Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

[Rapier]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Re; Angela Landsbury.

 

You think old Jessica Fletcher is bad, look at the MacMillans from MacMillan and Wife. He was the Police Commssioner and yet practically everyone they knew was murderer or a victim. What kind of people do they hang around with is what I wonder. In an interview, I recall Rock Hudson voicing his concerns that if the MacMillans didn't move, soon, the town they lived in would be depopulated. So they moved them the big city where it would take years to kill everyone.

MacMillan is a little before me, but that is pretty choice! TOO funny.

[Kristopher]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

So, they killed Spoiler in a pointless and idiotic way. That's OK, because goodness knows that none of the comic companies need interesting character with lots of potential.

 

Morons.

[Chuckg]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

There's a thread on CBR.com's "Rumbles" board (technically OT there, as the purpose of that board is to discuss "vs." fights with fictional characters according to our own loose set of scenario rules), that's spent the past several months having a group rant about certain undesirable trends and events in our funnybooks recently.

 

I called it "The Death Spiral of Comics".

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

So' date=' they killed Spoiler in a pointless and idiotic way. That's OK, because goodness knows that none of the comic companies need [i']interesting[/i] character with lots of potential.

 

Morons.

 

Just quoted to keep the topic clear. Making all the characters functionally immortal removes considerable suspense. Assume two costumed members of the Bat Universe were slated to die in War Games. Orpheus and Spoiler both died as written, and you're in the room with the decision makers as the storyline is plotted out.

 

What two characters should die instead, and why are they better choices?

 

EDIT: This exercise should assume that the deaths of two characters is essential to telling a great story. I agree with comments that characters should not be killed of blithely, and other options should be pursued. However, for purposes of this exercise, assume the arc in question will be the highlight of comics in the 21st century, and will not work unless two characters die.

[Lord Liaden]

Re: Brother Blood (original)

 

Actually' date=' the Brother Blood from the Wolfman/Perez era couldn't have been brought back, at all. The one the Titans faced died, and his only direct heir was a daughter, thus ending the legacy aspect of the character.[/quote']

 

If you don't mind, could you tell me more about when and how he died? My recollection was that he was still alive but amnesiac up until the birth of his daughter. I stopped following the Titans regularly shortly after that, so I'm not really that up on their later history.

 

(Not that dying ever kept a good comic villain from coming back.)

[Vigil]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Re: Hugh Neilson's post.

 

Hugh, I think you put your finger on the problem, exactly, but the question shouldn't be "what 2 characters should die?". Rather ir should be, "why do 2 characters have to die to tell this story?" "Isn't there some other we can tell it and be effective?"

 

Up here in Cowtown, I co-own a pro wrestling promotion and in the business we call stuff like killing charaters "cheap heat" since it has an immediate, visceral impact but has absolutely no substance or impact otherwise. It's the comic book equivalent of wrestlers blading themselves.

 

So, what I see is a failure of DC's editors to provide direction and to lead effectively. You just know that stuff like this wouldn't have happened when Archie Goodwin was at the bat helm.

 

Vigil

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Hugh' date=' I think you put your finger on the problem, exactly, but the question shouldn't be "what 2 characters should die?". Rather ir should be, "why do 2 characters have to die to tell this story?" "Isn't there some other we can tell it and be effective?" [/quote']

 

I think that question is also valid. However, if we decide that certain characters are sacred cows - they cannot be killed - then some of the suspense goes out of reading about those characters. We have that with many of the big guns now. They certainly won't kill Superman or Batman, will they? So, sometimes, characters die.

 

I recall Thunderbird in New X-Men being developed for the sole purpose of killing him off in his second appearance (which was to be Giant Size X-Men #2, and became X-Men #94 and #95) with the intent of sending the message that these characters are not invulnerable or immortal - and creating an air of uncertainty.

 

Up here in Cowtown

 

You mean DOWN THERE in Cowtown, right?

[Chuckg]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

> I think that question is also valid. However, if we decide that certain

> characters are sacred cows - they cannot be killed - then [snip]

 

Behold, the fallacy of the excluded middle.

 

He says 'characters should not be killed off if there's another way to tell a good story available', and you immediately jump to 'we can't have everybody be sacred cows'.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

He says 'characters should not be killed off if there's another way to tell a good story available'' date=' and you immediately jump to 'we can't have everybody be sacred cows'.[/quote']

 

And both are true.

