As 2022 began the world was fearful for Ukraine, as the might of the Russian military accumulated on its borders. Few gave the Ukrainians any hope of resisting a Russian invasion, but they had underestimated both the resolve of the Ukrainian people, and the abilities of its President to rally them in defense of their homeland. Vlodomyr Zelenskyy started the year as a former comedian who had become President of a country through unlikely circumstances. He ends it as a defiant figure who has faced down one of the largest armies on Earth, a Secret Superhero whose courage in the face of adversity has mobilized an entire nation to beat incredible odds. 

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A DISTRACTED LAW STUDENT

Zelenskyy was born in 1977 in Kryvyi Rih, the largest city in Central Ukraine, to comfortable middle class parents; his father, Oleksandyr, is a computer scientist and university professor, and his mother Rymma an engineer. Much of Oleksandyr’s work during the Soviet era was carried out in the Mongolian city of Erdenet, where he was stationed for 20 years. Volodymyr spent four years in Mongolia before returning to Ukraine to begin his schooling, where he excelled. He also developed a strong sense of justice thanks to the influence of his parents, citing his father as the reason for his staunch anti-corruption positions. As he told Ukrainian journalist Dmitri Gordon in 2018 - “I can't help but react when I hear something, especially if it concerns money. I know that my father will call and say: "Why didn't you say anything! You have to speak up. You know how ashamed I am to walk down the street, you know how I am respected at the university..." 

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This strong aversion to corruption and dishonesty, coupled with an early interest in international relations, led Volodymrr to study law at the Kryvyi Rih Institute of Economics, but thanks to another burgeoning talent he never put his degree to use. At the age of 17 he applied to join a team participating in the KVN, a popular Russian television variety show where clubs compete to provide the funniest answers in quizzes, and perform the best comic sketches. Zelenskyy was immediately successful, and invited to join Zaporizhia-Kryvyi Rih-Transit, one of Ukraine’s biggest KVN teams that competed in the prestigious KVN Major League. Three years later, Zelenskyy’s side won the Major League competition, prompting him to start his own KVN team, called Kvartal 95, in 1998. His ambitions of becoming involved in international politics were put on hold as he pursued a more glamorous life as an entertainer, actor and satirist. 

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SERVANT OF THE PEOPLE

Zelenskyy would continue to perform and compete with Kvartal 95 for another five years, touring extensively throughout Russian-speaking countries, before controversy hit his team in 2003. Zelenskyy claims that he was asked by the KVN organizers to abandon his team and join the KVN organizers; he refused, and instead publicly quit the KVN competition. Kvartal 95 were now no longer a team competing in a game show, but an independent media organization, but this newfound freedom only bolstered Zelenskyy’s popularity within Ukraine. Kvartal 95 began producing hit television shows for Ukrainian television, and Volodymyrr himself became even more in demand, appearing in numerous successful movies, and even providing the Ukrainian dubbing for hit western films such as Paddington. He was also in demand with politicians, relating one instance where the Kvartal Studio were hired to perform live sketches in front of a private audience of two: Russian Premier Dmitry Medevedev and the Ukrainian President, Viktor Yanukovych. While these occasions proved awkward, Kvartal 95 continued to grow, and by the time of Russia’s invasion of the Crimea and Donbass regions in 2014, Kvartal 95 was able to make sizable financial donations to the Ukrainian army, something which led to calls for the studio’s shows to be banned in Russia. 

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Zelenskyy’s experiences with KVN and Kvartal gave him plenty of opportunity to meet politicians at all levels, and he put this experience to use in 2015 with the launch of a fateful new series, Servant of the People. Zelenskyy plays a school teacher, Vasily Petrovych Goloborodko, who is unwittingly filmed by one of his students while ranting about corruption in Ukrainian politics. The student uploads the video to YouTube, and Goloborodko goes viral, sparking a grassroots campaign that eventually catapults him into the Presidency. The show didn’t just prove to be Kvartal 95’s most popular to date, but also a self-fulfilling prophecy. After three seasons, Zelenskyy’s popularity was such that he formed his own political party, also called Servant of the People, and put himself forward as a candidate for the 2019 Presidential election. His campaign was characterized by a reluctance to engage with traditional media outlets, preferring instead to use social media videos and other viral tactics to speak directly to voters, and this proved enormously effective. Much like Goloborodko, he won a landslide victory, defeating the incumbent Petro Poroshenko with 73.2% of the vote. 

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THE SECRET SUPERHERO

Zelenskyy’s presidential campaign pledges were largely focused on domestic policy, but military matters have taken precedence following the second Russian invasion of Ukraine, which eventually began in February 24th, 2022. The mobilization of Russian troops along the border had begun almost a year earlier, and while Zelenskyy had plenty of time to plan a military response, few observers gave the Ukrainians any hope of withstanding the might of the Russian military and expected a swift conclusion to the invasion. However, when the conflict finally began it quickly became clear that pundits had underestimated Ukrainian resolve to defend themselves from aggression, something which was most clearly embodied by the actions of Zelenskyy, leading by example from the front line.

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On the night the invasion began, Zelenskyy posted a video to Youtube of himself and several high-ranking government ministers dressed in plain combat fatigues in an outdoor location in Kyiv. Zelenskyy holds the camera, and introduces his colleagues and then himself as simply being “here”, a show of defiance that resonated throughout Ukraine and around the world, and further galvanized efforts to resist the Russian invasion. What had previously been seen as a foregone conclusion by foreign observers now appeared more complicated, and as the stalwart resistance of Ukrainian volunteer forces caused the Russian advance on Kyiv to flounder in the city’s suburbs, it became clear that the conflict would not be over quickly. The Russians, who were not expecting a rearguard action, were poorly supplied, and after several weeks of intense fighting, the Ukrainian military launched a successful counter offensive which pushed the Russians back, and by the start of April Russian troops had retreated completely from the Kyiv region. 

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Although the conflict continues to rage on the Eastern front, Russia’s failed attack on Kyiv has proven hugely valuable as a symbol of Ukrainian resistance, and provided Zelenskyy with an opportunity to marshall international support. That support, coupled with the continued defiance of the Ukrainian military, has prolonged the resistance against the Russian invasion for far longer than anyone believed was possible, and as 2022 draws to an end there is no sign of Ukrainian resolve cracking any time soon. That is at least in part thanks to the example set by its leader, a Secret Superhero who many made the mistake of underestimating, but who has played to his strengths as a communicator and helped lead his country in a remarkable defense against extraordinary odds. 

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