May 3, 2022 • 49 mins
Tensions are brewing in the Rain City Superhero Movement. After a disastrous patrol, things boil over. David picks through the rumors, betrayals and grudges, to figure out who’s to blame for the breakup of Seattle’s super-squad.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Novel. In the aftermath of Phoenix's arrest, there was a
lot of local news coverage of the pepper spray incident.
The same real life superheroes we introduced you to in
November are now stirring up trouble for Seattle police. Are
they superheroes or a super problem? People in Seattle started
(00:28):
to question Phoenix's methods. Was he really out there fighting
crime or was he just wandering around at two am
with a can of pepper spray looking to break up
bar fights. Among the many Seattleites watching Phoenix's troubles unfold
was a mysterious figure lurking in the shadows. Eventually he
(00:49):
would emerge from the darkness, but for now, he was
watching the coverage from his secret layer. You gotta have
a villain, can't be a hero without a On the
rain City superheroes had their detractors, but a single voice
rose above the rest. A new enemy was about to surface.
(01:10):
Hello and welcome Rex Velvet. Seattle's greatest real life supervillain
was born. Though he looked more like a character you
might find on a bottle of mustache wax than a
super villain. He wore dapper outfits like velvet waistcoats and
shiny suits, sometimes with a bow tie. He had an
(01:32):
eye patch, a cartoonish mustache, and a flair for the dramatic.
My Dean Citty, I can recall a time when I
could leave this layer and conduct my duties proudly and
without distraction. But now he's out there while with this
(01:52):
silly gang of mismit power ranges, disturbing the peace. He
called himself the people's villain, and he vowed not to
rest until he destroyed the famous Phoenix Jones. It's time
to get real, Jones. The community would be better off
without you. You're doing more harm than good, and I'm
willing to bet that a sensible, sane majority would agree
(02:13):
with me. You're a nuisance, a snitch shake. He must
be stopped once and for all. Bollocks. Rex Velvet burst
onto the scene in two thousand and twelve. He made
(02:33):
his entrance into the world in slick, high production videos
that he shot and released online. If this grand battle
was to be judged on the quality of the videos
they posted, Rex would have been the clear winner. His
videos mocking Phoenix and his team started attracting hundreds of
thousands of views, these days. Like Phoenix, Rex Velvet doesn't
(02:55):
have a secret identity. He posted his videos under his
real name, Ryan Corey. He's the social villain. He's the
culmination of all those old comic book villains that are
part campy, part comically cowardly. You know, if Batman and
Robin were to show up, the Riddler would just laugh
(03:15):
and run away. In his civilian life, Rex is a
video producer. He'd been watching the rain City superheroes growing
popularity and increasingly frequent TV appearances, but he was skeptical
about them, especially after Phoenix's pepper spraying controversy. He had
the idea of coming up with a character to call
(03:37):
out what he saw as hypocrisy and to hold Phoenix
to account, to make people think about, Okay, well, is
this really serving the community or is this serving an individual.
Unlike Phoenix, Rex saw his supervillain identity as a make
belief character. It was kind of like playing WWF bad
guy wrestler. This is a soap opera where Phoenix has
(04:00):
told me many times he's not playing a game. And
that's not the only thing that Rex and Phoenix don't
see eye to eye on. Rex said he tried to
reach out to Phoenix several times. When a friend of
his approached Phoenix in the gym on his behalf, Phoenix
seemed annoyed and flat out refused to speak to Rex.
I thought back then, oh, maybe we can do some
(04:20):
fundraising work. Maybe we can work with some nonprofits. Rex
told me he'd done some work as a super villain
for to make a Wish Foundation. When you're being involved
at levels like that, you think, huh, why wouldn't this
guy want to also be involved in charity work. Rex
wasn't convinced by Phoenix's approach. I believe you want to
lead a good life, and you see this as your
(04:43):
maybe method for helping. I just wonder about the tact
in which he's executing the vision and is it effective,
is it getting the results you want? And is it
serving the community or is it playing dress up? I
can see why Rex would have rubbed Phoenix the wrong
way with his over the top comedy villain persona. As
(05:06):
you know by now, Phoenix doesn't think there's anything funny
about crime fighting. I also wonder if maybe it was
an ego thing as well. The Phoenix didn't want to
share the spotlight. But when I asked Phoenix about it.
He said he had other reasons for his hatred of Rex.
His whole thing was like, oh, I thought it would
be fun to like play up our rivalry and use
(05:26):
it as a way to raise money for charity. Basically,
that's not what he wanted to do. He went to
vodka he called me trying to get me to get
on T shirts to sell vodka and make money, and
he was talking about shopping the profits and going on
fucking tour. What a fucking liar. You wanted to sell
T shirts go on a fake crime fighting tour and
fight each other in the city with fake fights and
sell tickets and T shirts. That's what that do want
(05:47):
to do? That he is a liar. After hearing Phoenix
talk openly about lying to the media to promote his
own cause, it was curious to hear him get so
fired up about truth telling. To strike back at Rex,
Phoenix says he concocted a dastardly plan of his own.
I copyrighted the name Rex Velvet and took the copyright
(06:08):
leagal ownership of it and then told him to season desist.
Really yeah him. Rex never mentioned this or the alleged
vodka deals when we spoke, but when we put it
to him afterwards, he replied, I'll say this, none of
that information is true. This is the first time I've
ever heard of it. Rex also said he never met
(06:28):
Phoenix and that all his attempts to reach out to
him so they could quote meet as men and discuss
potential superhero collaborations had been unsuccessful. Just f y I.
If you search the U S Copyright Office database, the
only copyright filings for Rex Velvet are three videos and
a logo, all registered to Ryan Corey, not Phoenix Jones
(06:52):
or his alter ego Ben Photo. If you believe Phoenix's
side of the story, Rex Velvet as an opportunist who
tried to make a buck or maybe just promote his
work as a video producer. According to Rex, Phoenix is
stuck up and delusional, taking himself way too seriously. But
as Phoenix himself told me, history is written by the winners,
(07:15):
and either way, it wasn't long before Rex Velvet was
sucked into the world of Phoenix Jones and his team.
People started coming to Rex with allegations about Phoenix as
if he were a real villain in search of dirt
on Seattle's own hero. The magnet of Rex Velvet was
drawing people in that really wanted to destroy, and you
(07:36):
get threats aims not at you, but at the hero
people would play informant on the Internet. I don't think
he understands how far I've gone to make sure that
people aren't attacking the guy. I don't want to see
this guy hurt. I don't want to see the city attacked.
And I go, whoa, whoa, whoa, not signing up for that. No,
(07:56):
thank you. I'm gonna put a pause on this. They
weren't all just random internet trolls either. Some of the
people coming with stories about Phoenix and about Ben Fodor
seemed like they were close to him. I'm like, wow,
like you call yourself Ben's friends, Like you're kind of
talking smack about your your boy here behind us back.
(08:17):
It's funny. It's as if everyone that joined his cause
doesn't like him, and the only person left who really
is more than ever interested in liking him is me.
And the most sinister thing that Rex could say is well, well,
(08:37):
well no more, friends, guess you're stuck with me. In
Seattle in two thousand and twelve, the line between heroes
and villains looked thinner than ever. Fresh from the trauma
of the Nicole Westbrook shooting, Phoenix was going rogue out
(09:00):
on patrols. Meanwhile, his fellow superheroes were dishing dirt to
his arch enemy, and soon the world of the Rain
City Superheroes would descend into costumed chaos. I'm David Weinberg
and from the Team's at novel and I heart Radio.
This is the Superhero Complex, Episode six, Kryptonite. By early
(09:41):
two thousand and twelve, Phoenix was struggling. He had clashed
with the authorities over the Pepper Sprayer arrest, He'd lost
the job he loved working with artistic kids, and he
was also having to spend a lot of his time
trying to prove to the state that he wasn't insane.
A lot of his personal life it often be in shambles.
(10:02):
His words, actually, that's Evocatus Phoenix is former right hand
man an unofficial chauffeur. He says that it was obvious
that Phoenix was having money problems. I knew things weren't
going well because he would always be sniffing around for money,
or one time he came up this idea. And this
was one of the many nights I was giving him
(10:22):
a ride. There's a long avenue full of bars and
clubs way north of Seattle, up in the U District.
He pitched this idea to me. Alright, but what do
you think of this? So all these bars, all these clubs.
What if I talked to the owners and say, we
can watch and pay special attention to your club, stand
out front of your club. You know, we'll end up
(10:44):
a contract. It'll be all over formal, you know, if
you give us, you know, say a hundred dollars a
week or something, or you know, we'll write it to
the team. You know, I'll manage the funds of course.
And uh, I'm like, dude, this is the mafia. This
is what a mafia does. Your offering air quotes protection
from businesses who paid. What are you hearing yourself? This
(11:06):
is the worst idea and the long sad history of
bad ideas. You can't be seriously, Oh oh yeah, that's
that strike. I guess I didn't think about that, but
he would end up actually doing exactly this. I think
maybe two out of over a dozen businesses you know
give I think one gave him like forty bucks, and
he did with one of them, and you know, he
(11:26):
would like get a bunch of selfies and like he
would kind of be like almost like an Instagram influencer
of that, like, hey, come on down to whatever the
name of the bar was. And money was a big
thing for him, and that would also affect his mood
pretty significantly. Evo had a theory about what was driving
Phoenix's fixation on money. He sent me text messages or
(11:48):
he would show me pictures of Hey, is what I
was at last night. It would be a picture of
him both arms holding kind of like a hug pose
of a giant stack of poker chips, and like you
could tell now this was legit at a casino, and
it's like, oh man, I should quit my job and
just do this full time and and be living a
(12:09):
high life. And the very next patrol everybody. I know,
it's only the tenth of the month, but if everyone
can have their dues for next month paid, that would
be great, thank you. I mean, like that would happen
all the time. So in my particular case, you just
flat out admit that, you know, I love gambling, and
he's incredibly smart, and you know, probably borders on like
(12:31):
card reading levels of genius there. But gambling is gambling too,
and that comes with its own dangers. Other members of
the rain City Superheroes told me similar stories. Here's Midnight Jack.