 

For greater clarity, however, I have edited my "challenge post". And I note no one has any preferred picks for characters who should have died. [Oddly, for all the attention paid to Spoiler, I've yet to see anyone comment - positively or negatively - on Orpheus getting his throat slit.]

 

Tangential thought: I wonder how the Dark Phoenix storyline would be viewed today if Jean Grey had lived, as the original plot intended. Without the sacrifice, would the story have lost some of its "Classic" status? Would people have been as upset by "Jean Grey gets her powers back" as they were by "Jean Grey was actually alive in stasis"?

[Vigil]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Hey Hugh,

 

I hadn't noticed that you're up there in Edmo-town. I was assuming that most of thee readership of the forums are American so it's pretty much all up from there, lol.

 

 

You mentioned the problem of certain characters being held as sacred cows and, somehow, that that's bad thing. I beg to differ. I think it's a good thing. Characters should be sacred cows. Killing them should be such a rarity as to become almost unthinkable. I think that, as readers, we invest in characters; hopes, dreams, aspirations. They're there as idealization and as heroic touchstones which tie us into the mythical. To allow their wholesale, or even reatil slaughter is incredibly cyncial and, I think, undercuts the entire premise of comics. That's one of the multitidinous flaws of the Authority, a complete failure to understand the fundamental premise of the genre. The death of a hero should be a monumentous, transformative event. I t should have impact and consequence. Sadly, over the past 2 decades (especially given the influence of Image) it's become trivial. Now, it seems, if someone doesn't die it's somehow not an event...or even a story. And I think that's what's truly tragic.

 

Vigil

[Lightray]

Tangential thought: I wonder how the Dark Phoenix storyline would be viewed today if Jean Grey had lived' date=' as the original plot intended. Without the sacrifice, would the story have lost some of its "Classic" status? Would people have been as upset by "Jean Grey gets her powers back" as they were by "Jean Grey was actually alive in stasis"?[/quote']

I would have been left wondering "Why in the Heck did they name her 'Phoenix' if she's not going to come back from the dead?"

[Doug McCrae]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

That's one of the multitidinous flaws of the Authority' date=' a complete failure to understand the fundamental premise of the genre. The death of a hero should be a monumentous, transformative event.[/quote']So why is a 'monumentous' death the fundamental premise of the genre? The only characters I can think of that had meaningful deaths and stayed dead aren't really heroes at all - Uncle Ben and Bucky Barnes.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

So why is a 'monumentous' death the fundamental premise of the genre? The only characters I can think of that had meaningful deaths and stayed dead aren't really heroes at all - Uncle Ben and Bucky Barnes.

The Kree Captain Mar-Vell is still dead, though his son now bears his pseudonym. The original Thunderbird of X-Men 94 fame remains dead.

[Eyendasky80]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

I'm not sure if we want to go in this direction because for comic fans, this is like politics and religion.

 

BUT: Why does it have to be so polar? Does every death have to be of epic event proportions? Is every death that isn't pointless? Can't we evaluate each story on its own merits regardless of body count?

 

My opinion (and I've heard this echoed by Pros or maybe I'm echoing them) is that comic audiences are maturing and the same escapist fantasy that pre-teens love regurgitated for the millionth time isn't going to thrill them for very long. So the industry is at a point where they must change or die. The industry has resisted this for years and we've seen a steady decline (dying) in comics as a medium. Now they're expirimenting with different kinds of stories, no longer catering to die-hard fans. Making their characters fallable and human. I believe that people who've made a strong attachment to the characters of these stories at a young age fear this change. There seems to be a contingent (usually a very vocal one) of people who, if they cannot recognize the story as something comfortable and familar, will cry foul no matter how well executed/written/drawn it is. It seems to me, they don't want to give it a chance.

 

I don't want to pigeon hole comics with the kind of mentality that limits them to children's entertainment. I believe they can run the entire spectrum of fiction, from iconic to human. Uplifting, tragic, funny, senseless, epic. I think comics can do all this and I'll lay my own personal favorites on the chopping block for a good story. It doesn't even have to be great and certainly not epic, just good. If I enjoy it, it was worth it.

 

The day comic books stop growing as a medium is the day I stop buying them. Because I've read all these stories before.

