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Topic: DC ’homages’ Marvel? Post ReplyPost New Topic
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Rebecca Jansen
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 11:39am | IP Logged | 1 post reply

Thinking of how the Imperial Guard in The X-Men were (mostly) Superboy And The Legion Of Super-Heroes under other names, and The Squadron Supreme in the Avengers were the Justice League, and I've even read that Moon Knight was started as Marvel's version of Batman... are there any instances of DC doing the 'favor' back to Marvel? Did they ever cook up a Spider-Man stand-in, or a patriotic Captain America? I've tried and I really can't think of much. It usually goes the other way... The Atom before Ant-Man (and Dollman before either, I know)... Swamp Thing preceding Man-Thing (and The Heap way back before either of course, I even had the '70s Skywald comic of him)... even The Doom Patrol before The X-Men (not that the mutants were copied in any sense)...

I suppose to answer my own question you could say the Creeper was a bit DC's Spider-Man, but mostly because of Ditko, and Wonder Woman was star-spangled and had an eagle symbol originally, but somehow never representing the U.S. of A. in the way Captain America (or The Shield) did. Lobo might've been a bit of a response to Wolverine's '80s popularity, but pretty much a one-note as a character in my opinion, which Wolverine hopefully only rarely was.

I'll stop typing, but I do want to find something to show it wasn't only a one-way street of Marvel 'homaging' DC characters.


Edited by Rebecca Jansen on 12 January 2021 at 11:42am
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Peter Martin
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 11:59am | IP Logged | 2 post reply

DC's Bumblebee seems to have some curious similarities to Marvel's Wasp.
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Paul Gibney
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 12:23pm | IP Logged | 3 post reply

You could go all the way back to Aquaman/Sub-mariner, of course.
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Ed Love
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 12:31pm | IP Logged | 4 post reply

In the 1970s, both the Invaders and the Freedom Fighters fought a group called the Crusaders who were pastiches of the other company's team. With Marvel, a couple of the characters, Dynamite and Spirit of '76 characters would become larger parts of the company's lore. For DC, the character disguised as a shield slinging patriot was actually the Freedom Fighters' recurring foe Silver Ghost.

The Justice League fought the Heroes of Angor who were Avengers analogs. They were brought back in the late 1980s and the two survivors Blue Jay (Yellowjacket) and Silver Sorceress (Scarlet Witch) appeared occasionally in the League. Their foes, the Extremists were based on Marvel villains. They also appeared in the big final fight of JLA/Avengers.

What initially seemed to be a one-off, Superman faced a group of four whose powers had mutated them painfully and was quickly killing them. They were easily recognizable as riffs on the Fantastic Four. Ultimately driven insane, the leader of the four Hank Henshaw would eventually return as the Cyborg-Superman.

The closest to DC producing their own Captain America was probably Gerry Conway's Steel, the Indestructible Man. Likewise, I think their answer to Spider-man was Firestorm.

The Justice League Unlimited had some fun using DC characters in Marvel roles and a couple of episodes centered around making a DC version of the Defenders: Dr. Fate (Dr. Strange), Hawkgirl (Nighthawk, even called "Birdnose" at one point), Aquaman (Namor), Solomon Grundy (the Hulk).
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Daniel Gillotte
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 12:39pm | IP Logged | 5 post reply

I definitely think that Lobo = Wolverine.

Wolfman/ Perez- New Teen Titans = X-men. OK, obviously not an analogue but in storytelling and feel, it sure felt cut from the same cloth.

And maybe I'm missing the point but isn't Deathstroke more or less Taskmaster?

The Bwahaha Justice League had some stand-ins: the Champions of Agnor were definitely Avengers- Thor, Wasp/ Yellowjacket, Scarlet Witch.
General Glory and Ernie the Battlin' Boy- obvs Cap and Bucky.

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Rebecca Jansen
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 12:44pm | IP Logged | 6 post reply

Bumblebee and Steel fit the mold. Taskmaster being followed by Deathstroke seems more a function of George Perez bringing the basic concept with him from Avengers to New Teen Titans just a few months later. Firestorm had a lot of differences from Spider-Man, but a young guy with problems ala Peter Parker fits, but could also be Nova.

