| Author |
|
Trevor Smith
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 21 September 2006
Location: Canada
Posts: 3521
|
| Posted: 29 January 2015 at 12:41am | IP Logged | 1
|
|
|
Wow, that's a whole lotta purple and green going on in
that cover Doug posted!
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
e-mail
|
| |
Brian O'Neill
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 13 November 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 1964
|
| Posted: 29 January 2015 at 2:04am | IP Logged | 2
|
|
|
Just for the historical record, that 'Too Many Crooks' story was written by Len Wein, during his relatively brief run on SUPERMAN...another guy I rank ahead of Cary Bates among Super-writers.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Roy Johnson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 19 May 2013
Location: Canada
Posts: 1323
|
| Posted: 29 January 2015 at 6:34am | IP Logged | 3
|
|
|
A little tangent - what's the deal with the Parasite's costume. He's purple, so it's just the trunks and .... that vertical gray thing?
I always thought he was cool though - I mean he can steal your powers, what a villain!
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Greg Woronchak
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 04 September 2007
Location: Canada
Posts: 1631
|
| Posted: 29 January 2015 at 8:05am | IP Logged | 4
|
|
|
Superman does have interesting rogues, but I don't think the older stories did them justice. There was no 'The Joker's Five-way Revenge!' kind of defining tale for Luthor, for example.
I remember fondly Action Comics 544 where Luthor and Braniac were 'updated' (and became instantly cool, in my book).
Solomon Grundy felt like a nice fit against Superman. I guess in the end, it's how the villains are written which determines how memorable they become!
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
| www
e-mail
|
| |
Andrew Bitner
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 June 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 7488
|
| Posted: 29 January 2015 at 8:08am | IP Logged | 5
|
|
|
Maybe Batman's rogues' gallery is just better known. Apart from rare guest appearances, they sure don't seem to fight anyone else in the DCU besides Batman...
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Kip Lewis
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 March 2011
Posts: 2880
|
| Posted: 01 February 2015 at 8:20am | IP Logged | 6
|
|
|
I think Superman might actually be more the norm with
villains.
Superman has a handful of really known villains and a
longer list of second-tier villains.
Hulk is the same. His primary villains are
Abomination and the Leader. Then he has a longer list
of second-tier villains.
Iron Man, he has many many villains, but only a couple
might rise to the level of Mandarin, and I can't even
think of one off the top of my head.
And just looking at the ones who have the really long
run titles--Thor, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman,
Daredevil. They have a few major villains and then a
bunch of other villains.
None of them have the villains that Spider-man, Batman
and Flash have. And I think Eric's point about team
ups might be a factor. Flash's villains have been
called his Rogue's Gallery for a long time and that
has solidified into an actual team. Spider-man's
villains team up regularly and the Sinister Six name
is known and Batman's villains regularly team up. And
with those three, their villains teamming up tends to
make sense. With the exception of Joker after he went
the insane route, Batman, Flash and Spider-man
villains are mostly about one thing--money. (Or
killing the hero.) It is easy to build team-ups around
that. Superman, Iron Man, Thor, Hulk's villains don't
seem to be about one theme. They have multiple
schemes or much more grandiose schemes. Loki teamming
up with Mr. Hyde doesn't make as much sense as Vulture
and Scorpion teamming up, unless their goal is killing
the hero.
(I realizing I'm generalizing here.)
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Jason Schulman
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 08 July 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 2473
|
| Posted: 01 February 2015 at 2:16pm | IP Logged | 7
|
|
|
Re: Hulk villains. From what I remember:
The Leader wants to conquer the world, preferably a world of gamma-people.
The Abomination was a thug-for-hire, essentially (by Xeron the Star-Slayer, MODOK, the Galaxy Master) until he became motivated primarily by ruining the life of Bruce Banner/the Hulk (as if it wasn't tragic enough).
(I think it was only under Peter David's writing that the Abomination started having a consistent personality.)
Tyrannus wants to conquer the surface world.
Zzzax wants to absorb electricity, including brain electricity.
The Bi-Beast wants revenge on the human race. (I think.)
The U-Foes want to kill Banner/Hulk.
Wendigo just wants to kill, generally.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Stephen Robinson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5835
|
| Posted: 01 February 2015 at 2:51pm | IP Logged | 8
|
|
|
Batman's and Spider-Man's villains are, essentially,
"gangsters with gimmicks." And things go wrong when they
stray too far from that concept (one of the reasons, I
think, that The Jackal didn't work).
Superman's villains need to have broader aims, but
somewhat ironically, during the 1950s prior to Brainiac's
first appearance, Superman battled a lot of gangsters
(some not even with gimmicks) while Batman fought aliens
from outer space.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
| www
|
| |
Ray Brady
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 3740
|
| Posted: 01 February 2015 at 3:28pm | IP Logged | 9
|
|
|
I suppose the TV shows helped. The 1960s Batman show codified that he had four primary villains, and all of these were memorably performed. None of Superman's villains ever appeared on his show. It's been a while since I've seen it, but I don't remember a single super-powered bad guy on the Adventures of Superman.
The movies were the same, of course. In four Batman movies, you get eight distinct villains. In seven Superman movies, you get Lex Luthor and Zod.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
| www
|
| |
Eric Smearman
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 02 September 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 5802
|
| Posted: 01 February 2015 at 3:41pm | IP Logged | 10
|
|
|
And (shudder) Nuclear Man.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
e-mail
|
| |
Rick Senger
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 9646
|
| Posted: 01 February 2015 at 6:35pm | IP Logged | 11
|
|
|
Bought Superman 299 and 337 (and most of the ones in between) off the stands and remember them vividly. To my 11-12 year old mind, I was losing money if I didn't buy books containing that many beloved villains on the cover (even with an asterisk.) Marty Pasko had a decent run in there, revitalizing The Parasite and the afforementioned Solomon Grundy, plus some oddball villains like Kobra, the Kryptonoid, etc.
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
e-mail
|
| |
Eric Jansen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 October 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 2294
|
| Posted: 01 February 2015 at 11:56pm | IP Logged | 12
|
|
|
If you watch the deleted scenes and listen to the commentary (yes, there's commentary!) for SUPERMAN 4, you'll see that there was a whole BIZARRO sub-plot that was completely edited out! They played him completely for laughs, but it still brings to mind what might have been. (If I recall correctly, Nuclear Man is actually Bizarro's genetic matter remixed!)
There was one episode of the old SUPERBOY show where Michael J. Pollard appeared in full costume as MR. MXYZPTLK! That was perfect casting...but he gave a really lackluster performance. And it was a little weird seeing a full-grown man dressed in a costume designed for a 3-foot tall imp!
Edited by Eric Jansen on 02 February 2015 at 12:15am
|
| Back to Top |
profile
| search
|
| |
Topic Closed)