[red_eagle123]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

So why is a 'monumentous' death the fundamental premise of the genre? The only characters I can think of that had meaningful deaths and stayed dead aren't really heroes at all - Uncle Ben and Bucky Barnes.

 

 

Barry Allen died, and damned but his death was momentous, and touching and he's still dead.

[red_eagle123]

Re: Brother Blood (original)

 

If you don't mind, could you tell me more about when and how he died? My recollection was that he was still alive but amnesiac up until the birth of his daughter. I stopped following the Titans regularly shortly after that, so I'm not really that up on their later history.

 

(Not that dying ever kept a good comic villain from coming back.)

 

 

You know Lord Liaden, you're right. I was going off my own faulty memory but you reminded me of what really happened. So I went and checked up on it at this great Titans news source

 

So it's entirely possible that the Brother Blood that appeared in Outsiders could potentially have been the original Brother Blood, having regained his memory. Of course that'd have to raise the question of what happened to Azrael, which DC wants to forget about I'm sure (Since they gave some other dude the name and a title for awhile).

[Chuckg]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

The day comic books stop growing as a medium is the day I stop buying them. Because I've read all these stories before.

 

Have you read 'War Games'?

 

I have. The story was distinctly sub-par, the death in no way was required to tell the story, /and/ the legacy the character has been given post-death... in the character voice of Batman and several others... has basically added up to 'She got killed because she was stupid.'

 

This was not comics growing as a medium, this was simply the editors taking advantage of the first excuse to kill off a character inherited from the prior editorial staff that they (for reasons which were entirely beyond me) despised(*), and then to indulge themselves in pissing on the grave.

 

This is not 'growing as a medium'.

 

 

 

 

 

(*) The fact that the character was so despised by the editors isn't in much doubt, however -- interviews and such

[Eyendasky80]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Have you read 'War Games'?

 

I have. The story was distinctly sub-par, the death in no way was required to tell the story, /and/ the legacy the character has been given post-death... in the character voice of Batman and several others... has basically added up to 'She got killed because she was stupid.'

 

This was not comics growing as a medium, this was simply the editors taking advantage of the first excuse to kill off a character inherited from the prior editorial staff that they (for reasons which were entirely beyond me) despised(*), and then to indulge themselves in pissing on the grave.

 

This is not 'growing as a medium'.

 

 

 

 

 

(*) The fact that the character was so despised by the editors isn't in much doubt, however -- interviews and such

 

So you are judging the story on its merit as opposed to its including the death of a character. That's good. That's all I'm advocating. I didn't read War Games, I don't read Batman regularly, just the occassional trade.

 

Now, making a blanket statement that the killing of characters is dumb and shouldn't happen, that's what I won't do. You read the story, you didn't like it, okay.

[Chuckg]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

SNow' date=' making a blanket statement that the killing of characters is dumb and shouldn't happen, that's what I won't do. You read the story, you didn't like it, okay.[/quote']

 

Nobody made the blanket statement that killing characters is wrong. No one.

 

What we did say is that killing characters in a stupid manner, for insufficient literary payoff, casually, etc, etc. is wrong.

[Eyendasky80]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Re: Hugh Neilson's post.

 

Hugh, I think you put your finger on the problem, exactly, but the question shouldn't be "what 2 characters should die?". Rather ir should be, "why do 2 characters have to die to tell this story?" "Isn't there some other we can tell it and be effective?"

 

Up here in Cowtown, I co-own a pro wrestling promotion and in the business we call stuff like killing charaters "cheap heat" since it has an immediate, visceral impact but has absolutely no substance or impact otherwise. It's the comic book equivalent of wrestlers blading themselves.

 

So, what I see is a failure of DC's editors to provide direction and to lead effectively. You just know that stuff like this wouldn't have happened when Archie Goodwin was at the bat helm.

 

Vigil

 

This was the post I was referring too. It calls the act of killing characters itself cheap, not calling cheap deaths to task.

 

I'm not advocating wholesale slaughter, I just think each death is unique and should be judged on its particular merits. Sometimes a senseless death is very effective at elevating the threat level of an antagonist.

[Chuckg]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Well, War Games would qualify as "cheap heat' by his definition, so I don't see it.

[Eyendasky80]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

He said killing characters is cheap heat.

