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

Where in all of your character write ups will go.
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Ken
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (CYCLONE!!! Green Arrow I-III! Amazing-Man! The Spectre!)

Post by Ken »

Thomas and Conway are pals. And when Heywood was added to the Squadron, Heywood III hadn't been invented yet. I think Thomas included Steel partially as a boon to Conway, as it meant the 6th issue of Steel now saw publication. Also since Steel was a recent creation, Thomas might get the fans of Steel onto his still new book. And it gave him a flag suit guy.

It also gave him someone that recent DC fans might recognise but management wouldn't bitch & moan about using the characters with counterparts.

Steel always struck me as the love child between Captain America and the $6 Million Man.
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The Bronze Age Steel

Post by Jabroniville »

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STEEL II (Hank Heywood III)
Created By:
Gerry Conway & Chuck Patton
First Appearance: Justice League of America Annual #2 (1984)
Role: Forgotten D-List Character, Powerhouse
Group Affiliations: The Justice League of America
PL 9 (108)
STRENGTH
8 STAMINA 8 AGILITY 2
FIGHTING 6 DEXTERITY 0
INTELLIGENCE 1 AWARENESS 2 PRESENCE 2

Skills:
Deception 3 (+5)
Expertise (Soldier) 4 (+5)
Insight 2 (+4)
Intimidation 5 (+7)
Perception 2 (+4)

Advantages:
Close Attack 2, Fast Grab, Improved Hold, Power Attack, Ranged Attack 4

Powers:
"Man of Steel"
Immunity 14 (Heat, Cold, Pressure, Radiation, Falling Damage, Fire Damage) [14]
Leaping 2 (30 feet) [2]
Speed 2 (8 mph) [2]
Protection 3 (Extras: Impervious 9) [12]

Offense:
Unarmed +8 (+8 Damage, DC 23)
Initiative +2

Defenses:
Dodge +6 (DC 16), Parry +6 (DC 16), Toughness +11 (+5 Impervious), Fortitude +8, Will +5

Complications:
Responsibilty (The League)
Relationship (Hank I- Grandfather)- Hank's grandfather forced him to go through a series of painful operations, turning him into a cyborg.

Total: Abilities: 60 / Skills: 16--8 / Advantages: 9 / Powers: 24 / Defenses: 7 (108)

-Commander Steel's grandson was on the infamous 1980s Detroit JLA (the Aquaman/Steel/Gypsy/Vixen/Vibe team). His backstory was that he had been raised by his grandfather, the Golden Age Commander Steel, after the deaths of his parents, and he'd been forcibly subjected to the same painful procedure to gain powers himself. This was mostly done because the old man wanted to live vicariously through his grandson. Steel becomes good friends with Vibe and has a crush on Vibe's sister Rosita, creating some tension on the squad. Along the way, he finally has it out with the old man, defeating him when Commander Steel sets up Infinity Inc. to fight the JLA. The team however doesn't last, and is disbanded during the Legends event. Steel is quickly killed by one of Professor Ivo's androids, sacrificing himself to take the blast as it self-destructs so that others don't die. A broken Grandpa Steel is thus convinced to turn off his grandson's life support by the Martian Manhunter. He appears in some background shots on JLU, never doing much of anything (though they did a Captain America gag with him decapitating a Parademon by throwing a disc-like object at it).

-A big, strong guy, Steel was nonetheless a pretty minor hero, and so only deserves PL 8.5 status. He's lacking in a lot of the heroic accoutrements- being a jobber and all. REALLY high level of Imperviousness, though.
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Re: The Golden Age Amazing-Man

Post by Sidney369 »

Ken wrote: Tue May 03, 2022 1:37 am
Sidney369 wrote: Tue May 03, 2022 1:31 amAnd his powers were changed as a homage to Volto, a Golden Age superhero/cereal pitch man https://pdsh.fandom.com/wiki/Volto
But why? Did Volto really need to be homaged?
Probably not, but then Doc Samson didn't need to be a homage to candy mascot Captain Tootsie either.
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Re: The Golden Age Amazing-Man

Post by Ken »

Sidney369 wrote: Wed May 04, 2022 1:03 am
Ken wrote: Tue May 03, 2022 1:37 am
Sidney369 wrote: Tue May 03, 2022 1:31 amAnd his powers were changed as a homage to Volto, a Golden Age superhero/cereal pitch man https://pdsh.fandom.com/wiki/Volto
But why? Did Volto really need to be homaged?
Probably not, but then Doc Samson didn't need to be a homage to candy mascot Captain Tootsie either.
Was Doc Samson created that way, or was he changed to be a homage to Captain Tootsie at some point?

