Hugh Neilson

I think that's indicative of the lack of an actual "superhero genre". Supers can be WW II action, a classic heist, a political thriller, an action drama, an alien invasion, a cop show, a modern noir drama, a campy comedy or a sit com or family drama, and many other genres besides. Whether Supers are subgenres of all of those genres, or they can be made subgenres of Supers, is a fine question.

Why am I hearing old Life Cereal ads in the back of my head?

For what it is worth, I love Smallville from S1 to S10. It is the first version of Superman that I could identify with and like.

My current comics list is mostly indie stuff - a lot of Image and so forth. I gave up on DC after New 52, and while I've heard some good things about the latest reboot I think I'm suffering from relaunch fatigue. There are still several good Marvel titles, tho crossover fatigue is the problem on that side. Ms. Marvel continues to be a delight. Spider-Man is actually fun again, the new Thor is interesting...I'm blanking out on other titles at the moment, and frankly haven't been keeping up over the last several months because reasons.
 
But I think the point is there have always been good comics stories and bad comics stories. Looking back it's easier to remember the good bits and forget the bad bits, whereas today I notice more ex-fans pointing at One Awful Story and using that to condemn the entire industry. Also, if you go back and re-read a lot of the great stories you remember, you may find not all of them hold up as well today. Some great story ideas, but some of the writing was pretty weak by today's standards.
 
As for superhero TV shows, I agree they weren't all awful. But even the best of them are painfully cheesy by modern standards. Mostly because the show runners refused to take the concept seriously and treated them like live-action cartoons. The fact that they were almost completely devoid of supervilllains certainly didn't help. If we're grading on a curve I'd say 70s Wonder Woman and 80s Greatest American Hero are among the best of their day, but neither could compete today with Supergirl, let alone Daredevil or Jessica Jones. (Unless you really like camp, in which case more power to you but I'll be over here.)

@ Hugh: Ant-Man is a classic heist film...with supers.

Seems like you had to reach a long way back to find those few. But you also hit on the key, IMO:
 

I will suggest a "fan" enjoys the average produced by the medium, not just the select few, once every few years or so, that are truly Stellar.
 
And the reality is that movies are also going to range from pretty bad to slightly above mediocre to truly stellar. I think the current MCU and even DCU crop has done pretty well in avoiding, or at least minimizing the "pretty bad" (Halle Barry as Catwoman, anyone? The Daredevil, Ghost Rider and Punisher movies? Batman's armor with nipples? The Fantastic Four movies? Compared to these, how does MCU or DCU look?). But the average movie is going to be an average movie. No one sets out to create dreck, but sometimes they do. Much more often they reach high, but achieve average.
 

I can't speak to '50s Superman. I think Wonder Woman embraced Supers, at least to some extent, with the advantage that DC tended more towards ordinary human adversaries/criminal masterminds than the Marvel Super Villain of the Month model. The '70s Hulk was a "fugitive with a heart of gold" show with a quasi-Supers twist, not really a Supers movie. I recall reading about Ferrigno being frustrated that the Hulk was not allowed to develop - it was really the Bixby/Banner Show.
 

I'd call that a "dramady", though it predated the term, wrapped in superhero trappings.
 

I'm never quite sure where to classify that one - SitCom Supers to some extent. But it did that well, and was entertaining. Largely because of that, it holds up.
 
The reality is that even restricted to Supers, comics can cover a wide array of genres. The Cap producers got that - they were quoted as calling the First Avenger a WW II film wrapped in comic book superheroes, with the Winter Solder being a political thriller wrapped in Superheroes. Even The Avengers could be described as an alien invasion flick, wrapped in Supers, and (at least to me) the first Iron Man film was more science fiction (of the armored suit/cyborg/robot variety) than superheroes. Superheroes have proven to be able to cross over with, and emulate, many genres.

So if you like virtually nothing in the source material, why would you expect the translation of the source material to another mention make it match your preferences.
 
I`m not sure what to call the New 52 (and I had asked what we call it when the books that were there at the start hit issue 52 more than a couple of years back). I think Old 52 is probably preferable to Prebirth.
 
So what superhero material in the past was so head and shoulders superior to what we see today? Are there comics you have re-read recently that hold up to your current high standards, or does the passage of time make the old stuff seem better because the stellar stuff is remembered and the dreck forgotten?

THIS - I would like those who consider the current crop on TV unwatchable dreck to provide their current comic reads for comparison.
 

 
AND THIS FOR SURE! - What superhero shows? The Incredible Hulk? Thing Ring Do Your Thing? Oh, for those thrilling days of yesteryear...NOT.
 
In that vein, finally made time to see Suicide Squad yesterday. Thanks to the cooler heads on the Boards for the points in the right direction. Hamlet it's not, nor should it be, and it takes some liberties with some of the characters, but had I walked in not knowing the movie's title or premise, that was definitely Amanda Waller and Harley Quinn. Katana, Croc and El Diablo were pretty good work at bringing those characters to life as well. Deadshot deviates the most from the comics, but there's his costume, his core premise is unchanged and he worked well in the movie. And Capt Boomerang? Well, he was in the whole series, before recent reboots, and that's probably as close as we'll get in a live action medium, so OK.
 