I think that he was really trying to be a
good dude in the beginning. He was focusing all his
energy into this superhero stuff, and over time he's kind
(12:54):
of got beaten down started gambling. I mean, the man
is just not in a good place. I asked Phoenix
about all of this, and he flatly denied it. You
who also said that you had a gambling problem? Is
that true? No, that's weird, Like what kind of gamling
from you were really into gambling, and that he worried
(13:16):
that some of the money that had been going to
stuff got gambled away, and that you would send him
photos of you at like a poker table and things
like that. That's all true, absolutely, Okay, now I know
he's talking about absolutely yet. So I played a ship
ton of poker, but it would have been a hard
to have a gambling problem doing that. Phoenix told me
he played tournament poker, where you just pay a flat
fee of fifty dollars to buy into the competition. So
(13:38):
I play a tournament every Friday, And I said, my
friends pictures of me with like thirty thousand ships. So
they're seeing these poker tip things and they're thinking I'm
making mad cash. But that's not how it works. Do
you play poker at all? Not really, I've been I
went through a poker phase when it was popular, so
you understand when you bind too a tournament, the chips
in front of you are not representative of money. This
seems like a reasonable explanation to me, and for what
it's worth, I believe Phoenix, but I do think it
(14:01):
seems credible that he might have had some financial difficulties
after his arrest. And as for charging nightclubs money to
protect them, Phoenix says that is one accurate sort of Yeah.
I definitely suggested that, but but not in the mob
shakedown way. I don't see. I just feel like he
was saying, like it's a murky line to be like
some of you get extra productions and some of you
(14:21):
we're gonna let go. I don't think it's an extra line. Like,
for example, we had sixteen shootings take place outside of
one nightclub, and they're like, we love when you're out here.
Fuck you, bro, if you want me to come and
stand out front of your club, you're gonna give me
a some money for that. Like, that's stupid. We're supposed
to be helping random real crime. This is crime. It
takes place because of your establishment. So if you want
me to stand outside your stabution so you can use
Phoenix Jones to pimp that, everybody's okay, you're gonna at
(14:42):
least paying me money for that. I don't even consider
that a bad thing. Yeah, but I definitely said it,
and I shared it with the team because you're supposed to.
And then the money never happened, so we didn't do it.
We just did regular as patrols. I could go on
and on letting Phoenix respond to the many wrongs that
his former teammates accused him of, and in fact, I
(15:05):
spent a lot of my time with Phoenix doing just that.
There are moments when Phoenix did admit to some of
those wrongs. Other times, like with the quote unquote protection money,
it just seemed to be a difference of opinion on
the morality of what happened. But at the end of
the day, Phoenix says that all of these disputes with
his former crime fighting friends are issues of the past,
(15:28):
and rehashing them is a waste of time. These guys
are so petty and stupid. There was just so many
more important things. I mean, even if everything they assumed
was right and everything they told you was right, Let's
say I had a crazy gambling problem. Let's just say
these things right. None of them change any of the
patrolling or effects we did zero, So why are you
still talking about that? I do think that Phoenix is
(15:53):
wrong on this point. Phoenix's teammates all felt that his
erratic behavior and failure to communicate did in fact have
an impact on their ability to fight crime, which makes
total sense. Phoenix was always the leader of the rain
City Superheroes, and a group is only as effective as
its leadership. And if Phoenix is going to take credit
(16:16):
for all his team's success, shouldn't he also take responsibility
for some of their failures. But then to do that
would mean that Phoenix would have to admit that he
is not perfect at crime fighting, and he won't. Over time,
the tension between Phoenix and his teammates built up, until finally,
(16:38):
one day, it all came to a head on a
disastrous patrol that would tear the team apart. That's coming up.
(17:01):
In late April of two thousand and twelve, the rain
City Superheroes were preparing for their biggest patrol of the year,
but according to Evocatus, Phoenix had become an absent leader.
We patrol and we we're from three to five nights
a week, and we would get wildly different results kind
of based on the day he said, or you know,
if he was hurting for money, or if he was
(17:23):
having relationship problems or something. That would always be kind
of something going on, and we never quite knew what
we would get. Anytime you didn't want to be answered
to anyone or didn't want to be accountable for anything,
he would just shot off. He would get real angry
and real pouty, call everyone traders, and would disappear. Everything
came to a head on May Day, two thousand and twelve.
(17:47):
May Day has always been a big day in Seattle.
Thousands of people take to the streets to march for
labor rights. There are protests all over the city. I
asked Phoenix if he thought that day was a turning
point for the team. You mean, clowns got caught as clowns,
and then eventually you have to ask yourself why you
didn't show up. I don't think that's a turning point.
(18:08):
I think you were bitches before and that showed it.
Phoenix and the rain City superheroes often showed up on
May Day to keep watch over the crowds and to
help keep the peace if things went awry, which is
exactly what happened in two thousand and twelve. El Caballero
was right there in the thick of it. There's always
(18:30):
two big protests in Seattle. The first one was the
labor unions and the Native rights and stuff, and that
was always peaceful, and there was another element that would
show up, well, I guess they call them black block
They would go out and look like hooding ninjas and
go and break windows and spray paint. And I think
we all agree that there's a lot of corporations and
(18:52):
entities that are ripping people off and taking money and
don't really care. But there's ways to go about things,
and these people are just terrorists, terrorizing people, terrorizing things
and scaring the Bejesus said, folks. The Rain City Heroes
didn't go blindly into these situations, They came prepared and
(19:13):
that year it was Eva who made detailed plans for
the May Day patrols. There's an awful lot of like
logistical planning that would go into something like this because
we have people. That was literally a contribution to the
team was to do a lot of research ahead of time.
How do we safely patrol? How do we access vehicles
if we need to get out of there? How do
we get first ato somebody if we need when roads
(19:35):
are closed. According to Evo, Phoenix had decided on his
own unusual strategy for monitoring the crowds the night before
May Day had happened. Phoenix said, tell you forget all that.
Here's what we're gonna do. I gotta buddy of mine.
He works at the front desk at this hotel, and
he's gonna let us go in and using one of
his hotel rooms. We're gonna turn on the TV. We're
(19:56):
gonna party in a music and we're just gonna be
watching all the local news stations. And when some fight
breaks out on TV, we'll put on a gear and
we'll run out the door and don't save the day.
The entire rest of us are just kind of sitting
around blinking, just what what on earth? No, I mean
by the time we'd see it on TV, I mean,
it's obviously will long have passed. Well, what about all
(20:19):
the research we did and all the intel work ahead
of time and the Index didn't want anything to do
with it. The next morning, when a disgruntled set of
rain seedy heroes gathered in a parking garage to start
the patrol, Phoenix turned up empty handed. He was really
really upset because his buddy or something was sick that
day or he couldn't make it, and basically we didn't
(20:42):
have a hotel room with our name on it, so
it's kind of like, well, okay, we're just gonna walk.
Then they followed the crowds through Seattle and began the patrol.
People of all ages had come to protest with painted
faces and colorful signs, bearing irreverent slogans, But even in
this eclectic crowd, the superhero stood out with their costumes
and shiny masks. They jostled through the pack streets. Ebo
(21:05):
says Phoenix wasn't sticking to the plan or communicating to
the team. He wouldn't listen to anyone on the team
you had people that were professionally trained medics and e
M t s. He had former military that was me
and uh, you know, we'd have a couple of the
former veterans from time to time on the team with
actual boots on the ground combat experience. He wouldn't listen
(21:28):
to the inputs anytime. He didn't want to be answered
to anyone, or he didn't want to be accountable for anything.
He would just shot off. Around twelve thirty, the protests
started to escalate. Explosions and pepper spray in downtown Seat
may Day breaks down to Mayhem in Seattle. Demonstrations turned violent.
(21:48):
There's thousands of people clogged downtown streets. A group of
about seventy five anarchists entered the fray. They streamed into
the downtown area and mixed in with the crowds marching
towards Westlake Park. They were dressed all in black, and
many of them were wielding bats and hammers as they
snaked through the protest, hurling rocks and shattering the windows
(22:11):
of shops and banks. Police officers in riot gear clashed
with the crowds. If we are disappointed in the police,
people launched flares and smoke bombs into the air. Paint
bombs and blood red and fluorescent green streaked the pavements
and buildings. The downtown streets, normally packed with tourists, were
(22:33):
filled with the smell of smoke and pepper spray. At
the epicenter of the chaos was the old Federal Courthouse.
Here's midnight Jack. This big, huge standoff ensues at the
Federal courthouse where they're throwing improvised explosives into The building
is occupied with people that worked there. A roving group
(22:55):
of the protesters had gathered outside the courthouse. They smashed
in the glass doors and windows with flagpoles and bats.
Someone tried to fire a smoke bomb into the building,
but it bounced off and burst into flames. Phoenix told
me that's where he wanted to be, in the heart
of the action. There was twelve of us. Right we
(23:15):
get word that they're gonna put a bomb in the
Federal building and blow it up. I don't I put
out the radio call that I need my team to
show up. I need to got the family right now.
We gotta get it together. Club about people, Oh yeah,
I got with Guess who shows up? El Caballero with Jack.
That's it, so Cavy, Jack and Phoenix assembled at the courthouse.
(23:41):
I'm looking out and see like sixty people in front
of us. They're throwing stuff. Ses heros held off a
group of sixty protest It's been I'm destroying a federal building.
I'm like, where's my team at? You know, were you
at Ebo? Oh, I'm in the military. I'm big. I'm
(24:01):
gonna go fight some crime. You're not gonna fight sixty
iron clad terrorists, are you. You're just gonna make me
look like the clown I'm standing in front of the building.
