Snowbirds don't fly

Green Arrow Oliver Quinn and Green Lantern Hal Jordan are attacked by a group of robbers who shoot them with a crossbow. Dealing with them, Quinn discovers that the crossbow is loaded with his own green arrows. Among the attackers, he notices Speedy - his ward. It turns out that this is a group of drug addicts who are trying to get money for a drug. It is becoming apparent that Speedy has stolen Queen's arrows to increase the efficiency of his robberies. Enraged Quinn pounced on Speedy, who, in his opinion, betrayed him, because they both fought against street crime, including drug dealers. Speedy breaks down when one of his accomplices dies from an overdose . The lantern and Strela decide to take a dose of the drug from him, and find out that the director general of one of the pharmaceutical companies who publicly condemned drug addiction, and in fact he is the boss of a criminal organization and thus kept his subordinates in check, put him on him. In the end, all three attend the funeral of the deceased addict.

Adams said that in the 1960s, Green Lantern comics were on the verge of cancellation, which partially gave him and O'Neill creative freedom, because many thought the comic book did not survive anyway ^[1] . They decided to concentrate on more socially-motivated topics, and in the spring of 1971, Adams got the idea to make young Speedy addicted to drugs. Then, in May-June 1971, Marvel Comics released the story “ Green Goblin Reborn! "In The Amazing Spider-Man # 96-98, which showed Spider-Man confronted with his friend's drug addiction. The plot was the first comic book to mention drugs, despite a ban on censorship by the Comics Code Authority. Later, Adams said:

We could be the first to release our story, and would be those who took a big step in the direction. Swallowing pills and walking from the roof is not what really happens in this case (meaning a crazy addict who nearly fell off the roof while under the influence of drugs in the Marvel storyline). We wanted one of our heroes to experience the potentially damaging effects of drugs. Anyway, three weeks after the release, DC and Marvel met at a meeting where the Code was rewritten. And we released our story. ^[one]

Adams' colleague, Dennis O'Neill, considered drug addiction the worst of social problems, which made it quite suitable for the socially oriented comic book that O'Neill himself became. O'Neill commented on the choice of a drug addict:

We chose Roy to maximize our emotional impact. We thought that showing a good guy in the throes of addiction would be stronger than any other possible character. In addition, we wanted to show that not only “bad” or “wrong” children become drug addicts.

O'Neill also noted that no one in DC was against both character choices and plot script makers ^[1] .

Image of Addiction

Throughout history, Adams and O'Neill portray drug addicts not as criminals, but as victims. For them, this has become a way to get away from reality, for example, for Asians or African Americans who were members of the gang. They grew up in poor areas, amid the dominance of racism, which made reality unbearable for them. Later, in adulthood, Roy Harper complains to Hal Jordan that the Jordan generation has inspired too many lies for children, for example, about the Vietnam War and much more, and he does not think that drug abuse is bad. According to him, he began to take drugs deliberately, in the hope of withdrawing from Queen's then custody when their friendship began to crumble. However, Adams and O'Neill showed the story so that the real villain in it was a wealthy businessman and the head of the criminal group Solomon Cooper. The writers openly stated that they were categorically against drug use, and fully showed their negative impact - breaking up Speedy, which is devoted to a whole page showing his painful condition (the Black Canary , Oliver Queen's girlfriend helped him to cope with it), as well as the moment of death Asian addict. The name “Snowbirds Don't Fly” itself includes the slang American word “Snowbird”, which means “cocaine”.

Snowbirds Don't Fly won the Shazam Award in the Best Individual Story nomination in 1971 ^[2] . In addition, New York Mayor John Leedsay, in response to a DC request to rate their work, sent them a letter, which was printed in # 86. In 2004, Comic Book Resources columnist John Weiland called the plot the beginning of an era of serious and socially directed comics in the history of the Green Lantern / Green Arrow series, which ultimately introduced DC and social minorities, such as homosexual Terry Berg , to its peak after the introduction of Mia Durden - successor to Roy Harper as a partner Green Arrow, who was not only a victim of child prostitution , but later became HIV-positive and, despite his sad fate, depicted as a positive character, and one of the g avnyh characters created writer Judd Winnick ^{[3] [4]} .

• Green Goblin Reborn!

• Snowbirds Don't Fly on ComicVine
• Green Lantern # 85 on the Grand Comics Database
• Green Lantern # 86 on the Grand Comics Database