditional format of classic superhero
adventures. Hard Time's first run was 12 issues long, published from April, 2004 to March, 2005.
The series returned from hiatus in December 2005, titled Hard Time: Season Two. With the demise of DC Focus, this run was published under the unfocused DC bullet.
DC announced Hard Times cancellation in March 2006. The comic ended with issue #7 of Season Two.
football
team bullied Ethan and his friend Brandon Snood, whose home life was fairly bad. After Travis and two of his friends tried to rape
a girl named Inez Mellencamp, Brandon stopped it by setting off the fire alarm. Travis and his friends merely got suspended for a week. Later Ethan and Brandon plan a "fake" school shooting as a way of getting back at the jocks. Unfortunately, things go wrong and Brandon winds up shooting several students and faculty members. As Ethan later tells his lawyer, "it was supposed to be a joke. Brandon told me the guns were loaded with blanks
". Ethan is initially in shock
; but when Brandon levels his gun at Alyssa Nichols, a girl that Ethan has feelings for, Ethan tries to stop him. Unsuccessful at first, Ethan's super-power emerges, killing Brandon.
After the shooting, Travis was paralyzed and Brandon was dead, along with four others.
Although Ethan was not directly involved with the murders, he was tried as an adult and given fifty years to life in prison
with eligibility for parole
in the year 2053. Ethan maintains that the media
convicted him before he ever got to trial
.
of his alter ego while he sleeps, or is otherwise unconscious. A fellow inmate, the elderly "Fruitcake" eventually instructs Ethan on the use of his power and its origin. Initially, Ethan is unaware of his alter ego, which acted on his suppressed emotions of anger and revenge. Ethan eventually learns how to control his powers and use them even in a conscious state.
While in prison, Ethan encounters a number of people, including:
While Ethan is in prison, life goes on outside. Ethan's mother, Sheila Harrow is dating Jack Forbes, his lawyer. Norma "Red" Rothenberg, the granddaughter of Curly corresponds with Ethan. Also, Alyssa Nichols, now institutionalized and currently residing at the Shady Grove mental institution, sends him letters thanking him for saving her life. She asked Ethan to write back, and the two share a dream
-like relationship
.
On Ethan Harrow's 16th birthday
, Red, the granddaughter of one of Ethan's fellow inmates, takes his virginity against the door of the visitor's restroom. Mercedes goes into labour
as she and Arturo are being married
. Ethan's lawyer asks his mother to marry him, but she said no.
Ethan met with his lawyer, who is trying to get him a new trial, and Red's parents, Julius and Truth Rothenberg, representatives of "The Prison
ers' Rights
Foundation
". Ethan told them the full story of the school shooting. Jack told Ethan that the judge was up for an election
and couldn't look "soft" on high school shooters. Jack told Ethan to stay out of trouble until the new trial.
A new inmate named CUTTER arrives at the prison, who is a psycho. Cole starts schooling Ethan in "Prison Economics
". Ethan's Khe-Chara starts having violent revulsion to CUTTER, so "Fruitcake" gives him a "Third Eye". The CUTTER befriends Hardin and Cindy into his "Sphere of Influence".
Hard Time Season Two #7 jumps ahead 49 years to the year 2053, to the end of Ethan's sentence. His mind is scanned, to determine whether he is genuinely repentant for his crime; in the process, the various fates of everyone he met while in prison are revealed, as are many details about how his superhuman power functioned (which allowed to send out his astral form to experience numerous activities outside the prison), and what happened to the people outside of prison. Eventually he is ruled to have truly atoned, and is released. He walks out the prison gate and sees a floating limousine
is waiting for him; although the readers do not see who is inside the limousine, Ethan does, and gets in.
