Jab’s Builds! (Miss Piggy! The Swedish Chef! Sweetums! Gonzo!)

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BriarThrone
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Re: Clor

Post by BriarThrone »

Woodclaw wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 12:21 am
Jabroniville wrote: Thu Oct 19, 2017 9:46 pm -So when Mark Millar was writing Civil War, he naturally came to the conclusion that fans would turn on Captain America's side and join Tony Stark's more reasonable, The-Government-Should-Control-Superheroes side, since the government has always been a 100% good-natured force for justice in the Marvel Universe, and has never TOTALLY been infiltrated by HYDRA, the Red Skull or any other super-villains. And so Millar felt the need to include several "negative points" to make the Pro-Registration side look bad. This included building a prison in the Negative Zone and trapping heroes there, putting supervillains in the position to hunt down Anti-Registration heroes, and... this guy. The problem of course was that fans (and many writers) DIDN'T fall into line with Stark's point of view, so having the Pro-Reg side be full of piss-poor decision making, no due-process, and be involved in numerous ethics violations... just served to make that side seem EVEN WORSE.
The big issue about the entire Civil War storyline was that Millar snd his fellow authors went the extra mile to remove any major powerhouses, like Hulk or Thor, to prevent any of the two side from having a massive advantage in power (also I don't think that either of those would have bow down to the U.S. goverment ever), but they completely failed to realize that the entire deal was first and foremost and ideological battle, which made Cap a much bigger problem than Thor or Hulk would have ever been. You just can't take the one guy that has been the moral compass of the entire superhero community for decades, the one guy who was pretty established having enough courage, integrity and force of will to make gods back down and just say: "He's wrong."

[Also apply all of the above at the Nth power to Secret Empire ...]
I'm just astonished that they had the clarity to put Cap on the side against government overreach. Though, from what I read, they thought they HAD to do that to preserve any moral ambiguity to the event. Without that, Marvel believed that the fans would simply declare Pro-Reg obviously correct, which would rob the event of any pathos.

For similar reasons, they made Tony, Reed, and Hank act like Nazis. "For the right reasons." And it really did rob the event of pathos.
Jabroniville
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Gorr

Post by Jabroniville »

Image

GORR THE GOD-BUTCHER
Created By:
Jason Aaron & Esad Ribic
First Appearance: Thor- God of Thunder #2 (Jan. 2013)
Role: One-Shot Villain, God-Slayer
PL 16 (193)
STRENGTH
10 STAMINA 18 AGILITY 5
FIGHTING 12 DEXTERITY 2
INTELLIGENCE 10 AWARENESS 5 PRESENCE 4

Skills:
Expertise (Science) 10 (+20)
Expertise (Theology) 10 (+20)
Intimidation 7 (+11)
Perception 5 (+10)
Technology 10 (+20)

Advantages: 
Chokehold, Diehard, Fearless, Favored Foe (Gods), Improved Initiative 2, Power Attack, Quick Draw, Ranged Attack 6, Seize Initiative, Startle

Powers:
Senses 2 (Darkvision) [2]

"All-Black The Necrosword" (Flaws: Easily Removable) (Feats: Unbreakable) [32]
Flight 10 (2,000 mph) (Flaws: Winged) (10)
"Shroud of Darkness" Concealment (Vision) 2 (Extras: Attack, Area- 30ft. Burst) (8)

"Magical Weapons" Strength-Damage +10 (Feats: Improved Critical 4, Reach 5) (Extras: Penetrating 14) (33)
-- (51 points)

Offense:
Unarmed +12 (+10 Damage, DC 25)
Magical Weapons +12 (+20 Damage, DC 35)
Initiative +13

Defenses:
Dodge +12 (DC 22), Parry +12 (DC 22), Toughness +18, Fortitude +18, Will +8

Complications:
Obsession (Killing Gods)- Blaming impartial Gods for the deaths of his family, Gorr is devoted to exterminating all of them.

