Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

[Brandi]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

PS - I see the embedded image attempt now, but I can't find the image (even if I put the link in a browser window directly

 

The effect otherwise known as screwing up the cache.

 

Parking Lot is Full did used to be hotlinkable; you'd think a comic that ended in 2002 wouldn't be so touchy about it now.

 

Edit: Sorry 'bout that.

[zornwil]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

The effect otherwise known as F**K CACHING.

 

Parking Lot is Full did used to be hotlinkable; you'd think a comic that ended in 2002 wouldn't be so touchy about it now.

I'm not a mod, but you need to clean up the language in the post before you receive a violation.

[Theron]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

But of course, Matter-Eater Lad's just one of the ten lamest superheroes ever, so it shouldn't count....

 

You must spread some reputation around before giving it to Haven Walkur again.

[Theron]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

Another point in favor of Tenzil ... in the later Legion years, Tenzil was an incredibly effective person NOT because of his powers, but because of his charisma. The dude went into politics and probably did as much, if not more good, from that post than he did (directly) as a Legionnaire.

 

Of course, he did once bite the Persuader's Atomic Axe in half ...

 

MEL: "When the battle got tough, I realized that I had to rely on my strengths."

Reporter: "Which are ...?"

MEL: "Well, mostly eating and digesting."

 

Don't forget his formidable political and legal skills! And his knowledge of archaeology!

[zornwil]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

The Silver Age Metal Men were not lame in concept but were pretty lame in stories. But I enjoyed those. It got worse (and lame in a bad way) as it tried to catch up to Bronze Age and they started putting flesh-costumes on them and all that garbage.

[casualplayer]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

As much as I love Tenzil and LSH, Matter-Eater Lad is a lame name. Not a lame character or even ability, even though the whole population of the planet had the same power, but a really, really lame name.

 

Cypher may not have had a combat effective power but he had one heck of a Follower, Warlock, and mad mojo. He caught the eye of Kitty Pryde, Wolfsbane and pre-Asian Psylocke. And any list of lame characters that doesn't include post-Asian Psylocke is not complete by any means.

 

Anyone calling The Legion of Super-Pets lame is braver than I am. Four Superman-class critters and a shapeshifter! That's a fresh can of Alpo whoopass.

 

Most of the list was just weak, unimaginative writing (as in Zan vs. Downpour from JLU) dragging the characters down. However there is no saving or defending the Red Bee.

[BigJackBrass]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

"In the late 1950s and the early 1960s DC just kind of got weird."

 

Absolutely my favourite line from the article. It's the point where the author seems to have finally realised just what he's been reading, understatement of the most perfect kind. As for the question of comical characters in comics, I'm all for more Plastic Man and Major Bummer in the world.

 

The lamest characters tend to be the one-trick merchants (not just the heroes, either. Body Bag particularly annoyed me, for some reason) but I'd like to throw in a controversial vote for ROM. Not because the ROM comic was lame, but because it was such a desperate effort to make something decent from a really rather poor action figure.

[Grimble]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

I love Tenzil Kem! His powers may not be up there with Superboy's, but they are useful. What is "lame" about being able to chew through most anything and also to be able to digest and fuel himself with whatever is around? I'd take those abilities in a sec.

 

Grimble, Son of Arm Fall Off Boy!

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

Let us not forget Charlton comics. I don't know how lame you might judge the following candidates, but they sure were wierd:

• E-Man: an energy being from space who just happens to choose a human form and is befriended by an exotic dancer.
   
  
• Thunder Bunny: A young boy acquires the ability to change into a large, hypermuscular superstrong flying anthropomorphic rabbit.
   
  
• 3D Man: A test pilot crashes his plane after encountering strange glowing energy clouds. His younger brother acquires the goggles his brother wore on his final flight. When the brother dons the goggles, he falls unconscious while a three-dimensional image of his brother appears an does semi-super stuff. Semi-super because he's three times better at anything than any other (presumably normal) human, and he only appears for three hours.

