01x03 - Unstoppable Adonis

[bunniefuu]

[narrator]
At Marvel, our stories and our superheroes

are inspired by real-life heroes.

So, the editors of some of
our best-known comics

have come together
to work on a special project:

to find and tell the stories
of kids doing the extraordinary,

helping communities near and far,

and changing the world.

These are the kids who will inspire
our stories for years to come.

I can't see anything
and that includes limits for myself.

[teammate] Let's go, Adonis.

[man] He is rescuing a generation of kids
behind him from whatever holds them back.

[narrator] Adonis is already a hero.

Now, we bring his story to the world
with the surprise of a lifetime.

Making him into a Marvel superhero,

immortalized in his very own comic,

as a member of Marvel's Hero Project.

They're everyday kids...

who have accomplished the amazing.

Now, their true stories...

will reveal the heroes that live among us.

This is Marvel's Hero Project.

We came across this really cool video
online of this young kid's touchdown,

and it went viral
because this kid happens to be blind.

His name is Adonis.

I cannot wait to share his story.

Like he is this kid--

Yes, he's a football player,
he's a supreme athlete.

Despite some of the challenges
he might have faced in his life,

that's not what he's defined by.

He's like, "I'm gonna still do it.
This isn't gonna stop me."

And he's inspired
so many people around him.

Obvious comparison is
a character like Daredevil.

He's the man without fear.
And that's what Adonis is.

Think what that must be like
to run down that field.

You can't see what's ahead of you
or know what's around you.

You have to be fearless.

Daredevil has tuned his remaining senses
to such a heightened level.

He does these incredible super heroics,

beyond anything
we've seen other people do.

And yet no one around him,

The Avengers, Spider-Man,

no one knows that
he's missing his eyesight,

that he can't see
because he does all these incredible--

And he never talks about it.

The idea that there's something behind
a person that could surprise you.

-I guess like Hulk a little bit.
-[Joe Quesada] Yeah, that's perfect.

You meet Bruce Banner,
you have no idea what's inside of him.

Yeah, like, I'm sure if you meet Adonis,
you know,

and, you know, what a sweet kid,
what a great loving kid, family, kid,

and you meet him on the football field,
you never wanna meet him again.

-Right [laughs]
-[Joe, Sana laugh]

[drumline playing]

[football team] Yeah!

-[teammate 1] One, two, three.
-[all] Broncos!

-[teammate 1] Go, go, fellas.
-[teammate 2] Let's go, man.

[crowd cheering]

[music stops]

[Adonis]

-[crowd applauding]
-[whistle blowing]

Everybody knows
I'll do whatever it takes to do my job.

[man] Okay, last game. Get on the field.

[Adonis]

-[teammate 1] Let's go, Adonis. Let's go.
-[teammate 2] Come on, Adonis.

[Adonis]

[crowd cheering]

[woman] Thank you, dear Lord.

Today I am most grateful for our family.

[Adonis] Family is very important.

We're all athletes.

[woman] Adonis, let's do it.
Let's do it. Go.

Yeah, see. I got hands.

My mom played basketball in college.

She was a cheerleader
for the Arizona Cardinals.

My dad played football.

And my brother plays football at college.

My sister plays basketball.

So we got that competitive drive.

[sister]
I'm not gonna help you win though.

[mother] You're not gonna help me win?

-[sister] I won last night.
-[mother] Okay, Adonis. What you got?

-[mother] Two. My turn.
-[brother] Look at you, Adonis.

If you're gonna be in this family,
you better win.

[Veronica] My turn. Draw two. Adonis.
Mm. What?

That one thing with our family,
we're very competitive.

[Veronica] All right.
This is it for the championship.

[Jordan] There's no such thing as
"a feel sorry for yourself."

You gotta be the best.

-Uno! Uno! I got it, all right.
-[sister shouts]

Ooh, ooh, don't stop
Shake what your mama gave ya

-[sister blows raspberry]
-What's wrong with y'all?

[Veronica] Yeah!

[Adonis] I love football.

Like, I used to be able to see.

When I was five,

my parents signed me up
on a football team.

In my mind it was like,

"He's on the same track like his brother,"
but he wasn't.

[Jordan]
We went to the pool to go swimming.

Adonis was just learning how to swim.

[Veronica] I had Adonis on his back.

I let him go under the water.

[Adonis] I came up out of the water,
and I couldn't really see.

He's screaming, he's crying like,
"I can't see. I can't see. I can't see."

[Veronica] We took him to the hospital
and they did surgery that day.

But I was blind, so...

[Marvin]
The doctor told me he had glaucoma.

That's something
I didn't wanna hear as a father.

And I took it pretty, pretty bad.

[man] When you have a diagnosis of
blindness in your child, it's devastating.

All your dreams... are changed.