If they wanted a Volto homage, create one. Don't change an already existing character.
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Citizen Steel

Post by Jabroniville »

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Good GOD is Alex Ross & "Shiny Metal Bodies" a match made in heaven.

CITIZEN STEEL (Nathan Heywood)
Created By:
Geoff Johns & Dale Eaglesham
First Appearance: The Justice Society of America #1 (Feb. 2007)
Role: Powerhouse, Trapped-In-His-Own-Body Guy
PL 10 (128)
STRENGTH
13 STAMINA 6 AGILITY 3
FIGHTING 6 DEXTERITY 0
INTELLIGENCE 1 AWARENESS 1 PRESENCE 1

Skills:
Acrobatics 3 (+6)
Expertise (Football Player) 6 (+7)
Insight 3 (+4)
Intimidation 4 (+5)
Perception 2 (+3)

Advantages:
Great Endurance, Fast Grab, Power Attack, Ranged Attack 3, Teamwork, Withstand Damage (Trade Defenses For Toughness)

Powers:
"Man of Steel"
Immunity 14 (Heat, Cold, Pressure, Radiation, Falling Damage, Fire Damage) [14]
Leaping 2 (30 feet) [2]
Protection 8 (Extras: Impervious 13) [21]
Features 5: Increased Mass 5 [5]

Offense:
Unarmed +6 (+13 Damage, DC 28)
Initiative +2

Defenses:
Dodge +6 (DC 16), Parry +6 (DC 16), Toughness +14 (+7 Impervious), Fortitude +8, Will +5

Complications:
Prejudice (Metal Man)- Nathan has been permanently transformed into a man of metal. He is so heavy that he causes tremors when he walks, can destroy tile flooring, and his skin is reflective. He is also overly-strong all the time, and has to work hard to not crush people with the slightest touch (his strength is Uncontrolled without his suit).
Relationship (The Heywood Family)- Almost all of Nathan's family was killed by the Fourth Reich, under orders from Vandal Savage to slay the families of the JSA. He has taken charge of the surviving children.
Responsibility (All-Out Power)- Nathan's strength is at such a high level he has a hard time controlling it- he has to constantly hold back or risk breaking things and people around him. He has to wear a steel costume (made from a literal foundry and poured over him at points) to even hold himself back.

Total: Abilities: 62 / Skills: 18--9 / Advantages: 7 / Powers: 43 / Defenses: 7 (128)

-Citizen Steel is kinda weird in that he's a legacy character created from one of the more unsuccessful attempts DC had of creating one years ago. The various Steels were long dead, the character totally forgotten, until Alex Ross got to create the really cool costume once more. And I mean, if you're gonna get Alex Ross, you need to add at least one shiny guy to your team- that's the rule. And thus, we've got the tragic Nathan Heywood, a painkiller-addicted amputee whose entire family is killed by the Fourth Reich, a gang of Nazi villains. Gaining a steel form as a result (because... a metal guy bled onto him. One of the weirdest origins ever- I don't think we ever even got an explanation as to how Reichsmark got his powers, EITHER), he's left permanently at high strength, which is definitely an unusual thing in DC, as there's guys who are WAY stronger than him kicking around without that problem.

-Truth be told, I damn near forgot this guy existed until flipping through old JSA books. He's not bad, though- a classic tragic origin story and all that. Now, the killing of his ENTIRE FAMILY by the Reich was a bit over the top (Johns LOVES to torture his characters by stuffing their loved ones into the refrigerator), especially when little girls and boys were being frozen into metal statues by an evil Nazi and never got better, but it REALLY made the bad guys look like assholes. Nathan, turning into Citizen Steel (since he had no military rank, unlike his forebear), becomes a hero and learns to use his super-strong, super-heavy new body. There's a weird side-story in a later issue where he is able to talk to his "statue-ized" family members through the vibrations in their steel skin, which is... odd. Because they're all solid steel, they "vibrate" in a way that lets him hear them- this nightmarish existence is barely touched upon, because it's just one story in a larger Annual.

