There are forces at work in this world that the ordinary person does not even suspect. Esoteric sciences are being practiced, conspiracies are being formulated and carried out. And (as if the "evil that men do" isn't sufficient), outside the space that we know, there is Evil that seems to possess a malignant life of its own, that would strip the Earth of all life and (in the words of H.P. Lovecraft) "drag [it] off to some nameless place for some nameless purpose." And sometimes it seems our fate rests on the shoulders of one person.
One extraordinary woman... who never thought she'd be a heroine.
PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION :
RESIDENCE:
Currently residing in her hometown of Orlando, Florida.
PERSONALITY:
A very friendly and outgoing person, Satin makes one feel like a close, lifelong friend at the first meeting. Quick to laugh and slow to anger, she's ready to give a stranger the benefit of the doubt unless given good reason not to. Her openness and acceptance of a person's "face value" has caused her pain on more than one occasion (usually when someone she thought was a friend has used her for selfish purposes), but hasn't caused her to turn bitter or cynical. (Yet.)
(This is also why Satin won't suspect for a long time that Morgana deVries is intimately involved with Tiger's Paw; to Satin, Morgana is simply a name in the newspaper's society column who throws all these parties for this or that high profile charity.)
On the other hand, when Satin does form a grudge, she's slow in forgiving it. For example she still hasn't forgiven one Dale Butler his part in the bullying of Matt during high school, even though in a way Dale was instrumental in bringing Matt and her together. (There's a story about this in the works.) But since Dale has "grown up" into something of a professional sleazeball, he hasn't exactly made it easy for her to change her mind about him.
Although she does have a healthy self-confidence (necessary for a pro bodybuilder), she is refreshingly free of egotism. She is proud of her accomplishments in sports, and will not hesitate to talk about those, but about her "heroics" she is very modest, due mainly to her feeling that she's doing no more than any concerned person would do (as though unaware of the incredible courage it takes to do some of what she's done).] She is practically the opposite of the public (mis-)conception of the female bodybuilder.
Satin is very protective of her sport, and continually trying to fight that stereotype, as well as efforts to "sleazify" women's bodybuilding.
The other dominant facet of Satin's personality is her "innate goodness". In a day when most comics "heroes" are motivated by revenge and/or bloodlust (so it seems), Satin is driven by a moral code as pure as Superman's: she does the "right thing" or the "good deed" simply because it needs to be done, because it is the right thing to do. Indeed, sometimes it seems Satin is congenitally unable to turn her back on anyone who needs help. This often manifests itself in volunteering her time for charity work, even though her career and training keeps her very busy.
POWERS AND ABILITIES:
Satin Steele possesses no "super powers" as such. She is, however, literally an Olympic - level athlete (having qualified for the US Olympic Gymnastics Team as a teenager; more about this) and still spends a great deal of time training and enhancing her abilities.
Genetically, Satin seems born to be a bodybuilder/ strength athlete. Her muscles respond well to exercise; even as a teenager, her gymnastics training endowed her with a higher degree of muscularity than even her teammates. Although she's never formally tested the limits of her physical strength, it is safe to say she is probably one of the five strongest (non-super-powered) humans in the world, certainly the strongest person weighing under 200 lbs.
She is capable of strength feats that astound even the men who train at the gym she trains at. She once "maxed out" at 800 lbs. in the squat; her personal best in the bench press is 315 lbs. for three reps; and has been seen curling a 160 lb. barbell for four reps. It's almost as though her muscles can "contain" more strength than anyone else's identically - sized muscles.
As a result of her gymnastics training, she's developed a high degree of balance that still allows her to do flips, handsprings and cartwheels with supreme confidence, as well as extraordinary flexibility.
When it finally became impractical for her to continue working out at the gymnastics club she'd trained at for most of her life, she decided karate would fill the gap and help her maintain her flexibility, balance and coordination. Needless to say, the fighting skills come in very useful in her battles against criminals and creatures.
"Courage" is perhaps not a power per se, but it is a quality for which she is often noted. If courage as defined, not as an inability to feel fear, but as the ability to act forthrightly and correctly even in the face of paralyzing fear, then Satin Steele is courageous indeed. (Her thoughts and "internal monologues" are often the only clue we have that Satin is indeed frightened to death of the situation that confronts her.)
CAREER:
Satin is a professional bodybuilder: that is, her living is made by competition in professional contests and collecting the cash awards, as well as conducting seminars in fitness, nutrition and competition, guest appearances at gyms, fitness clubs and stores, guest posing at contests (her beauty, as well as her high degree of muscle development and theatrical routines make her arguably the most popular guest-poser in recent memory), and modeling (with three TV commercials and over 30 print campaigns to her credit, mostly for sports-related merchandise). Movie and TV producers are starting to take notice of her, although she's yet to be offered a role she feels won't compromise her dignity and that of her beloved sport. (This drives her agent in Hollywood crazy; he seems incapable of understanding Satin's reasons for refusing the scripts he keeps sending her.)
