Jab’s Builds! (Beaker! Sam Eagle! Miss Piggy! The Swedish Chef!)

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Jabroniville
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Joined: Fri Nov 04, 2016 8:05 pm

Svyatagor

Post by Jabroniville »

Image
Image

SVYATAGOR (Sasha Pokryshkin)
Created By:
Roy & Dann Thomas, David Ross
First Appearance: The Avengers West Coast #87 (Oct. 1992)
Role: Psionic Guy
Group Affiliations: The Bogatyri
PL 9 (119)
STRENGTH
9 STAMINA 7 AGILITY 0
FIGHTING 7 DEXTERITY 2
INTELLIGENCE 2 AWARENESS 2 PRESENCE 2

Skills:
Deception 3 (+5)
Expertise (History) 2 (+4)
Expertise (Science) 2 (+4)
Insight 2 (+4)
Intimidation 2 (+4)
Perception 2 (+4)
Persuasion 2 (+4)
Technology 3 (+5)

Advantages:
Ranged Attack 7

Powers:
"Right Hand- Firearm" Blast 6 (Extras: Multiattack) [18]
"Body Armor" Protection 3 (Extras: Impervious 11) [14]

Offense:
Unarmed +7 (+9 Damage, DC 24)
Firearm +9 (+6 Ranged Damage, DC 21)
Initiative +0

Defenses:
Dodge +7 (DC 17), Parry +7 (DC 17), Toughness +10 (+6 Impervious), Fortitude +7, Will +4

Complications:
Motivation (Soviet Russia)- Svyatagor was a loyal Communist, and has little to fight for now that his government has fallen.
Responsibility (Mentally & Physically Scarred)- Badly injured by radiation, Svyatagor still has nightmares (causing him to destroy a McDonalds), can't watch frightening films, and needs to wear a mask, as his lungs were badly burned. This also gives him a violent temper.

Total: Abilities: 62 / Skills: 18--9 / Advantages: 7 / Powers: 31 / Defenses: 9 (119)

-Svyatagor was badly injured in an accident at a power plant, and was turned into a cyborg, because this was the early '90s. Named for the mightiest of the Slavic heroes, he joined the Bogatyri. He could not speak any English at all, and so only spoke to his comrades. Extremely strong, he was nonetheless mentally messed-up by his ordeal- Mikula teased him for having nightmares after watching scary movies, and destroying a McDonald's, and this provoked a fight between the two.

-Svyatagor's body is durable enough to withstand attacks from Wonder Man and Wolverine (whom he KO'd after Dennista set him up), but he's still only PL 8.5. Largely he just sat there and took offense, generally being only lightly scarred by Wolverine's claws.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Thu Aug 04, 2022 3:59 am, edited 2 times in total.
Jabroniville
Posts: 24689
Joined: Fri Nov 04, 2016 8:05 pm

Joseph Stalin

Post by Jabroniville »

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Image

"Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns; why should we let them have ideas?"

---

“This creature softened my heart of stone. She died and with her died my last warm feelings for humanity.”
-Stalin, at the funeral of his first wife


JOSEPH STALIN (Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili)
Created By:
Besarion Jughashvili & Ketevan Geladze
First Appearance: December 18th, 1878
Role: General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Translation: Dictator)
Country of Origin: Georgia
Group Affiliations: The Soviet Union, The Bolsheviks (political party, not Nikolai Volkoff & Boris Zhukov)
PL 3 (58), PL 6 (58) Defenses
STRENGTH
1 STAMINA 3 AGILITY 0
FIGHTING 2 DEXTERITY 2
INTELLIGENCE 4 AWARENESS 4 PRESENCE 0

Skills:
Deception 6 (+6)
Expertise (Politics) 4 (+8)
Expertise (Military) 4 (+8)
Insight 2 (+6)
Intimidation 10 (+10)

Advantages:
Benefit 6 (Soviet Dictator), Well-Informed

Offense:
Unarmed +2 (+1 Damage, DC 16)
Initiative +0

Defenses:
Dodge +2 (DC 12), Parry +2 (DC 12), Toughness +3, Fortitude +4, Will +7

Complications:
Motivation (Power)- OH HOLY GOD YEAH.
Disabled (Sickly & Somewhat-Crippled)- Stalin suffered from numerous health problems as a young boy- his face was scarred with smallpox, and his left arm was shorter and stiffer than the right. He was also apparently only about 5'6"
Reputation (Unlikable & Low-Class)- Stalin wasn't as educated as many of his rivals, nor was he as personable. He knew this, and knew his rivals made fun of him for it. This gave him a dangerous inferiority complex.
Responsibility (Atheist)- Despite training to be a priest, Stalin became an atheist in his first year of religious schooling. He enacted policies that often made it dangerous to publically be religious.
Enemy (Leon Trotsky)- The smartest and most-capable of the Bolsheviks, Trotsky was more thoughtful and beloved than Stalin, and had a great deal of power. Stalin soon took it all, exiled him, and then had him assassinated in 1940.
Relationship (Family)- Stalin was cruel to most of his family- his daughter defected to the United States, and his son Yakov tried to commit suicide due to his father's abuse (when Yakov survived, Stalin joked "he can't even shoot straight").
Enemy (Any Potential Threat)- Stalin was notorious for killing anyone he considered a threat. He had numerous old and current rivals (including all of Lenin's old cabinet) for power held in show trials and executed. He had Nikolai Yezhov lead the secret police in a purge of veteran Bolsheviks... then blamed him publically for excessive brutality and had him executed. He was known to spy on basically everyone, and killed so many enemies that nobody else dared stand against him.
Hatred (Koreans, Volga Germans, Crimean Tatars, Chechens, Poles)- Stalin mistrusted the loyalties of these ethnic groups, and forcibly moved them out of strategic areas. He also seemed to hate and mistrust Jews.
Responsibility (Cult of Personality)- Stalin allowed a tremendous amount of propaganda to be made about himself- describing heroic, godlike qualities.
Phobia (Flying)- Stalin prefered to travel by train.

Total: Abilities: 32 / Skills: 26--13 / Advantages: 7 / Powers: 0 / Defenses: 6 (58)

-Joseph Stalin stands as one of the great super-villains of the 20th Century- while nowhere near as famous or as notable as Hitler, his atrocities are almost as numerous, and he DIED IN HIS OWN BED. So on many levels, Stalin was a MUCH more effective villain.

