Yo, Brooklyn — I got yer superhero right here!
The County of Kings is, at long last, getting a crimefighter to call its own — Captain Brooklyn.
The uncaped crusader — “He’s not a cape-and-tights kind of guy. No cute little booties,” said series co-writer Frank Tieri — will make his debut in Image Comics’ “Captain Brooklyn” this spring.
Cap, whose secret identity is a not-so-mild-mannered Vinny the garbageman from Bay Ridge, gets his powers the really hard way.
“He winds up in the Gowanus Canal,” Tieri said. “You wind up in the Gowanus, either you end up with a terminal disease or superpowers. In Vinny’s case, he winds up with superpowers.
“Brooklyn being Brooklyn, things get crazy,” he said
The tongue-in-cheek series is the brainchild of comic-book vets — and Brooklyn natives — Tieri and Jimmy Palmiotti, and Palmiotti’s wife, former “Supergirl” artist Amanda Conner.
Palmiotti, who’s currently writing DC Comics’ “All-Star Western,” said the series is “very over the top” and aimed “at the 18-and-over crowd.”
Tieri and Palmiotti would reveal only one of Vinny’s powers — super strength. “The problem with super strength is if you have it, how do you gauge how strong you really are? What happens when you go to grab a gun from a bad guy? There’s a chance the arm might come off,” Palmiotti said.
“The power is more of a curse than a blessing,” Tieri said. “Vinny’s a good guy, and he means well, but every decision he makes is the wrong one.”
Tieri, a former “Iron Man” writer who also worked on the upcoming “Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3” video game, said he, Palmiotti and Conner came up with the idea for the hard-luck hero while drinking in a bar.
“It’s a love letter to Brooklyn. It’s the second main star of the book,” Tieri said.
All of the action in the three-issue limited series is confined to the borough, with stops in several different neighborhoods.
“We got in as many as we could,” Tieri said.
If the comic is a hit, Captain Brooklyn may return and check out the rest of the city, Tieri said.
“Maybe he’ll kick the crap out of Captain Staten Island. I’d hate to see what that would look like, Captain Staten Island.”