I got Midnight Jack, the least trained of us all,
never been in a fight with batons that don't know
how to use. Got El Caballero in hot pants, girls
hot pants dragging on the back of his shirt, a
luchador mask, and a sombrero that served no prayers but
(24:24):
to offend Mexican people, and short it was a highly
costumed shit show. We're trying to fucking stop them from
storming the building and throwing explosives and firebombs. It's just
me in front of that door, cleaning Mike Tyson punch
out with the dudes who come up while Midnight Jack
just douses everything you can see with pepper spray while screaming,
and El Caballeros on the phone with I didn't have anything.
(24:47):
I was just moving my arms and holding people back,
and people were like, oh, that one guy. Pepper sprayed people.
Pepper sprayed people. I sprayed probably sixty people that day.
I don't regret any of it. If you stepped up,
asked a certain point, I sprayed you. You threw something
at me, I sprayed you. You try to hit me
with something, I sprayed you. Go look through the world.
(25:09):
It might sound exciting, but El Cavallero was really not
a fan of the situation that Phoenix had put him in.
There's this romanticized Hollywood version of fighting criminals, and any
battle I've ever been in is ugly. It feels awkward,
it sucks, it's lame. That whole moment in space time
(25:31):
is frustrating, lame, and annoying. It's not sexy, it's not cool.
It's not a fucking thing that's awesome. It's lame. And
the violence, the hatred, the anger, It's like, where are
these people coming from? Why are you trying to hurt
other people? Why are you doing these negative things. It's
like and then to know that people's lives are in
(25:54):
danger at the same time. It's not like a cookie
cutter movie. It's like real life, intense stuff. By three PM,
(26:15):
the Mayor of Seattle had signed a proclamation of civil emergency,
and just before seven PM, a rainstorm hit the city,
causing the crowds to finally dissipate. An independent report commissioned
(26:38):
by the Seattle Police into the May Day riots singled
out the Rain City superheroes and said their involvement resulted
in allegations of assaults and crimes. The report recommended that
next year, the Seattle Police Department should collaborate with the
City Attorney's office to determine legal strategies to restrict superheroes
(26:58):
from creating time and interfering with law enforcement operations. Phoenix
took to social media to complain, this is crazy and
I am super mad. We see crime, we call police,
and we stop people from getting hurt. That's not against
the law. What you're saying is you don't like us,
you don't like that work different, and because we're different
(27:21):
from you, you're gonna make these rules and try to
shut us down. He even called out the author of
the report by name Michael Hillman. I hope your kids
don't have Batman posters or anything in their house because
you're a superhero hater. When we hung out, Phoenix claimed
that Homeland Security and the FBI actually thanked him for intervening.
Homeland Security comes up to us with these shotguns at
(27:43):
the end, and I'm thinking, so I get on the
ground and you're like, what are you doing? Like we
means like, Jones, get up, You're fine. I was like, okay.
They gave over, They shook her hand, and they brought
us to this like a suv. There was this guy
in of like the leader of our regional branch of
the FBI. Phoenix told me that the FBI agent asked
him for help and identifying violent protesters from the courthouse,
(28:06):
and that he said, quote Jones, I like your work.
He was like, I'm gonna tell the Seattle please to
leave you alone. But you sunk up. You sunk up.
He's like, you don't think you have superpowers. It's like, no,
I don't want superpowers. He's like okay, And that was
the beginning of our relationship. I wasn't able to confirm
any of this. When we asked the FBI about it,
(28:29):
they said, quote, we will not be able to provide
any information on this inquiry. The FBI has conversations with
individuals for a variety of reasons on a daily basis,
whether they are a witness, victim, subject, or someone providing information.
We cannot verify whether the FBI spoke to a particular individual,
(28:50):
but if this was supposedly the beginning of Phoenix's budding
relationship with the FBI, it was also one of the
final chapters of the Rain City Superheroes. When asked about
Phoenix's view that his team had hung him out to
dry that day, Eva was having none of it. It's
the ultimate irony to hear that he didn't feel backed
up or in reality, he was just doing whatever came
(29:13):
across his head at the moments. That's what he would say.
It's like, well, I just felt, you know, abandoned, or
you know, you guys betrayed me, or you know, I
just didn't feel like you know, you guys, you guys
just wanted to get up on me, or no one
wanted to follow my expertise. No, dude, you just stopped
showing and it would be so wildly unpredictable and sporadic,
(29:34):
nobody could trust him or rely on him, or have
any idea what version of Phoenix for getting any particular
night if you would show So that's a long winded
way of saying that's rich coming from him. Whatever the
truth is, the way Phoenix told it. May Day was
the final straw. That's when I stopped caring. I'll go, fuck,
(29:55):
they don't care. That just didn't feel different between everyone
after that. I mean, I guess there's no feeling because
you guys matter. You did not show up. You left
me in front of a fucking riot. Who cares what
they fucking think? Fuck that I wrote with you guys, untrained,
out of shape and ridiculous outfits, acting clowns every single
day when I'm a professional warrior and you can't show
up one time when I have sixty people trying to
(30:17):
murder me with a bomb. Evening arrived on Mayday and
the dust began to settle across Seattle. The police cars
filled with the protesters who've been arrested made their convoy
to the county jail. The swap police headed home, and
the last stragglers from the march dispersed. Shop owners boarded
(30:37):
up the jagged holes in their windows, and the debris
on the streets was swept away, But there's no cleaning
up the mess that the rain City Superheroes were in.
That's coming up. When you talk to Phoenix, he makes
(31:01):
it sound like he stopped trusting his teammates after the
May Day debacle. He claims he decided to go it
alone after that, But actually that's not how things went down,
because after the May Day protests, Phoenix continued to patrol
with some of the rain City superheroes for over a year.
And that, dear listener, that's how we get to what
(31:21):
is maybe the most fitting way I can think of
for a team of comic book inspired costume warriors to dissolve,
not in a blaze of crime fighting glory, but in
a petty dispute over a piece of clothing, a controversy
that has come to be known as helmet Gate. How
(31:42):
did your relationship with the rains City Here's end or
what caused you to leave the life that was all
about my purple helmet. This was news to me kind
of because I had heard the story of the falling
out between El Caballero and Phoenix long before I met
either of them. But the story that I found on blogs,
(32:03):
long lost Facebook pages, and podcasts was that they went
from best friends to despised enemies because Phoenix had stolen
El Kaballero's sombrero. Apparently, no one fact checked any of
those accounts, because while it is true that these two
grown men did in fact have a falling out over
(32:24):
a piece of headwear, it was not a sombrero, but
a purple army helmet, a mitch helmet, a nice tactical
bulletproof helmet with the padding inside so I wouldn't get
scrambled brains. It all started on a typical downtown patrol
one night and two thousand and thirteen, after the patrol
(32:45):
ended Caddy forgot his helmet, I left it in Phoenix
Jones's car for an evening. It was another night where
we had fought real criminals and done real stuff, and
I just, act said, minorly left it in his vehicle.
Evil remembers the saga of the purple helmet. Well, he says,
at first, the helmet just went missing. No one could
(33:07):
find his helmet, and it was the most aggravating series
of I guess backwards drama that honestly started getting pretty embarrassing.
I would start losing sleep over stuff like this, where
people would call me because I was a guy that
kind of ran the team on the back end. Evil
claims that Phoenix accused his girlfriend Purple Rain of stealing
(33:30):
the helmet that dr hearns, like, what are you talking about?
Why on earth would I want l caberleiro stinky helmet?
That's gross? For whatever reason, we think he just gave
it to, you know, a pretty young fan or something
like that. It all sounds so petty to me, But
for Cabby it was no joke. It really struck a
(33:52):
chord with me. This guy who I trust with my life.
I mean, we're literally dodging bullets and knives and crazy terrorists.
This guy trusted in my life made my helmet disappear
and it got it weird? Why did it get weird? Like,
I don't know. For what it's worth, Phoenix has a
response to the purple helmet story. He says it was
(34:14):
in his car, which got towed and impounded, and that
he was too embarrassed to admit this to his crew.
Helmet gate wasn't the first time things had allegedly gone
missing around Phoenix, Crystal Marks told me that Phoenix couldn't
be trusted when it came to money. He was charging
(34:35):
people like money per month for medical insurance that the
team's never saw the benefit for. He would say, yeah,
I'll buy you a tactical vest, give me money, and
then he would never provide the vest. Evo said he
personally had to reimburse team members. He sent me a
photo of a receipt he kept for a vest he
paid for out of his own pocket to give to
a fellow superhero. Soon these disputes spilled out onto the
(34:58):
Rain City Superheroes social media accounts. P J has been
proven to be consistently dishonest, unreliable, and untrustworthy. He's a
liar and a bump. You shouldn't be asking people for
money or playing to the media the way he does
here is replaceable. Friendship, loyalty, and trust are not the
theft allegations and the mud slinging escalated. Phoenix held a
fundraiser for Purple Rains anti domestic violence campaign. Someone accused
(35:21):
them of embezzling funds, and things got nasty. If you
want to show how honest. This campaign is usink. Slanderous
language is illegal. Some people don't deserve to have any
secret identities. Never understood by that cow was not on patrol.
She does not have any athletic ability or street skill.
She flirted with all the guys on the team and
wanted to be the center of attention. I refused to
involve myself in this textual spewit and ask that my
(35:43):
name we kept out of these theatrics. Hi strong and
suggest you research the term harassment and take a good
hard look in the mirror. The accusation of embezzlement turned
out to be false. The Seattle Weekly did a piece
about it. The charity confirmed that they had received the money.
Phoenix was vindicated, but then he launched another fundraiser for himself.
(36:05):
This time he wanted to raise ten thousand dollars for
a new supersuit. The campaign offered incentives for donations. For
the entry level ten dollars, you could get a rubber
Phoenix Jones bracelet. It went all the way up to
two thousand dollars or more. For that you were promised
the whole pile of Phoenix merch of Phoenix Jones replica
helmet build as fits most normal sized heads, is bullet
(36:29):
and blunt trauma resistant, plus the honor of having your
name engraved on phoenix brand new suit. He posted the
link for donations on Purple Rains Anti Domestic violence website.
It even caught the eye of actor Rain Wilson, who
plays Dwight in the Office. He posted about it on Facebook.