Total: Abilities: 112 / Skills: 42--21 / Advantages: 16 / Powers: 34 / Defenses: 10 (193)

-Gorr the God-Slayer (obviously unrelated to Gorr the Golden Gorilla) is another Jason Aaron creation, and grew up on a barren faraway planet, having lost his mate and children. Initially he'd thought that gods didn't exist, but when he found out that they DID, and that they were of no help to his people, he became enraged. Gaining a deathweapon called All-Black The Necrosword (which, naturally, is a construct from his dead son), he went on a God-killing rampage, but was halted by a group of vikings when they came to the rescue of a young Thor in medieval Iceland. Gorr retreats, but comes back with an army of "Shadow Berserkers" and quietly kills off more gods across space. He teleports Thor into the future (where an older Thor is the last remaining God against the Shadow Berserkers), but his son, who despises what his father has turned into, allows Thor to absorb the Necrosword's blast. Thor then uses two Mjolnirs to kill Gorr.

-All-Black The Necrosword apparently "carved the first dawn from the stone of the endless night" and gives him a variety of powers that can even kill Gods. At PL 16, he's so tough that Thor had to try ultra-hard to beat him (and need a cheat from Gorr's son), and he has an army of Shadow Monsters that fight on his behalf, too. He's also apparently quite smart, as he attempts to build a "Godbomb" that can kill all the world's Gods.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Sat Apr 16, 2022 9:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Ares
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Re: Clor

Post by Ares »

BriarThrone wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 12:59 am I'm just astonished that they had the clarity to put Cap on the side against government overreach.
That was always the brilliant thing about Captain America. He held allegiance to no political party, no administration, etc. He's loyal to the DREAM, the Nation as a whole, the higher ideals that this country was founded on and, which while we often fall short of, have been something the best people in this nation strive for. Cap has been against government overreach in the past, and gave up both his identity as Cap and his shield rather than bow to a group of government official that he didn't trust. If Cap ever has to choose between doing the right thing and doing what the current administration of the American government wants, he will do the right thing every time, because to him, doing the right thing is at the core of what it means to be a good American.
Though, from what I read, they thought they HAD to do that to preserve any moral ambiguity to the event. Without that, Marvel believed that the fans would simply declare Pro-Reg obviously correct, which would rob the event of any pathos.

For similar reasons, they made Tony, Reed, and Hank act like Nazis. "For the right reasons." And it really did rob the event of pathos.
Which again, makes me wonder just what in the Hell Marvel editorial was smoking.

One of the main problems with Civil War was that it only really would have worked if superheroes had only "just" appeared in Marvel Universe. That there was no laws governing how they function, that the government had just been basically allowing superheroes to do what they did without serious oversight because they didn't know what else to do.

This worked very well in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, because there, there had only really been one public superhero before Iron Man, and then we had a chaotic few years where superheroes gradually started appearing. A Civil War scenario worked better there because it was a world dealing with superheroes for the first time. Granted, the scenario put forth in the movie Civil War was also handled much, much better.

But in the 616 universe? Superheroes in LARGE numbers had been around since 1940. There had been active superheroes for nearly 100 years. There were laws in the books specifically for superhero trials. We've seen supervillains infiltrate SHIELD and the government, and we've only ever seen superheroes stop the bad guys. The entire thing just made no sense.

It didn't help that we never really got to see what the registration act entailed, how no two books could agree on it, and how afterwards the SRA basically became enforced conscription into military service. It also didn't help when Maria Hill starts the whole thing by having her men shoot at Captain America, and it's NEVER BROUGHT UP AGAIN. Hill should have been FIRED at that point, but everyone blows it off.
"My heart is as light as a child's, a feeling I'd nearly forgotten. And by helping those in need, I will be able to keep that feeling alive."
- Captain Marvel SHAZAM! : Power of Hope (2000)

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Jabroniville
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Cul

Post by Jabroniville »

Image
Image

Oh look- a villain proved his might by breaking Cap's Shield. Must be Thursday.

