Bishop

[Bishop]

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[Bishop]

August 30, 2011 on the set of "Good Morning Philadelphia," an early morning TV talk show.

ADAMS: Good morning, Philadelphia! Roger Adams here with Philly's latest local boy turned superhero, the Bishop!

AUDIENCE: (Applause)

ADAMS: Welcome, Bishop, good to have you with us this morning.

BISHOP: Thank you, Roger. Good to be here.

ADAMS: So, is Philly where you were born?

BISHOP: That's right. I've lived here all my life.

ADAMS: And what exactly is your superpower?

BISHOP: Well, I can instantly move from one place to another, or "teleport," by thinking about it just right. Basically, I think about it like I might a particular chess move. Somehow, that triggers my ability.

ADAMS: That's amazing! So, that's why you have this whole "chess-thing" going here, with the... the black and white and --

BISHOP: Yes, yes.

ADAMS: -- And that cool looking scepter thing.

BISHOP: Right.

ADAMS: Does that scepter... what does it do?

BISHOP: It was built for me by some of the geniuses of the Freedom League. It enhances my natural powers and lets me use my power to attack rather than just jump around here and there. It also has a few other nifty features, but that's basically it.

ADAMS: Cool, cool. Now, Bishop, I understand that you've decided NOT to keep your true identity a secret. That seems kind of unusual. Why did you decide to do that?

BISHOP: Well, supers who keep secret identities do so to protect their loved ones or to maintain their normal lives. I don't really have anyone I need to protect, or a normal life I care to try to maintain. Also, it gives me a lot more freedom.

ADAMS: What do you mean?

BISHOP: For starters, I don't need a car anymore. No worrying about finding parking places and all that.

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

BISHOP: I want to go somewhere, I just teleport there. It really frees up the schedule!

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

BISHOP: If I had a secret identity, I'd have to drive around everywhere to keep up appearances.

ADAMS: What motivated you to be a superhero?

BISHOP: My wife and my daughter. I'd want them to be proud of me. I think it’s what they’d want me to do with this gift.

ADAMS: So, it's okay for us to talk about your "normal" identity, right? You are a chess master, is that right?

BISHOP: Yes. A FIDE International Grandmaster. I ran a chess club on South Clarion Street.

ADAMS: What's it called?

BISHOP: Oh, nothing original: "the Clarion Chess Club."

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

ADAMS: And you're not running it anymore?

BISHOP: No, not really. I resigned as president. I still plan to "pop" in from time to time, but, as you might imagine, I've got a lot on my plate right now. This whole "superhero" thing is still pretty new to me.

ADAMS: So, being a chess master, the chess name, the chess-looking costume... does chess have a lot to do with your powers or is it just a cool theme, or what?

BISHOP: Well, a little of both, I guess. The supers who helped get me started may have taken the theme a little farther than I would have personally, but I still like it. As to my abilities, well, I'm also known for my tactical skills. I'd like to think my chess experience has helped with that.

ADAMS: You think playing chess has prepared you in some way?

BISHOP: Oh, certainly. For over a thousand years, it was used to train kings and generals in the arts of leading war. Chess is 99% tactics. It is about analyzing and exploiting weakness, about marshaling and deploying resources, calculating attacks. Really the biggest difference between chess and warfare is that in chess, the pieces aren't all moving around at the same time.

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

BISHOP: But, that's not really as big a difference as one might think.

ADAMS: So, Bishop, you haven't been a superhero for long, right?

BISHOP: Right. It happened just a couple of months ago. It was an accidental kind of thing, like one of those freak lab accidents in the comic books.

ADAMS: It was a lab accident?

BISHOP: Well, no, it was a relatively ordinary house fire. You see, my powers are genetic. I'm a mutant. But they lied dormant all my life until I faced a life-threatening situation. I guess I've led a pretty quiet life up until now.

ADAMS: Do you have any plans to go back to chess?

BISHOP: I never fully left it. I mean, I still play lots of games, I just don't enter tournaments any more. I'm playing several games now by correspondence with friends for fun. But, I don't think I'll go back to playing professionally. I haven't discussed the issue with FIDE yet, and there is no rule against supers playing chess, per se, but it’s not an issue I want to press. I have reason to believe they will think my powers give me an unfair advantage.

ADAMS: Why would they consider teleportation an unfair advantage?

BISHOP: Well, there is the question of whether my intelligence itself is part of my superpower.

ADAMS: Oh, so you have some kind of super-intelligence, too?

BISHOP: Well, I'd hesitate to say that. I mean, I'm no Dr. Archeville or anything.

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

ADAMS: And you have that because of your mutant power?

BISHOP: Who can say, really? Intelligence and various features of our mental processes are at least partly genetic, after all, and so is my superpower. There are people who, as a result of their genetic makeup, can perform amazing mental feats, but we don't call them super-powered. Where is the line between "normal" genetic abilities and "super" ones? It's a question I've asked myself a number of times, but I don't have a clear answer. I don't seem to be any "smarter" now then I was before my accident. But, my power DOES seem to rely on how my brain processes information. So, there's just no way to say for sure. If I stay in professional chess, it may even call into question my past level of performance. How much of that was due to some "unfair super-powered" advantage? I doubt it would really come to some kind of revocation of my ranking. After all, I’ve never been the World Champion or anything. But I have, as you can imagine, "bigger fish to fry" now. I'm okay with letting that part of my life go.

ADAMS: I see. So, Bishop, I'm sure all the supervillians out there want to know: do you have any weaknesses? Some kind of "kryptonite?"

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

BISHOP: (Laughs) No, no. Well, not that I know of yet anyway. I mean, I do have a weakness for Reuben sandwiches. Does that count?