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
series written by Steve Gerber
Steve Gerber
Stephen Ross "Steve" Gerber was an American comic book writer best known as co-creator of the satiric Marvel Comics character Howard the Duck....
and Mary Skrenes
Mary Skrenes
Mary Skrenes is a comic book writer and screenwriter. She may be best known as co-creator of Omega the Unknown for Marvel Comics, although she worked on other Marvel characters such as the Defenders and Guardians of the Galaxy...
and originally published by DC Focus
DC Focus
DC Focus was a short-lived imprint of DC Comics. The titles published under this imprint featured super-powered characters who didn't follow the trappings and traditions of classic superhero adventures. Most titles failed to generate significant sales, forcing DC Comics to cancel them. Hard Time...
, a short-lived imprint
Imprint
In the publishing industry, an imprint can mean several different things:* As a piece of bibliographic information about a book, it refers to the name and address of the book's publisher and its date of publication as given at the foot or on the verso of its title page.* It can mean a trade name...
of DC Comics
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
. The aim of the imprint was to feature super-powered characters who did not follow the traditional format of classic superhero
Superhero
A superhero is a type of stock character, possessing "extraordinary or superhuman powers", dedicated to protecting the public. Since the debut of the prototypical superhero Superman in 1938, stories of superheroes — ranging from brief episodic adventures to continuing years-long sagas —...
adventures. Hard Time
The series returned from hiatus in December 2005, titled Hard Time: Season Two. With the demise of DC Focus, this run was published under the unfocused DC bullet.
DC announced Hard Times cancellation in March 2006. The comic ended with issue #7 of Season Two.
Backstory
Hard Time focuses on 15-year-old Ethan Harrow (early publicity referred to him as "Ethan Chiles"), who was involved in a high-school shooting scare gone wrong which cost several students their lives. For two years Travis Danes and the high schoolHigh school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
football
American football
American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
team bullied Ethan and his friend Brandon Snood, whose home life was fairly bad. After Travis and two of his friends tried to rape
Rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
a girl named Inez Mellencamp, Brandon stopped it by setting off the fire alarm. Travis and his friends merely got suspended for a week. Later Ethan and Brandon plan a "fake" school shooting as a way of getting back at the jocks. Unfortunately, things go wrong and Brandon winds up shooting several students and faculty members. As Ethan later tells his lawyer, "it was supposed to be a joke. Brandon told me the guns were loaded with blanks
Blank (cartridge)
A blank is a type of cartridge for a firearm that contains gunpowder but no bullet or shot. When fired, the blank makes a flash and an explosive sound . Blanks are often used for simulation , training, and for signaling...
". Ethan is initially in shock
Acute stress reaction
Acute stress reaction is a psychological condition arising in response to a terrifying or traumatic event...
; but when Brandon levels his gun at Alyssa Nichols, a girl that Ethan has feelings for, Ethan tries to stop him. Unsuccessful at first, Ethan's super-power emerges, killing Brandon.
After the shooting, Travis was paralyzed and Brandon was dead, along with four others.
Although Ethan was not directly involved with the murders, he was tried as an adult and given fifty years to life in prison
Prisons in the United States
Incarceration in the United States is one of the main forms of punishment and/or rehabilitation for the commission of felony and other offenses. The United States has the highest documented incarceration rate in the world. At year-end 2009 it was 743 adults incarcerated per 100,000...
with eligibility for parole
Parole
Parole may have different meanings depending on the field and judiciary system. All of the meanings originated from the French parole . Following its use in late-resurrected Anglo-French chivalric practice, the term became associated with the release of prisoners based on prisoners giving their...
in the year 2053. Ethan maintains that the media
Mass media
Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...
convicted him before he ever got to trial
Trial (law)
In law, a trial is when parties to a dispute come together to present information in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to adjudicate claims or disputes. One form of tribunal is a court...
.
Season one
While in prison, Ethan continues to manifest a superpower called the "KHE-CHARE" that appears as psychic manifestationOut-of-body experience
An out-of-body experience is an experience that typically involves a sensation of floating outside of one's body and, in some cases, perceiving one's physical body from a place outside one's body ....
of his alter ego while he sleeps, or is otherwise unconscious. A fellow inmate, the elderly "Fruitcake" eventually instructs Ethan on the use of his power and its origin. Initially, Ethan is unaware of his alter ego, which acted on his suppressed emotions of anger and revenge. Ethan eventually learns how to control his powers and use them even in a conscious state.