CUL- THE SERPENT
Created By:
Matt Fraction & Stuart Immonen
First Appearance: Fear Itself #1 (June 2011)
Role: Odin's Long-Lost Brother
Group Affiliations: Asgard
PL 17 (455)
STRENGTH
18 STAMINA 19 AGILITY 3
FIGHTING 14 DEXTERITY 2
INTELLIGENCE 4 AWARENESS 4 PRESENCE 5

Skills:
Deception 4 (+9)
Expertise (History) 10 (+14)
Expertise (Asgard) 6 (+10)
Insight 2 (+6)
Intimidation 12 (+17)
Perception 3 (+7)
Ranged Combat (Godly Blasts) 5 (+13)

Advantages: 
All-Out Attack, Daze (Intimidation), Diehard, Fast Grab, Extraordinary Effort, Fearless, Great Endurance, Improved Critical (Unarmed, Blasts) 2, Improved Hold, Fast Grab, Improved Trip, Power Attack, Ranged Attack 6, Startle, Takedown 2

Powers:
"Immortal God"
Regeneration 8 (Feats: Regrow Limbs) [9]
Immunity 9 (Aging, Starvation & Thirst, Heat, Cold, Disease, Drowning & Suffocation, Poison, Pressure) [9]
Speed 2 (8 mph) [2]
Power-Lifting 6 (200,000 tons) [6]
Impervious Toughness 15 [15]
Flight 10 (2,000 mph) [20]
Morph 4 (Any Form) (Extras: Metamorph) [24]
Senses 6 (Detect Magic- Ranged, Acute, Analytical, Counters Illusion) [6]
"Allspeak" Comprehend (Languages) 3 [6]

"Skyfather Might"
"Skyfather Power" Variable 14 (98) -- [113]
  • Dynamic AE: "Godly Beam" Damage 17 (Feats: Dynamic, Variable 2- Any Magic) (Extras: Area- 250ft. Line +4) (88)
  • Dynamic AE: "Explosive Blast" Blast 17 (Feats: Dynamic, Variable 2- Any Magic) (Extras: Area- 60ft. Burst +2) (70)
  • Dynamic AE: "Skyfather Blast" Blast 21 (Feats: Dynamic, Variable 2- Any Magic, Extended Range 2, Indirect, Penetrating 14) (41)
  • Dynamic AE: Force Field 2 (Feats: Dynamic) (Extras: Affects Others 12, Impervious 6) (21)
  • AE: Movement 3 (Dimensional Travel 3) (Feats: Increased Mass 5) (12)
  • AE: Teleport 10 (Feats: Increased Mass 5) (Extras: Extended, Accurate) (46)
  • AE: Illusion (Vision & Hearing) 10 (30)
  • AE: Communication 5 (Mental) (Feats: Dimensional) (Extras: Area) (Flaws: Limited to Asgardians) (21)
  • AE: Move Object 14 (Extras: Perception Range) (42)
  • AE: "Molecular Transformation" Transform 10 (Anything to Anything) (50)
  • AE: Healing 10 (Extras: Resurrection) (30)
"Raise the Dead" Summon Zombies 3 (Extras: Horde, 32 Minions +10) [39]

"Mystical Hammer" (Flaws: Easily Removable) [6]
Strength-Damage +2 (Extras: Penetrating 8) (10 points)

Offense:
Unarmed +14 (+18 Damage, DC 33)
Hammer +14 (+20 Damage, DC 35)
Godly Attacks +17 Area (+17 Damage, DC 32)
Blast +13 (+21 Ranged Damage, DC 36)
Initiative +3

Defenses:
Dodge +14 (DC 24), Parry +14 (DC 24), Toughness +19 (+8 Impervious), Fortitude +19, Will +12

Complications: 
Enemy (Odin)- Cul wishes to destroy Odin in revenge for being unseated millennia ago.
Power Loss (All Powers)- Cul requires fear in order to use his powers- a "fear eater", he loses powers and his youthful appearance if people around the world aren't afraid. He also loses powers if he himself is afraid.