-Nate joins the JSA All-Stars team, largely as a side-character- him & "Tomcat" have some witty repartee but don't get up to much, though there's a "Puzzlemen" arc where he deals once more with a body that's unable to feel anything. He even has Power Girl go all-out and punch him, to little effect, then tricks some monstrous puzzle-piece bedrock creatures into tearing his armor off so he can go all-out... but it's still the JSA's computer intelligence friend Roxy who defeats them (using Bach's music, which was set up to be the opposite resonance of the magical Puzzlemen). There just isn't time to develop him otherwise.

-Nathan is virtually identical to the Golden Age Steel, except he's got the quirk of being permanently strong without the costume (he still has trouble holding back), and has some more Football-related things. He's only PL 7 offensively, PL 8 defensively thanks to his large amount of Protection, but he's no major player just yet. Way too much of a rookie. Figuring out his strength is just a guess; like most DC guys, they just say someone's strong and give you little inkling of just how much. You've got guys who lift cars (Hourman) and guys who lift buildings (Superman, Power Girl), and there isn't much official weights thrown about- DCA lists him as Strength *16*, which is really high, though he IS the only JSA member able to knock Gog on his ass (though he's clearly playing a Hero Point, what with tearing his power-limiting costume off all dramatic-like and letting out his pent-up aggression).
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Green Arrow I-III! Amazing-Man! The Spectre! Steel I-II!)

Post by greycrusader »

I always kind of liked Citizen Steel for some reason. He seemed like an oddity for the DC universe, but was a decent fit on the JSA book. But like most of the newcomers, the team got so large that he just ended up not getting much focus in the end. But yes, the New Reich villains were properly depicted as rotten bastards, as one would expect of Neo-Nazis. I remember fist pumping at the panel where Reichsmark got blasted to fragments by Damage.

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Re: Jab’s Builds! (Green Arrow I-III! Amazing-Man! The Spectre! Steel I-II!)

Post by Ken »

And Alex Ross painted Nathan so he looks like he's as hard as steel....
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Quality Comics

Post by Jabroniville »

QUALITY COMICS:

-One the surface, Quality Comics seems like the biggest misnomer ever.



... okay that's unfair; I've never actually read any of their books. But HOLY BUCKETS do most of their characters stink! But it was apparently one of the best ones of the Golden Age!

Quality Comics was reasonably-successful, lasting for about twenty years. Founded by Everett "Busy" Arnold, they started in 1937 doing reprints of popular comic strips. However, they soon shifted to superheroes, creating Plastic Man and Kid Eternity, as well as the aviator Blackhawk, getting most of their stuff from the (Will) Eisner & Iger Shop (and apparently paid the best, since most E&I stuff went to them). They also created the heroes who would be later combined together into DC's Freedom Fighters- Uncle Sam, The Human Bomb, Doll Man, The Phantom Lady (later sold to Fox Comics), Black Condor and The Ray forming the main squad, but also less-popular acts like The Red Bee, Red Torpedo, Magno and Neon the Unknown. Other failed acts included Merlin the Magician and Midnight (knock-offs of the then-popular Magician Hero and Spirit strips), a reporter strip called Chic Stone (who sometimes became The Sword), Blue Tracer and Stormy Foster.

Our own Ken figures that they were the #2 superhero publisher of the Golden Age (behind National/All-American), owing to their longevity and their sheer number of recurring titles. They had three heroes (Doll Man, Blackhawk & Plastic Man) who were able to run their own books AND a starring role in another title simultaneously (and nearly had a fourth in Uncle Sam). They also had a lot of stuff from Will Eisner, Lou Fine, Reed Crandall & Jack Cole, who were all among the best of the era- this meant that Quality books were in fact quite often the prettiest (many books of the Golden Age have a pretty slapdash, "made on the cheap" look to them, especially second-tier books or cheapskate Timely's). Reprinting Eisner's "Spirit" obviously helped, too.

Quality Comics suffered as most did during the 1950s, moving on to horror, crime and war books, and shut their doors in 1956, eventually selling the copywrites for most of their superheroes to DC Comics, who mostly wanted the still-popular Blackhawks strip, which they kept going.