 

I couldn't find a link for that last character, but I remember buying the comic when it came out.

[Brandi]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

Most of the list was just weak' date=' unimaginative writing (as in Zan vs. Downpour from JLU) dragging the characters down. [/quote']

 

It must be said, though, that Downpour still got the dirty end of the stick in JLU. Bed-wetting jokes and a pimp-slap from Aquaman (admittedly, a more formidable and respectable Aquaman, but even so)....

[freakboy6117]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

i think 3d man is a marvel character so probably wasn't a Charlton one as they where bought by DC he later had his powers acquired by Triathlon who was an avenger its not actually that lame a power he was three times as strong as the strongest man not just a normal man and that applied to all his other stats which strictly speaking would make him stronger and faster than Captain America.

[Twilight]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

It must be said' date=' though, that Downpour still got the dirty end of the stick in JLU. Bed-wetting jokes and a pimp-slap from Aquaman (admittedly, a more formidable and respectable Aquaman, but even so)....[/quote']

 

His fault for jumping the sole Justice League member there who could survive his powers easily. Had he jumped Batman he might've done quite a bit better. So not so much lame as dumb as a sack of hammers.

[Grimble]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

I have a bunch of old E-Man comics. They are a guilty pleasure.

 

Grimble

[assault]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

E-Man rocks.

 

3-D Man is kind of fun. I liked the whole "1950's Avengers" team - it had almost everything a super team needs - a robot, a gorilla, a Love Goddess... All it needed was a dog and a small boy.

 

I will second the nomination of Psylocke. Not originally a bad character, but messed with to an incredible degree.

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

i think 3d man is a marvel character so probably wasn't a Charlton one as they where bought by DC he later had his powers acquired by Triathlon who was an avenger its not actually that lame a power he was three times as strong as the strongest man not just a normal man and that applied to all his other stats which strictly speaking would make him stronger and faster than Captain America.

 

Okay, maybe he's not as lame as I thought, but his origin and means of activating his powers are distinctly odd and emit the aroma of "Just give him an origin so we can start drawing."

[st barbara]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

I'd be tempted to nominate "The Punisher" who SEEMS to be a casual killer who murders people he doesn't like and claims that it is "revenge" for the death of his family. But then I realised that I haven't been interested enough in the character to read more than one or two of the comics (although I DID see the second movie !) so I don't really know WHAT he is actually like.

[Badger]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

Where was Cable? Surely, he was lame.

[Shaft]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

The Vulture has been suggested as a lame villain in another thread.

 

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1246851&postcount=42

 

My reply is that the concept is not bad, I suspect that Marvel just never did anything with the character. If I wanted to make him more interesting, I'd tie in the design to Falcon and create some kind of enmity or rivalry. Vulture would make an interesting "dark reflection" of Falcon, much as Sabretooth is to Wolverine.

[wcw43921]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

I'd be tempted to nominate "The Punisher" who SEEMS to be a casual killer who murders people he doesn't like and claims that it is "revenge" for the death of his family. But then I realised that I haven't been interested enough in the character to read more than one or two of the comics (although I DID see the second movie !) so I don't really know WHAT he is actually like.

 

The Punisher is not lame solely for being a casual killer. The Punisher is lame most of all for being a thinly veiled plagiarism of Don Pendleton's character Mack Bolan--The Executioner. Take away the kevlar leotards with the big skull and there'd be no difference, apart from the name.

 

If I had been Pendleton or Pinnacle Books, I would have sued Marvel so very, very hard. And I would have won. Marvel would have become a wholly owned subsidary of Pinnacle, and the Punisher would have been forgotten as a comic series adapting the Executioner novels would have been published instead.

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

Thunder Bunny: A young boy acquires the ability to change into a large' date=' hypermuscular superstrong flying anthropomorphic rabbit.[/quote']

 

Doh! I just remembered I once played an homage to T-Bunny in someone else's campaign called "Thunder Rabbit". I bought "Targeting Sense" for his hearing because I figured he needed a super sense.