Given her previous experiences with Phoenix, Crystal Marks was not impressed.
(36:51):
I think Phoenix Jones is a liar. I mean, come
at me for whatever you need to for saying it.
But raising money for his supersuit, which so ridiculous to
say those words out loud. But like this high end,
like tactical suit that was like super bullet proof and
like stab proof. He did to go fund me for it?
Tons of money. Where's the suit, dude? Like it never happened.
(37:13):
The tide of public opinion looked to be turning on Phoenix.
More allegations against him started surfacing. A superhero named Urban
Avenger called Phoenix an ego centric glory hound, and a
blog post titled Phoenix Jones sells snake oil calls it
a supersuit. The Seattle Weekly ran a piece called the
(37:36):
Emperor's new suit, with a cartoon of Phoenix straining to
pull his rubber supersuit on over his bloated belly, which
is labeled Hubris. One of the rain City superheroes took
to Facebook to claim that Phoenix had stolen his go
pro to boot. Then The Seattle Weekly published another story
that quoted a superhero saying Phoenix Jones is a con artist, thief,
(37:59):
steve link from his closest friends and fans, with zero
integrity for his community. El Caballero went to the press too,
telling the Seattle Weekly quote, I've always thought of Phoenix
as our quarterback, but I feel betrayed by his actions
and certain trusts have been broken. Soon after that, Cabby
(38:20):
formally announced his departure from the rain Ceaity Heroes. On
his Facebook page. He said quote effective immediately attention family
and friends, fans, law enforcement, and even my entities. I
will no longer I said that part louder because it
was in all caps. I will no longer be working
(38:41):
with Phoenix Jones. After three years of patrols, I see
loyalty is worth nothing to him. I feel betrayed by
a man I called my brother and that hurts his dishonesty, manipulation,
and Deceit has caused me to not want to be
associated with someone I can't trust. I will continue to
(39:01):
wear my mask and patrol the streets of Seattle, but
will henceforth not be aligned with him or the rain
City Superhero Movement. I respect the team members individually. The
Phoenix has nose dived into the flames, and I'm done
with him. After El Caballero's departure, Morale also took a
(39:27):
nose dive. Phoenix's girlfriend, Prebble Rain, announced that she was
officially leaving the team too, and that she and Phoenix
were no longer together. Discontent was brewing in what remained
of the rain City Superhero movement. Even said everyone came
to him with their grievances. They wanted to know what
had really gone down between Cabby and Phoenix. Everyone was
(39:48):
very much on edge, and every person on the team
stop me if this sounds familiar, had heard a different
version of this same story, and we had all been
talking about and realized that, Okay, someone has fallen. Shipp
called the denominator. Here is Phoenix Jones. The superheroes gathered
for a crisis meeting. Their plan was to challenge Phoenix
on everything that had been going down and to hold
(40:09):
him accountable. So we get to this meeting just kind
of like, Okay, here's what we're gonna do with forward
and stuff like that, and here's what actually happened, and
here's how's al it. You want nothing of the sword?
He said, all right, well, all medical insurance stuff is
going to go through my friend Dave, so any questions
go through him, and we're gonna put schedules on a
new Facebook page, and uh, everything's fine going forward. Any questions,
(40:33):
all right, let's go on. I'm like, oh, hold up,
and then nothing has been answered? What this? What? We
have so many questions about what just happened. And you know,
if this happened to El Caberro, one of your most
trusted allies, and you're doing this stuff to him, like
what else are you gonna do. The more his teammates
challenged him, the more Phoenix dismissed their claims, and things
(40:54):
got heated. I almost threw a table out of mo
so mad they confronted their former leader, and Phoenix lost
his cool. He through the world's biggest internettangent, which I
still have screenshots of him talking about while you're all
betrayers and you're all traders, and I started a team
so I can end it. So the r C s
M is officially resolved. P J out and that was that.
(41:23):
Soon after the final blowout, Phoenix posted his resignation from
the rain City Superheroes on his Facebook page. It was
written in all caps and full of typos and grammatical errors.
Here's a condensed version. First off, I'm sorry. I started
fighting crime years ago and inspired a lot if people
to do the same. I really thought of having a
(41:45):
large group of civilian crime fighters was a good idea.
I was wrong. It takes a certain type of person
to do this job correctly, and unfortunately I have inspired,
worked with, and even taught some of the wrong kinds
of people. As of today, the rain City superhero movement
is over. I will be patrolling solo with supers I trust.
(42:08):
I will not go into many details, but I feel
you deserve a few reasons why we can no longer
work together. Certain members cannot run two point five miles
in thirty minutes, or do five pull ups or sit
ups in two minutes, or believe it is okay to
carry illegal weapons or want to patrol with other superheroes
(42:30):
that have a track record of making bad choices that
are potential dangerous. I love being a superhero, and I
believe there's a certain level of professionalism that goes with that.
When I or any member of the r C s
M show up to help you, I want you to
know that we have first Aid CPR training, we have
taking blood borne pathogens training, and that we will only
(42:52):
work with others who are equally physically and medically trained.
I'm sorry if I let anyone down. I will continue
to patrol and help people. I just can't, in good
conscience continue to put my seal of approval on people
I feel are not loyal or properly trained as always
(43:12):
be safe, make good choices, and I'll see you in
the streets. When we talked about the team breakup, Phoenix
said that people are fickle and driven by the attention,
and that no one on his team brought up these
disputes back in their crime fighting heyday. It was only
(43:34):
later after things went south with the team that he
says these grievances started surfacing. When we had these arguments
and disagreements that was pre people knowing my identity. After
my identity came out, we got all popular and everyone
was doing these interviews and everything was going on. So
all of us were all buddy, buddy, Fine. Then we
went and have these arguments later and they brought up
all this ship from past, saying when we never solved
(43:55):
all this and we stuck with you for four years
and you're this and you're that, And I'm thinking, if
you want to come with me, Slee, than fuck you.
Maybe I'm a sucker. But I always believed Phoenix whenever
I was with him, From the first moment I met him,
he told me that he would answer me honestly about
any accusation someone made against him. He also told me
there were other things that he'd done that were wrong,
(44:17):
but he would never admit them to me. I would
have to find out for myself, and if I did,
then he would answer truthfully about the incident. This policy
felt reasonable to me, and I took Phoenix at his word,
and I thought it was an indication that he was
willing to admit when he was wrong. I bought into
his logic because it seemed to make sense to me,
(44:38):
and I also agree with him that so much of
the beef between him and his crew always felt a
little petty, like who cares about what happened to a
purple helmet? Does it even matter in the grand scheme
of things. But looking back on it, I don't think
he lived up to his promise of answering everything truthfully.
(44:59):
A lot of it I think is tied up in
his desire to be the best at everything. I think
that desire was what made him a champion bowler an
mm A fighter, but I think it is also the
quality that made him an ineffective leader. It blinded him
to the possibility that he could be wrong, or that
someone in his group might have a better idea for
how to be good crime fighters. And I felt like
(45:21):
he was still blinded by it when he talked about
his former crew. I don't know how I associated with
these clouds for so long that, Like, that's the one
thing I am curious about. Like, on one hand, you
seemed because I carried them to stay and because I
carried them, I carried these motherfucker's. I carried them because
you were lonely or like well, because they believed in
what I believed in when no one else believed in it.
(45:42):
You always like to get up and get dressed every
day and put on a rubber suit and people laugh
at you in the streets like it fucking sucks. So
even if you're huge and fat, or you're out of
shape where you're former freaking drug out a homeless kid,
if you're gonna say, I believe in you too, let's
go walk together. I would rather do that with you.
People who believe in me, believe in the concept. If
it's about me letting them down, you let me down.
I gotta stab for you, out cavaler because you want
(46:03):
how to do a disarmed lydon said you want to
do knife fighting skills, You fucking don't, And I can stab,
like for real, I got fucking stabbed and you want
to talk about a helmet? Fuck you, Jack Jack. Jack
can't even run. He has asthma. He can't even run.
There's videos where I run into after bad guys and
(46:25):
he can't run, Like what the fuck? It's clear, but
there's genuine hurt and betrayal behind Phoenix's anger and also
on the side of the other Rain City superheroes. Just
because they wear goofy outfits doesn't mean they aren't people
(46:47):
with real feelings, and for all the bitterness, I think
the reason there's so much hurt involved in this highly
costumed severance is because all of them once bought into
the belief that Phoenix talks about the mission that had
united them. And maybe that's hard to understand from the outside,
but to enter into the world of real life superheroes,
(47:09):
you have to rethink certain beliefs about how the world works,
because the belief in their mission is to believe that
a guy in a sombrero and purple hot pants is
actually the man who might at any moment save your
life from a hammer wielding mugger lurking in an alleyway.
That's the thing I find so fascinating about all of this,
(47:30):
the mash up of the absurdity with the seriousness of
what these masked adventurers were trying to pull off. Their
dream was powerful, too powerful to be totally crushed by
a purple army helmet and some snarky Facebook comments. After all,
this wasn't the end for Phoenix Jones. After the breakup,
(47:52):
he would set out on a bid to conquer the
world in a different arena, and in a way, it
wasn't the end of the rain City Superhero movement. Either
the team may have disbanded, but the legend they built
together lived on and out of the darkness, a new
generation of superheroes would rise up to unite behind it.
(48:12):
That's coming up next time. The Superhero Complex is hosted
(48:37):
and written by Me David Weinberg and reported by me
Amalia Sortland and Caroline Thornhum. Production from Mamalia Sortland and
Caroline Thornhum, Sean Glenn, Max O'Brien and David Waters are
executive producers. Fact checking by Andrew Schwartz. Production management from
Sharie Houston, Frankie Taylor and Charlotte Wolf. Sound design, mixing
(48:59):
and scoring by Nicholas Alexander and Daniel Kempson. Music supervision
by Nicholas Alexander and David Waters. Original music is composed
by Paul Housden. Special thanks to Peter Tangan, Willard Boxton,
Matt o'mera, Katrina Norvelle Beth and Macaluso, Born Rosenbaum, Shelby
Snkman and all the team at U t A. For
(49:22):
more from novel, visit novel dot Audio
Novel. In the aftermath of Phoenix's arrest, there was a
lot of local news coverage of the pepper spray incident.