-Despite being one of the least-known of the Golden Age (since Archie, Marvel & DC are still around), Quality had a pretty successful number of characters in terms of their longevity, since DC would bring a lot of them back over the years. In particular, Plastic Man had his own cartoon series, Doll Man was the first Shrinking Hero in comics, and The Freedom Fighters became a recurring title in the '70s. However, they ultimately got less and less popular, eventually being disposed of for the most part- DC revives them on occasion to keep up their copywrites (the early books are actually in the public domain, but DC owns the characters), but they had fallen into disuse even by the 1980s, and were considered so disposable they were wiped out in the opening moments of Geoff Johns's Infinite Crisis, utterly crushed by dozens of super-villains at once.

THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS:

-In 1971, DC brought in several Quality Comics characters as The Freedom Fighters- a retcon was introduced that resulted in the deaths of a few during Pearl Harbor, and they were said to reside on Earth-X, a parallel world in which the Axis Powers had won World War II following a successful Japanese invasion of California. They allied with the Justice League and Society against the villains of their world, attempting to undo this horrific future- they got their own series in 1976, but it only lasted a mere 11 issues (DC was NOT doing well by the end of the '60s, and things took a long time to pick up) and took place on Earth-One, where they'd travelled, giving some of them extra powers to make them less lame (Phantom Lady becomes intangible & Doll Man gains telekinesis). Following the Crisis, the Freedom Fighters were placed on the singular mainstream Earth, resulting in a bit of reshuffling- the Fighters were now considered like a subsidiary of the All-Star Squadron, and were contemporaries of the JSA & All-Stars in any case.

However, the Fighters were a pretty sad bunch- undynamic costumes, silly and dated names (UNCLE SAM?!?), and overall lame. Some people hate wanton killing of characters, but I reveled with fanboy GLEE at this team of losers being cut down in the opening of Infinite Crisis, as an elite squad of top-tier Super-Villains annihilates them one-by-one- Damage is nearly-fatally injured, Phantom Lady is run through, Human Bomb is beaten to death, and Black Condor is impaled on an energy beam. Just awesome stuff, and on characters that really didn't have much purpose. Sure, you COULD save them and turn them into something good... but why bother? DC already HAD good characters!

A new team was introduced for no reason other than to protect copywrites in 2006, just following Infinite Crisis. Despite some pretty good art by Daniel Acuna, and some tolerable costume changes, it was just too wacky. Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters was basically a book about Black Ops government agents doing dark, nasty stuff on behalf of America, only to turn their backs on the idea and join Uncle Sam... and continue to kill people and stuff. Uncle Sam got a Christ-like role, Father Time got involved, and there was a guy named Gonzo the Mechanical Bastard out to install RFID chips in every American... okay Grant Morrison was part of the design process, alright? It was messed-up, dark, drug-inspired, and made little sense. Nonetheless, it was given THREE books between 2006 & 2011, being relaunched consistently for some reason (DC darling Jimmy Palmiotti was writing, which might be why), and ultimately I think most of the characters were killed.

An ongoing was planned for 2010, featuring the team being treated like public celebrities, which backfired (Phantom Lady drunkenly-killed someone on live TV), but was an unmitigated failure, being cancelled after only NINE ISSUES- truly pathetic.

So to me, the Freedom Fighters represent the worst of the Golden Age- stupid gimmicks, awful costumes, goofy code-names (UNCLE SAM? Doll Man?), and weak stories. Combining all of them onto ONE TEAM doesn't help, because it adds all of the sucktitude together, as well as poisoning the few that are half-decent (The Ray, mostly).

The Roster:
Golden Age:
Black Condor- Flying Hero
Doll Man- Shrinking Hero
Human Bomb- Exploding Hero
Phantom Lady- Invisibility & Fanservice
The Ray- Energy Blaster
Uncle Sam- Goofy Patriotic Hero
Firebrand I & II- Guy in a pink shirt, and his Retconned replacement.
The Invisible Hood- Little-known invisible guy.
Magno- Magnetic guy.
Hourman I- Retconned in.
Neon the Unknown- Blaster & weird guy.
Miss America- Alchemy-type.
Red Torpedo- Uses a submarine.
The Red Bee- Uses a bee.
Alias the Spider- Archer.
The Jester- Prank-based superhero.
Quicksilver- aka Max Mercury, a Speedster.
Manhunter- Dan Richards, the one with the dog.
Plastic Man- Largely used for the JLA.
The Blackhawks- Fighter pilots.

Later Age:
Black Condor II- Flying Guy
Damage- Exploding Hero
Iron Munro- Young All-Star, still looks young.
The Phantom Lady II- A new one.
The Ray II- One-time potentially-big DC hero.

