From Comic to Crime - Dr.Ch@os
The Real Life Super Villain Story
Since the early 2000s a community arose out of fandom and hope. Still going today, Real Life Super Heroes (RLSH) are determined, nerdy and take a lot of pictures. But with great costumes comes a greater challenge. A spotlit place is left next to them.
‘So riddle me this Ratman, What’s on the other side of a Super Heroes’ coin?’
A Super Villain, obviously! It’s in the fuckin’ title.
A Super Villain in the classic comic sense usually has an agenda that goes hand in hand with their self-imposed theme. So how The Joker is a wildcard, he wants chaos. Ultron’s a robot, he wants extinction. Or as basic as Deathstroke the assassin, just going through a list of targets.
That's the villainy, it’s main objective rule is as camp as staying on theme.
As for the ’Super’ aspect, is it a costume? Or is it the acts that make a Villain super?
Infamous Villains such as Lex Luthor and Kingpin, respectively, have proven that powers and costumes aren’t needed to reach status. It is the greatness of the acts, the spread of fear, the reach that your power has - fireblasting or not.
Out of Chicago’s tunnels, shrouded in mystery, crawled ‘Dr. Ch@os’.
A man whose only disguise was the anonymity of the internet. But before Chicago, he was in Wisconsin, there, Dr. Ch@os enacted a long list of crimes dated around 1998 - 2001. He didn’t act alone however. His greatest powers were his allies.
Dr. Ch@os’ first plan was to start posting on like-minded anarchist message boards under his alias. He approached underground zines. He expressed his plans to his subculture and they found him inspirational. Joining his ‘Realm of Ch@os’. Although, it should be said, he wasn’t organising them, he wasn’t training them in tech or readying them for action. They were who they were, a group of like minded anarchists, excited to spread mayhem around Wisconsin.
The crimes committed under this Realm of Ch@os caused $800,000 in damages (Nearly 2 million dollars today). These acts included: Arson, Vandalism, 28 Power outages, Disruption to tv & radio, Taking out internet service providers, Bootlegging, And disabling air traffic control. Wisconsin was their wrecked little playground.
Dr. Ch@os and his minions were hardcore-punk rock-matrix level-menaces. When asked why, he said “I have several reasons, but no real good reason.” Shits and gigs were enough. Anger was enough. They were enough, with no formal training between them, no military-like plotting, organised crime had never had a looser meaning.
But after 28 power outages and messing with the airport, the feds are going to look at you. They’re no Batman but they’re still detectives. So Chaos was on the run.
He became transient, regularly crossing state lines and interacting with Urban explorer groups for locations that he could hide or stash things. Dr. Ch@os got quite good at it, learning how to lockpick and even change locks in order to give himself sole access to these abandoned spaces.
He hid well, he ran better. But in the end, he was picked up in 2002. Chicago. Tunnels. Caught with a vial of cyanide, and a store of more beneath the University of Illinois. Ratted out by the urbexers and the hacker group he had made acquaintance with, ‘2600’.
To this day no one knows what was planned with the chemical weapon store, Ch@os himself admitted he didn’t. Maybe suicide, he said.
And like that the Legend of Dr. Ch@os unfolded. For around 15 years, he spent in prison. Released 6 years ago. He says “It’s a time I put behind me”. With no regrets, he told WGN.
So a Super Villain retired. Saying it was just a fun time of his young life. He hung up the mask. Leaving Dr. Ch@os there, with everything he represented. Self-taught disorder, mayhem and damage. Anti-government, irrational fuckery. Punk Rock Fun. He was Dr. Ch@os.