 

...we call stuff like killing charaters "cheap heat" since it has an immediate, visceral impact but has absolutely no substance or impact otherwise.

[Vigil]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

To expand on my wrestling analogy and maybe make it a bit more clear, let's take the current bent of the WWE for example. Currently, on any given night you can catch 3H (who is a brilliant wrestler, by the way, and quite capable of working way beyond the level he's usually booked at - which is funny cause he books himself, but that's another discusssion) or mayve Michaels or Orton or any of the others engaging in matches which end up with both workers swimming in pools of blood. And what does that accomplish? Not much in the long run. What it does accomplish is ever dwindling ratings as the fans become desensitized to the gore and the mayhem. That's why it's called cheap heat. It works in the short term but does nothing to "build heat" (or "get you over" in the lingo) in the long run.

 

Contrast this with a great example of how wrestling used to be, about 20 years ago. back then, my good friend and one of the sport's true icons, Bad News Allen was enegaged in a feud with another great worker, Archie "The Stomper" Goldie. They'd built the intensity of the feud for over a year, going through regular matches, then no DQ matches then lumberjack and strap matches etc. culminating ultimately in a cage match in whch both workers drew blood (their own actually, as is ususally the protocol) and in which Archie ultimately got revenge on Allen for crippling Archie's "son" at the beginning of the program.

 

The thing is, does anyone remember any sort of impact whatsoever from tthe last time 3H juiced? No, proabably not. Does anyone even remmeber why he did it or what the "angle" was about? No, probably not. But the Allen/Gouldie match is rememebred and will live on in legend to anyone who has any sort of knowledge of the history of the business. One of the reasons (and there are many and this isn't exclusively the reason) that it will be remembered is that the blood shed in the cage match was the last step in a year long escalation. If they'd done that right off the bat as they do taody, where do you go? Nowhere...and fast.

 

By analaogy, if you have books like the Authroity where characters are being slaughtered, left and right, page after page in increasingly absurd numbers, what's th impact? Ultimately nothing except, maybe, to desensitize the reader. When it was done in Marshall Law, it was a critique or satire of the genre and the Iron Age. When it's done in Authority it's done with out any subtlety, any sense of irony or any impact. It's absolutely gratuitous and self indulgent. And it didn't have to be. The writer merely chose it to be so, most proabably because he wasn't good enough or smart enough or creative enough to do anything else.

 

Contrast that with the Death of Captain Marvel. This is a story which resonates with meaning and will for decades to come. His death was the final, tragic, act of a life that was redolant with impact, heroism and meaning. It showed his true quality as hero and, ultimately, the tragedy that sometimes heroes don't have glamourous, action packed, 4 color fates. Rather, it's how he copes with his end that revealed his inherent heroism.

 

You ask why it should be that death in comics should be momentous, as I said "by definition"? It's because "by definition" the founders of the superhero genre had a thorough, deep understanding of Greek mythology and of the mythic nature of the characters which they were creating. That understanding allowed them, at their best, to imbue meaning beyond the immediate or gratuitous to the deaths' of these iconic figures. They understood that the death of a mythical character had to be of mythic proportions or meaning to have any true impact. That's what they knew and that's what's reflected in death in comics, at the best of times. To deal with it otherwise is to trivialize and diminsh not only the death but the hero who pays that ultimate price.

 

 

Vigil

[Doug McCrae]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Barry Allen died' date=' and damned but his death was momentous, and touching and he's still dead.[/quote']Yeah, you're right.

[Doug McCrae]

Re: Iyo: The Most Underrated Or Underused Character In Comics

 

Vigil, you make good points but superhero comics are unlike the heroic myths of Hercules, Balder, etc in one important respect - they never end. Since the beginning, superheroes have been more like Sexton Blake, Doc Savage or other pulp heroes. For as long as they make money, their stories must go on and on and on with no end in sight. You can't kill off all the X-Men, no matter how grand their deaths are (and I'm not sure they ought to be, given that the X-Men are a little closer to real life than the likes of Superman or Thor) cause the X-Men are big money makers.

 

I've always felt the best Superman stories are the ones where he dies. This story has actually been told a bunch of times in the Silver Age, as well as the Doomsday thing, but the SA ones were all imaginary stories. Though, to quote Alan Moore, "Aren't they all?"