Total: Abilities: 138 / Skills: 42--21 / Advantages: 22 / Powers: 255 / Defenses: 19 (455)

-Matt Fraction is such an odd writer. His Immortal Iron Fist (with co-writer, Ed Brubaker) is considered one of the greatest of the modern comics. His Hawkeye was phenomenal stuff, too- both hilarious and heartfelt. And then he goes and writes his shit X-Men run and THIS piece of garbage. Like... how can someone be so hit and miss? Is he just amazing at weird, outside-the-box thinking, but his generic superhero stuff is just crap-awful? Is his hatred for "standard" superhero tales so deep that he just can't even muster the effort? It's the damndest thing- I've seen hit-or-miss writers (Grant Morrison, Geoff Johns), but nothing like THIS- this guy either hits the stratosphere or makes Chuck Austen look like a close contemporary.

-So with Fear Itself, Fraction reveals that Odin has a THIRD long-lost brother, the monstrous Cul, son of Bor and Bestla. Cul was badly injured by Giants, but managed to crawl to their domicile and slaughter them while they slept, drinking their blood. The fear the remaining giant felt gave birth to the "God of Fear". Cul became King of the Gods upon the death of Bor, but broke a promise to his three brothers, taking the council of only his "Worthy" over Odin, Vili and Ve. Cul became a despot who spread fear all over the Nine Realms, leading Odin to defeat him, sealing him beneath the ocean.

-Cul of course returns in modern times, creating new "Worthy" with a series of weapons that empower Earth supervillains (Attuma, The Absorbing Man, Titania, The Grey Gargoyle, Sin and the Juggernaut) and heroes (The Thing & The Hulk), seeking to spread more fear, as he is now called "The Serpent". Odin is unrealistically terrified of something that shouldn't be any scarier than Surtur or an Elder God, and decides that Earth is doomed and that no Aesir should challenge him- he fears that Thor will die (the prophecy of Thor dying of the serpent's venom is apparently about Cul- not Jormungand). With Odin fleeing, Thor fights at the side of the Avengers (complete with Uru-powered gear designed by Iron Man), eventually slaying Cul with the Odinsword, before dying in his father's arms.

-This story landed with a resounding "MEH" from the comic book universe- it was pretty well reviled as a generic "Event Story" with a one-note evil villain, a bunch of action set-pieces based around baddies gaining Super-Gear, and a HELL of a lot of "filler" comics featuring talking heads going on about various things (one Avengers story was literally just talking heads going on about how awesome the Red Hulk was for standing up to an empowered Ben Grimm, as though that wasn't something superheroes ALWAYS did, often with much less power than Rulk had). And Matt Fraction decided to get all butthurt over it and whine about how his special story was being blamed for things like "Event Fatigue" (which was a thing even in 2005, much less 2011; never mind TODAY's market), and he got mad at comic fans for rejecting it.

-Cul himself was soon resurrected, along with Thor (who'd spent a while on the shelf around Civil War anyway)- he repented his sins and Odin even PARDONED him, making him Minister of Justice. Odin sent Cul to defeat the new lady Thor, and nearly beat her until Odinson (ie. ThorThor), Freyja and an army of women held him back, and Freyja insulted Odin.