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

BISHOP: Amazing things they are. Normally, I don't care much for sauerkraut, rye bread, Swiss cheese, thousand island dressing, OR corn beef. But, man, put them all together? I turn weak in the knees thinking about it.

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

ADAMS: I take it telling jokes isn’t one of your superpowers.

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

ADAMS: I kid! I kid! So, are you staying in Philly or doing the big move over to Freedom City?

BISHOP: Right now, I'm between permanent residences.

ADAMS: Right, right.

BISHOP: Anyway, I'm staying in hotels and "couch surfing" at friends houses and superheroes' headquarters and such. I probably will land in Freedom City, given it's the "Mecca" for supers, but the good thing is it's not really an either/or thing. With my powers, the world is a much smaller place. I can travel from Freedom City to Philly in basically the blink of an eye, and I plan to make myself available to the Philadelphia community. I think it's what my wife and daughter would have wanted.

AUDIENCE: (Applause)

ADAMS: So, what's the hardest thing you've found so far about being a superhero?

BISHOP: Oh, that's easy: the workouts!

ADAMS: Workouts?

BISHOP: Oh, yes. As you can imagine, chess is not exactly the most athletic of sports, and I've never been one for the gyms. All I did to stay a bit in shape was swimming and biking. That had to change. Being a superhero, you have to be in good shape to take a hit. I try to use my head to avoid getting hit, but all the same... there are guys out there who can punch me through a brick wall! So, now... now I do a lot of sit-ups. A LOT of sit-ups... More sit-ups than I ever thought I'd be able to. ...I have to tell you, I HATE sit-ups.

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

BISHOP: The Freedom League has some real slave-drivers when it comes to workouts and practice.

ADAMS: You're with the Freedom League?

BISHOP: Oh, no, no, not really. They have helped me get started and are still helping me by training me in the things I need to know and be able to do if I expect to survive long... like that "getting punched through a brick wall" issue.

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

ADAMS: Are you part of a super hero team, or would you like to be? Why?

BISHOP: I am not part of a team, yet. I would certainly like to be, though, as I think I'd be much more effective that way than entirely solo.

ADAMS: Well, it's time for a commercial break. But after the break, we'll take questions from the audience for The Bishop!

AUDIENCE: (Applause)

[break]

ADAMS: And, we're back, Philadelphia!

AUDIENCE: (Applause)

ADAMS: We're here with one of the newest superheroes, chess master Donovan Kross, now known as "The Bishop." So, let's see if our audience has any questions. Yes...

AUDIENCE MEMBER 1: Hello, Bishop, my condolences for your recent loss, sir.

BISHOP: Thank you.

AUDIENCE MEMBER 1: I followed the story of the fire in the papers and I was wondering: do you have any idea who started it?

BISHOP: No. No, I don't.

AUDIENCE MEMBER 1: Well, I mean, why would someone set YOUR house on fire? Did they know you had super powers or something?

BISHOP: I... I really have no idea who started it or why. I do know this, though... I will find out. And I will see that whoever is behind it is brought to justice.

AUDIENCE: (Applause)

AUDIENCE MEMBER 2: Hello Mr. Bishop, my name is Connie, and I start college this fall. ...and, I don't know, I've never gotten to talk to a super genius superhero and I just wanted to know, what kind of advice could you give me for, like, life and stuff?

BISHOP: Well, I may be some "super-brain." I think the jury’s still out on that one. But, I sure don't have the answers. I make mistakes. So, take anything I say with a grain of salt. As for starting college, all I can offer you is the same advice I would have given my own daughter. She would have been starting college this year, too, by the way. And what I'd tell her is this: “do what you love.†The rest will sort itself out. Sounds cheesy and obvious, but the really important things often do.

AUDIENCE: (Applause)

AUDIENCE MEMBER 3: Mr. Bishop, what is your greatest ambition?

BISHOP: Other than battling evil and injustice?

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

BISHOP: I am thinking of starting a new chess club in Freedom City. It would be nice to bring new players to the game.

AUDIENCE MEMBER 4: How do you feel about the state of the world and your place in it?

BISHOP: I'm not really sure how much real effect I will have in the world. All I can do is what I can do. Living true to my values is the best I can do.

AUDIENCE MEMBER 5: How do you get along with others? Especially other supers?

BISHOP: I think I get along pretty well with other people, other supers. I’d probably even get along with many villains, too, if it weren’t for, you know, their whole “being evil†thing.

AUDIENCE: (Laughter)

BISHOP: There is one kind of person I don’t get along with: I don't care much for people who think being super-smart makes them somehow superior to others. Hubris. Maybe that's my own insecurities talking, though. Maybe that's something I don't like about myself, or afraid I might see in myself. Who knows.

AUDIENCE MEMBER 6: How spiritual are you? Do you follow a religious tradition?

BISHOP: That's something I don't normally discuss, and my answer is likely to offend some people. I don't mean to offend, and I don't think any less of people for their beliefs. As for myself, I consider myself a secular humanist. I think we are responsible to ourselves for our morality, not to some supernatural being in the sky. So, I don't consider myself "spiritual." But moral? Yes.

AUDIENCE MEMBER 7: How do you feel about the place of metahumans and aliens on Earth?

BISHOP: How do I feel about it? I guess it makes life a lot more interesting than it would be without them. But, it's kind of like that Chinese curse: "may you live in interesting times." These ARE interesting times, indeed.

ADAMS: Well, thank you, Mr. Bishop, for joining us this morning.

AUDIENCE: (Applause)

BISHOP: Thank you, Roger. It's been a pleasure.

ADAMS: It's time for another commercial break. Stay tuned for "Jungle John" from the Philadelphia zoo and find out what wild animals he brought for us today!