Soldier Zero

Origin

Stuart Trautmann is the man behind Soldier Zero. However, before becoming a hero of Earth and the galaxy, he was a Captain in the Marines for the United States. While on a trip back home from Afghanistan his convoy was attacked by a bombing, which killed his entire team and also rendered him unable to walk! Finding out the bad news about not being able to walk again, Stuart decided to leave the marines and become an Astronomy TA at a college back in his hometown. Throughout his time in a wheelchair Stuart has been deemed, helpless, and constantly gets help from friends and family. The only family that Stuart is currently alive is his older brother, James Trautmann.

James is overprotective and will protect Stuart to the extent of his on life being placed on the line. Most of this changed when Stuart gained the Soldier Zero alien tech. Stuart had a love life before meeting Soldier Zero. His love, Lily, was the only person that understood him and would do anything to get his disability to be looked over by others. When the two of them were out stargazing, Soldier Zero crashed down on top of them and destroyed a building. With both lives hanging in the balance, Soldier Zero bonded with Stuart to save himself and Lilly! While everyone ended up safe in the end, Soldier Zero didn’t come alone. The more powerful and evil version of Soldier Zero, Soldier One, has come to execute Zero once and for all!

Stuart and Soldier Zero encounter threats from both, space and Earth, but are always prepared as a united hero!

Creation

The legendary Stan Lee, through his POW! Entertainment, has partnered with writer Paul Cornell and artist Javier Pina to create this superhero for a new line of superhero comics from BOOM! Studios. Soldier Zero is the flagship character from this new line of superhero comics as it is the first to launch (October, 2010). With Soldier Zero there is a concious effort to represent wheelchair users and their community through the character of Stuart Travers, the human half of the character.

Soldier Zero Co-Creater Paul Cornell:

I’m very conscious that there’s an incredibly crass way to do this book, but, by bringing in the great comics creator Al Davison, who’s a wheelchair-using martial artist, as our advisor, and reaching out to other wheelchair-using comics fans, I’m hoping that instead it’s a comic that’ll represent that community. Al’s been giving us video, art advice, and script notes. It was him who gave me the ethos Stewart lives by: it’s only the environment that limits him. That is, not just a physical environment that isn’t designed for wheelchairs often enough, but the attitudes of other people. Like his brother, who’s cared for him since he was a kid, and who rather tries to run his life. I was shocked, for example, to learn that wheelchair users get abused in the street, often and continually. I didn’t believe that until Al told me about his own experiences.