I never ran across the Angor characters in The Justice League; it sounds fun and the sort of thing I was hoping to learn of! While searching for more about them I also ran into a DC Louse-Man! :^D


Edited by Rebecca Jansen on 12 January 2021 at 12:47pm
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Ed Love
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 2:43pm | IP Logged | 7 post reply

Forgot all about General Glory. Clearly a pastiche of the various golden-age patriotic heroes

When they decided to give Rex the Wonder Dog a secret origin, it was basically Captain America's.

The John Henry Irons version of Steel as well as the Malibu imprint's Hardware could be seen as variations of the Iron Man/War Machine motif.

Taskmaster vs. Deathstroke - I think that is just more the same visual designer than character similarity. Although Taskmaster seems to have been used more and more as a Deathstroke type mercenary but they were very different in terms of personality and M.O initially. Deadpool was initially designed to be based on Deathstroke though.

Mogul strikes me as DC's answer to Thanos who was himself a riff on Darkseid.

For the most part, I tend to think DC's characters tend to be more iconic archetypes in nature leading to an easier copying, whereas with the Marvel characters, DC already has characters they rarely use that could easily fit into the mold of Marvel characters without creating new ones, many they have acquired from buying other companies. Marvel keeps trying with Shang Chi and Iron Fist in limited series, but DC seems content to let the likes of Judomaster, Richard Dragon, Bronze Tiger, and Karate Kid to gather dust. In fact, they keep killing off the latter. Their answer to Thor tends to be Wonder Woman these days
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Mike Benson
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 3:12pm | IP Logged | 8 post reply

It goes both ways.   But Marvel has seemed desperate, at least of late, to have their own Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman.  Feel like they have a half dozen Superman pastiches running around.   Marvel came to prominence partially by being so different than DC.  Not sure what fuels these efforts.  Maybe they just want characters that can beat the Big 3 in an internet fight?


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Daniel Gillotte
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Posted: 12 January 2021 at 3:54pm | IP Logged | 9 post reply

Yeah, the Dematties/ Giffen/ Maguire team is so deeply Marvel Method it's kind of amazing. While JLA is known for its humor, the fact that it's built visually and then scripted gives it a character that a lot of DC books always lacked. And, of course, Stan added a lot of humor in his scripting so that makes sense. (I'm no historian, so I'm happy to be corrected on this if I have facts wrong.)



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Greg McPhee
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Posted: 13 January 2021 at 2:40am | IP Logged | 10 post reply

I'd say Guardian is a riff on Captain America.

Black Racer / Silver Surfer - Kirby homage to himself.

Imperiex was DC's answer to Galactus.

Zatanna / Scarlet Witch.
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Philippe Negrin
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Posted: 13 January 2021 at 3:30am | IP Logged | 11 post reply

They're not that popular in France and I'm very ignorant about them but aren't Swamp-Thing and Man-Thing more or less the same characters ?
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Matt Hawes
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Posted: 13 January 2021 at 7:02am | IP Logged | 12 post reply

Not any more than The Hulk and The Thing are the same because they are monster-heroes, Phillippe. Swamp-Thing is an intelligent creature, while Ma-Thing is more of a mindless force. Both were once humans who lost their humanity,  like Hulk and The Thing, but the stories told with them are typically different other than the horror elements.

I will also take this moment to note that many fans and comics historians debate if one ripped off the other. It's funny to me to suggest that either was ripping off the other, as they both were clearly ripping off the basic premise (with differences,  naturally ) of The Heap. I figure what happened is that since both swamp creatures were created during the early 1970s,  at the time that the Comics Code Authority laxed some of its rules, the creators ar both DC and Marvel saw it as a ripe time to revive The Heap in a fashion. That same period  also saw the emergence of Dracula,  Werewolf by Night, Frankenstein's Monster, Ghost Rider, and other horror characters in comics again,  too. 


Edited by Matt Hawes on 13 January 2021 at 7:05am
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