The same real life superheroes we introduced you to in
November are now stirring up trouble for Seattle police. Are
they superheroes or a super problem? People in Seattle started
(00:28):
to question Phoenix's methods. Was he really out there fighting
crime or was he just wandering around at two am
with a can of pepper spray looking to break up
bar fights. Among the many Seattleites watching Phoenix's troubles unfold
was a mysterious figure lurking in the shadows. Eventually he
(00:49):
would emerge from the darkness, but for now, he was
watching the coverage from his secret layer. You gotta have
a villain, can't be a hero without a On the
rain City superheroes had their detractors, but a single voice
rose above the rest. A new enemy was about to surface.
(01:10):
Hello and welcome Rex Velvet. Seattle's greatest real life supervillain
was born. Though he looked more like a character you
might find on a bottle of mustache wax than a
super villain. He wore dapper outfits like velvet waistcoats and
shiny suits, sometimes with a bow tie. He had an
(01:32):
eye patch, a cartoonish mustache, and a flair for the dramatic.
My Dean Citty, I can recall a time when I
could leave this layer and conduct my duties proudly and
without distraction. But now he's out there while with this
(01:52):
silly gang of mismit power ranges, disturbing the peace. He
called himself the people's villain, and he vowed not to
rest until he destroyed the famous Phoenix Jones. It's time
to get real, Jones. The community would be better off
without you. You're doing more harm than good, and I'm
willing to bet that a sensible, sane majority would agree
(02:13):
with me. You're a nuisance, a snitch shake. He must
be stopped once and for all. Bollocks. Rex Velvet burst
onto the scene in two thousand and twelve. He made
(02:33):
his entrance into the world in slick, high production videos
that he shot and released online. If this grand battle
was to be judged on the quality of the videos
they posted, Rex would have been the clear winner. His
videos mocking Phoenix and his team started attracting hundreds of
thousands of views, these days. Like Phoenix, Rex Velvet doesn't
(02:55):
have a secret identity. He posted his videos under his
real name, Ryan Corey. He's the social villain. He's the
culmination of all those old comic book villains that are
part campy, part comically cowardly. You know, if Batman and
Robin were to show up, the Riddler would just laugh
(03:15):
and run away. In his civilian life, Rex is a
video producer. He'd been watching the rain City superheroes growing
popularity and increasingly frequent TV appearances, but he was skeptical
about them, especially after Phoenix's pepper spraying controversy. He had
the idea of coming up with a character to call
(03:37):
out what he saw as hypocrisy and to hold Phoenix
to account, to make people think about, Okay, well, is
this really serving the community or is this serving an individual.
Unlike Phoenix, Rex saw his supervillain identity as a make
belief character. It was kind of like playing WWF bad
guy wrestler. This is a soap opera where Phoenix has
(04:00):
told me many times he's not playing a game. And
that's not the only thing that Rex and Phoenix don't
see eye to eye on. Rex said he tried to
reach out to Phoenix several times. When a friend of
his approached Phoenix in the gym on his behalf, Phoenix
seemed annoyed and flat out refused to speak to Rex.
I thought back then, oh, maybe we can do some
(04:20):
fundraising work. Maybe we can work with some nonprofits. Rex
told me he'd done some work as a super villain
for to make a Wish Foundation. When you're being involved
at levels like that, you think, huh, why wouldn't this
guy want to also be involved in charity work. Rex
wasn't convinced by Phoenix's approach. I believe you want to
lead a good life, and you see this as your
(04:43):
maybe method for helping. I just wonder about the tact
in which he's executing the vision and is it effective,
is it getting the results you want? And is it
serving the community or is it playing dress up? I
can see why Rex would have rubbed Phoenix the wrong
way with his over the top comedy villain persona. As
(05:06):
you know by now, Phoenix doesn't think there's anything funny
about crime fighting. I also wonder if maybe it was
an ego thing as well. The Phoenix didn't want to
share the spotlight. But when I asked Phoenix about it.
He said he had other reasons for his hatred of Rex.
His whole thing was like, oh, I thought it would
be fun to like play up our rivalry and use
(05:26):
it as a way to raise money for charity. Basically,
that's not what he wanted to do. He went to
vodka he called me trying to get me to get
on T shirts to sell vodka and make money, and
he was talking about shopping the profits and going on
fucking tour. What a fucking liar. You wanted to sell
T shirts go on a fake crime fighting tour and
fight each other in the city with fake fights and
sell tickets and T shirts. That's what that do want
(05:47):
to do? That he is a liar. After hearing Phoenix
talk openly about lying to the media to promote his
own cause, it was curious to hear him get so
fired up about truth telling. To strike back at Rex,
Phoenix says he concocted a dastardly plan of his own.
I copyrighted the name Rex Velvet and took the copyright
(06:08):
leagal ownership of it and then told him to season desist.
Really yeah him. Rex never mentioned this or the alleged
vodka deals when we spoke, but when we put it
to him afterwards, he replied, I'll say this, none of
that information is true. This is the first time I've
ever heard of it. Rex also said he never met
(06:28):
Phoenix and that all his attempts to reach out to
him so they could quote meet as men and discuss
potential superhero collaborations had been unsuccessful. Just f y I.
If you search the U S Copyright Office database, the
only copyright filings for Rex Velvet are three videos and
a logo, all registered to Ryan Corey, not Phoenix Jones
(06:52):
or his alter ego Ben Photo. If you believe Phoenix's
side of the story, Rex Velvet as an opportunist who
tried to make a buck or maybe just promote his
work as a video producer. According to Rex, Phoenix is
stuck up and delusional, taking himself way too seriously. But
as Phoenix himself told me, history is written by the winners,
(07:15):
and either way, it wasn't long before Rex Velvet was
sucked into the world of Phoenix Jones and his team.
People started coming to Rex with allegations about Phoenix as
if he were a real villain in search of dirt
on Seattle's own hero. The magnet of Rex Velvet was
drawing people in that really wanted to destroy, and you
(07:36):
get threats aims not at you, but at the hero
people would play informant on the Internet. I don't think
he understands how far I've gone to make sure that
people aren't attacking the guy. I don't want to see
this guy hurt. I don't want to see the city attacked.
And I go, whoa, whoa, whoa, not signing up for that. No,
(07:56):
thank you. I'm gonna put a pause on this. They
weren't all just random internet trolls either. Some of the
people coming with stories about Phoenix and about Ben Fodor
seemed like they were close to him. I'm like, wow,
like you call yourself Ben's friends, Like you're kind of
talking smack about your your boy here behind us back.
(08:17):
It's funny. It's as if everyone that joined his cause
doesn't like him, and the only person left who really
is more than ever interested in liking him is me.
And the most sinister thing that Rex could say is well, well,
(08:37):
well no more, friends, guess you're stuck with me. In
Seattle in two thousand and twelve, the line between heroes
and villains looked thinner than ever. Fresh from the trauma
of the Nicole Westbrook shooting, Phoenix was going rogue out
(09:00):
on patrols. Meanwhile, his fellow superheroes were dishing dirt to
his arch enemy, and soon the world of the Rain
City Superheroes would descend into costumed chaos. I'm David Weinberg
and from the Team's at novel and I heart Radio.
This is the Superhero Complex, Episode six, Kryptonite. By early
(09:41):
two thousand and twelve, Phoenix was struggling. He had clashed
with the authorities over the Pepper Sprayer arrest, He'd lost
the job he loved working with artistic kids, and he
was also having to spend a lot of his time
trying to prove to the state that he wasn't insane.
A lot of his personal life it often be in shambles.
(10:02):
His words, actually, that's Evocatus Phoenix is former right hand
man an unofficial chauffeur. He says that it was obvious
that Phoenix was having money problems. I knew things weren't
going well because he would always be sniffing around for money,
or one time he came up this idea. And this
was one of the many nights I was giving him
(10:22):
a ride. There's a long avenue full of bars and
clubs way north of Seattle, up in the U District.
He pitched this idea to me. Alright, but what do
you think of this? So all these bars, all these clubs.
What if I talked to the owners and say, we
can watch and pay special attention to your club, stand
out front of your club. You know, we'll end up
(10:44):
a contract. It'll be all over formal, you know, if
you give us, you know, say a hundred dollars a
week or something, or you know, we'll write it to
the team. You know, I'll manage the funds of course.
And uh, I'm like, dude, this is the mafia. This
is what a mafia does. Your offering air quotes protection
from businesses who paid. What are you hearing yourself? This
(11:06):
is the worst idea and the long sad history of
bad ideas. You can't be seriously, Oh oh yeah, that's
that strike. I guess I didn't think about that, but
he would end up actually doing exactly this. I think
maybe two out of over a dozen businesses you know
give I think one gave him like forty bucks, and
he did with one of them, and you know, he
(11:26):
would like get a bunch of selfies and like he
would kind of be like almost like an Instagram influencer
of that, like, hey, come on down to whatever the
name of the bar was. And money was a big
thing for him, and that would also affect his mood
pretty significantly. Evo had a theory about what was driving
Phoenix's fixation on money. He sent me text messages or
(11:48):
he would show me pictures of Hey, is what I
was at last night. It would be a picture of
him both arms holding kind of like a hug pose
of a giant stack of poker chips, and like you
could tell now this was legit at a casino, and
it's like, oh man, I should quit my job and
just do this full time and and be living a
(12:09):
high life. And the very next patrol everybody. I know,
it's only the tenth of the month, but if everyone
can have their dues for next month paid, that would
be great, thank you. I mean, like that would happen
all the time. So in my particular case, you just
flat out admit that, you know, I love gambling, and
he's incredibly smart, and you know, probably borders on like
(12:31):
card reading levels of genius there. But gambling is gambling too,
and that comes with its own dangers. Other members of
the rain City Superheroes told me similar stories. Here's Midnight Jack.
