Doug McCrae

Re: What is a Superhero to you? What is a superhero to me? A protagonist in adventure fiction who possesses superhuman powers and is more good than he is evil. If he's more evil than he is good then he's a supervillain. Secondary qualities: Code name Costume Secret identity Having these makes you more superheroey but they're not essential. His possession of all the secondary qualities strengthens the case for Batman being a superhero despite his lack of powers. Superman is the outstanding exemplar of superheroness. All other superheroes derive from him.

Re: Superhero Definition All comic book superheroes are weirdness magnets anyway so they don't have to go out looking for adventure, it'll find them. The plane you're travelling on get's hijacked by the Flying Tiger, go to Canada and you meet the Wendigo, etc.

Re: What is a Superhero to you? Do you have to have superhuman powers to be a superhero? I'd say Batman's lack of them makes him borderline. A number of other normal human costumed crimefighters don't even have any special gadgets. Wildcat, for example.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: What is a Superhero to you?

Re: Code VS Killing Poll RDU Neil's concept has actually been covered in four colour comics - Galactus. The Big G is regarded as vastly beyond human in all capacities. I think at one point a character even says something like "We're just amoebas to him." Galactus is also sometimes described as more like a force of nature than a sentient being. In a way he's both more and less than human.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll If any Superman as at a state where he is no longer subject to human morality then in my view it's the Silver Age version. Iron Age Supes has great physical power and enhanced senses but merely a human level mind. The Silver Age Superman on the other hand was super intelligent. So paradoxically, the only Superman that never killed had the most right to do.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: Code VS Killing Poll If those gods merely possess advanced physical power (superstrength, longevity, etc.) then I don't think it would make a difference. Here I think I might be disagreeing with RDU Neil, not sure what his view is on advanced physical powers. OTOH if we're talking about a being as far beyond human in mental capacity as humanity is beyond an amoeba then to ascribe our morality to such beings is a mistake. Sure we could apply our human concepts to their actions and talk as if such beings had human mentalities but we would be mistaken. In the same way I can imagine the Earth having a mind behind it and say that that mind is morally good when it provides fertile crops and morally bad when it causes earthquakes. But I would be wrong to do so. I'm ascribing human morality to something that doesn't possess it.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: Code VS Killing Poll Doctor Manhattan is probably a better example. Miracleman has a multiform in HERO terms. One form (Micky Moran) is completely human , the other (Miracleman) is something beyond human, though still retains a not very well defined connection with Micky Moran.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll nexus said it was OK. Anyway you always get thread drift. So long as it's interesting, and this certainly is, then it's alright. And actually the issue of whether sufficiently powerful metahumans would be beyond human morality is perfectly appropriate when discussing whether superheroes can kill.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll Yeah, but you are, so far as I am aware, still within human limits of thinking power and perception. Imagine if you had the mental, perceptual and physical capabilities of one of the spaceship-based AIs from Iain M. Banks Culture novels.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll RDU Neil, obviously a metahuman whose only power was to leap 20 metres vertically would be subject to exactly the same moral obligations as ourselves. I'd say the same goes for the vast majority of comic book superheroes. When you talk about metahumans who are not subject to these rules I think you need another term - godlike being or some such. The issues you discuss were examined to some degree in Watchmen through the character Doctor Manhattan.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: Your superhero games, comic-based or comic-opposed? I'm a genre fiend, no doubt about it.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll True, if you're talking about the Silver Age Superman, but not true of the Iron Age Man of Steel. Superman will kill but his circumstances threshold is very high, much higher than Wolverine for example.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: Reconciling Manga & Batman Batman isn't the World's Greatest Fighter, even in the DCU. He's the World's Greatest Detective. As to the chi powers thing, maybe that is a problem. But Karate Kid was the best even without them. I think you just have to give Karate Kid types an absolutely ridiculous amount of CV and damage classes. To Hell with justifying it.

Re: Code VS Killing Poll

Re: Name by Dream Springheeled Jack

Re: Code VS Killing Poll That depends on your definition of anti-hero, I guess. He was certainly the protagonist at any rate.