And at that moment,
all your dreams are over.

The first blind person
I had ever met was my son.

I'm thinking surely there's a surgery
that's gonna correct this.

I had 12 surgeries before I was ten.

There's a time in our life
where we look at our family pictures,

and there's no family pictures.

There's no pictures of Adonis

because we didn't wanna
take pictures of him blind.

We were waiting for him
to get his eyesight back.

[scoffs]
We were talking about the next surgery.

[Adonis] I told my mom I really didn't
wanna have surgeries anymore

'cause they were just helping me miss time

and get behind in school and just sports.

When Adonis said,
"I don't want any more surgeries,"

I was so angry.

And I was like, "Can't you see
we're trying to make you whole?

You're missing something.

What happened to your fight?
You gotta fight."

I was like, "We win.

Like, show me where's the win in this?"

And he says, "Mom, we're still winning."

I felt like he was saying...

"I'm not broke. I'm enough."

And I was like, "Okay, if you show me
where to go, I will go there.

Show me, and you better win."

He was telling me every day,
"I need to play football.

Put me on the field, Mom.
Come on. Come on.

You know I can do it, Mom."

I was afraid.

[chattering]

-[friend] I'll see you later, Adonis.
-Later.

[Marc Ashton]
Brophy is the best school in Arizona.

[teacher]
All right, everyone sit down, please.

[Veronica]
He trained himself to learn braille.

And now he's doing English,
Spanish, Braille and Braille Spanish.

[Adonis] I got books I gotta read.
I got homework.

I got tests I gotta prepare for.

[bell chimes]

He loves everyone.
He's friends with everyone.

I can look to him if I need advice.

I can look to him if I need to find
that inner fire to get something done.

When are we gonna play basketball?

[chattering]

[man] When I first heard
he was coming in, I'm thinking...

"This is a tackle sport,
and you're asking a guy who can't see

to take hits and run full speed."

Then someone said,
"He wants to be a running back."

And I'm thinking "Oh, my goodness."

I've tried, like, closing my eyes
and then running. It's very hard.

And then just to play football, I mean...
[inhales]

...that's a little... it's a little scary.

[chattering]

[Scott Heideman]
As everybody's being introduced to Adonis,

I think they realized pretty quickly
that he's a fearless young man.

[Scott] Wider.

I wanna be more fearless too, man. Right?

What'd you say?

[Scott Heideman]
Watching how his teammates respond,

he's putting his hand
on the back of his teammates,

teammate steps up
to bring him out to the huddle.

Once you spend any kind of time
with Adonis,

you realize that you can't stop him.

So you might as well figure out a way
to encourage him and help him.

You gotta think of it like this:

I had to work so hard

just to convince the coach
to let me be me and let me go.

So knowing that, I mean,
I know how hard I work.

Everybody around me knows how hard I work.

So, I mean, everybody knows
that I do whatever it takes.

[alarm clock beeping]

[alarm stops]

[Veronica] He's up at 4:30 in the morning.

[Scott Heideman] My coaches understand
that they have a job to do:

It's to put the players on the field
who deserve it.

He knows already what he's got to do--

to come to school early
and put in those extra hours

just to be able to even think about being
at the same place that his classmates are.

[chattering, clapping]

[breathing heavily]

[director] Most players rely on sight
to even learn plays.

How do you learn plays?

I just listen to them.

[Scott Heideman] Hit.

[Adonis] Based off the description,
I imagine them in my head.

It's about just practicing

and figuring out
where I'm supposed to be at what time.

[Scott Heideman] He's not a charity case.

That's not what he wants.
That's not what he's about.

That's not what kind of kid he is.

[Veronica] When I see him in his uniform,

you know, for those three hours
his jersey is like his cape.

Like, he's my hero.

[crowd cheering]

[Veronica] Yeah, boy! Bring it!

[Scott Heideman] With Adonis, we
understand what kind of running back he is

and he really is hard to bring down.

-[teammate 1] Let's go, Adonis!
-[teammate 2] Come on, Adonis!

-[teammate 3] Let's go, baby.
-[teammate 1] Bro!

When he's called to do his job,
he wants to do his job

at the very best that he's capable of.

One game, he scored two touchdowns.

-[crowd cheering]
-[teammates shouting indistinctly]

I'd never heard a crowd be so loud.
The coaches had to tell us to be quiet.

[radio DJ] Did you guys hear about
Adonis Watt? He's blind.

Over the weekend he scored two touchdowns.

Amazing!
This high school freshman is blind.

[Jordan] I found out
through my teammates at school.

They were like, "Look up Instagram
right now. Bro, is this your brother?"

And I was like, "Yeah, that's my brother."
[chuckles]

[Scott Heideman]
He had three nice runs into the game.

And I told him this is
something that he earned.