-Stalin was one of Vladimir Lenin's strongest-supporters during the Bolshevik revolution (he joined early-on, and impressed many with his leadership capabilities, street-smarts, escape-artistry, and intellectual skills, despite coming from a common background in Georgia, not Russia itself), and cannily-grabbed power when Lenin grew ill- he supressed Lenin's criticisms against him, had his rivals discredited and/or murdered, and eventually became the central force of the new Soviet Union. Stalin changes it irrevocably- he rejected Lenin's idea of spreading Socialism throughout the world in numerous revolutions and instead consolidated it. He ordered the Soviet state to industrialize so rapidly that it destroyed millions of lives. Then he enacted the "Great Purge" between 1934 & 1939 that booted out countless "enemies of the working class" (translation: people Stalin didn't like). Historians now estimate that somewhere around 700,000 people were eliminated in the purges.

-When World War II came about, he entered a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany that saw him grab a lot of territory in Poland, but an invasion by Germany put a stop to that. Stalin's Russia was in no way prepared for the German war machine, and his nation suffered by FAR the largest number of casualties of any nation in the War. However, Russia has a great defender: General Winter. The harsh Russian winter hampered the Germans badly, and the exhausted Nazis were stopped at the Battles of Moscow & Stalingrad- it was the Red Army that ended up capturing Berlin in 1945. And with that, the Soviet Union emerged as a world superpower (sharing the title with the United States), then cast an "Iron Curtain" over Eastern Europe and made alliances with China's Mao Zedong and North Korea's Kim Il-sung- both Communists.

-And he's responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths even OUTSIDE of the executions he was responsible for- Soviet farming & crop policies, and the massive rush to industrialization, led to massive famines (especially in Ukraine, which classify theirs as a deliberate genocide, meant to ruin their nation as a political force). It's never been proven that he actually said "One death is a tragedy- a million is a statistic", but he sure as hell seemed to believe it. Stalin doesn't appear to be much of a statesman, but at least created public health care that eliminated various diseases, allowed equal rights to women in numerous respects, and, in the old cliche, "at least the trains ran on time" (translation: "Sure he was a monster, but at least there was order"). His personality is typified by barking anger and ruling through fear, but he was a good organizer of people, and knew how to play the "uneducated simple guy" schtick to his enemies before sticking a knife in them. He had some very intelligent adversaries- Trotsky was no dummy- and he killed them all. He was extremely-paranoid, but he of course outlived most of the people who hated him, so who's to say it was excessive?

-And yeah, after all that death, and all that evil... the man died at 74 years old in his own bed. No humiliating fall, no suicide in a bunker, no being publically-executed by his enemies... the guy was a SUCCESSFUL dictator. Some rumors persist that he may have been poisoned or murdered, and we'll probably never know the truth. What IS known is that the Soviet party began discrediting him soon after his death, blaming him for numerous atrocities- his successor, Nikita Kruschev, specifically-trashed Stalin numerous times. Hell, when Kruschev was ousted from power, he basically considered it proof of his leadership- pointing out that nobody would have EVER dreamed of doing such a thing to Stalin, so if the party now felt comfortable ousting their own leader, then he'd managed to stem the tide of dictators.

-But even after ALL THAT, including the deaths of some 20 million people that could be attributed to him, and the fact that he'd probably be the 20th Century's greatest villain in a world without Hitler, Stalin is still seen as a somewhat-positive figure in Russia by virtue of his power, and the power he gave to Russia. But then, that's Russia- they're so used to genocide, mass starvation, and winning wars through sheer attrition and sacrifice over wimpy things like tactics and technology, that it's no surprise the SUCCESSFUL evil guy is their favorite.

-Stats-wise, Stalin is a rarity: a high-end political powerhouse who was relatively-low on charisma. Some men (especially foreign diplomats) found him to be a bit gregarious and happy, but most of the time he was grim and hostile. People like Churchill, Hitler & the Roosevelts were charismatic leaders, but Stalin appears to rule entirely through fear, paranoia and suspicion- since anyone caught speaking against him was killed (and he had EVERYTHING bugged), people tended to clam up. Soviet Russia under Stalin may in fact be the most-expansive, controlled Police State in human history. He was physically-unimpressive (even a bit deformed), but was tough enough to hit 74, dying only of a cerebral hemmorhage.
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Davies
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Crimson Dynamo! Titanium Man! Fantasma! Perun!)

Post by Davies »

My favorite story about him -- which is such an odd thing to say -- involves what basically amounts to a panic attack he had after Barbarossa started, retreating to his dacha so that Zhukov and others had to come get him. From that account, it seems that he honestly thought that was the end for him, as though he fully expected to be dragged off and shot for having misread the situation so badly. But no, they honestly thought he was still the best candidate to lead them, and he seemed amazed at this for a few moments before the mask came back down. He'd convinced everyone that he was essential, even though he didn't believe it himself, and I think that's part of the reason he managed to hold on to power for so very long.

My favorite fictional story about him involves him beating up Baba Yaga as a seminary student because even then he was way more evil than her, in a Hellboy anthology.
"I'm sorry. I love you. I'm not sorry I love you."
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Scots Dragon
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Crimson Dynamo! Titanium Man! Fantasma! Perun!)

Post by Scots Dragon »

There's still a contingent of people who think he had the right idea. We anarchists call them tankies and they generally suck.

Anyone attempting to actually achieve communism died with the rise of Stalin, whose propaganda redefined the concepts so as to benefit his reign, which was about as far as you could possibly get from the classless, stateless, moneyless society envisioned by Karl Marx.
Formerly known as Narsil on the ATT and Ronin Army forums.
Jabroniville
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Joined: Fri Nov 04, 2016 8:05 pm

Re: Jab’s Builds! (Crimson Dynamo! Titanium Man! Fantasma! Perun!)

Post by Jabroniville »

So I was gonna post Rasputin as Russia's other great villain, but it turns out I already did when I did Anastasia builds, so go read that instead :): https://www.echoesofthemultiverse.com/v ... 102#p11102
Jabroniville
Posts: 24689
Joined: Fri Nov 04, 2016 8:05 pm

Thermo

Post by Jabroniville »

Image
Image

THERMO, THE THERMATRONIC MAN (Dr. Walter Michaels)
Created By:
Tom DeFalco, David Michelinie & Herb Trimpe
First Appearance: Marvel Team-Up #108 (Aug. 1981)
Role: Jobber Villain
Group Affiliations: None
PL 8 (133)
STRENGTH
1/8 STAMINA 2/8 AGILITY 2
FIGHTING 7 DEXTERITY 3
INTELLIGENCE 4 AWARENESS 1 PRESENCE 1