2006 Team:
Uncle Sam
Firebrand IV
Doll Man II
Human Bomb II
Phantom Lady III
The Ray III
The Red Bee II
Black Condor III
Invisible Hood II
Miss America I
The Ray II

-These guys are relatively little-known, and thus rather difficult to stat. I'll see what they look like when I get to them. I'll also be making notes and updates on ALL the lesser-known side Quality characters as well.
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Uncle Sam

Post by Jabroniville »

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UNCLE SAM (aka The Spirit of America, Johnny Reb, Minuteman, Brother Johnathan, Billy Yank, Patriot, Taylor Samuel Hawke, Sam Adams, Sam Wilson, Father-Time)
Created By:
Will Eisner
First Appearance: National Comics #1 (July 1940)
Role: Golden Age Hero, Spirit of America
Group Affiliations: The Freedom Fighters, The All-Star Squadron, S.H.A.D.E.
PL 10 (149)
STRENGTH
10 STAMINA 10 AGILITY 3
FIGHTING 10 DEXTERITY 3
INTELLIGENCE 2 AWARENESS 4 PRESENCE 4

Skills:
Persuasion 5 (+9)
Expertise (History) 10 (+12)
Expertise (Theology & Philosophy) 5 (+7)
Expertise (Civics) 10 (+12)
Perception 7 (+11)
Insight 6 (+10)
Stealth 3 (+6)

Advantages:
Accurate Attack, Great Endurance, Improved Initiative, Inspire, Leadership, Power Attack, Ranged Attack 2, Teamwork

Powers:
Impervious Toughness 3 [3]
Immunity 2 (Aging, Disease) [2]
"Clairvoyance" Features 1: May Ask the GM a Direct Question with an HP Spent [1]
Immortality 5 (Flaws: Source- American Faith) [5]
"Travel To The Heartland" Movement 1 (Dimensional Travel 1) [2]

Offense:
Unarmed +10 (+10 Damage, DC 25)
Initiative +7

Defenses:
Dodge +10 (DC 20), Parry +10 (DC 20), Toughness +10, Fortitude +10, Will +9

Complications:
Power Loss (All Powers)- Should Americans lose faith, Uncle Sam will lose his powers.

Total: Abilities: 92 / Skills: 46--23 / Advantages: 9 / Powers: 13 / Defenses: 12 (149)

Uncle Sam- The Goofiest Thing DC Takes Seriously:
-Uncle Sam is probably the living embodiment of why some adults looked down on comics back in the day. OK, that's mean, but I don't think I've ever seen a "comics newbie" flip through a book and see friggin' UNCLE SAM in it without laughing or making some kind of derogatory comment. He's like Aquaman, but not as famous. Maybe it's just because I'm Canadian, I dunno- people like Cap or other patriotic heroes don't bother me (obviously, patriots are a real thing, especially in America), but the kind of mindless, flag-waving patriotism and sheer CHEESEBALL nature of someone like Uncle friggin' Sam fighting as a superhero is just too eye-rolling for me to bear. Uncle Sam is basically what I think a lot of people are afraid of Captain America being, which at least in Cap's case is unfounded. Cap is idealistic, but not jingoistic.

-And here's a question: why is AMERICA the only country to get the embodiment of their fighting spirit into the fray of the War? They joined World War II years after EVERYONE ELSE did- ya think maybe England or RUSSIA (the country suffering the most losses) had any kind of national patriotic spirit going for them? Obviously it makes sense from a real world point of view (America was producing the comics, so America got the Spirit of America as a superhero and nobody else got a comparable guy), but I poop all over this idea.

Uncle Sam's Debut:
-Uncle Sam (based off of a famous wartime recruiting poster- "Uncle Sam Wants YOU!"- for the War of 1812, known as the one where the U.S. & Britain fought a proxy war in CANADA, in which both sides claimed victory, but Canadians are right because I am Canadian so eat it :)) was a big enough deal in the Golden Age, getting his own Quarterly book for a while, but it didn't last that long- his run was only from 1940 to 1944 (Doll Man, Plastic Man and Blackhawk were all more successful characters at Quality Comics). So he lasted for 40+ issues of National Comics (run by Quality, not National Comics, lol) but went away as soon as the war ended- I guess a hero so defined by the War wasn't needed after. Captain America (who similarly struggled after the War ended) was EASILY the most-popular Golden Age Patriotic superhero (surpassing even The Shield, the originator of the idea). Sam is the spirit of a slain patriot during the American Revolutionary War, and now appears every time his country needs him.

