01x07 - The Dazzling Lorelei

[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.

Lorelei was born
missing half of her heart.

With Lorelei's diagnosis,
you never know how long you have.

I make compression heart pillows
for pediatric children.

If you give love, you get love.

[narrator] Lorelei is already a hero.

Now, we bring her story to the world
with the surprise of a lifetime:

making her into a Marvel superhero,

immortalized in her 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.

[man] For decades,

some of our creators, from Stan Lee
to Jack Kirby to John Romita,

they've been on the search every month

for those stories that make a hero
out of the normal person.

And when I think about that,
I go right to Lorelei.

More than just about anyone,
she exemplifies everything Marvel.

This awesome, funny, cool girl.

She's born with this
very serious heart condition,

but she doesn't let it stop her
for a second.

She's born with half a heart, right?
But I feel like she's all heart.

You know, she exemplifies so much love

that her entire purpose
is to give love to other people.

I can't get enough of her.

Right? The Heart Hug pillows.

And she's just sending them out
to so many people.

People who have similar heart conditions.

Something that could've made her
so vulnerable.

And now she feels invincible.

It kinda gets me thinking of Rogue
from the X-Men.

You know, here's someone whose challenges
are wrapped up in her powers.

You know,
she's able to empathize with you.

It's so personable,
such a one-to-one thing.

She doesn't let her fears get in the way
of relating to other people.

You were talking about
invincibility earlier

and I realized, oh, my God,
Invincible Iron Man!

He had an accident
and he had a heart condition.

And at that moment he realized
how important and how precious life was,

and he decided he had to do good
for the rest of his life.

And Lorelei, in the same way,

understands just the preciousness
of the singular moments.

That every single person matters
outside of herself.

She wants to send a hug to everyone.

It's great.
I think she's gonna fit in perfectly

with some of our great heroes.

[woman] "Dear Little Miss Lorelei,

I'm also a congenital-heart-defect
survivor.

Thank you for all the good things you do
with Heart Hugs.

When I was little, I had those huge
ugly pillows for grown-ups.

I always wished for a pillow
that was made especially for me

and that looked pretty.

I want you to know
that you changed a child's life: mine.

I learned that I was not alone.

That others had to endure hospital stays,
procedures and even surgeries.

And they learned you'd cheered them on
the whole time,

whether you knew them or not.

You are an amazing
and inspiring little girl,

and I know you'll keep changing the world.

Big hugs, Erin."

I really like her.

Yeah.

[Lorelei] That's my boy.

[woman] I've always known that there was
something special about Lorelei.

She truly seems like someone who was
brought into this world with a purpose.

We went in to be able to have the baby,

um, and then kind of mourned that loss.

The doctor said,
"I'm not comfortable doing anything

until I do an ultrasound."

I remember her saying, "There's a flicker.

It's a weird flicker, but it's a flicker.

There's a baby in here that's living."

[man] I remember Chel and I,
we held each other's hands.

There was a flood of different emotions.

There's a sadness for losing Rory.

But there was a rush of excitement

that there was this little life
that was fighting...

that just refused to give up.

That's Lorelei.

Congenital heart def--

a congenital heart defe--

I'm missing half of my heart,
the left side.

[Steve] Lorelei was only 36 hours old

when they did her first
open heart surgery.

Lorelei is extremely brave
in being able to take this on

and face it every day.

It can be very humbling
to have to tell them

that I really don't know
what the future holds.

I'm always tired.

Yeah, but...

I'm not letting death take me this far.

[Dr. Meryl Cohen] There's pain
associated with heart surgery.

It's like experiencing
a broken bone in your chest.

When you breathe,
it comes with a lot of discomfort.

When children are able to hug a pillow,

that brings them some comfort
and allows them to take deeper breaths

and potentially helps them
to recover faster.

[laughs]

After my, what was it?
Third open heart surgery, um...

my lungs collapsed
and so they brought in a pillow.

And when I tried to squeeze it,
it was much too big for me.

So, I decided to make, um...

smaller ones for smaller kids.

Such as...

this.

[Chellie] She was learning how to sew.
She would start sewing one pillow a day.

[Steve] What she wanted to do
was help other kids.

She's a very loving little girl,

and it was like
an instant decision for her.

When you consider
that every one in 100 children

is born with a congenital heart defect,

then people know people who have surgeries
or have surgeries coming up,

and then as they would have these cute,
adorable little pillows in the hospital,

other families were like,
"Oh, my goodness! Where did you find that?

That is so adorable."

And so, word started to spread.

And Lorelei and I were like,
"Well, what do we do?"

And Lorelei's like, "Well, they need it.

We need to get it to 'em."