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

I love Tenzil Kem! His powers may not be up there with Superboy's, but they are useful. What is "lame" about being able to chew through most anything and also to be able to digest and fuel himself with whatever is around? I'd take those abilities in a sec.

 

Grimble, Son of Arm Fall Off Boy!

 

Actually, if we're going there, I'd rather go the extra mile and get Calorie Queen's power, which is basically Matter-Eater Lad ... but she gets super-strength for a while based on how much stuff she eats.

[Squall]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

To a degree, I can understand Bishop and Cable packing guns.

 

Cable's telekinesis and telepathy are more or less useless in combat situations, because they're very weak. They help him around the workshop, but that's about it (at least originally ... not sure what's happened since then).

Yeah, that's changed. Well, unless it changed back (which is far from impossible, I'm sure). It turns out Cable is, for lack of a more scientific term, "ZOMG TEH BESTEST SYCHIC EVAR!!111!!"

 

Spoilers ahead:

 

Apparently he was never able to fully use his TK because he was constantly using it on the subconscious level to keep the techno-organic virus (his 'cybernetic' arm, eye, etc) from overrunning the rest of his body. They changed that in a mini series or two, and the last I read of him he was ridiculously powerful. I mean, downright absurdly powerful. So stupidly potent he had trouble controlling himself, so he went back to using guns most of the time because he was scared he'd destroy mountains or whatever. After getting shot full on in the head, point blank, his body reflexively used telekinesis to pop the bullet out and re-knit his rent flesh, bone, and brain matter until he was fine in about twenty seconds. He used his telepathy to shut off a violent mutant's ability to use her powers -- and accidentally turned off the brains of about fifty people. He used his TK on a vine of growing grapes, to manipulate them on the molecular level and turn them into poison (effortlessly). With a glance, he telepathically turned off the ability to breath in a half dozen bad guys at once.

 

Silly stuff. I stopped reading it.

[Susano]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

Yeah' date=' that's changed. Well, unless it changed [i']back[/i] (which is far from impossible, I'm sure). It turns out Cable is, for lack of a more scientific term, "ZOMG TEH BESTEST SYCHIC EVAR!!111!!"

 

Spoilers ahead:

 

Apparently he was never able to fully use his TK because he was constantly using it on the subconscious level to keep the techno-organic virus (his 'cybernetic' arm, eye, etc) from overrunning the rest of his body. They changed that in a mini series or two, and the last I read of him he was ridiculously powerful. I mean, downright absurdly powerful. So stupidly potent he had trouble controlling himself, so he went back to using guns most of the time because he was scared he'd destroy mountains or whatever. After getting shot full on in the head, point blank, his body reflexively used telekinesis to pop the bullet out and re-knit his rent flesh, bone, and brain matter until he was fine in about twenty seconds. He used his telepathy to shut off a violent mutant's ability to use her powers -- and accidentally turned off the brains of about fifty people. He used his TK on a vine of growing grapes, to manipulate them on the molecular level and turn them into poison (effortlessly). With a glance, he telepathically turned off the ability to breath in a half dozen bad guys at once.

 

Silly stuff. I stopped reading it.

 

This is what you get when Rob Liefield creates characters.

[Sundog]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

This is what you get when Rob Liefield creates characters.

 

This is what you get when Rob Liefeld is in the building.

[death tribble]

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

 

And any list of lame characters that doesn't include post-Asian Psylocke is not complete by any means.

 

I will second the nomination of Psylocke. Not originally a bad character' date=' but messed with to an incredible degree.[/quote']

 

As one of the Brits on the board I feel I must defend Psylocke as one of the few British heroes around who is not clad in patriotic guise ie Union Jack, Robin Hood etc.

Granted they screwed with the character including bringing her back from the dead recently. Having a brother that can warp reality helps.

But rest assured I know where you post and will deal with you later TRAITORS !

 

And what no seconders for Maggot ?

I also think Mr Terrific is lame. The name particularly.