While in prison, Ethan encounters a number of people, including:
- Prison Staff
- Harvey Brickman, the warden
- Dr. Robert Dinkens , a psychiatristPsychiatristA psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
- Inmates
- Hubert "Curly" Wallace, Ethan's cellmate and grandfather to Norma "Red" Rothenberg.
- George W. Cole, who gives Ethan the nickname "Prodigy". Released in 2009 and dead in 2010 in attempting a robbery.
- Alonzo "Fruitcake" Mullins, who knows of Ethan's powers. Dead on December 16, 2012, strokeStrokeA stroke, previously known medically as a cerebrovascular accident , is the rapidly developing loss of brain function due to disturbance in the blood supply to the brain. This can be due to ischemia caused by blockage , or a hemorrhage...
in bed. - Arturo Lopez, a Latino gang member whose girlfriend Mercedes is pregnant, later on in life (40 so years later) he is a "Don Arturo" and released.
- Cindy Crane, a transgenderTransgenderTransgender is a general term applied to a variety of individuals, behaviors, and groups involving tendencies to vary from culturally conventional gender roles....
woman. Released in 2011, obtained sexual reassignment surgery, and inherited her mother's salon. - Swift, Cindy's lover and a member of the Aryan BrotherhoodAryan BrotherhoodThe Aryan Brotherhood, also known as The Brand, the AB, or the One-Two, is a white supremacist prison gang and organized crime syndicate in the United States with about 20,000 members in and out of prison...
deceased - Gantry the Preacher, an arsonist deceased
- Lewis Gatherwood, a rapist deceased
- Raeder, The Gang boss of the Aryan BrotherhoodAryan BrotherhoodThe Aryan Brotherhood, also known as The Brand, the AB, or the One-Two, is a white supremacist prison gang and organized crime syndicate in the United States with about 20,000 members in and out of prison...
. - Alcazar, The Gang boss of the Diablos, a LatinoLatinoThe demonyms Latino and Latina , are defined in English language dictionaries as:* "a person of Latin-American descent."* "A Latin American."* "A person of Hispanic, especially Latin-American, descent, often one living in the United States."...
gang. - Kilo, Samoan, Big man willing to throw his weight, for a candy barCandy barA chocolate bar is a confection in bar form comprising some or all of the following components: cocoa solids, cocoa butter, sugar, milk. The relative presence or absence of these components form the subclasses of dark chocolate, milk chocolate, and white chocolate. In addition to these main...
or two. - Everly, CraftsmanMaster craftsmanA master craftsman or master tradesman was a member of a guild. In the European guild system, only masters were allowed to be members of the guild....
makes things out of GlassGlassGlass is an amorphous solid material. Glasses are typically brittle and optically transparent.The most familiar type of glass, used for centuries in windows and drinking vessels, is soda-lime glass, composed of about 75% silica plus Na2O, CaO, and several minor additives...
, PlasticPlasticA plastic material is any of a wide range of synthetic or semi-synthetic organic solids used in the manufacture of industrial products. Plastics are typically polymers of high molecular mass, and may contain other substances to improve performance and/or reduce production costs...
, WoodWoodWood is a hard, fibrous tissue found in many trees. It has been used for hundreds of thousands of years for both fuel and as a construction material. It is an organic material, a natural composite of cellulose fibers embedded in a matrix of lignin which resists compression...
for Porn. - Brazo, A one-armed artistArtistAn artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
always needs supplies. - Saeed, Prison smuggler, like cigarettes, prunoPrunoPruno, or prison wine, is an alcoholic liquid variously made from apples, oranges, fruit cocktail, ketchup, sugar, and possibly other ingredients, including crumbled bread. Bread provides the yeast for the pruno to ferment. Pruno originated in prisons and jails, where it can be produced cheaply,...