-Despite, or because of, his origins, he's one of the more successful "Non-JSA" All-Stars, becoming the key representative of Earth-X (although Ray Terrill gets the occasional push) whenever that issue comes up. He was made the founder and leader of the Freedom Fighters, the coalition of Quality's characters, and they featured in a book in the 1970s. A retcon in The Spectre involved a mystical ritual by the Founding Fathers, and he'd been reincarnated in various forms over the years (splitting in twain during the Civil War). He joined the WWII-era Freedom Fighters & All-Star Squadron, disappearing by 1944, as his country no longer needed him. Later on, he gained a new costume as The Patriot, one of the more stupid-looking Powersuit designs of the 1990s- it didn't last long, but made the JSA: Our Worlds at War event tie-in. There was also a Vertigo book that featured a haggard Sam watching the darker side of American history (the destruction of the Native tribes, lynchings, etc.)- producing some pretty emotive Alex Ross work.

Sam's Later Years:
-Unfortunately for Sam, DC had basically reserved the Freedom Fighters to "Jobber" status, using them solely to get their asses kicked or show up in an "all the reserves are called up" JSA story, in the 1990s, leading to there eventual massacre at the hands to the elite super-villains in Infinite Crisis. But Sam came back for ANOTHER revival of the team, which gets rid of some of the chaff (ie. uninteresting characters) with new, super-flawed newbies, though that series was also a failure, resulting in a glut of weird new characters using the old names. Me, you could replace the entire roster of the Freedom Fighters with Hank Pym and the Council of Cross-Time Pyms and I'd be more likely to read it, so it's possible I might be a LITTLE bit biased against them. Sam himself is just a little bit over the line as a comic book character to me- just INCREDIBLY silly.

Sam's Powers:
-Uncle Sam is pretty easy to stat up, but I had to decide which of his weird powers to include. He's been seen growing huge before, but I'm pretty sure that never happened in the DCU proper, so it's out. He gets the Cosmic Awareness power thanks to his remarkable intuitiveness, as well as Resurrection for his stated ability to come out in new forms regularly. Not alot of ranks, but it's there. Otherwise, he's a standard Balanced Brick, a guy who's super-strong in combat, but focused entirely upon that. But he's +10/+10 offensively, which is unusual in my builds. His DCA version has a MILLION powers that I've never seen used before, probably from the newer series. It ain't on his online bios, that's for sure. Also, I seriously doubt he's worth PL 13, especially with my lower-tiered builds. PL 10 seems good enough for a guy who's tough, but not a world-beater.
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Re: Uncle Sam

Post by Davies »

Jabroniville wrote: Wed May 04, 2022 7:02 pmA retcon in The Spectre involved a mystical ritual by the Founding Fathers, and he'd been reincarnated in various forms over the years (splitting in twain during the Civil War). He joined the WWII-era Freedom Fighters & All-Star Squadron, disappearing by 1944, as his country no longer needed him. Later on, he gained a new costume as The Patriot, one of the more stupid-looking Powersuit designs of the 1990s- it didn't last long, but made the JSA: Our Worlds at War event tie-in. There was also a Vertigo book that featured a haggard Sam watching the darker side of American history (the destruction of the Native tribes, lynchings, etc.)- producing some pretty emotive Alex Ross work.
I suspect that the Spectre retcon was inspired by previews of Mr. Ross' book, which (based on the cameo of that series' Sam in the Kingdom Come trade paperback) Ostrander thought was going to be set in the DCU (it wasn't) since he'd been keen to introduce characters from that series into the present of the DCU.

As for me, I like the guy. One series I've thought about is a version of Hawk & Dove that, ditching the Order & Chaos business from the 80s series, has the two of them empowered by him, somewhat inspired by his appearance in the last issue of their 80s series.
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Re: Jab’s Builds! (The Spectre! Steel I-II! Quality Comics- Uncle Sam!)

Post by catsi563 »

I always loved the idea of Uncle Sam being one of the new class of American gods. Those symbols like Rosie the Riveter Lady Liberty or the easter bunny or Ronald Mcdonald or Mickey Mouse that get so popular and become so engrained in the american psyche that they take on a life of their own like most divinity does.

