Jon Sable, Freelance: Man of action!

Olympic athlete turned family man turned mercenary, soldier of fortune, bounty hunter, hitman, secret agent, bodyguard, detective, adventurer and author of books for children – Jon Sable was many things, but he did not want to be “Batman”.

The creation of the very talented writer and gifted artist Mike Grell, Jon Sable, Freelance debuted in his own series in 1983. Published by First Comics without Comics Code Authority approval, the series dealt with many realistic and mature themes that were ground-breaking back in the eighties and pushed the envelope of what could be achieved in mainstream comic books, both when it came to realistically portraying bloody and gory violence, but also hot nudity and sex in the best possible taste. Even by todays standards, the series still holds up as exceptionally sophisticated reading material – a must-read for fans of the non-powered hero variety like James Bond, Green Arrow or Hawkeye.

What made the series even more compelling was that besides a very complex, handsome leading man, the series also featured a riveting supporting cast. From the women Jon Sable was involved with over his gay acquaintance to the people Sable met professionally – Mike Grell excelled at great characterizations.

Jon Sable: Secretly nice guy

Jon Sable’s origin was told in Jon Sable, Freelance #3-6. He was a pentathlon competitor who fell in love with a gymnast from Kenya at the 1972 Olympics and married her. They started a life together in Africa with Jon working as a safari guide and they had two kids. When Jon’s family was brutally murdered by ivory poachers, he went on a revenge-crazed killing-spree in the tradition of the Punisher and Mad Max. Then he worked as a soldier-of-fortune before moving to New York and trying his hand as a writer. Finding lucrative work as an author of children’s books, he nevertheless also started a side-career working as a freelance bodyguard/bounty-hunter/adventurer because he craved danger and excitement.

“The inspiration for Sable was a character who would be the exact opposite of Batman,” Grell told Justin Francoeur of the DC in the 80s blog in June 2016. “He doesn't work for the greater good, he works for money - you got to pay him, he's a mercenary. He doesn't have a secret identity. The mask is only symbolic apart from the fact that it scares the hell out of the bad guys. He's not trying to disguise who he is - everybody knows he's mister blood and guts. His deep dark secret is that he's a closet "nice guy" who writes children's books about a group of leprechauns living in a fairy mound in central park. The only time he wears any kind of disguise is when he has to go out into public and appear as the children's author B.B. Flemm.”

“Sable was originally based on James Brolin - Josh Brolin's dad,” Grell revealed, and throughout the series, readers got to follow Sable’s exciting professional life, as well as his private love and sex life and his ongoing battle with cigarette addiction - all of which made the character seem very real.

Jon Sable’s love life

At the beginning of the series, Jon Sable had a “no strings attached” type of relationship with his literary agent Eden Kendall. She explained their relationship in Jon Sable, Freelance #20: “We’re intimate when it suits both our needs. We use each other’s bodies… each other’s talents. I make him write and I make him rich. But he’s never once opened up to me – never spoken about himself or his past.”

Being sexy, single and unattached, Jon was free to sleep with whomever he wanted. In Jon Sable, Freelance #12, he was pictured in bed with an unknown woman, and in issue #16, he slept with Lady Margaret Graemalcyn also known as the jewel thief Maggie the Cat. In issue #23 he also hooked up with his Israeli intelligence contact Rachel Elazar.

But ever since the first issue, a romance had been blossoming with his 25 years old book illustrator Myke Blackmon. It was the classic story of not liking each other at first, but then slowly developing feelings for each other as they got to know each other better. In issue #27, they finally gave in to their love as Myke gave herself to Jon as his present on his 40^th birthday and they became a monogamous couple.

Making comic book history

In Jon Sable, Freelance #10, he visited Myke Blackmon at her place and saw a nude portrait she was working on. Jon assumed the well-endowed model was her boyfriend, but it was her roommate Grey Adler whom Jon managed to invite along for a fencing event before learning Grey was gay. Clearly uncomfortable with the situation, Jon nevertheless went through with it and actually invited Grey out again for a ballet in Jon Sable, Freelance #14 and 15. The two men in Myke’s life then got along splendidly, with Grey throwing business Jon’s way in Jon Sable, Freelance #14 and 44 by having showbiz associates hiring him. In issue #48, Sable and Grey were even practicing fencing together.