We started handing out these patterns
to different civic groups

throughout the community
such as Boy Scouts,

Girl Scouts, 4-H, nursing homes.

They came out of the woodwork,
and they started making the pillows.

And it became so big.

[Lorelei] I've sent pillows to Ireland,

the rest of the UK,
Spain, Vietnam, Canada.

[Chellie] You work on every continent
except for Antarctica.

Because we don't know any penguins
with hypoplastic left heart syndrome.

[laughs]

It wasn't that bad.

This bag here. And then I'll have to
take a look in that bag over there

to see what size those are,

and then that'll be plenty for
both of the hospitals for a while,

'cause they're smaller. Okay?

Aw, it has little ducks.

-[Chellie] That's cool.
-That's adorable.

[Steve] I remember Lorelei
in the hospital herself.

She's going around the floor
as a patient herself

and visiting people in there.

She didn't talk at all about herself,
what she had felt.

She asked them, "How are you?
What are you feeling?"

She just shares hope with you
when she walks into a room.

[Dr. Meryl Cohen] I've seen Lorelei
and her family come to the hospital

to try to make
other children's lives better.

To bring comfort to a patient
who is going through that is wonderful.

-Hey.
-What are you drawing over here?

I was making this for you and Aunt Kelly.

[young man 1] How does that go?

-How's it--
-You have half--

You have half a body. I have half a heart.

Yeah, that's it.
Half a body, half a heart.

[chuckles]

She's always thinking about other people,

always worried about
what other people are feeling.

M and L.

She's just Lorelei. [chuckles]
She's just full of love.

[young man 2] Being in the hospital,
you have different visitors who are...

whether it's politicians
or famous people or whoever.

You can tell who's sincere.

Immediately. You can tell who's sincere.

[Lorelei] Here are some blowguns.

[Tim Donley] That's crazy.

[Lorelei]
Don't blow them at anyone, please.

-[Mark Fidler] Oh, nice.
-That sticks pretty good.

He took...

[Lorelei] I fight for people like
Uncle Mark and Uncle Tim

to have good cardiac care.

Because right now, no one is really
taking care of them, really.

[Mark Fidler] Lorelei's really
been trying, you know,

working to get us as much help...
whatever help we need.

I don't care about myself so much as them.
I love them.

[Chellie] You've had a super big day,

and I have a feeling
what you are doing right now

is using all of that energy
just to keep yourself awake.

[kisses]

These are all the different kiddos
who have sent us stuff over the years.

[Lorelei] Oh...

[Chellie] Do you remember Emilia?

She's from West Virginia.

I don't really remember
any of the kids' names.

-[Lorelei sighs]
-Do you remember Louis? Teresa?

-Teresa?
-Mm-hmm.

I remember her.

I wish she was still here.

Yeah.

But I think that's one of the reasons
why we should sit down

and look at these things.
You know what I mean?

So that you can keep...
even though you've forgotten,

because of some of the things
that you've had to go through,

I think it's good for you
to go back and see

how many people you've been able to help.

And then this one here says,
"Dear Lorelei,

you are very special and have
a more perfect heart than most people.

Here is a hug for your heart from me.
Love, Cassie."

[kisses] Isn't that cool?

This is Henry right here,

and that was when we were living
in Maryland.

Actually, I just don't really remember
any of the kids.

I know, I know. Does that bother you?

Yeah. That's gotta be hard.

That's a lot for a little girl
to have to deal with.

I would give her my heart if I could.

My friend has a daughter
who needed to have a liver transplant,

and Julia was able to give her
part of her liver.

I would do anything for that, but I can't.

[Lorelei] Hey, Easy. Easy-peasy.

[Steve] With Lorelei's diagnosis,
you never know how long you have.

[woman] Did you feel that?

Stay tall and feel your seat bones,
ladies!

[Steve] She has this heart condition.
There is no cure.

We can choose
to look at the future for her

as something that's dire.

[woman] That's a good job, Lorelei.
Keep those hands down a little lower.

[Steve] Or we can choose to say...

"This little girl,
she's not only survived, she has thrived.

She has fought.
She is conquering her life.

And this little girl
is not ready to give up yet."

[Lorelei] I consider myself very lucky.

I have such amazing friends,
such an amazing family.

[Tim Donley]
Her attitude rubs off on people.

Everybody she comes in contact with.

They're a little more accepting,

a little more caring,
a little more loving.

[Chellie] She thinks about,

"When I wake up today,
who am I gonna help?"

That's truly her legacy:

Do what you can to help other people.

And that's all
we can really control in life.

[Lorelei] I am not thinking
I'm giving them my literal heart.

But, yes, I give them
bits of my love and joy.

And that never runs out.

I hope.

But think about it,
if you give love, you get love.