I think that he was really trying to be a
good dude in the beginning. He was focusing all his
energy into this superhero stuff, and over time he's kind
(12:54):
of got beaten down started gambling. I mean, the man
is just not in a good place. I asked Phoenix
about all of this, and he flatly denied it. You
who also said that you had a gambling problem? Is
that true? No, that's weird, Like what kind of gamling
from you were really into gambling, and that he worried
(13:16):
that some of the money that had been going to
stuff got gambled away, and that you would send him
photos of you at like a poker table and things
like that. That's all true, absolutely, Okay, now I know
he's talking about absolutely yet. So I played a ship
ton of poker, but it would have been a hard
to have a gambling problem doing that. Phoenix told me
he played tournament poker, where you just pay a flat
fee of fifty dollars to buy into the competition. So
(13:38):
I play a tournament every Friday, And I said, my
friends pictures of me with like thirty thousand ships. So
they're seeing these poker tip things and they're thinking I'm
making mad cash. But that's not how it works. Do
you play poker at all? Not really, I've been I
went through a poker phase when it was popular, so
you understand when you bind too a tournament, the chips
in front of you are not representative of money. This
seems like a reasonable explanation to me, and for what
it's worth, I believe Phoenix, but I do think it
(14:01):
seems credible that he might have had some financial difficulties
after his arrest. And as for charging nightclubs money to
protect them, Phoenix says that is one accurate sort of Yeah.
I definitely suggested that, but but not in the mob
shakedown way. I don't see. I just feel like he
was saying, like it's a murky line to be like
some of you get extra productions and some of you
(14:21):
we're gonna let go. I don't think it's an extra line. Like,
for example, we had sixteen shootings take place outside of
one nightclub, and they're like, we love when you're out here.
Fuck you, bro, if you want me to come and
stand out front of your club, you're gonna give me
a some money for that. Like, that's stupid. We're supposed
to be helping random real crime. This is crime. It
takes place because of your establishment. So if you want
me to stand outside your stabution so you can use
Phoenix Jones to pimp that, everybody's okay, you're gonna at
(14:42):
least paying me money for that. I don't even consider
that a bad thing. Yeah, but I definitely said it,
and I shared it with the team because you're supposed to.
And then the money never happened, so we didn't do it.
We just did regular as patrols. I could go on
and on letting Phoenix respond to the many wrongs that
his former teammates accused him of, and in fact, I
(15:05):
spent a lot of my time with Phoenix doing just that.
There are moments when Phoenix did admit to some of
those wrongs. Other times, like with the quote unquote protection money,
it just seemed to be a difference of opinion on
the morality of what happened. But at the end of
the day, Phoenix says that all of these disputes with
his former crime fighting friends are issues of the past,
(15:28):
and rehashing them is a waste of time. These guys
are so petty and stupid. There was just so many
more important things. I mean, even if everything they assumed
was right and everything they told you was right, Let's
say I had a crazy gambling problem. Let's just say
these things right. None of them change any of the
patrolling or effects we did zero, So why are you
still talking about that? I do think that Phoenix is
(15:53):
wrong on this point. Phoenix's teammates all felt that his
erratic behavior and failure to communicate did in fact have
an impact on their ability to fight crime, which makes
total sense. Phoenix was always the leader of the rain
City Superheroes, and a group is only as effective as
its leadership. And if Phoenix is going to take credit
(16:16):
for all his team's success, shouldn't he also take responsibility
for some of their failures. But then to do that
would mean that Phoenix would have to admit that he
is not perfect at crime fighting, and he won't. Over time,
the tension between Phoenix and his teammates built up, until finally,
(16:38):
one day, it all came to a head on a
disastrous patrol that would tear the team apart. That's coming up.
(17:01):
In late April of two thousand and twelve, the rain
City Superheroes were preparing for their biggest patrol of the year,
but according to Evocatus, Phoenix had become an absent leader.
We patrol and we we're from three to five nights
a week, and we would get wildly different results kind
of based on the day he said, or you know,
if he was hurting for money, or if he was
(17:23):
having relationship problems or something. That would always be kind
of something going on, and we never quite knew what
we would get. Anytime you didn't want to be answered
to anyone or didn't want to be accountable for anything,
he would just shot off. He would get real angry
and real pouty, call everyone traders, and would disappear. Everything
came to a head on May Day, two thousand and twelve.
(17:47):
May Day has always been a big day in Seattle.
Thousands of people take to the streets to march for
labor rights. There are protests all over the city. I
asked Phoenix if he thought that day was a turning
point for the team. You mean, clowns got caught as clowns,
and then eventually you have to ask yourself why you
didn't show up. I don't think that's a turning point.
(18:08):
I think you were bitches before and that showed it.
Phoenix and the rain City superheroes often showed up on
May Day to keep watch over the crowds and to
help keep the peace if things went awry, which is
exactly what happened in two thousand and twelve. El Caballero
was right there in the thick of it. There's always
(18:30):
two big protests in Seattle. The first one was the
labor unions and the Native rights and stuff, and that
was always peaceful, and there was another element that would
show up, well, I guess they call them black block
They would go out and look like hooding ninjas and
go and break windows and spray paint. And I think
we all agree that there's a lot of corporations and
(18:52):
entities that are ripping people off and taking money and
don't really care. But there's ways to go about things,
and these people are just terrorists, terrorizing people, terrorizing things
and scaring the Bejesus said, folks. The Rain City Heroes
didn't go blindly into these situations, They came prepared and
(19:13):
that year it was Eva who made detailed plans for
the May Day patrols. There's an awful lot of like
logistical planning that would go into something like this because
we have people. That was literally a contribution to the
team was to do a lot of research ahead of time.
How do we safely patrol? How do we access vehicles
if we need to get out of there? How do
we get first ato somebody if we need when roads
(19:35):
are closed. According to Evo, Phoenix had decided on his
own unusual strategy for monitoring the crowds the night before
May Day had happened. Phoenix said, tell you forget all that.
Here's what we're gonna do. I gotta buddy of mine.
He works at the front desk at this hotel, and
he's gonna let us go in and using one of
his hotel rooms. We're gonna turn on the TV. We're
(19:56):
gonna party in a music and we're just gonna be
watching all the local news stations. And when some fight
breaks out on TV, we'll put on a gear and
we'll run out the door and don't save the day.
The entire rest of us are just kind of sitting
around blinking, just what what on earth? No, I mean
by the time we'd see it on TV, I mean,
it's obviously will long have passed. Well, what about all
(20:19):
the research we did and all the intel work ahead
of time and the Index didn't want anything to do
with it. The next morning, when a disgruntled set of
rain seedy heroes gathered in a parking garage to start
the patrol, Phoenix turned up empty handed. He was really
really upset because his buddy or something was sick that
day or he couldn't make it, and basically we didn't
(20:42):
have a hotel room with our name on it, so
it's kind of like, well, okay, we're just gonna walk.
Then they followed the crowds through Seattle and began the patrol.
People of all ages had come to protest with painted
faces and colorful signs, bearing irreverent slogans, But even in
this eclectic crowd, the superhero stood out with their costumes
and shiny masks. They jostled through the pack streets. Ebo
(21:05):
says Phoenix wasn't sticking to the plan or communicating to
the team. He wouldn't listen to anyone on the team
you had people that were professionally trained medics and e
M t s. He had former military that was me
and uh, you know, we'd have a couple of the
former veterans from time to time on the team with
actual boots on the ground combat experience. He wouldn't listen
(21:28):
to the inputs anytime. He didn't want to be answered
to anyone, or he didn't want to be accountable for anything.
He would just shot off. Around twelve thirty, the protests
started to escalate. Explosions and pepper spray in downtown Seat
may Day breaks down to Mayhem in Seattle. Demonstrations turned violent.
(21:48):
There's thousands of people clogged downtown streets. A group of
about seventy five anarchists entered the fray. They streamed into
the downtown area and mixed in with the crowds marching
towards Westlake Park. They were dressed all in black, and
many of them were wielding bats and hammers as they
snaked through the protest, hurling rocks and shattering the windows
(22:11):
of shops and banks. Police officers in riot gear clashed
with the crowds. If we are disappointed in the police,
people launched flares and smoke bombs into the air. Paint
bombs and blood red and fluorescent green streaked the pavements
and buildings. The downtown streets, normally packed with tourists, were
(22:33):
filled with the smell of smoke and pepper spray. At
the epicenter of the chaos was the old Federal Courthouse.
Here's midnight Jack. This big, huge standoff ensues at the
Federal courthouse where they're throwing improvised explosives into The building
is occupied with people that worked there. A roving group
(22:55):
of the protesters had gathered outside the courthouse. They smashed
in the glass doors and windows with flagpoles and bats.
Someone tried to fire a smoke bomb into the building,
but it bounced off and burst into flames. Phoenix told
me that's where he wanted to be, in the heart
of the action. There was twelve of us. Right we
(23:15):
get word that they're gonna put a bomb in the
Federal building and blow it up. I don't I put
out the radio call that I need my team to
show up. I need to got the family right now.
We gotta get it together. Club about people, Oh yeah,
I got with Guess who shows up? El Caballero with Jack.
That's it, so Cavy, Jack and Phoenix assembled at the courthouse.
(23:41):
I'm looking out and see like sixty people in front
of us. They're throwing stuff. Ses heros held off a
group of sixty protest It's been I'm destroying a federal building.
I'm like, where's my team at? You know, were you
at Ebo? Oh, I'm in the military. I'm big. I'm
(24:01):
gonna go fight some crime. You're not gonna fight sixty
iron clad terrorists, are you. You're just gonna make me
look like the clown I'm standing in front of the building.
I got Midnight Jack, the least trained of us all,
never been in a fight with batons that don't know
how to use. Got El Caballero in hot pants, girls
hot pants dragging on the back of his shirt, a
luchador mask, and a sombrero that served no prayers but
(24:24):
to offend Mexican people, and short it was a highly
costumed shit show. We're trying to fucking stop them from
storming the building and throwing explosives and firebombs. It's just
me in front of that door, cleaning Mike Tyson punch
out with the dudes who come up while Midnight Jack
just douses everything you can see with pepper spray while screaming,
and El Caballeros on the phone with I didn't have anything.