-Cul has a lot of "Standard Modern Super-Villain Stuff", such as the ability to break Captain America's Shield with his bare hands (something that's become depressingly common these days). He's basically Skyfather-level, meaning that he can defeat PL 14s like Thor with very little trouble, and "New Villain Stink" makes him almost unstoppable.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Sat Apr 16, 2022 9:51 pm, edited 3 times in total.
greycrusader
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by greycrusader »

I officially am a middle aged guy, because I can remember when the Hulk, Kallark/the Gladiator, an amped-up Mr. Hyde, etc., couldn't even DENT Cap's shield, let alone break the thing...hell, it was considered almost shocking when the Molecule Man disintegrated the shield (along with Iron Man's "polarized" armor, Mjolnir, and the Silver Surfer's cosmic board)-all the Avengers' fans were shocked with MM pulled that feat off! Nowadays....

All my best.
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Ares
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Re: Cul

Post by Ares »

Jabroniville wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 3:11 am Image

Oh look- a villain proved his moght by breaking Cap's Shield. Must be Thursday.

CUL- THE SERPENT
Created By:
Matt Fraction & Stuart Immonen
First Appearance: Fear Itself #1 (June 2011)
Role: Odin's Long-Lost Brother

-Cul of course returns in modern times, creating new "Worthy" with a series of weapons that empower Earth supervillains (Attuma, The Absorbing Man, Titania, The Grey Gargoyle, Sin and the Juggernaut) and heroes (The Thing & The Hulk), seeking to spread more fear, as he is now called "The Serpent". Odin is unrealistically terrified of something that shouldn't be any scarier than Surtur or an Elder God, and decides that Earth is doomed and that no Aesir should challenge him- he fears that Thor will die (the prophecy of Thor dying of the serpent's venom is apparently about Cul- not Jormungand). With Odin fleeing, Thor fights at the side of the Avengers (complete with Uru-powered gear designed by Iron Man), eventually slaying Cul with the Odinsword, before dying in his father's arms.

-This story landed with a resounding "MEH" from the comic book universe- it was pretty well reviled as a generic "Event Story" with a one-note evil villain, a bunch of action set-pieces based around baddies gaining Super-Gear, and a HELL of a lot of "filler" comics featuring talking heads going on about various things (one Avengers story was literally just talking heads going on about how awesome the Red Hulk was for standing up to an empowered Ben Grimm, as though that wasn't something superheroes ALWAYS did, often with much less power than Rulk had). And Matt Fraction decided to get all butthurt over it and whine about how his special story was being blamed for things like "Event Fatigue" (which was a thing even in 2005, much less 2011; never mind TODAY's market), and he got mad at comic fans for rejecting it.
The sad thing is, the CONCEPT of "The Worthy" was actually pretty bad ass. You create a bunch of Mjolnir-lite hammers that empower a lot of characters, heroes and villains, into unstoppable powerhouses, creating some intense action across the globe while creating a deadly "Mini-Boss Squad" which also removes some of the more powerful heroes from the board. And you get awesome showings like Peter Parker standing up to Worthy Ben Grimm, despite how outclassed he is in a moment that's PURE Spider-Man.

The problem was that Cul was a heck of a retcon, he didn't seem to have a real plan, and there was nothing really outside of the introduction of the Worthy to make it interesting. I mean, even the Exemplars had a GOAL like waging a massive war. This is the kind of concept I'd want to use in an RPG and make work.
-Cul himself was soon resurrected, along with Thor (who'd spent a while on the shelf around Civil War anyway)- he repented his sins and Odin even PARDONED him, making him Minister of Justice. Odin sent Cul to defeat the new lady Thor, and nearly beat her until Odinson (ie. ThorThor), Freyja and an army of women held him back, and Freyja insulted Odin.
Yup. No agenda here.
-Cul has a lot of "Standard Modern Super-Villain Stuff", such as the ability to break Captain America's Shield with his bare hands (something that's become depressingly common these days). He's basically Skyfather-level, meaning that he can defeat PL 14s like Thor with very little trouble, and "New Villain Stink" makes him almost unstoppable.
I'm glad I'm not alone in how "easy" breaking Cap's shield and Thor's hammer has become. It use to be those two items were basically amongst the most indestructible objects in Marvel. For the longest time, the only two things that had broken Cap's shield through raw force was a Beyonder-powered Dr. Doom and an Infinity Gauntlet-powered Thanos. It's like the only thing fans would accept as being able to shatter the shield was beings who vastly out-powered Galactus.