At the time, Mike Grell was not aware that he had created the first openly gay character in mainstream comics, he revealed in an interview with R.J. Carter of Critical Blast.com in 2017. “I had no idea,” he said. “I certainly had no agenda. The honest truth is that I was basically going for the joke, because I felt that Sable, being Mister Macho, putting him in that situation, it would be so funny to just watch him squirm. And the joke was when he mistakes Gray for Mike Blackmon's boyfriend, and she tells him, "No, I'm not his type." And Sable says, "Well, what's his type? Short, fat, and ugly?" And she says, "No. Tall, dark, and handsome." That moment, that was the whole purpose of it. But the Gray Adler character became an integral part of the story and the relationship as well.”

Grell added that, “It was something that I did just out of hand without having a specific agenda. There are times when I have gone straight at a subject matter, because I wanted to address it and hit it square on the head, no two ways about it. And there are times when everything is sort of back-doored. As a writer, I don't feel that it's my job to provide answers. I think it's more my job to ask questions - to raise the issue and get people talking about it. And that clearly happened with Gray Adler in Sable.”

Raising the bar

Jon Sable, Freelance #28 from 1985 had a fun sequence with a lesbian hitting on Eden Kendall at a party, and in #31, the “gay”-word was used about Grey. It was the first time, the words “lesbian” and “gay” were used in mainstream comic books, and Mike Grell also raised the bar when it came to nudity in #31, tastefully depicting Myke and Jon naked together.

By Jon Sable, Freelance #44 in 1987, Grell was no longer doing the artwork, but he still wrote the stories and continued raising the bar with a murder mystery in #44 and 45 that involved both bi-sexuality and AIDS.

“I am trying in my writing to be representative of as broad a spectrum of the human population as possible,” Grell told Andy Mangels for a feature on comic books in the Advocate #530, August 1989. “It happens that, occasionally, a story line will come up and the choice of the character (to be gay) is so logical that there’s no denying it. There are characters who can’t be written any other way than gay. (…) If, as a storyteller, you omit gays from your stories, you’re eliminating an interesting factor of the human population that can contribute very strongly to your story line.”

“I don’t have to be gay to write a gay character,” Grell continued. “All I have to be is as informed as possible and try to be honest with my readers.”

“If editors or publishers or even writers perceive that featuring a gay character decreases a book’s salability and marketability, they’ll tend to stay away from it. At least in my readership, I haven’t had that problem. It may be that my books are reaching a more mature or informed readership – people who are capable of self-directed thought, as opposed to those whose opinions are influenced by someone else.”

“I do think, though, that the lack of gays in comics is partly a case of prejudice by omission,” he continues. “People would rather not face the existence of something or would rather not deal with it, so they don’t. They just ignore it and pretend it doesn’t exist at all.”

“I think we’re seeing the beginning of a trend toward representing people as people are instead of a stereotypical view of what a small section of society is,” Grell said. “With stories that are more firmly rooted in the real world, you’ll see more gays appear, because they are a part of the population. If comics that profess to be rooted in the real world ignore gays, that is being false to readers.”

The end of Sable?

Mike Grell wrapped up his run on Jon Sable, Freelance with issue #56 in 1988. It also marked the end of the series, although it was immediately relaunched as simply Sable with a new #1. The new series featured no involvement from Grell and got cancelled in 1990 after 27 issues. A TV-series also titled simply Sable was also produced, but only lasted seven episodes.

In 2000, Mike Grell published a Sable novel based on his comic book character, and in 2005 he revived the comic with a six-issue Jon Sable, Freelance: Bloodtrail miniseries published by IDW Publishing. Grell now had Jon so tormented by what had happened to his family – as well as by what he himself had done in retaliation, that he had developed a drinking problem. Myke had broken off with him because of that, and he had rekindled his affair with his literary agent Eden. Myke still cared about Jon, though, and he had to rescue her from a villain who used her as bait to draw him out, getting the couple reunited.

A 5-issue miniseries sequel was published in 2009, also by IDW. It was titled Jon Sable, Freelance: Ashes of Eden and featured the return of Jon’s former love interest Maggie the Cat. And Grey Adler had gotten himself a boyfriend. A follow-up series entitled Rules of the Hunt was announced at the end of the mini but never materialized, making the 5-issue mini the end of the road for Jon Sable, Freelance and his lovable supporting cast.