Satin seems so tailor-made a spokeswoman and symbol for women's bodybuilding that if she didn't exist, they'd have to invent her. Muscular enough to satisfy even the most hardcore physique freak, she's beautiful and "feminine" (whatever that means) enough to make her massive development palatable to all but the most diehard male-chauvinists.
Her incredible physique graces the cover of at least five muscle magazines a year. A recent pictorial feature she did for Female Physique became that magazine's most popular feature ever.
All this activity provides an income that could be described as "upper middle class". She lives modestly but comfortably; however, bodybuilding can be an expensive lifestyle, and the financial rewards of even a top contender are puny compared to the salaries of pros in other sports.
She keeps an extremely busy schedule. Weekends usually find her out of town, giving seminars and guest-posing at one contest or another; she'll actually compete in two to three pro contests a year. She does some training every day except Sunday: weight training usually takes up a total of three hours a day divided between morning and afternoon working different bodyparts on different days. Another hour is spent each day in some form of either aerobics or karate training (alternate days) with yet another hour every day taken up by stretching and flexibility. Evenings usually finds her practicing her posing or developing new routines; and when she's not working out, she's usually studying nutrition, physiology, or sports medicine, seeking new ways to maximize her muscularity, increase the efficiency of her workouts, improve her diet, and avoid injury.
(One more time, because this is important: Satin Steele Does NOT Use Steroids. Or any other illegal drug or artificial means of adding muscle mass. In fact, the only thing "fake" about Satin is her tan: she uses a skin dye to darken her skin for competition in order to avoid having to spend hours tanning in the sun and running the risk of skin cancer.)
She will try to volunteer at least an hour a week of her time to some worthy cause: working with the Red Cross, or serving food at a local homeless shelter. (There are times when her "charity work" could take on a slightly more glamorous cast: for example, as might well be chronicled in an upcoming issue, she'll appear at an MD telethon where she'll perform a feat of strength, like breaking a pair of handcuffs, if a certain amount of money is pledged.)
All this activity leaves her little time for most recreational activities, or for seeing Matt; and as the series goes on, this will be an important factor in their relationship. It will cause them to decide to move in together; it will become a sore point with Matt that Satin seems to have no time for anything but her bodybuilding.
MISCELLANEOUS:
As noted before, her busy schedule leaves Satin little time for recreation. She does, however, try to fit it in whenever she can. Instead of riding a stationary cycle for aerobics training, for example, she'll try to ride a real bike to take advantage of fresh air and natural scenery. Most of her spare time is spent with Matt; they'll often go to a movie (Matt and Satin share a liking for action films, and Matt is a sport about attending the occasional "relationship" flick that Satin may want to see), or stay home and watch a rented video.
She's not much of a reader, but she has picked up a liking for comics from Matt. Satin has also picked up a fascination with Japanese culture (since Matt is a big fan of manga and anime), even to the point of trying to study a smattering of the Japanese language. (But her limited time keeps her from being proficient; Matt's Japanese is somewhat better, since he has a bit more time to study, but still not "fluent" by any means.)
Matt and Satin will also visit nightclubs whenever possible, Satin being partial to dance and techno music (since these will usually the kinds of music she'll do her posing routines to). She also appreciates the opportunity of dressing in her "hot babe" clothes, and (as you can guess), she draws a lot of attention when she dances. It seems sometimes, though, that Satin and Matt spend most of their time together making love.
Matt and Satin were literally high school sweethearts.
One of Satin's first "real" jobs was at Buster's, a chain of restaurants which had achieved a bit of notoriety for their "concept" of hiring beautiful, voluptuous young women as waitresses, dressed in skimpy outfits which gave the eatery's name a double-entendre meaning.
As the series begins, Matt and Satin have entered a state of being "unofficially" engaged; Satin, at least, thinks of marriage as a foregone conclusion, an event waiting only for the proper circumstances to arrive. Matt, though not opposed to the idea of marrying Satin, is a little shy of the institution of marriage itself, trotting out the "do we need a piece of paper to make our relationship legal?" argument. We can see this situation becoming a source of some tension between Satin and Matt, building very slowly and subtly until it threatens to break up their relationship...
SATIN: A SUPER HEROINE?
As mentioned before, Satin possesses no "super powers". (Her physical strength is incredible, but is wholly the result of hard training and genetic predisposition.) Despite this, I consider Satin a "superheroine" in the same way that Batman is considered a "superhero" though he as well lacks super powers: they both battle outrageous adversaries in incredible situation that "average people" rarely find themselves in.