(24:47):
I was just moving my arms and holding people back,
and people were like, oh, that one guy. Pepper sprayed people.
Pepper sprayed people. I sprayed probably sixty people that day.
I don't regret any of it. If you stepped up,
asked a certain point, I sprayed you. You threw something
at me, I sprayed you. You try to hit me
with something, I sprayed you. Go look through the world.
(25:09):
It might sound exciting, but El Cavallero was really not
a fan of the situation that Phoenix had put him in.
There's this romanticized Hollywood version of fighting criminals, and any
battle I've ever been in is ugly. It feels awkward,
it sucks, it's lame. That whole moment in space time
(25:31):
is frustrating, lame, and annoying. It's not sexy, it's not cool.
It's not a fucking thing that's awesome. It's lame. And
the violence, the hatred, the anger, It's like, where are
these people coming from? Why are you trying to hurt
other people? Why are you doing these negative things. It's
like and then to know that people's lives are in
(25:54):
danger at the same time. It's not like a cookie
cutter movie. It's like real life, intense stuff. By three PM,
(26:15):
the Mayor of Seattle had signed a proclamation of civil emergency,
and just before seven PM, a rainstorm hit the city,
causing the crowds to finally dissipate. An independent report commissioned
(26:38):
by the Seattle Police into the May Day riots singled
out the Rain City superheroes and said their involvement resulted
in allegations of assaults and crimes. The report recommended that
next year, the Seattle Police Department should collaborate with the
City Attorney's office to determine legal strategies to restrict superheroes
(26:58):
from creating time and interfering with law enforcement operations. Phoenix
took to social media to complain, this is crazy and
I am super mad. We see crime, we call police,
and we stop people from getting hurt. That's not against
the law. What you're saying is you don't like us,
you don't like that work different, and because we're different
(27:21):
from you, you're gonna make these rules and try to
shut us down. He even called out the author of
the report by name Michael Hillman. I hope your kids
don't have Batman posters or anything in their house because
you're a superhero hater. When we hung out, Phoenix claimed
that Homeland Security and the FBI actually thanked him for intervening.
Homeland Security comes up to us with these shotguns at
(27:43):
the end, and I'm thinking, so I get on the
ground and you're like, what are you doing? Like we
means like, Jones, get up, You're fine. I was like, okay.
They gave over, They shook her hand, and they brought
us to this like a suv. There was this guy
in of like the leader of our regional branch of
the FBI. Phoenix told me that the FBI agent asked
him for help and identifying violent protesters from the courthouse,
(28:06):
and that he said, quote Jones, I like your work.
He was like, I'm gonna tell the Seattle please to
leave you alone. But you sunk up. You sunk up.
He's like, you don't think you have superpowers. It's like, no,
I don't want superpowers. He's like okay, And that was
the beginning of our relationship. I wasn't able to confirm
any of this. When we asked the FBI about it,
(28:29):
they said, quote, we will not be able to provide
any information on this inquiry. The FBI has conversations with
individuals for a variety of reasons on a daily basis,
whether they are a witness, victim, subject, or someone providing information.
We cannot verify whether the FBI spoke to a particular individual,
(28:50):
but if this was supposedly the beginning of Phoenix's budding
relationship with the FBI, it was also one of the
final chapters of the Rain City Superheroes. When asked about
Phoenix's view that his team had hung him out to
dry that day, Eva was having none of it. It's
the ultimate irony to hear that he didn't feel backed
up or in reality, he was just doing whatever came
(29:13):
across his head at the moments. That's what he would say.
It's like, well, I just felt, you know, abandoned, or
you know, you guys betrayed me, or you know, I
just didn't feel like you know, you guys, you guys
just wanted to get up on me, or no one
wanted to follow my expertise. No, dude, you just stopped
showing and it would be so wildly unpredictable and sporadic,
(29:34):
nobody could trust him or rely on him, or have
any idea what version of Phoenix for getting any particular
night if you would show So that's a long winded
way of saying that's rich coming from him. Whatever the
truth is, the way Phoenix told it. May Day was
the final straw. That's when I stopped caring. I'll go, fuck,
(29:55):
they don't care. That just didn't feel different between everyone
after that. I mean, I guess there's no feeling because
you guys matter. You did not show up. You left
me in front of a fucking riot. Who cares what
they fucking think? Fuck that I wrote with you guys, untrained,
out of shape and ridiculous outfits, acting clowns every single
day when I'm a professional warrior and you can't show
up one time when I have sixty people trying to
(30:17):
murder me with a bomb. Evening arrived on Mayday and
the dust began to settle across Seattle. The police cars
filled with the protesters who've been arrested made their convoy
to the county jail. The swap police headed home, and
the last stragglers from the march dispersed. Shop owners boarded
(30:37):
up the jagged holes in their windows, and the debris
on the streets was swept away, But there's no cleaning
up the mess that the rain City Superheroes were in.
That's coming up. When you talk to Phoenix, he makes
(31:01):
it sound like he stopped trusting his teammates after the
May Day debacle. He claims he decided to go it
alone after that, But actually that's not how things went down,
because after the May Day protests, Phoenix continued to patrol
with some of the rain City superheroes for over a year.
And that, dear listener, that's how we get to what
(31:21):
is maybe the most fitting way I can think of
for a team of comic book inspired costume warriors to dissolve,
not in a blaze of crime fighting glory, but in
a petty dispute over a piece of clothing, a controversy
that has come to be known as helmet Gate. How
(31:42):
did your relationship with the rains City Here's end or
what caused you to leave the life that was all
about my purple helmet. This was news to me kind
of because I had heard the story of the falling
out between El Caballero and Phoenix long before I met
either of them. But the story that I found on blogs,
(32:03):
long lost Facebook pages, and podcasts was that they went
from best friends to despised enemies because Phoenix had stolen
El Kaballero's sombrero. Apparently, no one fact checked any of
those accounts, because while it is true that these two
grown men did in fact have a falling out over
(32:24):
a piece of headwear, it was not a sombrero, but
a purple army helmet, a mitch helmet, a nice tactical
bulletproof helmet with the padding inside so I wouldn't get
scrambled brains. It all started on a typical downtown patrol
one night and two thousand and thirteen, after the patrol
(32:45):
ended Caddy forgot his helmet, I left it in Phoenix
Jones's car for an evening. It was another night where
we had fought real criminals and done real stuff, and
I just, act said, minorly left it in his vehicle.
Evil remembers the saga of the purple helmet. Well, he says,
at first, the helmet just went missing. No one could
(33:07):
find his helmet, and it was the most aggravating series
of I guess backwards drama that honestly started getting pretty embarrassing.
I would start losing sleep over stuff like this, where
people would call me because I was a guy that
kind of ran the team on the back end. Evil
claims that Phoenix accused his girlfriend Purple Rain of stealing
(33:30):
the helmet that dr hearns, like, what are you talking about?
Why on earth would I want l caberleiro stinky helmet?
That's gross? For whatever reason, we think he just gave
it to, you know, a pretty young fan or something
like that. It all sounds so petty to me, But
for Cabby it was no joke. It really struck a
(33:52):
chord with me. This guy who I trust with my life.
I mean, we're literally dodging bullets and knives and crazy terrorists.
This guy trusted in my life made my helmet disappear
and it got it weird? Why did it get weird? Like,
I don't know. For what it's worth, Phoenix has a
response to the purple helmet story. He says it was
(34:14):
in his car, which got towed and impounded, and that
he was too embarrassed to admit this to his crew.
Helmet gate wasn't the first time things had allegedly gone
missing around Phoenix, Crystal Marks told me that Phoenix couldn't
be trusted when it came to money. He was charging
(34:35):
people like money per month for medical insurance that the
team's never saw the benefit for. He would say, yeah,
I'll buy you a tactical vest, give me money, and
then he would never provide the vest. Evo said he
personally had to reimburse team members. He sent me a
photo of a receipt he kept for a vest he
paid for out of his own pocket to give to
a fellow superhero. Soon these disputes spilled out onto the
(34:58):
Rain City Superheroes social media accounts. P J has been
proven to be consistently dishonest, unreliable, and untrustworthy. He's a
liar and a bump. You shouldn't be asking people for
money or playing to the media the way he does
here is replaceable. Friendship, loyalty, and trust are not the
theft allegations and the mud slinging escalated. Phoenix held a
fundraiser for Purple Rains anti domestic violence campaign. Someone accused
(35:21):
them of embezzling funds, and things got nasty. If you
want to show how honest. This campaign is usink. Slanderous
language is illegal. Some people don't deserve to have any
secret identities. Never understood by that cow was not on patrol.
She does not have any athletic ability or street skill.
She flirted with all the guys on the team and
wanted to be the center of attention. I refused to
involve myself in this textual spewit and ask that my
(35:43):
name we kept out of these theatrics. Hi strong and
suggest you research the term harassment and take a good
hard look in the mirror. The accusation of embezzlement turned
out to be false. The Seattle Weekly did a piece
about it. The charity confirmed that they had received the money.
Phoenix was vindicated, but then he launched another fundraiser for himself.
(36:05):
This time he wanted to raise ten thousand dollars for
a new supersuit. The campaign offered incentives for donations. For
the entry level ten dollars, you could get a rubber
Phoenix Jones bracelet. It went all the way up to
two thousand dollars or more. For that you were promised
the whole pile of Phoenix merch of Phoenix Jones replica
helmet build as fits most normal sized heads, is bullet
(36:29):
and blunt trauma resistant, plus the honor of having your
name engraved on phoenix brand new suit. He posted the
link for donations on Purple Rains Anti Domestic violence website.
It even caught the eye of actor Rain Wilson, who
plays Dwight in the Office. He posted about it on Facebook.
Given her previous experiences with Phoenix, Crystal Marks was not impressed.
