"Static in Africa"

"Static in Africa" is the third episode of the third season of Static Shock. It first aired on February 8, 2003. On a vacation to Ghana, Static meets the African hero Anansi.

Plot

Virgil and his family go on a trip to Ghana. While there, Virgil calls Richie and tells him that he's closer to his heritage and doesn't feel like a minority but a person. On a train trip, a criminal called Osebo tries to steal a professor's map to an ancient city of gold that is buried under a lake. A superhero named Anansi, aka "the spider", stops Osebo from crashing the train, but not from taking the map. Virgil puts a tracer on Osebo and later reveals his secret identity to Anansi in order to help him stop Osebo. They track him to a dam that holds a man made lake, and together they stop him from blowing it up. Before departing Africa, Static tells Anansi that he has become his hero, and that he fills a void as he has very few black heroes in America.

Continuity

• Anansi and Osebo return in "Out of Africa".

Background information

Home video releases

• Static Shock: The Complete Third Season (DVD)

Production notes

• When Osebo's bomb blows up, the resulting explosion is reused footage from the scene of Superman: The Animated Series episode "World's Finest, Part III" in which one Wayne/Lex T-7 blows up another droid.

Production inconsistencies

• Robert and the bus driver say Ghana was the first independent (decolonized) country in Africa. This is not entirely true, as several countries were independent before Ghana, and what is now Ethiopia was never colonized at all. It was, however, the first sub-Saharan country to gain independence in the post-World War II decolonization era.
• Virgil's seating position changes frequently between shots during Anansi and Osebo's duel on the train.
• Virgil says he wishes there was a black superhero in America. When this episode aired, John Stewart had been appearing on Justice League for a year and a half.
• No director is credited.

Trivia

• The episode centers highly on the Ashanti culture.
  • Anansi, the spider, is a trickster in West African folklore.
  • Osebo is only a minor character in one of the legends; a leopard tricked, caught and killed by Anansi.
  • "Dr. Anokye" is likely named after Okomfo Anokye, cofounder of the Empire of Ashanti.
• Kumasi is the capital of the Ashanti region.
• The dam, though unnamed in the episode, is the Akosombo Dam
• Virgil refers to his sister as "Shoppa Zulu", a reference to the Zulu king Shaka Zulu.
• Virgil asks Anansi to "hit [Osebo] with a web blast", and poses his hand in Spider-Man's traditional web shooter pose.
• The title of this episode is a reference to the Shaft film "Shaft in Africa".

Cast

Quotes