Skills:
Athletics 2 (+3)
Deception 2 (+3)
Expertise (Criminal) 2 (+3)
Expertise (Science) 5 (+9)
Intimidation 3 (+4)
Ranged Combat (Blasts) 3 (+8)
Technology 5 (+9)
Treatment 2 (+6)

Advantages:
Improved Initiative, Ranged Attack 1

Powers:
"Absorb Thermal Energy" Affliction 9 (Fort; Fatigued/Exhausted/Incapacitated) (Extras: Cumulative) [18]

"Absorbed Abilities" (All Have Quirks: Must Absorb Thermal Energy First -2)
"Thermal Blasts" Blast 8 [14]
Enhanced Strength 7 [12]
Enhanced Stamina 6 [10]
Speed 5 (60 mph) [3]

Offense:
Unarmed +7 (+1 Damage, DC 16)
Boosted Strength +7 (+8 Damage, DC 23)
Absorb Energy +7 (+9 Affliction, DC 19)
Thermal Blasts +8 (+8 Ranged Damage, DC 23)
Initiative +2

Defenses:
Dodge +7 (DC 17), Parry +8 (DC 18), Toughness +2 (+8 Absorbed Energy), Fortitude +4 (+10 Absorbed Energy), Will +3

Complications:
Motivation (Greed)
Power Loss (Energy Drains)- Thermo's energy can be sucked dry by those with thermal-absorbing abilities, leaving him powerless.

Total: Abilities: 42 / Skills: 24--12 / Advantages: 2 / Powers: 67 / Defenses: 10 (133)

-Huh, so in mid-2011 I built a guy named Thermo, but for some reason he missed my archives completely.

-Thermo's another of those one-shot terrible Marvel Team-Up villains (is there a master list of these issues somewhere? I need to build these guys like Roman Polanski needs little girls. I'd just get the Essential collections, but guys this crappy NEED to be in colour, you know?), an EEEEVIL scientist with one great idea (the most common super-villain origin besides "is a mutant") that resulted in him sucking "thermal energy" from living beings, and gaining super-powers from them. Immediately going mad with power, he escaped and attacked a ton of people. He confounded Spider-Man, Paladin & Dazzler in their Team-Up (two-parters tended to involve getting a separate partner in the 2nd issue), and was finally beaten when a device was placed over his head, de-powering him.

-Thermo then got shuffled into the "Only Mark Gruenwald knows who the hell these characters are" section of the Marvel Universe, fighting Quasar once (when he invaded the Baxter Building, where Quasar also worked)... and then Captain America in another issue, where he was seen among many Jobber Villains at an A.I.M. Weapons Expo (seriously, Gru loves Jobbers as much as I do). The character never appeared again after that, until a random one-off appearance in World War Hulk, where Korg of the Warbound defeated him while he was trying to loot buildings.

-Thermo's sorta-powerful at first, especially with an Affliction that can kill people, but his caps are kinda all over the place regarding offensive power and his Blasts. Once he absorbs energy, he can probably keep going for a good while, so it's only a minor Quirk. Despite a relatively hot debut (fighting three heroes simultaneously... though keep in mind Spidey's "Weak Against Rookies" Complication I gave him), he eventually became just another Jobber.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Thu Aug 04, 2022 4:01 am, edited 1 time in total.
Jabroniville
Posts: 24689
Joined: Fri Nov 04, 2016 8:05 pm

The Avengers

Post by Jabroniville »

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THE AVENGERS:

-The Avengers have had a long, storied run as one of Marvel's top books that was never QUITE the top book, until very, very recently. See, back in the 1960s, The Avengers were basically a rip-off of the Justice League of America- a collection of all Marvel's top-selling solo heroes (Thor, Iron Man, The Hulk, Ant-Man & The Wasp)- but the Fantastic Four was by then dedicated as Marvel's #1 book, and it was soon followed with Spider-Man. So The Avengers was really just #3 for most of the '60s, despite having some pretty big villains (the early Masters of Evil, Kang, Namor the Sub-Mariner, the Hulk after he turned on them). It's an odd book to look at nowadays, as the team fits together even more oddly than the FF does (The Hulk quit almost immediately- which you'd NEVER see in JLA). It never really "felt" like the Avengers until they thawed Captain America out of the ice to serve as their new leader, which set off a major era in the books. Of course, that was only issue #4, and we were on our way. But overall, the book was always far behind The Fantastic Four and Spider-Man in importance, and was then completely trumped by The Uncanny X-Men from the 1970s on for about thirty years! And then all of a sudden in the 2000s, the book is Marvel's top thing, and soon becomes a cultural phenomenon! Life is weird.

It's a testament to the book's standing that at one point, ALL the originals left, with Cap sticking in an unproven group of ex-cons in the role. Can you imagine them trying that today? Every new line-up change has tons of fans whining about their favourites missing, and complaining about writer-faves showing up, and here The Avengers pulled one of the biggest roster-switches of all time in the mid-1960s with Cap, Iron Man foe Hawkeye, & background X-Men villains the Scarlet Witch & Quicksilver suddenly showing up as a new, deliberately-weaker team of guys. But that risky move (while making the Avengers even more of a B-level book) ended up revolutionizing all of those characters, who have since moved on to iconic Avenger status. And this gave the Avengers a place not enjoyed by many other teams- it was the book that CONTAINED some A-list characters, but often made its name using lesser-known C & D-List characters and then MAKING something out of them. Since Cap, Thor & Iron Man were always busy with their own stories in their own books, this freed up story space for the personal interactions of Hawkeye, Hank Pym (since his own snippet of a book was cancelled) and more. This gave us the best of BOTH worlds, and allowed Marvel to solve the old problem of "nothing in the Main Book ever matters" for the "unchangeable" guys like Thor, who after a point would have his own creative team, doing their own thing- if you give The Avengers at least SOME heroes unique to that book, then you're suddenly allowed to have stories that change things.

The early brawls the team got into would be CLASSIC Silver Age: books in the '60s would actually re-use villains for months at a time, despite the comics themselves being mostly one-shots. So they'd fight Baron Zemo and his Masters of Evil (taken from the enemies of the respective heroes) one issue, then have to fight them AGAIN an issue later. THEN he'd create a super-powered guy named Wonder Man and fight them AGAIN. They'd also fight The Hulk & The Sub-Mariner, Kang the Conquerer, Thor's half-brother Loki, and more.