Satin is what I term an "accidental" heroine: she has taken no formal pledge to "use her powers for good", nor does she seek out situations in which to be a heroine. She is in fact somewhat embarrassed by this "media image" of a flamboyant costumed do-gooder (since most of the more public incidents have occurred while she "just happened" to be wearing the white bikini and cape she appears in for performing - great video for the 11:00 news!); she considers it a distraction from what she wants to be famous for, a great bodybuilder. (Although she does come to realize all this "notoriety" makes her a bigger "attraction" at contests and personal appearances than the current
The truth is, as a magnet attracts metal, so danger and adventure seem to seek out Satin wherever she is. Some people seem to attract success, others a disproportionate portion of "bad luck"; Satin draws more than her share of excitement.
(It could be that some cosmic force has "chosen" Satin as their instrument for opposing the evil represented largely by Tiger's Paw. Or it could just be an amazing set of coincidences. But I don't believe in coincidence...)
As Satin herself would sum it up then, she's only trying to live her own life, pursue her career, and do right by her fellow man, but she never asked to be a superheroine.
Notes on the creation of Satin Steele
A quiet, almost painfully shy boy, Matt found refuge (as so many of us quiet, almost painfully shy types do) in his love for drawing, especially comics.
He and Janet met in high school under somewhat unusual circumstances, and began dating almost immediately (at least as much as Janet's studeis and gymnastics practice would allow). Watching Janet perform her gymnastics, Matt came to appreciate the beauty of strong. well-trained female muscle; secretly, he wished that Janet would get even more muscular but kept this dream to himself lest she react negatively to the suggestion... but muscular women would soon become his favorite subjects, and Janet was the model and inspiration for more than one of his characters.
After graduating from the Pittsburgh Institute of Art, Matt sought a career in comics, first moving to New York; but after some months of fruitless search for a staff artist position with one of the major publishers, Matt decided to move back to Orlando and try his luck with a start-up publisher, Explosive Comics. He soon became their "star" artist, and is still a minor celebrity at whichever comics conventions he can attend.
Matt's schedule is not quite as hectic as Satin's, although his good work habits and overall dependability cause his publishers to rely on him to take up the slack (in the form of rush inking jobs, etc.) when one of the other artists fall behind schedule. Matt tries to work out at the gym when he can, but when time gets tight, it's usually his exercise regimen that'll get jettisoned first.
Matt calls Satin by her real name, Janet, in private; however, in deference to her wishes he'll call her "Satin" in public.)
At the start of the series, Matt has his own apartment, but he winds up spending about half his nights at Satin's condo. As the series progresses, he'll "officially" move in with Satin.
Matt is as voracious a reader as his time permits, especiallly science fiction. (And comics, of course.) He's also a big fan of manga and anime, to the point where he's taken up the informal study of the Japanese language. (His enthusiasm for comics, Japanese manga and anime have even influenced Satin to some degree.) He likes 80's-era alternative music, and anime songs and soundtracks.
A vacation trip took Tony to Orlando where he saw, at first impression, a "small town that just happened to be spread out over a lot of land and contain a lot of people." Tony found Orlando's mild winters and (relatively) low crime rate very appealing, so he applied for and was hired to a position as detective with the Orlando Police Department (OPD). As the series starts, Tony is a few months into his new promotion as Chief of Detectives, Homicide Division.
Ironically, Tony moves to Orlando to escape NY's high crime rate. In Orlando, however, he befriends a woman who'll inadvertently involve Tony in some of the most bizarre and dangerous cases of his life! Satin is one of the first people Tony befriends when he moves to Orlando, indeed Satin was the first woman Tony Ravaglia dated in Orlando. (Of course, this was before Matt's return.) Tony was seeking a place to work out to pass OPD's physical, and Satin was working at Southside Gym at the time. After a few weeks, they started dating. It didn't quite work for either of them; they enjoy each other's company, but the "spark" just isn't there. (A few months later, Matt would re-enter Satin's life and all other boyfriends would be history.) Tony perhaps still carries somewhat of a torch for Satin, but, like Riker and Troi on Star Trek, they've come to an "understanding". During the course of the series, he'll be seen with a number of eligible women, but none of these relationships will last long.
Tony is not unlike what one expects a New York cop of Italian heritage to look and act like. (Physically, he's modeled after actor Tony Rosato, who appeared on Saturday Night Live and a short-run series, Diamonds, that ran on "CBS Late Night" and USA Network some years ago.) His speech is peppered with profanity, especially when he's angry. He'll try to curb his more "colorful" talk when around Satin or any other woman, but it's difficult.
Tiger's Paw (the individual) enjoys brandishing her power and seeing others cower in fear of her. Only Morgana deVries is allowed to address her as "Mistress"; all others (henchmen and monsters alike) must use terms like "Supreme One", "Almighty One", and similar terms in her presence. (They will use "Tiger's Paw" and "Mistress" to refer to her to other people, but never in her presence. Even Morgana will resort to "Supreme One" if she senses her Mistress is especially displeased.)
