Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

[Trebuchet]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Nick Carter faced a race of "Aryan" blond warriors' date=' including female warriors, in a hidden valley in Tibet in one of his pulp era adventures. Their toys included invisible planes and strength enhancing belts. Source: Jess Nevins.[/quote']Since Nick Carter is often considered the original "pulp" series (they were written in the 1890's and early 1900's), I'd say that pretty much verifies that Wonder Woman could be a pulp character.

[OddHat]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Since Nick Carter is often considered the original "pulp" series (they were written in the 1890's and early 1900's)' date=' I'd say that pretty much verifies that Wonder Woman could be a pulp character.[/quote']

 

Yup.

 

I was also thinking recently about Edward Bulwer-Lyton's 1870 "The Coming Race" Vril novel. It's full of interesting ideas and devices that could be used to create superheroes. A "Vril Lantern" would make an interesting choice for a Green Lantern type character in the 1920s.

[starblaze]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Don't forget the Monster Hunters. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monster_Hunters

 

Even though the story is in the 50's it still is a very pulping kind of team. At least two of the characters were either immortal or very long-lived and could most possibly appear in the pulp era.

[Sketchpad]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

I would suggest checking out JSA: The Liberty Files

Takes some of the common heroes and makes them a bit more pulpy IMHO

[st barbara]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

"The Green Lama" in his original incarnation (1940) would fit perfectly well into a pulp setting as his powers are mostly hypnotism,slightly enhanced strength and similar things (my reference book mentions a minor electrical power as well) he could be very "Shadow" like I think.

[Midas]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

but if you focus on Eel O'Brien trying to make up for his misspent life...

 

My Name is Eel?

 

Most of Batman's villains are also talented normals, even Rhas Al Ghul is more of a pulp villain than a supervillain. The only off the cuff character in the Bat stable that would be hard to do would be Poisen Ivy. A fanatic Greeny with a few character driven gadgets/talents (poisen kiss, immunity to poisen) would work. Be a bit harder for some of her more "mystic" powers, though.

 

Iron Man could be retroed, but his suit would have to be modified for pulpyness. It would look more like Titanium Man's armor, I suspect. Care would have to be taken for PC's not to make "Professor Klankenhissen" jokes.

 

Just had a bothersome idea. Didn't Tony Stark loan out his suit to a black friend/employee a few years back? How would a black super react in the pulp era?

 

Suppose that for every lynching, seven Klansmen were found the next day hanging from lamp posts on main street?

 

Would lynchings become rarer, or would a full blown helter skelter race war break out?

 

Even a non powered hero like Bats could (and has) clean the clocks of a hoard of talented normals. Give Storm nothing but a small "wind powers" multipower, and then tick her off , for example. And her origin is almost sterling pulp: Lost Tribe Jungle Goddess, brought back from deep Africa...

 

Midas

[telemachus]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

"The Green Lama" in his original incarnation (1940) would fit perfectly well into a pulp setting as his powers are mostly hypnotism' date='slightly enhanced strength and similar things (my reference book mentions a minor electrical power as well) he could be very "Shadow" like I think.[/quote']

 

The Green Lama actually started out as a pulp character before he moved over to comics.

[lynnlefey]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Didn't Tony Stark loan out his suit to a black friend/employee a few years back? How would a black super react in the pulp era?

 

James Rhodes took over the guise of Iron Man for a while when Stark was dealing with severe alcohol issues. Later on, when Stark took the role over again, he also made a suit of armor for Rhodes, who took on the identity of War Machine.

 

I was just thinking about Green Hornet and such. And really, the whole cast of 'Watchmen' minus Dr. Manhatten.

[Mentor]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Batman was never super in the sense of the rest of the Justice League, so he was always a natural Pulp Hero IMHO. Wonder Woman with a 30 STR still fits just fine for me too. You guys have covered some of the others just fine.

[SKJAM!]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

I did a write-up of the pulp version of Green Lama; do a search here or at Surbrook's Stuff to see it.

 

The early radio version of Superman is very pulp, though it did introduce flying before Supes had it in the comic books. Clark Kent, mild-mannered but fearless reporter, is the main character, with Superman careful to only appear in darkness, smoke, fog or to unreliable witnesses. As of the most recent episode I listened to (about nine or ten storylines in), Superman is still an urban legend.

 

This changes drastically later, of course.

[Trebuchet]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

I did a write-up of the pulp version of Green Lama; do a search here or at Surbrook's Stuff to see it.

 

The early radio version of Superman is very pulp, though it did introduce flying before Supes had it in the comic books. Clark Kent, mild-mannered but fearless reporter, is the main character, with Superman careful to only appear in darkness, smoke, fog or to unreliable witnesses. As of the most recent episode I listened to (about nine or ten storylines in), Superman is still an urban legend.

 

This changes drastically later, of course.

Do you know if the Superman radio shows and/or Max Fleisher cartoons are available anywhere for download?

 

There was a pretty good show about Superman on the History Channel a few weeks back. They mentioned that both flight and kryptonite were first introduced on the radio broadcasts rather than in the comics. Another interesting tidbit: Lex Luthor was originally just called Luthor; he didn't acquire a first name until years later. In those days he was a megamaniacal mad scientist.

[SKJAM!]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Do you know if the Superman radio shows and/or Max Fleisher cartoons are available anywhere for download?

 

 

I've been listening to the Superman radio show via the Botar's Old Time Radio podcast; I use iTunes to subscribe, but their homepage is http://www.botar.us/ and you can skip shows you're not interested in that way.