The 1970s:
-Stan Lee & Jack Kirby left the book pretty early on, but it was the newer creative teams that really set the standard on the book. It was there, with Roy Thomas & John Buscema, that we got new concepts like Ultron, The Vision, The Black Panther (created for the FF book) and more. Several iconic storylines followed- the Kree/Skrull War (with the legendary Neal Adams-drawn "Ant-Man goes into Vision's comatose body and fights his antibodies" story), etc. The Avengers met up with The Squadron Supreme (a winking jab at DC's Justice League), Arkon the Thunderer, and more. The Black Knight & Black Widow joined the team, and they frequently allied with Captain Marvel (Mar-Vell) on cosmic adventures while Vision & the Scarlet Witch have oodles of sexual tension. Hank Pym quits and rejoins the team a couple times, goes crazy, "kills" Pym while dressed as Yellowjacket, and more.

Steve Englehart soon took over the book, and turned it into The Mantis Story with his Celestial Madonna mega-arc. By bringing in the villainous Swordsman and his new, mysterious Vietnamese Bug-Hooker, Englehart set off a huge multi-part epic that is still talked about today. His obvious Fanwankery over Mantis aside, it was pretty big. Hawkeye saves the Universe (one of the first among many times where ONLY HE can do it), Mantis runs off to have plant-babies, The Swordsman redeems himself before dying, and The Vision & The Scarlet Witch FINALLY hook up after years of tortured relations. Soon, former X-Man The Beast joins the team with an all-new, fun-loving personality ("he discovered pot", sez Englehart), acting as a humorous wacky man. George Perez got recognized as the new Avengers artist, and Moondragon also joined the team. In true Marvel standards, she was a giant bitch, thus shaking up the roster and allowing more conflict. Wonder Man would finally be resurrected after constant teases and added to the group, giving it someone who could lose the fight to make Thor look better.

Englehart's run begat Jim Shooter's, who set off The Korvac Saga, his own opus about a Cosmically-Powerful Thor villain named Michael Korvac, gaining supreme power and having to be put down. He slays the Avengers & Guardians of the Galaxy, but realizes what he's done and resurrects them, committing suicide because all of the universe's Cosmic Powers have awakened to his threat. Finally reading it decades later, I was a bit confused, and Korvac seems a lot more menacing than Shooter's sad "oh, he could have been a heroic force if everyone had handled this differently" eulogy. H.P. Gyrich was added to the book, acting as the perfect Obstructive Bureaucrat, pissing everyone off like a good government liaison should. In 1979, Marvel finally admitted to the "open secret" that Magneto was the father of two Avengers- Wanda & Pietro Maximoff. The Vision & Wanda are married, and Carol "Ms. Marvel" Danvers, a feminist Flying Brick, joins the team.

The 1980s:
-In the '80s, Hank Pym would go crazy and slap his wife, and would never live it down, sadly dropping his coolest costume ever. He would largely retire from super-heroics for the decade, despite redeeming himself IN THE SAME STORYLINE (which people forget happened). Roger Stern would begin his run here, taking over the team for most of the decade, even while Englehart formed The West Coast Avengers, a gathering of some of the "cool" members as Hawkeye split off his own squad. Mark Gruenwald, then Avengers Editor, was happy but realized a mistake- they'd unwittingly split up The Trinity of Avengers by removing Iron Man from Cap & Thor, and plunking him on the West Coast. This decade began the true start of "Franchising" Marvel's heroes (we had West Coast Avengers, The Spectacular Spider-Man, X-Factor and New Mutants, and more), it was perhaps inevitable. This squad would feature Hawkeye, Iron Man (in the rad Silver Centurion armor), Wonder Man, Tigra (formerly The Cat) and Mockingbird (Hawkeye's wife). It'd soon gather OTHER East Coasters like The Wasp & Scarlet Witch, then build its own roster occasionally.

Stern's run was EXCELLENT. He would add Monica Rambeau to the team as the second Captain Marvel, and make her his Pet Character, throw NAMOR of all people on the squad (with only a bit of his rambunctious personality intact), and add She-Hulk while putting The Black Knight back on the team as a generic guy. Hercules would also join, but be beaten up during the classic Under Siege story, which featured Stern & Gru gathering a HUGE army of villains together into a new Masters of Evil, while Baron Zemo agonized Captain America by burning all of his precious mementos (including his original shield and the only picture of his mother) and torture poor butler Jarvis before his eyes. THEN the Avengers would have to deal with a bunch of pissed-off Olympians, deal with the paunchy jerk Doctor Druid becoming the new Team Asshole, Namor's leaving after mercy-killing his poor wife Marrina, and more.

Starfox would also join, the team would fight Nebula, and they'd all move to Hydrobase once the Mansion was destroyed by the Masters in Under Siege. Alas, Stern's run came to an end when Gru as Editor interjected himself and forced Cap back on as team leader instead of Captain Marvel (Stern had recently upgraded her after The Wasp stepped down), resulting in some REALLY dark years for the book. Walt Simonson, Larry Hama and others would take over, but the team would lose traction quickly- too many short, awful runs. This is a curious time, as since Gruenwald died NOBODY says ill of the man, but clearly editorial stuff was getting involved here.

Gru would, at least, define much of the Avengers' charter (he's a HUGE nerd for details and specifics, as anyone who's read his Official Handbooks would know; I'm much the same). John Byrne, in taking over both books, would ruin The Vision for years by reverting him to a soulless robot, splitting up his marriage and sending Wanda into the arms of Wonder Man... plus she went crazy, which had some repurcussions for later. Acts of Vegeance would come and go, and not have much success. Gilgamesh, Quasar and Sersi would join the team, followed by Rage (who quickly joins The New Warriors) under Larry Hama. The West Coast Avengers would add War Machine, Living Lightning, U.S.Agent, Moon Knight, Firebird, the original Human Torch and a new Spider-Woman in Julia Carpenter.

The 1990s:
-Bob Harras would show up and immediately throw the team into its darkest period, referred to as "The Leather Jacket Era". See... The X-Men at the time were the most popular characters in comics by a LONG ways, largely amped-up by Chris Claremont's huge run gathering steam for over a decade, as well as the work of a revolving door of hot young artists who drew an increasingly bad-ass looking X-team. This would culminate with Jim Lee's brilliant work, which also featured a lot of stylish brown leather jackets on people like Gambit, and popularized the "Bad-Ass Jacket Over Super-Hero Uniform" look. In a sad, transparent attempt at copying this, the floundering Avengers title would latch onto the obvious VISUAL elements of the X-Titles, without mimicking any of the stuff that'd ACTUALLY MADE THE X-TITLES POPULAR TO READERS- Leather Jackets. And so we had Sersi the Eternal dropping her green onesie and wearing a black & red number... with a brown jacket. The Black Knight, still decked out in Arthurian Armor Plate, would throw on... a brown jacket. Hercules, bless him, wouldn't wear one, but OH GOD did he ever put on an ugly-ass shoulder-padded outfit. I've even seen pictures of Captain America & The Black Widow wearing the ubiquitous brown jackets, too. Naturally, they all had an "A" logo on them, copying the X-Men's "X" logo exactly. It was a move as pointless as it was tragically-obvious.