I think it was around the time they had an Odin-powered Thor dent Cap's shield, and then later blow a chunk out of it in the bad future, it became more acceptable to just have the villain show how powerful he was by breaking the shield. I'm reminded of when Count Nefaria got his big power boost the first time and was taking apart the Avengers, and decided to really show off by destroying Cap's shield. Only the shield resisted even Nefaria's strength, to the point a frustrated Nefaria just tossed it away while telling himself "I'm definitely still invincible, this kind of thing happens to everyone, it's just performance anxiety" . Nowadays Nefaria would have destroyed the shield just to establish him as being really dangerous.
"My heart is as light as a child's, a feeling I'd nearly forgotten. And by helping those in need, I will be able to keep that feeling alive."
- Captain Marvel SHAZAM! : Power of Hope (2000)

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Jabroniville
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by Jabroniville »

Man statting up Thor characters for an RPG is weird. The power creep is INSANE. He goes from Mr. Hyde & Cobra to guys like Ulik... then in the '80s it's Kurse & Jormungand. Then in modern times every bad guy could kill Odin.

I mean, the '60s had guys who were unkillable and had to be outsmarted. Nowadays, Thor just overpowers and kills even Cul, Gorr and other Monster Heels.
Horsenhero
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by Horsenhero »

Jabroniville wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 4:40 am Man statting up Thor characters for an RPG is weird. The power creep is INSANE. He goes from Mr. Hyde & Cobra to guys like Ulik... then in the '80s it's Kurse & Jormungand. Then in modern times every bad guy could kill Odin.

I mean, the '60s had guys who were unkillable and had to be outsmarted. Nowadays, Thor just overpowers and kills even Cul, Gorr and other Monster Heels.
This is what is commonly called lazy writing.
Jabroniville
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by Jabroniville »

Horsenhero wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 5:12 am
Jabroniville wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 4:40 am Man statting up Thor characters for an RPG is weird. The power creep is INSANE. He goes from Mr. Hyde & Cobra to guys like Ulik... then in the '80s it's Kurse & Jormungand. Then in modern times every bad guy could kill Odin.

I mean, the '60s had guys who were unkillable and had to be outsmarted. Nowadays, Thor just overpowers and kills even Cul, Gorr and other Monster Heels.
This is what is commonly called lazy writing.
Yup- standard-issue comic book writing is "make villain stronger than hero; let hero use Limit Break to win". The fact that the latter half of these builds has been FILLED with super high-level guys (Bor, Gorr & Cul) is as emblematic of the House Being Out Of Ideas as anything.
Jabroniville
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by Jabroniville »

And that's it for the Thor builds! It took a little longer than I thought at first, because I was going for the "four posts per day" format, since they were "old builds". But upon looking at things, I realized I last statted many of these guys five and a half years ago making them roughly the mid-point of me doing M&M builds. That meant I could afford to spread them out a little bit. Plus I do so hate it when people fall behind in reading stuff :).

So this took about 19-21 days or so. The next set will feature Marvel's Olympians (yes, I'll be posting Marvel & Jabverse Olympians alongside each other)! After that, the rest of Marvel's Gods!