[Trebuchet]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Thanks! I've downloaded the first 15 episodes, although I have to play them on my PC because I don't have an MP3 player.

[Trebuchet]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

After a bit of googling I found the Max Fleisher Superman cartoons online:

 

http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=superman%20AND%20mediatype%3Amovies%20AND%20collection%3Amoviesandfilms

 

They can be streamed or downloaded in several video formats (I balked at the 500 Mb versions, though. 50 - 75 Mb was big enough!).

[Comic]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Hrm.. Pulp Groo.. Pulp Groo.. Uhm. Nevermind.

 

Pulp Fantastic Four? Doable, carefully translated and scaled, I suppose.

 

Pulp Spiderman? He's only a shade less Pulp than Daredevil, and DD could definitely be Pulp, so Spiderman could be too. Especially the "I am Spider" sequences in the death of Kraven the Hunter story.

 

Pulp Element Man? He always had the Pulp tone. Maybe make him a mad test-tube-flinging chemist?

[lapsedgamer]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

I would suggest checking out JSA: The Liberty Files

Takes some of the common heroes and makes them a bit more pulpy IMHO

 

I love that book. I've had to buy it twice because I loaned a copy out and it never came back. I actually liked Hourman after reading it, and I never thought he made much sense as a character.

 

By the way, this would make an excellent campaign. Low to medium powered supers in the pulp era. I'd set it at 200 (100+100) points and you buy equipment with money unless it is a part of your shtick. Guys like Green Arrow and Batman might be problematic, but you could rule that anything that wasn't commony available at the time would cost points. Those items would be replaceable as long as you didn't buy them with the limitation that they were not. Use NCM for stats, keep the DCs under 10, and you're there.

[freakboy6117]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

pulp fantastic four is easy you just don't give them super powers

 

super scientist and his girlfriend/wife

her hot head racing driver brother

and his best friend the rough and ready test pilot(if necessary have him horribly scared by an accident that's reeds fault to get the thing type angst)

they travel the world having adventures whilst testing inventions or investigating strange events as agents of the us government

[John Desmarais]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

pulp fantastic four is easy you just don't give them super powers...

 

... and call them the Challengers of the Unknown.

[Scott Baker]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

... and call them the Challengers of the Unknown.

 

I like that name. Is it a reference to something that I'm not catching, or just a name you came up with?

 

Scott Baker

[csyphrett]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Challengers of the Unknown were four adventurers who were nearly killed in a plane crash. They decide they are living on borrowed time and should do what they can to explore and adventure. They have been around awhile, adding members, saving the world, sometimes changing over to Vertigo horror.

CES

[lapsedgamer]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

pulp fantastic four is easy you just don't give them super powers

 

super scientist and his girlfriend/wife

her hot head racing driver brother

and his best friend the rough and ready test pilot(if necessary have him horribly scared by an accident that's reeds fault to get the thing type angst)

they travel the world having adventures whilst testing inventions or investigating strange events as agents of the us government

 

Others mentioned the Challengers of the Unknown. It might be interesting if they had minor abilities.

 

The super scientist is also into escape artistry and is a contortionist.

The race car driver has minor pyrokinetic powers.

The horribly scared pilot has lost a lot nerve sensation and that gives him the abilty to overexert himself and ignore injury.

The wife has minor mental powers including the Shadow's ability to cloud men's minds.

[freakboy6117]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

sue storm already has the power to cloud mens minds in spades look how many man are after her

[lapsedgamer]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

sue storm already has the power to cloud mens minds in spades look how many man are after her

 

I thought that was only when Greg Land or John Byrne draws her.

[OddHat]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Plenty of invisible characters in fiction from Victorian sci fi on up, including at least two pulp era characters with invisibility not counting the Shadow. The pre-Force Fields Invisible Girl works fine as a Pulp character. The rest of the group are more of a problem. There were plenty of strong men (even borderline Superhuman Strongmen) and yogis, so low powered versions of Reed (he becomes a super scientist escape artist with grappling skills) and Ben fit well enough, though Ben in particular would either have to look normal or be covered in bandages if you wanted to preserve the Heroic Monster aspect of the character. I can't think of any Victorian or Pulp Era types that actually flew under their own power, but making Johnny an acrobat with exaggerated circus style fire walking and fire eating/breathing skills might work, maybe armed with a mini flame thrower and some fire bombs as well.

[lapsedgamer]

Re: Golden Age Superheroes as Pulp Heroes

 

Plenty of invisible characters in fiction from Victorian sci fi on up' date=' including at least two pulp era characters with invisibility not counting the Shadow. The pre-Force Fields Invisible Girl works fine as a Pulp character. The rest of the group are more of a problem. There were plenty of strong men (even borderline Superhuman Strongmen) and yogis, so low powered versions of Reed (he becomes a super scientist escape artist with grappling skills) and Ben fit well enough, though Ben in particular would either have to look normal or be covered in bandages if you wanted to preserve the Heroic Monster aspect of the character. I can't think of any Victorian or Pulp Era types that actually flew under their own power, but making Johnny an acrobat with exaggerated circus style fire walking and fire eating/breathing skills might work, maybe armed with a mini flame thrower and some fire bombs as well.[/quote']

 

The question is would this campaign be as fun to play as it sounds. I would personally go for a pulp version of the Black Panther, who needs very little translation. I would go more mystic witch doctor than super scientist to keep the noble savage archetype of the era. Everything else would stay the same: mystic root based powers and martial skills, hidden land of origin, royal perks.