Harras would add Crystal of the Inhumans to the team, and the failed Event Story Operation: Galactic Storm wouldn't gain much traction, despite basically ending the Kree race as a threat for years. The West Coast team would be forcibly taken-down by the baseline team, which would then refuse the offer of "absorption" into the main league, and form Force Works instead. Unfortunately, Force Works was a failure of an EXTREEEEEEEEEEEME '90s book, and would quickly fail after killing off Wonder Man and adding some pointless revamps of older characters to look more cool.

The whole thing ended in disaster with The Crossing, a storyline so hated that Marvel went out of its way to Retcon it out of existence within only a couple of years- it featured Tony Stark having been revealed as a double-agent for Kang, and replaced by a Teen Tony who was free of corruption! This was DISASTROUS, and more or less threatened to kill The Avengers for good- finally Heroes Reborn allowed a Soft Reboot of sorts as all the mainstream heroes but Spider-Man died in battle against Onslaught. With a year and so's break, The Avengerscame roaring back with an all-new volume, with the EPIC creative team of Kurt "Continuity Nerd" Busiek & George Perez. Busiek, as enamored with plot threads as Gruenwald but a better writer, easily turned the team around and made a big success out of it, coming into the Post-Modern Era of comics (after the Comic Book Crash that accompanied the Leather Jacket Era) with great new stories. Using what came before as well as new ideas, he created what I'd still consider to be the "Perfect Avengers Run" (I mean... minus the lame new characters he added).

Busiek & Perez's team was The Big Three, plus a revived Wonder Man, The Scarlet Witch and former New Warriors Justice & Firestar, soon to be joined by The Vision, Silverclaw & Triathlon (whose $cientology-themed Big Arc never really panned out, leaving him forgettable). The run went for a few years, and was a big hit, resurrecting Perez's flagging career (thanks to his frequent illnesses and delays), and ending with a huge Kang-themed arc where he temporarily took over the entire world!

The 2000s:
-Geoff Johns would get a short, unpopular arc out (even he's not impressed with it) before leaving to revolutionize DC, and then... Chuck Austen. Bleh. The two would add Jack of Hearts, Scott Lang's Ant-Man, and a new Captain Britain to the team, but some indie writer named Brian Michael Bendis would take over and have a more long-lasting effect than anyone before or since, unbeknownst to everyone. The Scarlet Witch sets off a storm of events revolving around her broken psyche (a mostly-ignored thing ever since it turned out her children were living figments of her own imagination), kills Vision, Hawkeye, Jack of Hearts & Scott Lang, and removes a huge portion of the Mutants on Earth. Avengers: Disassembled was controversial as HELL, but effectively wiped the slate clean for Bendis's new team.

Soon, Bendis combines several of Marvel's "Big Name" characters onto one book- Cap, Iron Man, Spider-Man, Wolverine and The Sentry are joined by the '70s Spider-Woman (a childhood fave of his) and Luke Cage (as Token Black Guy), effectively making a franchise out of the team, combining big-selling characters (Spidey & Wolvie), established Avengers (Tony, Cap) a big new character (Sentry), and a highly-visible female & black male (Julia & Luke). However, after only a couple of years, the team soon splits up due to Civil War, with the Street Levelers siding with Cap and the others going with Tony because of the Superhuman Registration Act. The Avengers splits into two books once again, and suddenly heroes who had never joined the team over the decades were now Avengers- guys like Iron Fist and Dr. Strange. This was now the Era of Events, as big story after big story hits, resulting in multiple shake-ups that last a couple years. Despite Avengers now being a big-name franchise (if anything, Bendis succeeded in making them a bigger deal than The X-Men was, as that book was now faltering under its own series of forgettable, short runs), it was now mostly used as a "Talking Heads" book revolving around whatever Big Event was going on- Secret Invasion, Dark Reign and others.

Iron Man & Carol Danvers would set up a new team of Mighty Avengers using some OTHER names (Ares), but soon the whole shebang was taken over by Norman Osborn as part of Dark Reign- watching Tony Stark bungle the "Secret Invasion" got him fired, and Norman, as a notable "redeemed villain" thanks to actions during the war, was given the role, effectively showing WHY Registration was such an awful idea in the first place (in the writers' defense, the U.S. Government is WELL-KNOWN for dropping nasty characters into high-power positions. You think Osborn's rap sheet is bigger than Henry Kissinger's?). Osborn forms The Dark Avengers comprised of nutcases and barely-controlled villains in place of the regular Avengers (Wolverine's evil son Daken, Moonstone as Ms. Marvel, Bullseye as Hawkeye, the insane Marvel Boy, plus The Sentry).

Hank Pym led a new team of Mighty Avengers as The Wasp, there were seemingly 900 Avengers books out there, and finally we hit the next decade.

The 2010s:
-Siege was an awful, stupid event, that crapped on the entire Dark Reign concept of "Villain takes over, but slowly grows more corrupt and obvious, and the heroes take him down" by making Osborn a ludicrously-stupid idiot who attacked Asgard for no damned reason. The disappointing storyline (someone I know said something like "this is supposed to be the triumphant return of Captain America to bring down the villains, and the best they can do is a panel of him leading the Young Avengers?") capped off with a whimper and really went nowhere. The Heroic Age was at least less of an event and more of a New Status Quo, with the various Avengers teams making nice. About 10,000 Avengers books sprouted up once again, making keeping track of them impossible, but hey- that's the price of Franchising. We even had a Secret group that added a bunch of guys in as one-shots. The Avengers fought The X-Men in one of the stupidest events in comics history (and that's saying something), because the entire point was dumb ("We should protect Hope" "NO! YOU GUYS SUCK! LET'S FIGHT AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!").

The past half-decade has been its own back of tricks. Bendis FINALLY left (he was good at building from one event to the next, but I got REALLY sick of him writing his David Mamet-Speak style for EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER, making entire groups of teammates sound identical to each other), leaving Jonathan Hickman to write his giant Myth Arc. Infinity was alright in parts, but WAY too long and rambling, leading to a lot of redundancy, Filler Issues and meaningless crap in between all of the awesome fights and some great dialogue. He JSA'd the team into a giant, bloated roster that made characterization of anyone impossible, thus negating potentially-interesting new characters & Avengers like Manifold, Cannonball, Sunspot & Smasher into one-note forgotten background people. He's too critcally-vague about many other things as well, like The White Event mentioned at the beginning being important, but it then gets ignored for other stories for YEARS.