After that... I have a few ideas. Maybe a couple of days of random posts from "The List" (including the infamous Marville!). I think it can be time to re-post Power Pack (the oldest ATT-era builds to not be re-posted- they're from the original posting of 3rd Edition M&M!). Maybe a look back at Contest of Champions (another ancient set, though many characters from it have since been re-posted). Anything else any of you can think of, that you might like to see posted?
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Woodclaw
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Re: Clor

Post by Woodclaw »

Ares wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 3:04 am
BriarThrone wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 12:59 am I'm just astonished that they had the clarity to put Cap on the side against government overreach.
That was always the brilliant thing about Captain America. He held allegiance to no political party, no administration, etc. He's loyal to the DREAM, the Nation as a whole, the higher ideals that this country was founded on and, which while we often fall short of, have been something the best people in this nation strive for. Cap has been against government overreach in the past, and gave up both his identity as Cap and his shield rather than bow to a group of government official that he didn't trust. If Cap ever has to choose between doing the right thing and doing what the current administration of the American government wants, he will do the right thing every time, because to him, doing the right thing is at the core of what it means to be a good American.
Unless he got written by Ann Nocenti. I've never been able to track down the issue, but at some point Nocenti wrote a couple of issues of Cap where he delivered the most pseudo-fascist and right-winged speech ever, something that would have make John Walker go "wait a fucking minute".
Ares wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 3:04 am
Though, from what I read, they thought they HAD to do that to preserve any moral ambiguity to the event. Without that, Marvel believed that the fans would simply declare Pro-Reg obviously correct, which would rob the event of any pathos.

For similar reasons, they made Tony, Reed, and Hank act like Nazis. "For the right reasons." And it really did rob the event of pathos.
Which again, makes me wonder just what in the Hell Marvel editorial was smoking.

One of the main problems with Civil War was that it only really would have worked if superheroes had only "just" appeared in Marvel Universe. That there was no laws governing how they function, that the government had just been basically allowing superheroes to do what they did without serious oversight because they didn't know what else to do.

This worked very well in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, because there, there had only really been one public superhero before Iron Man, and then we had a chaotic few years where superheroes gradually started appearing. A Civil War scenario worked better there because it was a world dealing with superheroes for the first time. Granted, the scenario put forth in the movie Civil War was also handled much, much better.

But in the 616 universe? Superheroes in LARGE numbers had been around since 1940. There had been active superheroes for nearly 100 years. There were laws in the books specifically for superhero trials. We've seen supervillains infiltrate SHIELD and the government, and we've only ever seen superheroes stop the bad guys. The entire thing just made no sense.

It didn't help that we never really got to see what the registration act entailed, how no two books could agree on it, and how afterwards the SRA basically became enforced conscription into military service. It also didn't help when Maria Hill starts the whole thing by having her men shoot at Captain America, and it's NEVER BROUGHT UP AGAIN. Hill should have been FIRED at that point, but everyone blows it off.
The SRA was actually a very old multi-series storyline that was around since the '80s and in and of itself was a great idea, even a perfectly logical one. Back then we got a lot of heroes actually forced to dabble in politics for a while just to find a way out of it. The big problem with Civil War was that too many characters acted as if they got a major dose of idiot ball (a problem that got even worst with Avengers vs X-Men), even considering the many bumps down the road Cap and Iron Man were still friends and it took the entire storyline before they decided to sit down and try to talk instead to punching each other. Red from Overly Sarcastic Productions made a really point about the cinematic Civil War saying that the entire stitch of that movie is that Cap is perceived as a unchanging paragon, a character that would die rather than changing his mind and because of this things escalated quickly. I think that this observation is pretty spot on for the movie, but goes against everything that the Marvel continuity established up to that point. Tony and Steve (not to mention pretty mcuh every other major character at that point) have gone through hell and back together and this should have accounted for something.
Ares wrote: Fri Oct 20, 2017 3:46 am
-Cul has a lot of "Standard Modern Super-Villain Stuff", such as the ability to break Captain America's Shield with his bare hands (something that's become depressingly common these days). He's basically Skyfather-level, meaning that he can defeat PL 14s like Thor with very little trouble, and "New Villain Stink" makes him almost unstoppable.
I'm glad I'm not alone in how "easy" breaking Cap's shield and Thor's hammer has become. It use to be those two items were basically amongst the most indestructible objects in Marvel. For the longest time, the only two things that had broken Cap's shield through raw force was a Beyonder-powered Dr. Doom and an Infinity Gauntlet-powered Thanos. It's like the only thing fans would accept as being able to shatter the shield was beings who vastly out-powered Galactus.

