“She’s a bit like the fallen angel in paradise,” Swedish police detective Jan Bublanski says of Lisbeth Salander in The Girl Who Lived Twice. “She serves nobody, belongs to nobody.”
David Lagercrantz’s The Girl Who Lived Twice was published fourteen years after Salander’s initial appearance in Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, yet despite that passage of time the character continues to remain an enigma. While Bublanski referred to her as a “fallen angel,” others have used the term “avenging angel,” as well as “egomaniacal psychopath” and both a “survivor” and “vigilante.” Regardless of the term, there is no doubt that Salander is one of the most fascinating and nuanced female literary characters of contemporary times.
David Lagercrantz was the second author to bring Lisbeth Salander to life on the written page, taking over for Stieg Larsson after his untimely death in 2004. While Lagercrantz was merely following in Larsson’s footsteps, however, he also added to the mythology of Salander. Those flourishes may not have been what Larsson himself intended but provided further depth to the character nonetheless, and even expanded upon the comparison of both “avenging angel” and “vigilante” by elevating Salander to the status of comic book superhero as well.
This shouldn’t be surprising, given the background of the character. While post-Larsson depictions have often compared Lisbeth Salander to a rogue James Bond action hero, it’s not a stretch to further connect the dots to comic book superhero. Although physically the antitheses of Batman – her diminutive ninety-pound frame of a human body hardly compares to that of Bruce Wayne – what Salander lacks in muscle and skills is offset by determination, ferocity, and the ability to measure an opponent’s weaknesses as well as her surroundings.
Intellectually, Lisbeth Salander is on par with the Dark Knight, and maybe even surpasses him. The phrase “genius hacker” is often used to describe her, but both Stieg Larsson and David Lagercrantz took that label even further by portraying Salander as a bona fide mathematical prodigy capable of understanding the inherent mysteries of the universe.
It has likewise been suggested that Lisbeth Salander’s intelligence stems from genetic anomalies inherited from her father – a criminal overlord and mastermind who also spawned a physically superior son who is oblivious to pain and a second daughter who is both cunning and manipulative to the extreme. A dysfunctional family at best, and true den of supervillains at worst.
Although Lisbeth Salander makes no attempt to conceal her identity in the real world like the superheroes of comic books, the virtual world of the Internet is another matter altogether. A prominent member of the international hacktivist community Hacker Republic, Salander uses the pseudonym Wasp to hide her identity online. In the 2015 book The Girl in the Spider’s Web, David Lagercrantz uses that moniker to make the most direct comparison of Lisbeth Salander to comic book superheroes.
During the narrative, Lisbeth Salander’s former guardian Holger Palmgren confides to journalist Mikael Blomkvist that Salander was an avid comic book reader in her youth. “Powerlessness can be a devastating force, and before Lisbeth was old enough to do something about it she needed a place of strength, a refuge,” Palmgren says. “She found that in the world of superheroes. I know better than most how important literature can be, whether it’s comic books or fine old novels, and I know that Lisbeth grew particularly attached to a young heroine called Janet van Dyne.”
Blomkvist is unaware of the character, so Palmgren explains that Janet van Dyne was the daughter of a rich scientist who was murdered by an alien entity. Determined to seek revenge, Janet convinces Hank Pym to use his shrinking formula – which Hank himself used to turn into the original Ant-Man – on her, transforming the young woman into the superhero the Wasp.
“Not just the handle,” Palmgren corrects when Blomkvist makes the obvious connection. “The first time I saw a picture of the Wasp, it gave me a start. There was so much of Lisbeth in her. There still is, in a way. I think she picked up a lot of her style from that character. I don’t want to make too much of it. But I do know she thought a great deal about the transformation Janet van Dyne underwent when she became the Wasp. Somehow she understood that she herself had to undergo the same drastic metamorphosis – from child and victim to someone who could fight back against a highly trained and ruthless intelligence agent.”
David Lagercrantz further expands upon the mythology of Lisbeth Salander in his second book, The Girl Who Takes an Eye for and Eye, when he explains the significance of Salander’s infamous tattoo. According to Lagercrantz, when Lisbeth was six-years-old, she ran away from home and ended up at the Stockholm cathedral of Storkyrkan. Inside she discovered the statue of Saint George and the Dragon. The famous sculpture portrays Saint George on horseback, his sword raised and ready to slay the already dying dragon beneath him. A woman – the damsel in distress – stands nearby, with an unconcerned expression on her face.
In Salander’s eyes, however, it was the dragon who was the victim, just as she and her mother were victims of her father’s cruelty. Saint George in turn was her father while the woman was representative of the various government officials who had looked the other way when it came to her father’s violent behavior.
Later in The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye, Lisbeth speaks at Holger Palmgren’s funeral. “The last time we saw each other, we talked about the statue,” she begins. “He wanted to know why I was so fascinated by it. I told him that I had never seen it as a monument to a heroic deed, but rather as a representation of a terrible assault. He understood immediately, and asked, ‘What about the fire the dragon is breathing?’ I said it was the same fire that burns inside everyone who is being trampled on. The same fire that can turn us into ashes and waste, but which sometimes can become something totally different – a force which allows us to strike back.”
In Christopher Nolan’s film Batman Begins, a young Bruce Wayne falls through a sealed-up well into a hidden cave under Wayne Manor, fracturing his arm. Adding to his distress, the cave is filled with a swarm of bats that attack him. A few days later, Bruce admits to his father that he was afraid of the bats and has been having nightmares ever since. Unfortunately those nightmares would only grow worse, as that very evening was the fateful night when both his parents would be murdered.
Like Lisbeth Salander with the dragon, Bruce Wayne would use the bat as a symbol for his own fight against the criminal elements of Gotham City. Meant to induce fear, the bat of Batman would be transformed into an emblem of hope for the hopeless, just as the dragon of St. George would likewise become a similar symbol in the hands of Lisbeth Salander.
There’s no way of knowing if the comparisons that David Lagercrantz makes in regards to wasps and dragons are in line with Stieg Larsson’s original vision of Lisbeth Salander, but they are intriguing additions nonetheless. Bruce Wayne is often the poster child for superhero wannabees of the real world, as his skills are neither otherworldly nor supernatural but the result of hard work and intellectual curiosity.
If Batman proved that anyone can be a superhero, the same can be said of Lisbeth Salander – a ninety-pound misfit with subpar social skills who has the intelligence and perseverance to fight evil just as well as the Dark Knight.
Anthony Letizia