Hickman's stories have a tendency towards some great moments and bad-ass acts, but... they're light on characterization (to the point where I didn't realize Shang-Chi was on the team until he got a focus issue, nor do any of the new characters have any kind of real "character" to them that makes them worth cheering for or hating), and he has a MAJOR weakness regarding clarity. And clarity is quite possibly the MOST important, MOST underrated aspect of any writer's talents- if people can't figure out what the hell is going on due to lack of (or vague) explanations, then they're going to get out of the story.

-Also, there's like three pairings of male characters that have an INSANE amount of homoerotic interaction- the series starts with Tony smiling his way into Captain America's bedroom and flirting with him, Thor & Hyperion being all Alpha Male Fatherly Bros with each other, and Sunspot & Cannonball have turned into life partner fratboys. We're talking crossing Ken/Ryu levels into Sam/Frodo territory here- it is REALLY, REALLY HOMOEROTIC. Which actually only made the books better, because it's hilarious.

But then Hickman kind of tore everything down in a way to get a "Soft Reboot" of the Marvel Universe (that changed only a few tiny things here and there)- his mega-arc built up rather horridly, with 50 issues being used to take up twelve issues' worth of storytelling, every member acting wildly out of character to justify the story and tons of people being added simply because he REALLY just wanted to write Legion of Super-Heroes but couldn't... ultimately, he re-used the "Illuminati" idea with Reed Richards, Tony Stark, Black Bolt, Namor & the Black Panther (plus The Beast, swapped in because someone killed Professor Xavier) figuring that the proper response to parallel worlds colliding with each other and killing both worlds was to commit genocide on those other worlds in secret, NOT to ask other heroes for help. Because simply being up-front and going all "oh hey this is going on- any help?" is UNACCEPTABLE and they have to do all this stuff to commit genocide to protect their Earth (I mean, I get that it's better than letting BOTH worlds die, but still- why hide the problem from EVERYONE ELSE?).

This grand-scale Character Assassination was only made "right" by Hickman hitting the reset button, as Doctor Doom as "Rabum Alal" was revealed to be behind it all, he took over all reality as God Doom, and eventually lost it all because he couldn't handle it. And so Marvel rebooted itself and they called a "Mulligan" on things, so technically, none of what we read for the past 3-4 years actually mattered.

So what's been going down in the Avengers books since then? Well, we had a ton of spinoffs again. Al Ewing made good use of side-characters for a few runs (a team with Luke Cage, and another led by Sunspot). Rick Remender crawled up his own ass with Uncanny Avengers and soon lost the plot so badly that a comic about Captain America bringing together the Avengers & X-Men turned into a book about Cable & Deadpool. Mark Waid led this big new Avengers team that was really just "Established Heroes, Modern Minority Replacements & Kids", buggered it right away by making the Vision get mind-controlled and casting a pall over the rest of the book, and doing a poor Kang arc that killed things before the kids split off. And then we got a couple other runs that were so short I can barely remember what happened in any of them, as things would split, consolidate, re-consolidate, and more. Most recently, Jason Aaron has put together a team book that I personally enjoy for his blend of "Let's Embrace The Weird of Comics" but still enrages people with some bizarre turns (like She-Hulk WANTING to be ugly because she was sexualized before... something she'd never had a problem with in the past), but at least seems to be leading to various big arcs. Though he's one of the worst for just scrapping a previous identity and writing his own story. At least his stories tend to be FUNNY.

----

Summation:

-The book's been EVERYWHERE. Its status as a major-league Marvel title gave it a great pick of creative teams, with icons like Thomas, Buscema, Steve Englehart, George Perez, Kurt Busiek, Mark Waid and others all trying their shot, and though the Cap's Kooky Quartet team was viewed with some derision, it set the standard- while other books had constant rosters, The Avengers had EVERYBODY. At any given moment, a half-dozen guys would leave the team, and be replaced with rarely-seen or unheard-of characters. Where else would you get Hercules (initially a Thor rival), The Black Widow (another criminal-turned-hero), Wonder Man (resurrected "died a hero" villain), The Beast (then unused by the X-books), Warbird (a failed solo hero), the Black Knight (hero with a villainous legacy), Swordsman, and others. It also became common for new creators to just invent their own new heroes to add to what was once a "Major Heroes" collective roster. Englehart created his own Mary Sue, The Mantis, to the team. Thomas had the aforementioned Vision. Kurt Busiek & George Perez threw in Silverclaw. Many of these characters utterly flopped, but it gave The Avengers one of the biggest rosters in all of comics, with characters bursting at the seams.

-So it's been a crazy run, with varying levels of success. One of the biggest teams in history, with all sorts of major names and jobbers alike, legends and forgotten people on the same roster (often at the same time). By doing these builds, I basically throw down and build nearly every major hero in the Marvel Universe that isn't an X-Man.
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Fantasma! Perun! Bogatyri! Stalin!)

Post by M4C8 »

And of course Stalin was resurrected by Satannish and became part of his Lethal Legion as Cold Steel.
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Re: Thermo

Post by Ares »

Jabroniville wrote: Thu May 28, 2020 6:00 am Image
Image

THERMO, THE THERMATRONIC MAN (Dr. Walter Michaels)
Created By:
Tom DeFalco, David Michelinie & Herb Trimpe
First Appearance: Marvel Team-Up #108 (Aug. 1981)
Role: Jobber Villain
Group Affiliations: None


-Huh, so in mid-2011 I built a guy named Thermo, but for some reason he missed my archives completely.

-Thermo's another of those one-shot terrible Marvel Team-Up villains (is there a master list of these issues somewhere? I need to build these guys like Roman Polanski needs little girls. I'd just get the Essential collections, but guys this crappy NEED to be in colour, you know?), an EEEEVIL scientist with one great idea (the most common super-villain origin besides "is a mutant") that resulted in him sucking "thermal energy" from living beings, and gaining super-powers from them. Immediately going mad with power, he escaped and attacked a ton of people. He confounded Spider-Man, Paladin & Dazzler in their Team-Up (two-parters tended to involve getting a separate partner in the 2nd issue), and was finally beaten when a device was placed over his head, de-powering him.

-Thermo then got shuffled into the "Only Mark Gruenwald knows who the hell these characters are" section of the Marvel Universe, fighting Quasar once (when he invaded the Baxter Building, where Quasar also worked)... and then Captain America in another issue, where he was seen among many Jobber Villains at an A.I.M. Weapons Expo (seriously, Gru loves Jobbers as much as I do). The character never appeared again after that, until a random one-off appearance in World War Hulk, where Korg of the Warbound defeated him while he was trying to loot buildings.