And I loved the name on the building - definitely good when the movies shout out the real creators.

Which is what I said: Not anyone would react the same way. Tony, who has been shown to a) be emotionally unstable and b>  to be under growing levels of stress, would. Because they've developed his character that way. It's within genre tropes, sure. I was only responding to the assertion that anyone would react the same way.

I think "anyone would react" in a strongly negative way is pretty reasonable. But that's a genre trope element. In Trek (certainly TNG onwards), violence is a last resort. Diplomacy, discipline and discussion is the starting point for problem resolution - especially for trained officers of the Federation interacting in that capacity.
 
In Superhero comics, problems are solved with punches and energy blasts. Add to that, Tony has never been great with self-discipline and impulse control, and top it off with the stress of recent events and, at least within Superhero Genre Action Movie reality (hey, there's that Cinematic Reality we keep talking about in Hero System), his reaction is at least plausible. Now, if he spends the next half dozen movies assembling a team of villains to storm Avengers Tower and take vengeance on Cap, that's problematic. But an initial emotional reaction? That's well within the bounds of the genre tropes.

[deja vu moment]
 
Yes, these shows have faults... and will probably never win any awards; but they're superhero shows that are on the air, dang it! And IMO still better than the other dreck on the airwaves.
 
[/deja vu moment]

Comics can suck too, and most of them do. It's like we're criticizing the shows for not living up to the very best of comics' potential, while ignoring the vast amount of mediocre to laughable material that makes up about 95% of comics ever published.
 
I watched all of the  CW/Berlanti shows, Agents of SHIELD, and even Lucifer last season. (And previous seasons for the older shows.) They all had some good points and some bad. Some of the shows with the worst bad points were also some of the most comic book-like shows, and I appreciated the attempt to embrace the genre, even when the plot induced stupidity was making me facepalm so hard that I risked concussing myself.

I'm OK with villains dying in the Marvel movies, as long as the heroes lose all their Karma.

Because, as I recently came to realize in another thread regarding power costs from the very rule book I play by, none of us has perfect memory.
 
In the earliest days of play, it's nice for the GM to have a reference against which to judge who you say your character is versus who you play him as: a guideline for bonus "roleplaying" XP. It's also nice for a new player to have a sort of "bible" on his own idea upon which he can improve or change as the need of the character / his personal needs (the players) change.
 
Some campaigns go on for quite some time. In those instances, it's very handy to have a note or two on the early days of your character: there may be a plot hook or a story seed in there that has been completely forgotten about.
 
Some campaigns will occur in a "shared world" type environment: same players-- perhaps a few new ones-- but in the same world, possibly even concurrent to the events of a previous campaign. Not just a laziness thing, either: sometimes the players and the GM have crafted a world so thoroughly enjoyable that the group would like to revisit it. For whatever the reason, having notes-- even just a couple of sketchy sentences-- is an unparalleled boon to everyone involved.
 
As you noted above, not everyone can write stuff. That's why there's usually a Q&A-- usually short- about what's really important to the player before the game settles in. So long as you _have_ the information, someone else can record it. It's just important that you actually _have_ something.

The only Cap who would unfailingly do what the government asked him to do, was the Cap from the 1940s.  And to be fair, the only thing the government asked him to do was fight Nazis.  They were simpler comics where the government was always good, the bad guys were always bad, and Cap can punch Hitler in the jaw on the cover.  That government would not ask Cap to do anything evil (or even questionable) because that's not what kind of comic it is.  That would be as out-of-character as having Superman murder a bunch of people.
 
Once Cap was introduced into a genre of comics where political issues were tackled, where the government might be wrong, from that point forward Cap became a symbol of American idealism.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

Great examples all. This reminds me of the GMs who complain that their players don't follow genre conventions. When we get in deeper, we discover the GM does not follow genre conventions.
 
Superman and Batman do not kill. And they prevail despite their refusal to kill. When the GM puts them in a situation where their refusal to kill guarantees they lose, the players stop building characters with Codes vs Killing, and the GM gets upset that THEY are not following genre conventions.
 
I read a great article on running an early Star Trek RPG which hit the nail on the head. When the opportunity to trade his life for that of a crew member arises, the Captain should have no hesitation in taking it. That's playing to the genre. But so is the ability of the Captain to turn his certain death into victory - the GM also has to follow genre conventions.

One of the parts of stories that is consistently satisfying is watching a hero who seems utterly without options, totally trapped and pinned down... finding a way to triumph anyway.  Superman over the decades has done this over and over (Batman, Spider-Man, etc as well): how to defeat the bad guy without murdering them.  This is the entire premise of the writing of Stephen Moffat (Dr Who, Sherlock): put your hero into impossible situations and yet they triumph.
 
Man of Steel set out deliberately to have him murder Zod.  The writing wrote him into a corner where it seemed like that was his only option, so its more gritty and badass, its EPIC! (sound of pounding music).  The negative zone projector is destroyed!  He can't banish them!  Take that, old Superman stories!
 
A good writer would have come up with a way for Superman to stop Zod and protect the city without murder.  A lazy one has him twist the guy's head, despite being unable to stop his head from turning because he's so strong (??).