I think it was around the time they had an Odin-powered Thor dent Cap's shield, and then later blow a chunk out of it in the bad future, it became more acceptable to just have the villain show how powerful he was by breaking the shield. I'm reminded of when Count Nefaria got his big power boost the first time and was taking apart the Avengers, and decided to really show off by destroying Cap's shield. Only the shield resisted even Nefaria's strength, to the point a frustrated Nefaria just tossed it away while telling himself "I'm definitely still invincible, this kind of thing happens to everyone, it's just performance anxiety" . Nowadays Nefaria would have destroyed the shield just to establish him as being really dangerous.
By nowadays standards Cap's shield has pretty much become the Martian Manhunter of the Marvel Comics: breaking it has become sort of a graduation test to establish a villain as a major threat that would require more than one hero to beat. This isn't anything new, in the original Secret War cap running around with a broken shield after Doom-Beyonder blasted all the heroes to kingdom come. It was a way to show how high were the odds. Around 2000, when Thor become king of Asgard and inherited the Odinforce (dumb name BTW), it took all his power plus some to dent the shield and, once again, it was symbolic of how high were the odds. Between these two episodes we got two decades of stories where the shield stood still. This narrative convention was all well and good, but only when it was used sparsely, right now people are getting used to it and it lost it's meaning.
In general I got the feeling that Marvel lost its way around the beginning of the 2000 and started accelerating its production process by having more and more events that tried to push the bar higher and higher, which in turns got the opposite effect: the readers felt that each one was dulled than the last one. Fear Itself is a good example, as asinine as the basic storyile was, it was even more inexcusable that it was over in a few months. Given the nature of the story I think that it should have been a long timed event (sort of like Inferno in the late '80s) something that was hinted in various comics for months, giving out small teasers, until the time was right. Unfortunately this kind of coordination seem to be beyond the scope and skills of the current Marvel.
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drkrash
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by drkrash »

I realize we're moving on and it's a minor point, but overall, I really liked Fear Itself and I think one of the things I liked about it WAS that it was a "generic event." Aside from the Asgardian stuff, you basically had a high-tech Nazi army trying to take over the world, and a veritable army of superheroes fighting them with loads of fight scenes - what's not to love?

Like all major stories, there are plenty of stupid elements to it, and it goes on way too long (I like to read whole events on Marvel Unlimited, and Fear Itself is something like 160 issues - only Civil War has been bigger), but in the modern era, it's probably my favorite "heroes fight lots of villains" story.
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by Jabroniville »

huh- interesting. I'd mostly heard negative stuff about it, and I think I read too many weak tie-ins along with the regular event (which I recall reading... the beginning and the end. I'm not sure if I read the middle, now that I think about it).

The whole "Heroes Fight Bad Guys" thing does remind me of the recent Monsters Unleashed, which was more of a "Generic Event Story", though apparently it was trashed a bit as a cash-grab/attempt at advertising a new series.
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by drkrash »

I think Fear Itself also incorporated the feel of contemporary real-world politics in a better way: in the real world, America was dealing with financial uncertainty and they translated that into a supernatural fear effect that pervaded the whole world. Much better than the nonsense we're seeing now.
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Re: Jab's Builds! (Bor! Angela! Sera! Ragnarok! Gorr!)

Post by Jack of Spades »

The fact that Fear Itself incorporated more of the Marvel Universe appealed to me. The X-Men crossover didn't feel forced or an afterthought (probably because Fraction was also writing the X-Men at the time), and it gave us one of my favorite Cyclops lines of all time: "Plan two. Plan B implies I only have twenty-six."

Cul was an overpowered cypher, but he brought with him something for everyone, and Fraction made it feel like it really was a world-threatening event, not just an overhyped Avengers story.
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