-Thermo's sorta-powerful at first, especially with an Affliction that can kill people, but his caps are kinda all over the place regarding offensive power and his Blasts. Once he absorbs energy, he can probably keep going for a good while, so it's only a minor Quirk. Despite a relatively hot debut (fighting three heroes simultaneously... though keep in mind Spidey's "Weak Against Rookies" Complication I gave him), he eventually became just another Jobber.
Thermo was very much a classic "scientific accident" villain, where the power he gained also unhinged his mind. He was actually portrayed kind of sympathetically at first, as someone who was conflicted about his power, suffered major mood swings, and went full blown nuts when it looked like (to him) that his best friend was moving in on his wife. So it's weird that he wound up as a more generic mercenary villain, but that's better than most Marvel Team-Up one-shot villains get.

Thermo might warrant full on Str 9, as at one point he actually picked up an 18 Wheeler and casually swung it around like a baseball club. He definitely was stronger than Spidey.

I also like that the issue showcased Spidey's intelligence. Thermo's wife was a scientist and designed an attachment for Paladin's gun that would supposedly de-power Thermo. When they tried it, it didn't work. So Peter took the nullifier attachment home and spent the night working on it. The next day he had a full blown HELMET that, when put on Thermo, turned his powers off and knocked him out cold for as long as he was wearing it. It was a nice reminder that Peter Parker is a scientific genius and could do more than punch his way out of a problem.
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Re: The Avengers

Post by Ares »

Jabroniville wrote: Thu May 28, 2020 1:40 pm Stern's run was EXCELLENT. He would add Monica Rambeau to the team as the second Captain Marvel, and make her his Pet Character, throw NAMOR of all people on the squad (with only a bit of his rambunctious personality intact), and add She-Hulk while putting The Black Knight back on the team as a generic guy. Hercules would also join, but be beaten up during the classic Under Siege story, which featured Stern & Gru gathering a HUGE army of villains together into a new Masters of Evil, while Baron Zemo agonized Captain America by burning all of his precious mementos (including his original shield and the only picture of his mother) and torture poor butler Jarvis before his eyes. THEN the Avengers would have to deal with a bunch of pissed-off Olympians, deal with the paunchy jerk Doctor Druid becoming the new Team Asshole, Namor's leaving after mercy-killing his poor wife Marrina, and more.

Starfox would also join, the team would fight Nebula, and they'd all move to Hydrobase once the Mansion was destroyed by the Masters in Under Siege. Alas, Stern's run came to an end when Gru as Editor interjected himself and forced Cap back on as team leader instead of Captain Marvel (Stern had recently upgraded her after The Wasp stepped down), resulting in some REALLY dark years for the book. Walt Simonson, Larry Hama and others would take over, but the team would lose traction quickly- too many short, awful runs. This is a curious time, as since Gruenwald died NOBODY says ill of the man, but clearly editorial stuff was getting involved here.

Gru would, at least, define much of the Avengers' charter (he's a HUGE nerd for details and specifics, as anyone who's read his Official Handbooks would know; I'm much the same). John Byrne, in taking over both books, would ruin The Vision for years by reverting him to a soulless robot, splitting up his marriage and sending Wanda into the arms of Wonder Man... plus she went crazy, which had some repurcussions for later. Acts of Vegeance would come and go, and not have much success. Gilgamesh, Quasar and Sersi would join the team, followed by Rage (who quickly joins The New Warriors) under Larry Hama. The West Coast Avengers would add War Machine, Living Lightning, U.S.Agent, Moon Knight, Firebird, the original Human Torch and a new Spider-Woman in Julia Carpenter.
The Avengers are definitely a favorite book of mine, and I was glad when they FINALLY got the respect and prominence they deserved as basically THE team of the Marvel Universe.

I'm also a fan of Roger Stern, though I can see both sides of the argument with regards to Monica vs Steve when it comes to leadership. I give Stern full credit for introducing a new member of the team with some unique powers, a cool outfit, and making her both a woman and black. It's annoying how modern writers think they're re-inventing the wheel when it comes to adding non-white, non-male characters to the Marvel Universe. It's been a thing since at least the 80s, when you had things like a female writer writing the most popular book of the time (the X-Men), which was made up of mostly women and lead by a black woman.

Anyway, Stern was well within his rights to introduce a new character and make her cool . . . but it also seems a bit weird that the character he created and added to the team ALSO becomes team leader when Captain America is right there. I have a hard time picturing any Avenger leading the team while Cap is on the roster, which either necessitates him being off the team (which feels weird) or someone giving Steve orders, which feels odd unless Cap is also acting as their major tactical advisor.

So on the one hand, full props to Stern for creating someone cool and new, but I also think he overdid it a little, and Gru had a point.

As for John Byrne and the Vision, I'll say it now so I can talk about other stuff when the Vision comes up: That was the STUPIDEST idea ever. John Byrne comes off as someone completely up his own ass about how things should be. I will fully admit that I have my own ideas about things should be, but I feel like Byrne takes it to a whole other level. "I've got to FIX this character and undo all of his character development to make him how he was originally!" Except that the Vision was NEVER an emotionless machine! From the start he was a machine that had emotions (he CRIES at the end of his first appearance!), he just struggled to process them. Byrne did not give the Vision a factor reset, he created a completely new character.
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Re: The Avengers

Post by Ares »

Jabroniville wrote: Thu May 28, 2020 1:40 pm
The past half-decade has been its own back of tricks. Bendis FINALLY left (he was good at building from one event to the next, but I got REALLY sick of him writing his David Mamet-Speak style for EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER, making entire groups of teammates sound identical to each other), leaving Jonathan Hickman to write his giant Myth Arc. Infinity was alright in parts, but WAY too long and rambling, leading to a lot of redundancy, Filler Issues and meaningless crap in between all of the awesome fights and some great dialogue. He JSA'd the team into a giant, bloated roster that made characterization of anyone impossible, thus negating potentially-interesting new characters & Avengers like Manifold, Cannonball, Sunspot & Smasher into one-note forgotten background people. He's too critcally-vague about many other things as well, like The White Event mentioned at the beginning being important, but it then gets ignored for other stories for YEARS.

