Deaf Awareness Week: How Marvel Comics Are Doing Their Bit For People With Hearing Impairments

A young, hearing-impaired boy in America has lived out the ultimate dream of any four year-old by being made into a comic book superhero.

Super-hero mega-fan, Anthony Smith was born with Mosaic Trisomy 22 which meant he has no hearing in his right ear and minimal hearing in his left. When he was given a blue hearing aid to help him with his hearing he became increasingly depressed and refused to wear it. “Superheroes don’t wear blue ears” he told his mother.

At a loss for what else to do, his mother, Christina D’Allesandro, sent an email to Marvel Comics telling them about the problem. Amazingly, just like all the characters they have created, Marvel quickly came to the rescue!

They sent Anthony some comics from the Eighties featuring Hawkeye – a superhero who had worn hearing aids when he lost 80% of his hearing. Even better, they included some brand new pictures of a new superhero, based around Anthony himself, called Blue Ear.

Blue Ear was made in Anthony’s image and wears a hearing aid to help him fight crime. His catchphrase is: “Thanks to my listening device I hear someone in trouble!” Click here to see a video of Anthony’s story on Fox News.

But it didn’t end there. Anthony, now five, has been made a honorary Avenger and part of the Marvel Universe. Marvel then followed up on all this, recently, with a special comic strip called Hearing Is Believing featuring Iron Man and another boy, much like Anthony, who wears a hearing aid. In the story, Iron Man tells a group of children that there is no need to be embarrassed about using technology to help you out. Whether it’s a hearing aid or an Iron Man Suit, if something will help you live your life to its fullest, you should go for it.

The comic, which is a brilliant way of raising awareness of hearing impairment, was unveiled at Anthony’s school. A man in an Iron Man costume was present to help Anthony show it off and to give him his own Iron Man costume to put on. Which he did immediately.

It’s truly admirable of Marvel to have done something that not only helps Anthony feel good about himself but does a lot to help raise awareness of hearing-impairment in general.

Bill Roseman, an editor at Marvel explained:”The reason why it was so easy for us to respond to this is because our characters, which were invented around the ’60s, all have real challenges. [They] became superheroes despite of — or because of — the challenges they face.”

It’s an uplifting idea and something we couldn’t resist highlighting during Deaf Awareness Week. On the surface of it you have a cute kid getting to live out his dream but underlying that is a more powerful idea about overcoming an impairment. Marvelous stuff.