He doesn't need any gifts.

[news anchor] Adonis appeared in
every game during his freshman season

and he even rushed for three touchdowns.

[Marvin] G'morning, Adonis.

[Adonis] When I scored the first time
it was pretty cool,

it being a high school game.

And all this is like... it's regular.

Like me scoring,
that's kind of a regular thing.

Me, being on a winning team,
that's not nothing new.

[man] I wanna do a shout out
to Adonis Watt.

Adonis and I have been running together
for six years.

-[cheering]
-[woman] Whoo!

[Marc Ashton] What makes Adonis strong
is he recognizes his higher purpose.

His purpose is to blaze a pathway.

He is rescuing generations of kids
behind him,

from whatever holds them back.

And all they have to do is point to Adonis

and say, "If he can do it, I can do it."

[cheering]

-Good job.
-[woman] Oh, my God.

[Marvin] This is what's it's all about,
the story of Adonis.

Don't let nothing hold you back.

Do what you want to do and be confident.

That's a blessing, man.

[Adonis] When I'm done playing
high school and college football,

I'm going to the NFL.

[Veronica] He's got some bold dreams,

but they're typical for a 14-year-old.

But people will see he's blind and they're
like, "Oh, he can't dream that big."

Why? Why can't he do that?

Somebody has to be first.

For three years I did not support my kid.

The years of me holding him back are over.

Huh. Nope. I'm on board.

And I want to cheerlead for him.

'Cause I'm gonna be there.

And I'm never gonna not support him.

NFL, we're doing this. Give me a whistle.

If I can show somebody
that they can do what they want

and their dreams can come true,

I guess I did my job.

Just keep going.

Do what you gotta do
and just believe in yourself.

Even when nobody else does.

[Joe Quesada]
I think his nickname should be...

-"The Unstoppable Adonis."
-Great.

We have the potential in each and every
issue to change somebody's life.

So, we had to make sure

that the experience
of recreating Adonis' story

was as exciting for readers
as it was to watch him.

-His story is literally a superhero story.
-Right.

It's already there.
All we had to do is just tell his story.

-He made it easy for us.
-That's what you said when we started.

-You said, "He's already a superhero."
-Yeah.

And the truth of the matter is
we didn't even have enough pages

to really delve into like everything
he could possibly do.

The way we've tried to show his senses,

the way when he's on the field
and he can hear the grass crunching

and within three pages
give the entire experience

of what Adonis has on the field.

We don't lead with the fact
that Adonis can't see, right?

We introduce him,
he's this, you know, star player,

he's kicking butt,
he's knocking people over.

He's scoring a touchdown.

And then, the reveal is of course,
"Oh, Adonis is blind."

We did something we've never done before.

Never done it.

-We printed it in braille for him to read.
-Right here.

[Joe Quesada]
Here we have our opening cover.

And then we've got this
sort of embossing here.

That gives us a sense, you know,

even the fabric of the pants
has got a texture to it.

But you know,
it's not without its challenges.

And it's not without adopting
a completely different approach,

because it takes
so much more space, right,

to write things out in braille than it
would to just write it out anywhere.

But because of the way a comic book's made

and because of the amount of text
that's in a comic book,

we had to almost take it
one or a few panels at a time

rather than a whole page at a time.

But this way he can actually get
the experience

of what is on each one of these images.

-So we broke it down differently.
-[Stephen Wacker] That's great.

Our final page, we've sort of,

given him this sort of tactile feel

where you can feel the jersey,
the legs, the whole thing.

He's right there,
in the flesh so to speak.

It's a great way for Adonis
to share his story.

'Cause I think he's gonna inspire
so many people coming out of this.

-Yeah.
-But he has his own heroes too.

-Yes, he does.
-Yeah.

He loves the NFL.

He does and he has his own heroes.

And maybe, just maybe,
he might get to meet one of them.

-That's gonna be cool.
-It should be.

-It would be for me.
-[chuckles]

[Jordan] Stay low. Cut.

Cut. Cut.

Way to use the ball.
Way to change the ball.

All right, the Ashtons, the Diaz brothers
and Coach is over here with us too.

You gonna come sit on this bench.

There's a box in front of you.
Don't read it yet. Hold on.

I'll tell you about it in a second.

"Dear, Adonis,

your friends at Marvel want you to know
how much we appreciate you.

Yes, physically, you do amazing things.

You play football,

you have a much better free-throw
percentage than our entire office,

you win 5K races.

All of those things are remarkable
but they are not what make you a hero.

What makes you a hero is that
you are blind to limitations.

And what you can see is
that nothing is impossible.

That's why you inspire us
and countless others.

You stand tall amongst the greats
like Black Panther and Spider-Man,

representing everything
that Marvel stands for.

There's a box in front of you.

