Today in Black History Month in Comics (part one):
Storm is probably one of the most popular Black Women in superheroes & comics. It doesn't help that for many, by no fault of theirs, Storm is one of the few Black Women given a large amount of shine by her membership in the X-Men. And yes, I'm a Storm fan. I'm a huge fan of her evolution as a person and her powers are amazing. But take away her powers and what do you have?
A complete badass. Cyclops found out the hard way.
For a stint of time, Storm was without her powers. Thanks to Forge's Neutralizer gun, Storm was stripped of her powers (issue 184). When I was younger I was furious. However it lead to Storm being seen not only in a new light, but cementing her place as the one hero you don't want the smoke from.
Cyclops was having a moral dilemma, his heart was with the X-Men and his commitment to Professor Xavier's dream. On the flip side, he had a wife and newborn that needed his attention and love. It didn't help that his wife Madelyne was nearly an exact clone of his long dead former love Jean Grey (But that's a whole other story. Also I want to add while I dig Cyclops the hero, Scott Summers is a trashy dude. Again, a story for another time...).
Storm and Cyclops agreed to have a duel in the Danger Room, the X-Men's training area powered with holograms, robots, and such. The whole time Cyclops saw this as an unfair match. Storm had no powers and Cyclops believed he was the better combatant, despite his respect for Storm. One stray shot from his Optic Blast, match over. So when the lights dimmed and the fight started in a ruined city, Cyclops thought he had won this match.
Wrong.
Storm made Cyclops look like a rank amateur. Storm pushed and pressured Cyclops into several mistakes and ended by snatching his visor that controlled his eye beams off his face. Had Cyclops not been distracted with his own thoughts, perhaps the duel would have went his way. Storm fairly brought up that Cyclops can't spread himself so thin and be a proper leader for the X-Men and husband & father to his family.
Storm went on to have several successful stints as field leader/leader of the X-Men. When she had no powers, Storm faced many powerful foes. Some she might have easily handled with her powers, many more would have taxed her at full strength. And yet, Storm was never a liability to her team, only a power asset.
Eventually Storm would regain her powers in full. For a Young Kofi, seeing a Black Woman leading my favorite team while being powerless was empowering and showed how powerful we are. Superpowers or not.