If you give happy, you usually get happy.

Lorelei says these things
that are so moving.

Words of the amount of love that you give,
that's what you're going to get back.

The amount of happiness you give,
that's what you're gonna get back.

I feel like those are the words that
we all really, really need to live by.

She is just the embodiment

-...of love.
-...of love. Yeah, absolutely.

That's the best way to start a story.

We had to really think about that.

Our solution was to imbue that power
into this thread

that Lorelei uses to create her pillows.

We tried to kind of keep the idea
of pastels,

and we really wanted to put that color
into the story.

We're talking about something
that's pretty difficult and yet,

you know, the brightness of the colors
is also just sort of,

just the brightness of her spirit too,

-you know?
-Yes, absolutely.

I feel like the reason that we wanted
to have this amazing splash page

-at the very, very end...
-Yeah.

...is just to showcase how far
that love has spread across the world.

Every hero needs their trusty sidekick,

and she's got one with Mandu,
her service dog.

Which is why we thought it made sense
to go back to the service dog facility

where she first got Mandu.

Pretty important place to her,

and that's where we wanted
to start celebrating Lorelei.

Lorelei's been through a lot of struggles,

and she's giving a lot of herself
to other people, you know?

She has a birthday coming up,

and we thought it was the perfect time
to give back to her

and hopefully give her a really,
really memorable birthday.

[cheering, clapping]

Lorelei,
you have been such a great support

to Susquehanna Service Dogs

-for so many years.
-[dogs whining]

[laughing]

[all] Aw!

Aw, puppies.

[Pam Foreman] So, they've given you
the naming rights to this whole litter.

Aw, it's a baby Mandu!

[Pam Foreman]
So this, Lorelei, is Lorelei's litter.

They're so cute. Who's a cute puppy?

Your twin brother, he didn't make it.

And so we wanted to make sure
that there was a puppy

that was named in his honor.

And so this one's called Rory.

[chuckles]

[Steve chuckles] I think Rory likes you.

[Pam Foreman] Yeah, definitely.

-[Chellie] And your hair.
-[Steve] And your hair. [chuckles]

Puppies are so tiny and adorable.

So, we actually have
one more surprise for you.

"Dear Lorelei. This room is filled
with people who love you,

and who feel better about themselves
because of you.

And there are so many others who have
felt the power of your love

and been lifted by your beautiful heart.

The team at Marvel recognizes that
you never stop working to help others,

and yet ask nothing in return.

Marvel heroes, like Iron Man,
have always used personal struggles

to empower themselves
in the service of others.

And in doing just that, you represent
everything Marvel stands for.

There is a box in front of you.

Open it and begin your initiation
into a special group of kids like you.

Kids whose compassion
and courage amaze us.

Welcome to The Marvel Hero Project."

[cheering]

[Steve]
"This jacket was made just for you.

Now that you're an official member
of the Marvel Hero Project,

we hope you wear it with pride.

Lorelei, you are devoted to raising funds
for all kinds of causes.

We want to help, too.
So, we are making a donation in your honor

to an organization that supports
pediatric care

in the amount of $10,000."

[cheering]

"There's one more surprise in the box,

and it's from the mighty Marvel Bullpen.

An instant collector's item.

It's The Dazzling Lorelei number one.

A comic book inspired by you.

We hope that in these pages,

you see yourself
in the same way we see you."

-There's Mandu!
-There's Mandu!

"As a true Marvel superhero,

welcome to The Marvel Hero Project.

Signed, your friends at Marvel."

It's, like, your life.

[all] Aw!

[cheering]

Happy Birthday.

[girl] It's a hard decision.

I have to choose Iron Man or Lorelei?

I think Lorelei. Definitely Lorelei.
[laughs]

[Steve] Spider-Man was my hero growing up,

because he just did what was right
because it was right.

And to see my daughter
be put into a comic book as a superhero

is really amazing.

"I believe in the power of love.
Love creates new life.

And love can carry us
through our worst moments."

I also really like that
they put in pictures of other kids, too.

'Cause when you have the people that
you really, really love and care about,

because you guys
go through hell together...

it's not just about us.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure
that was my favorite part, too.

I think my favorite part was the part
where it shows, like, all the thread.

And then it shows her
picking her materials.

And I really like the part
where it shows her sewing it.

It looks really interesting.

I really like the front page
where she's just showing the love

and she's just pushing it out
to the whole world.

And I think it's really sweet
that she didn't just do it for herself.

She did it for everybody.

I met these two in the hospital.

I like her.

I love her.

I love them!

[Steve] She's so humble.

She doesn't see what she does
as a big deal.

She just thinks
it's what's supposed to be done.

She's a superhero,
and I think there's no question of that.