(36:51):
I think Phoenix Jones is a liar. I mean, come
at me for whatever you need to for saying it.
But raising money for his supersuit, which so ridiculous to
say those words out loud. But like this high end,
like tactical suit that was like super bullet proof and
like stab proof. He did to go fund me for it?
Tons of money. Where's the suit, dude? Like it never happened.
(37:13):
The tide of public opinion looked to be turning on Phoenix.
More allegations against him started surfacing. A superhero named Urban
Avenger called Phoenix an ego centric glory hound, and a
blog post titled Phoenix Jones sells snake oil calls it
a supersuit. The Seattle Weekly ran a piece called the
(37:36):
Emperor's new suit, with a cartoon of Phoenix straining to
pull his rubber supersuit on over his bloated belly, which
is labeled Hubris. One of the rain City superheroes took
to Facebook to claim that Phoenix had stolen his go
pro to boot. Then The Seattle Weekly published another story
that quoted a superhero saying Phoenix Jones is a con artist, thief,
(37:59):
steve link from his closest friends and fans, with zero
integrity for his community. El Caballero went to the press too,
telling the Seattle Weekly quote, I've always thought of Phoenix
as our quarterback, but I feel betrayed by his actions
and certain trusts have been broken. Soon after that, Cabby
(38:20):
formally announced his departure from the rain Ceaity Heroes. On
his Facebook page. He said quote effective immediately attention family
and friends, fans, law enforcement, and even my entities. I
will no longer I said that part louder because it
was in all caps. I will no longer be working
(38:41):
with Phoenix Jones. After three years of patrols, I see
loyalty is worth nothing to him. I feel betrayed by
a man I called my brother and that hurts his dishonesty, manipulation,
and Deceit has caused me to not want to be
associated with someone I can't trust. I will continue to
(39:01):
wear my mask and patrol the streets of Seattle, but
will henceforth not be aligned with him or the rain
City Superhero Movement. I respect the team members individually. The
Phoenix has nose dived into the flames, and I'm done
with him. After El Caballero's departure, Morale also took a
(39:27):
nose dive. Phoenix's girlfriend, Prebble Rain, announced that she was
officially leaving the team too, and that she and Phoenix
were no longer together. Discontent was brewing in what remained
of the rain City Superhero movement. Even said everyone came
to him with their grievances. They wanted to know what
had really gone down between Cabby and Phoenix. Everyone was
(39:48):
very much on edge, and every person on the team
stop me if this sounds familiar, had heard a different
version of this same story, and we had all been
talking about and realized that, Okay, someone has fallen. Shipp
called the denominator. Here is Phoenix Jones. The superheroes gathered
for a crisis meeting. Their plan was to challenge Phoenix
on everything that had been going down and to hold
(40:09):
him accountable. So we get to this meeting just kind
of like, Okay, here's what we're gonna do with forward
and stuff like that, and here's what actually happened, and
here's how's al it. You want nothing of the sword?
He said, all right, well, all medical insurance stuff is
going to go through my friend Dave, so any questions
go through him, and we're gonna put schedules on a
new Facebook page, and uh, everything's fine going forward. Any questions,
(40:33):
all right, let's go on. I'm like, oh, hold up,
and then nothing has been answered? What this? What? We
have so many questions about what just happened. And you know,
if this happened to El Caberro, one of your most
trusted allies, and you're doing this stuff to him, like
what else are you gonna do. The more his teammates
challenged him, the more Phoenix dismissed their claims, and things
(40:54):
got heated. I almost threw a table out of mo
so mad they confronted their former leader, and Phoenix lost
his cool. He through the world's biggest internettangent, which I
still have screenshots of him talking about while you're all
betrayers and you're all traders, and I started a team
so I can end it. So the r C s
M is officially resolved. P J out and that was that.
(41:23):
Soon after the final blowout, Phoenix posted his resignation from
the rain City Superheroes on his Facebook page. It was
written in all caps and full of typos and grammatical errors.
Here's a condensed version. First off, I'm sorry. I started
fighting crime years ago and inspired a lot if people
to do the same. I really thought of having a
(41:45):
large group of civilian crime fighters was a good idea.
I was wrong. It takes a certain type of person
to do this job correctly, and unfortunately I have inspired,
worked with, and even taught some of the wrong kinds
of people. As of today, the rain City superhero movement
is over. I will be patrolling solo with supers I trust.
(42:08):
I will not go into many details, but I feel
you deserve a few reasons why we can no longer
work together. Certain members cannot run two point five miles
in thirty minutes, or do five pull ups or sit
ups in two minutes, or believe it is okay to
carry illegal weapons or want to patrol with other superheroes
(42:30):
that have a track record of making bad choices that
are potential dangerous. I love being a superhero, and I
believe there's a certain level of professionalism that goes with that.
When I or any member of the r C s
M show up to help you, I want you to
know that we have first Aid CPR training, we have
taking blood borne pathogens training, and that we will only
(42:52):
work with others who are equally physically and medically trained.
I'm sorry if I let anyone down. I will continue
to patrol and help people. I just can't, in good
conscience continue to put my seal of approval on people
I feel are not loyal or properly trained as always
(43:12):
be safe, make good choices, and I'll see you in
the streets. When we talked about the team breakup, Phoenix
said that people are fickle and driven by the attention,
and that no one on his team brought up these
disputes back in their crime fighting heyday. It was only
(43:34):
later after things went south with the team that he
says these grievances started surfacing. When we had these arguments
and disagreements that was pre people knowing my identity. After
my identity came out, we got all popular and everyone
was doing these interviews and everything was going on. So
all of us were all buddy, buddy, Fine. Then we
went and have these arguments later and they brought up
all this ship from past, saying when we never solved
(43:55):
all this and we stuck with you for four years
and you're this and you're that, And I'm thinking, if
you want to come with me, Slee, than fuck you.
Maybe I'm a sucker. But I always believed Phoenix whenever
I was with him, From the first moment I met him,
he told me that he would answer me honestly about
any accusation someone made against him. He also told me
there were other things that he'd done that were wrong,
(44:17):
but he would never admit them to me. I would
have to find out for myself, and if I did,
then he would answer truthfully about the incident. This policy
felt reasonable to me, and I took Phoenix at his word,
and I thought it was an indication that he was
willing to admit when he was wrong. I bought into
his logic because it seemed to make sense to me,
(44:38):
and I also agree with him that so much of
the beef between him and his crew always felt a
little petty, like who cares about what happened to a
purple helmet? Does it even matter in the grand scheme
of things. But looking back on it, I don't think
he lived up to his promise of answering everything truthfully.
(44:59):
A lot of it I think is tied up in
his desire to be the best at everything. I think
that desire was what made him a champion bowler an
mm A fighter, but I think it is also the
quality that made him an ineffective leader. It blinded him
to the possibility that he could be wrong, or that
someone in his group might have a better idea for
how to be good crime fighters. And I felt like
(45:21):
he was still blinded by it when he talked about
his former crew. I don't know how I associated with
these clouds for so long that, Like, that's the one
thing I am curious about. Like, on one hand, you
seemed because I carried them to stay and because I
carried them, I carried these motherfucker's. I carried them because
you were lonely or like well, because they believed in
what I believed in when no one else believed in it.
(45:42):
You always like to get up and get dressed every
day and put on a rubber suit and people laugh
at you in the streets like it fucking sucks. So
even if you're huge and fat, or you're out of
shape where you're former freaking drug out a homeless kid,
if you're gonna say, I believe in you too, let's
go walk together. I would rather do that with you.
People who believe in me, believe in the concept. If
it's about me letting them down, you let me down.
I gotta stab for you, out cavaler because you want
(46:03):
how to do a disarmed lydon said you want to
do knife fighting skills, You fucking don't, And I can stab,
like for real, I got fucking stabbed and you want
to talk about a helmet? Fuck you, Jack Jack. Jack
can't even run. He has asthma. He can't even run.
There's videos where I run into after bad guys and
(46:25):
he can't run, Like what the fuck? It's clear, but
there's genuine hurt and betrayal behind Phoenix's anger and also
on the side of the other Rain City superheroes. Just
because they wear goofy outfits doesn't mean they aren't people
(46:47):
with real feelings, and for all the bitterness, I think
the reason there's so much hurt involved in this highly
costumed severance is because all of them once bought into
the belief that Phoenix talks about the mission that had
united them. And maybe that's hard to understand from the outside,
but to enter into the world of real life superheroes,
(47:09):
you have to rethink certain beliefs about how the world works,
because the belief in their mission is to believe that
a guy in a sombrero and purple hot pants is
actually the man who might at any moment save your
life from a hammer wielding mugger lurking in an alleyway.
That's the thing I find so fascinating about all of this,
(47:30):
the mash up of the absurdity with the seriousness of
what these masked adventurers were trying to pull off. Their
dream was powerful, too powerful to be totally crushed by
a purple army helmet and some snarky Facebook comments. After all,
this wasn't the end for Phoenix Jones. After the breakup,
(47:52):
he would set out on a bid to conquer the
world in a different arena, and in a way, it
wasn't the end of the rain City Superhero movement. Either
the team may have disbanded, but the legend they built
together lived on and out of the darkness, a new
generation of superheroes would rise up to unite behind it.
(48:12):
That's coming up next time. The Superhero Complex is hosted
(48:37):
and written by Me David Weinberg and reported by me
Amalia Sortland and Caroline Thornhum. Production from Mamalia Sortland and
Caroline Thornhum, Sean Glenn, Max O'Brien and David Waters are
executive producers. Fact checking by Andrew Schwartz. Production management from
Sharie Houston, Frankie Taylor and Charlotte Wolf. Sound design, mixing
(48:59):
and scoring by Nicholas Alexander and Daniel Kempson. Music supervision
by Nicholas Alexander and David Waters. Original music is composed
by Paul Housden. Special thanks to Peter Tangan, Willard Boxton,
Matt o'mera, Katrina Norvelle Beth and Macaluso, Born Rosenbaum, Shelby
Snkman and all the team at U t A. For
(49:22):
more from novel, visit novel dot Audio
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