Hickman's stories have a tendency towards some great moments and bad-ass acts, but... they're light on characterization (to the point where I didn't realize Shang-Chi was on the team until he got a focus issue, nor do any of the new characters have any kind of real "character" to them that makes them worth cheering for or hating), and he has a MAJOR weakness regarding clarity. And clarity is quite possibly the MOST important, MOST underrated aspect of any writer's talents- if people can't figure out what the hell is going on due to lack of (or vague) explanations, then they're going to get out of the story.

-Also, there's like three pairings of male characters that have an INSANE amount of homoerotic interaction- the series starts with Tony smiling his way into Captain America's bedroom and flirting with him, Thor & Hyperion being all Alpha Male Fatherly Bros with each other, and Sunspot & Cannonball have turned into life partner fratboys. We're talking crossing Ken/Ryu levels into Sam/Frodo territory here- it is REALLY, REALLY HOMOEROTIC. Which actually only made the books better, because it's hilarious.

But then Hickman kind of tore everything down in a way to get a "Soft Reboot" of the Marvel Universe (that changed only a few tiny things here and there)- his mega-arc built up rather horridly, with 50 issues being used to take up twelve issues' worth of storytelling, every member acting wildly out of character to justify the story and tons of people being added simply because he REALLY just wanted to write Legion of Super-Heroes but couldn't... ultimately, he re-used the "Illuminati" idea with Reed Richards, Tony Stark, Black Bolt, Namor & the Black Panther (plus The Beast, swapped in because someone killed Professor Xavier) figuring that the proper response to parallel worlds colliding with each other and killing both worlds was to commit genocide on those other worlds in secret, NOT to ask other heroes for help. Because simply being up-front and going all "oh hey this is going on- any help?" is UNACCEPTABLE and they have to do all this stuff to commit genocide to protect their Earth (I mean, I get that it's better than letting BOTH worlds die, but still- why hide the problem from EVERYONE ELSE?).

This grand-scale Character Assassination was only made "right" by Hickman hitting the reset button, as Doctor Doom as "Rabum Alal" was revealed to be behind it all, he took over all reality as God Doom, and eventually lost it all because he couldn't handle it. And so Marvel rebooted itself and they called a "Mulligan" on things, so technically, none of what we read for the past 3-4 years actually mattered.

So what's been going down in the Avengers books since then? Well, we had a ton of spinoffs again. Al Ewing made good use of side-characters for a few runs (a team with Luke Cage, and another led by Sunspot). Rick Remender crawled up his own ass with Uncanny Avengers and soon lost the plot so badly that a comic about Captain America bringing together the Avengers & X-Men turned into a book about Cable & Deadpool. Mark Waid led this big new Avengers team that was really just "Established Heroes, Modern Minority Replacements & Kids", buggered it right away by making the Vision get mind-controlled and casting a pall over the rest of the book, and doing a poor Kang arc that killed things before the kids split off. And then we got a couple other runs that were so short I can barely remember what happened in any of them, as things would split, consolidate, re-consolidate, and more. Most recently, Jason Aaron has put together a team book that I personally enjoy for his blend of "Let's Embrace The Weird of Comics" but still enrages people with some bizarre turns (like She-Hulk WANTING to be ugly because she was sexualized before... something she'd never had a problem with in the past), but at least seems to be leading to various big arcs. Though he's one of the worst for just scrapping a previous identity and writing his own story. At least his stories tend to be FUNNY.
I find Hickman and Aaron to be sort of the opposite of Kurt Busiek in a way. Busiek made a real effort to make the characters feel like individuals, be clear about what was going on, and not only respect continuity, but incorporate it into his stories WELL.

Hickman's stuff is bloated, confusing and lacks real characterization. It's got these big moments, but getting to them is often a chore. Some of his stuff is interesting, but it's rarely fun.

Aaron's run is at least trying to be fun, and it has a lot of elements that I'd enjoy if not for all of the things I dislike about Aaron. He's basically the worst for just ignoring what came before and re-inventing entire new histories and characterizations for people he wants to use. What's that? Iron Fist and Black Panther already had a history and established legacy? Well too bad! I'mma retcon the hell out of it. He's also really bad for responding to criticism by putting the words of critics into the mouths of villains. He answered criticisms about She-Hulk by having her fight a literally Troll and putting fan quotes in Ulik's mouth. He also just involves so many damn characters, and happily puts people like Ghost Rider and Blade on a team where having Wolverine was once considered a stretch. And he's got his own problems with character bloat.

That said, I do like Aaron's imagination, the idea of a base being made out of the corps of a Celestial is an interesting one, and he has some fun concepts. But for the most part, writers like Aaron and Hickman just make me miss guys like Stern and Busiek.

*EDIT*

We JUST got an example of the kind of crap Aaron just pulls out of his ass. He has Moon Knight take out Thor by retconning that the Uru Mjolnir is made out of is "moon rock" so he can control it. Also we see Moon Knight walk all over Iron Fist, Dr. Strange and Thor, but Black Panther not only gets to keep his dignity by not being defeated, but he makes Moon Knight look like a fool.
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Fantasma! Perun! Bogatyri! Stalin!)

Post by Scots Dragon »

It's a shame because I actually liked some of Hickman's ideas, they were just kinda too much ambitious scope and not enough exploration of the characters and the way it affected them.

It's almost unfair to compare most writers to Busiek though because he's one of the strongest writers to work for either company.
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Fantasma! Perun! Bogatyri! Stalin!)

Post by drkrash »

I also love the Avengers as the "Marvel JLA" and I'm looking forward to this series.

Right now, I'm re-reading the Busiek/Perez series and I'm really enjoying it compared to contemporary comics writing, because it still has character development and sub-plots while still remembering to tell superhero stories. The Triathlon stuff is a little cringe-y to me- and he's an asshole of a character.

This week, I went back and re-read the end leading up to Onslaught. The story is meh, but I love both Black Widow's costume and Scarlet Witch's Force Works costume (even if she is almost unrecognizable as Scarlet Witch). Even with the meh story, I'll take that over a lot of modern storytelling.

About 10 years ago when I started reading comics again, I was re-introduced to the Avengers with Bendis and Disassembled. I now understand the weaknesses of these stories, but at the time, I have to admit I loved Bendis' dialogue, humor, and storytelling. I liked Deodato's art too.

I despise, despise, despise Hickman's writing. Infinity and Secret Wars were absolute garbage. I hated them. I don't understand what people love about his new X-Men run because it sucks too. And there's no homoerotic subtext there; it's just text.

Anyway. Looking forward to this.
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Fantasma! Perun! Bogatyri! Stalin!)

Post by Scots Dragon »

Nothing wrong with a bit of homoerotic text.
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Fantasma! Perun! Bogatyri! Stalin!)

Post by Ares »

As with everything, it depends on the characters.
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