Tiger's Paw's ultimate goal, referred to always as "The Cause", goes far deeper than mere "world domination"; even the enslavement of all of humanity would amuse Tiger's Paw only momentarily. For Tiger's Paw is of extra-dimensional origin... I'd tell you more, but then you'd become a target of the wrath of Tiger's Paw, like Joe Taylor in issue #3.
One major setback to "The Cause" was the breakup of the Soviet empire; with that, a major cause of a possible nuclear war removed, and Tiger's Paw estimates they've been set back five to ten years, unless the current nuclear tension between India and Pakistan can become the major threat to world peace that the former USSR was.
The other major setback to "The Cause" was, of course, Satin Steele. Satin, it seems, will coincidentally be at just the right place at just the right time to foil the more dangerous of Tiger's Paw's plots; as she was the first time they tangled inissue #1. Since Satin can't be everywhere at once, Tiger's Paw does manage to score some minor victories in remote places; but Satin always seems to be around to halt Tiger's Paw at critical junctures... almost as though she was unknowingly "sent" by some "greater power".
Notes on the creation of Tiger's Paw
She's arguably the wealthiest woman in the state of Florida, one of the wealthiest single women in the world, a socialite and party-thrower of the first order. The world would be shocked to find out that Morgana is secretly the right-hand woman to an organization that is committed to destroying the economies and social structures of the world.
In her mid-forties, Morgana can still pass for 30ish, and an extremely beautiful and glamorous 30ish at that. Morgana flaunts her wealth, living in a spacious and extravagantly appointed mansion in Winter Park, dressing in the latest and most expensive fashions, chauffeured around in a white stretch limo... in other words the kind of person you want to shoot for living a lifestyle that seems calculated to say to the world, "I have money and you don't."
The only saving grace for such a "conspicuous consumer" as Morgana is that her "career" seems to be the throwing of lavish galas to benefit one charity or another. Her soirees are always well-attended by the upper crust of Central Florida society (and beyond; more than a handful of international socialites and celebrities have put in an appearance at her affairs) and successful at raising thousands and millions of dollars. Even this, however, should not endear her to you; for her "expenses" in throwing these parties often results in the charity receiving only pennies of each dollar raised; moreover, Morgana is a hypocrite, who privately insults and badmouths the very people her parties are supposed to benefit. She also spares no kindness at all to anyone in the service industry. The caterers, servers, and other personnel she hires for her parties are treated as little better than slaves. Indeed it is a joke among the high society types how her tyrannical demeanor towards service personnel contrasts with her "darling how nice to see you" attitude among her own peers. (And, of course, her lust for power over her fellow human beings makes her a willing accomplice to Tiger's Paw and "The Cause".)
It's also observed (with more than a few arched eyebrows) that Morgana brings a steady procession of young, handsome hunks to her bed, only to discard them when they start to bore her.
But to the public at large (including Satin Steele who at this time knows nothing of her involvement with Tiger's Paw), Morgana is the flashy, brassy redhead who rules the glitterati of Central Florida's social scene.
As shown in issue #1, Morgana's service to Tiger's Paw includes wielding her considerable influence with politicians and businessmen to worm out pieces of sensitive information that Tiger's Paw can then exploit; and (VERY occasionally) disguise herself as Tiger's Paw and act as "The Supreme One's" mouthpiece.
To Satin, Morgana deVries is little more than a name in the society column in the newspaper; Satin isn't aware of having ever met Morgana (Morgana being in disguise the few times they've confronted each other), and indeed Satin would probably consider it an honor to meet Morgana. Morgana, on the other hand, hates Satin Steele almost as fanatically as her mistress Tiger's Paw does. Were they to meet in a social setting, Morgana might well have to remind herself that Satin knows nothing of her involvement with Tiger's Paw and fight down the urge to kill Satin herself on the spot.
...AND MORE ON THE WAY...
Future nemeses might include The Master Mind, Cy-Man, and the "Vampire Killer"...
©1998 David C. Matthews. Characters, events and institutions named in this document are entirely fictitious, and any similarity to any actual persons or institutions is entirely coincidental.
Born Matthew Charles Davison on January 17, 1966 in Richmond, Virginia; the only child of Grant and Diane (Boland) Davison. At the age of 10, he and his mother moved to Orlando to stay with relatives after the death of his father.
A former NYPD detective who, a few years ago, became increasingly frustrated at New York's rising crime rate and the seeming ineffectiveness of himself and his fellow cops at stemming the tide.
The first and foremost of Satin Steele's adversaries, the most evil and dangerous. Tiger's Paw is to Satin what The Joker is to Batman, Lex Luthor to Superman, Professor Moriarty to Sherlock Holmes.