Scion worked that angle abit and some rpgs have things like Father Winter for china or the like Hell a series based on these national symbols might be very interesting depending on who they get to write it
Last edited by catsi563 on Wed May 04, 2022 8:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Uncle Sam

Post by brothersale »

Jabroniville wrote: Wed May 04, 2022 7:02 pm
-And here's a question: why is AMERICA the only country to get the embodiment of their fighting spirit into the fray of the War? They joined World War II years after EVERYONE ELSE did- ya think maybe England or RUSSIA (the country suffering the most losses) had any kind of national patriotic spirit going for them? Obviously it makes sense from a real world point of view (America was producing the comics, so America got the Spirit of America as a superhero and nobody else got a comparable guy), but I poop all over this idea.
well if its the real life reasoning then Britainia was a Roman goddess (kinda it a bit weird background as it was a retro active change like the others to a goddess "daughter" of Minerva/Athena) much like alot of the female patriotic figues for nations, so for the allies during the war that kinda left the French (which believe only had a female, Marianne), the Russians (Mother Russia- who may have started as the goddess Mokosh - a slavic goddess before being distorted as the others are into a romanised goddess) as such most would have been Goddess rather than heroes.

In a nut shell it meant that only one was left for them to use as a character, Jonh Bull, which Quality did use https://dc.fandom.com/wiki/John_Bull_(Quality_Universe), but as most of the images of him that people would see in the real world are this http://www.projectbritain.com/calendar/ ... h/bull.jpg a fat over weight man, i can't say the loss is a bad thing
Last edited by brothersale on Wed May 04, 2022 8:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Uncle Sam

Post by Davies »

brothersale wrote: Wed May 04, 2022 8:08 pm
well if its the real life reasoning then Britainia was a Roman goddess (kinda it a bit weird background as it was a retro active change like the others to a goddess "daughter" of Minerva/Athena) much like alot of the female patriotic figues for nations,
Of whom there is also Columbia, the feminine personification of the United States.
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Re: Quality Comics

Post by Ken »

Jabroniville wrote: Wed May 04, 2022 6:14 pm Our own Ken figures that they were the #2 superhero publisher of the Golden Age (behind National/All-American), owing to their longevity and their sheer number of recurring titles. They had three heroes (Doll Man, Blackhawk & Plastic Man) who were able to run their own books AND a starring role in another title simultaneously (and nearly had a fourth in Uncle Sam). They also had a lot of stuff from Will Eisner, Lou Fine, Reed Crandall & Jack Cole, who were all among the best of the era- this meant that Quality books were in fact quite often the prettiest (many books of the Golden Age have a pretty slapdash, "made on the cheap" look to them, especially second-tier books or cheapskate Timely's). Reprinting Eisner's "Spirit" obviously helped, too.
The only other contender for the #2 superhero publisher is Fawcett. It is known that Fawcett had the #1 best selling super hero title of the golden age (Captain Marvel Adventures) which sold well enough that Fawcett started putting it out bi-weekly. And they were respected enough that they picked up the license for Captain Midnight. But other than the Marvel Family, Bulletman was the only one who could maintain a solo book for more than two years. But Fawcett did have CMA, Whiz, Master, Wow, Captain Marvel Jr., Mary Marvel, and Marvel Family, for a total of seven books that carried the Marvels, so without sales charts, it's hard to guestimate which of the two sold better than the other.

National/All-American being two companies masquerading as one, at the time, gave them an advantage.
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Re: Uncle Sam

Post by Ken »

Jabroniville wrote: Wed May 04, 2022 7:02 pm-And here's a question: why is AMERICA the only country to get the embodiment of their fighting spirit into the fray of the War? They joined World War II years after EVERYONE ELSE did- ya think maybe England or RUSSIA (the country suffering the most losses) had any kind of national patriotic spirit going for them? Obviously it makes sense from a real world point of view (America was producing the comics, so America got the Spirit of America as a superhero and nobody else got a comparable guy), but I poop all over this idea.
Because the comics were only being sold to Americans.

During the war, a lot of countries weren't importing non-essential goods from other countries. Comic books were on this list. I know, for a time, MLJ was able to publish some of their super hero titles in Canada, but that was with edits. The Shield's uniform was adapted to be a Union Jack across his torso, not an American shield, and the Black Hood's tights were red, not gold.
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