. - Duane Cutter, serial killerSerial killerA serial killer, as typically defined, is an individual who has murdered three or more people over a period of more than a month, with down time between the murders, and whose motivation for killing is usually based on psychological gratification...
, who carved up his victims.
While Ethan is in prison, life goes on outside. Ethan's mother, Sheila Harrow is dating Jack Forbes, his lawyer. Norma "Red" Rothenberg, the granddaughter of Curly corresponds with Ethan. Also, Alyssa Nichols, now institutionalized and currently residing at the Shady Grove mental institution, sends him letters thanking him for saving her life. She asked Ethan to write back, and the two share a dream
Dream
Dreams are successions of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. The content and purpose of dreams are not definitively understood, though they have been a topic of scientific speculation, philosophical intrigue and religious...
-like relationship
Intimate relationship
An intimate relationship is a particularly close interpersonal relationship that involves physical or emotional intimacy. Physical intimacy is characterized by romantic or passionate love and attachment, or sexual activity. The term is also sometimes used euphemistically for a sexual...
.
On Ethan Harrow's 16th birthday
Birthday
A birthday is a day or anniversary where a person celebrates his or her date of birth. Birthdays are celebrated in numerous cultures, often with a gift, party or rite of passage. Although the major religions celebrate the birth of their founders , Christmas – which is celebrated widely by...
, Red, the granddaughter of one of Ethan's fellow inmates, takes his virginity against the door of the visitor's restroom. Mercedes goes into labour
Childbirth
Childbirth is the culmination of a human pregnancy or gestation period with the birth of one or more newborn infants from a woman's uterus...
as she and Arturo are being married
Wedding
A wedding is the ceremony in which two people are united in marriage or a similar institution. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnic groups, religions, countries, and social classes...
. Ethan's lawyer asks his mother to marry him, but she said no.
Season two
The first issue of Season Two was released on December 7, 2005.Ethan met with his lawyer, who is trying to get him a new trial, and Red's parents, Julius and Truth Rothenberg, representatives of "The Prison
Prison
A prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...
ers' Rights
Rights
Rights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people, according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical theory...
Foundation
Foundation (charity)
A foundation is a legal categorization of nonprofit organizations that will typically either donate funds and support to other organizations, or provide the source of funding for its own charitable purposes....
". Ethan told them the full story of the school shooting. Jack told Ethan that the judge was up for an election
Election
An election is a formal decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy operates since the 17th century. Elections may fill offices in the legislature, sometimes in the...
and couldn't look "soft" on high school shooters. Jack told Ethan to stay out of trouble until the new trial.
A new inmate named CUTTER arrives at the prison, who is a psycho. Cole starts schooling Ethan in "Prison Economics
Supply and demand
Supply and demand is an economic model of price determination in a market. It concludes that in a competitive market, the unit price for a particular good will vary until it settles at a point where the quantity demanded by consumers will equal the quantity supplied by producers , resulting in an...
". Ethan's Khe-Chara starts having violent revulsion to CUTTER, so "Fruitcake" gives him a "Third Eye". The CUTTER befriends Hardin and Cindy into his "Sphere of Influence".
Hard Time Season Two #7 jumps ahead 49 years to the year 2053, to the end of Ethan's sentence. His mind is scanned, to determine whether he is genuinely repentant for his crime; in the process, the various fates of everyone he met while in prison are revealed, as are many details about how his superhuman power functioned (which allowed to send out his astral form to experience numerous activities outside the prison), and what happened to the people outside of prison. Eventually he is ruled to have truly atoned, and is released. He walks out the prison gate and sees a floating limousine
Limousine
A limousine is a luxury sedan or saloon car, especially one with a lengthened wheelbase or driven by a chauffeur. The chassis of a limousine may have been extended by the manufacturer or by an independent coachbuilder. These are called "stretch" limousines and are traditionally black or white....
is waiting for him; although the readers do not see who is inside the limousine, Ethan does, and gets in.