When you open it,

you'll become a founding member
of the Marvel Hero Project,

an elite group of Avengers-in-training,

who, like you,
are making the world a better place.

Now, reach inside.

We made this jacket just for you.

When you put it on,

we hope you'll feel like
the Marvel superhero you are."

[Veronica]
Oh, check it out. Avengers, heroes.

It was made for you.

[Jordan] "As a token of our admiration
for your courage,

we're making a donation in your honor

to an organization that supports
those who are visually impaired

in the amount of $10,000.

Now that you are
an official Marvel superhero,

the amazing artists in
the mighty Marvel Bullpen

want to make sure your story lives on.

So, inside the box,
you'll find a collector's item classic.

A comic book starring you and who you are.

We hope that as you read these pages,

you recognize yourself
as the hero you truly are.

Your friends at Marvel."

Oh, my gosh. Look at that.

Oh, Adonis.

And it says, "Go, Adonis."

And it does look like him too.

[Veronica, Jordan chuckle]

[Adonis]
For the blind people that wanna read it,

they don't have to rely on other people.

It was just surreal

knowing that the same people that was
doing Black Panther and Avengers,

was like working on a whole thing
just for me.

[Veronica] That means so much.

People don't, you know,
take the time out to do that.

He's been through a lot.
And he works really hard.

I thought he was gonna inspire kids
that were visually impaired

but I can see
he's inspiring just regular people.

And that's what's so exciting.

[Marc Ashton] You look like Spider-Man
in that little bench.

[Scott Heideman] Those abs though, man.

[Jordan laughs]

The imagery of the drawings,
it was like real crisp,

like, you could put it on
like a comic bookshelf and you'd--

It would just fit in perfect.

It was not like, some, like, half deal.

It was, like, legit a Marvel Comic.

To the max.

[Veronica] It was really our son
and it was really braille

and it was really his story
and it was true and authentic.

Like they got it right, you know.

Adonis, I have a letter here
that you can read it to yourself.

It's from Saquon Barkley.

[Saquon Barkley's voice] Dear Adonis,
even though we have never met,

you are one of my heroes.

Your accomplishments,
both on and off the field,

inspire me and so many others.

You once said that being blind

only means that you can't see
limitations for yourself.

I love your competitive nature.

I hope I'm like you in that way.

You've got the heart of a true champion.

So keep going.
Keep reaching for your dreams,

and I'll be waiting for you
when you get here.

Your fan, Saquon.

PS, when I heard Marvel
was making you a superhero comic book,

I couldn't wait to read it.

-What's up, man? It's Saquon.
-[Scott Heideman laughing]

-[Adonis] What's up, bruh?
-[Saquon Barkley] How you doin'?

[Veronica] Oh, my goodness.

You doing good? How you doing?
Saquon, nice to meet you.

Oh, this the comic book?

[Veronica, Scott Heideman laughs]

-This is pretty dope.
-[Adonis] Yeah.

-Hey, man, I just wanna say--
-[all laughing]

I just wanna say that I know that you
got to read the letter and everything,

but what you do, man,
and the way you do it,

you truly deserve a comic book.

You are a superhero, man.

You not only inspire kids,
you inspire athletes like myself.

What you're doing, man, is unbelievable.

I just want you to know

you are really touching
and inspiring people out there.

-[man] Stand up and say hi to him.
-[Veronica] Stand up and say hello.

[Marc Ashton] Oh, my God.

You're taller than I thought.
What's up, man?

I got caught off guard.
Like this is actually him.

It's crazy.

I want a copy of this. [chuckles]

[Saquon Barkley] Man, I don't know.
You got a comic book, though.

[Jordan] Man, we used to watch
your highlights all day.

-You know that, right?
-[Adonis] Nah. I can't do that.

[Jordan] You don't wanna rock it.
[chuckles]

You play the game 'cause you love it
and you're passionate about it.

For me, I go out there every single day

even though, yes, I do get paid,

but in the back of my mind,

I just try to play the best I can
for my team and have fun.

When you have that mind-set,

and obviously I think you epitomize
that better than anyone in this world,

is going out and being passionate
about something you love.

And you said that, yes,
you're blind, you can't see anything,

but you can't see anything
stopping you from your future.

And stuff like that, like,
just blew me away.

So, I just wanna say thank you,
to be honest,

to allow me to be here sitting,
enjoying this quality time with you.

Saquon is one of the guys
I look up to as a hero.

It made me feel like
I was doing something right.

[Saquon Barkley]
Adonis Watt, you gonna come take my job?

[Adonis]
Man, I'm trying to play on the West Coast.

-The West Coast?
-Yeah.

[Saquon Barkley] When you're in the NFL,
you say you're a Giants fan.

[Adonis] Yeah, but it's cold.

[Saquon Barkley chuckles]