Martinex1: With 22 episodes already in the bag, and previous topics ranging from Arnold Schwarzenegger to misheard song lyrics to Hammer Films to the worst Beatles' tunes, I think you know what to do every Tuesday. So challenge us with a new topic for Follow the Leader! Cheers!
12 comments:
Comic book characters you can't be bothered to care about. Are there characters who keep coming back that you'd rather never see again?
My example:
Lilandra and the Sh'ar Empire in Uncanny X-men. Chris Claremont kept bringing them back. An alien kingdom based on the Roman Empire except with "bird jerks." It seemed like Claremont was determined to make readers care about the Shi'ar, even retconning Deathbird (a stupid villain) who he created as a foe of Mx. Marvel into Lilandra's sister.
I thought the Imperal Guard was okay (I didn't realize they were an homage to the Legion of Superheroes until later), but the Shi'ar in general bored the heck out of me.
Whoops, meant to type "Ms. Marvel" not "Mx. Marvel."
Oh, I don't know, J.A., I kind of liked the Shi'ar. Didn't find them any more or less interesting than other alien races that popped up in the MU occasionally, like the Kree or Rigelians. And some good stuff came out of the Shi'ar-based stories: you mentioned the Imperial Guard, and I also liked the Starjammers. And I liked Lilandra, too (although I was pretty indifferent to her romance with Prof. X).
My own contribution to this discussion would be Red Tornado. Never found him very interesting, but he kept appearing in JLA, and never doing much of note. The only Red Tornado story I liked was the 2-parter from JLA 192-193, in which he was basically fighting the JLA in the first part (indicating that he would worked better as a villain) and broken to pieces in the second. I much prefer the Ma Hunkel version of Red Tornado...
I on the other hand am with J.A. On the Shi'ar. I did not find them interesting. Lilandra on her own I could take - but the world and culture created did not interest me. They seemed very one note in their hunt for Phoenix and it seemed they could have easily been replaced by the Kree or Skrulls. In fact Professor X in relationship with a Skrull empress may have been more interesting. But I also was not a fan of Corsair and the Starjammers - cramming the Summers' father into that seemed over the top and unnecessary.
For me, Lois Lane always bored me. I am not an avid reader of Superman so I may have missed it but she never seemed like an ace reporter. They may have created a whole life story that I don't know, but she always left me uninterested.
San Guthrie and Roberto Dacosta from the New Mutants were like that also. I think Claremont's faux accents did them in for me. I so wanted to like the New Mutants but they seemed so flat and anywhere they appeared I had little interest.
Well, I got tired of Jericho (in New Teen Titans) very quickly, but he was there for the duration. What really bothered me was when a character got an iconic death, then ended up being resurrected ... Norman Osborn, Harry Osborn, Elektra, Red Skull.
I do recall getting tired of Jekyll and Mr Hyde, given their lack of powers,fighting Thor, Cap, I think Avengers...
I get tired of the Wrecking Crew. Boring costumes, no real character, and they just keep popping up.
I can't narrow it down to a "specific" character so I'll throw in a "type".
Any character who's weapon as a sword!!! The Swordsman, The Valkyrie and The Black Knight. They spent their entire careers using just the "flat of their blade"!?! Really? Seriously!?! The Mandarin upgrade The Swordsman's sword with buttons on the hilt. By pressing a button, different rays would shoot out! If you have something that shoots something out of it... it's not A SWORD!!! It's a gun...
And then Dane Whitman, The Black Knight, went through several different swords. The Ebony Blade that thirsted for blood, driving the wielder mad with every taste. And don't forget the neural blade!!! It could cut through non-living matter but anything organic, it would give the person a shock....
Not my cup of tea...
(
The Great Hound Barked
And the world turned white
The Great Hound Sighed
And the forest died
The Wizard Blew His Horn
The Wizard Blew His Horn
The snow snake hissed
And the world turned round
The snow snake grinned
In his fine cold sin
When The Wizard Blew His Horn
The Wizard Blew His Horn
The horse wept blood
And the earth did groan
The tall horse reared
From a lake of tears
To seek a Champion
To seek a Champion
The world was bleak
And the Earth did fear
The Wizard's Horn
The magic Horn
So it screamed for a champion
It screamed for a champion
The eagle laughed
And the world grew black
It stretched giant claws
And it snatched the Law
And the Champion stirred in sleep
The Champion stirred in sleep).
PS: In "Good News for Robots", the Military announced the first successful missile intercept today. Skynet just laughed...
The classic “Amazing Spider-Man” #129 featured the appearance of ‘The Punisher’ … Punisher would turn up later in ASM and fans seemed to clamor for his return … Punisher was as overused as Wolverine during the 80s in the Marvel Universe and while I like a little Frank now and then (Daredevil for instance) he was never my “cup of tea” overall (though I liked the Franken-Punisher story line for its weirdness and didn’t mind the Netflix version either…
Never had any interest in Nova. Bought a couple issues when it came out but dropped it quickly. Just seemed too derivative, and essentially unremarkable...
Now E-Man's Nova- that's another matter entirely!
RayAtl - I agree with you on the Punisher. I feel the same way about Ghost Rider and even Wolverine at the peak of their guest star status.
On a completely different note, some of the Bronze Age supporting cast of Spider-Man left me cold. Deb Whitman and Lance Bannon did not keep my interest. I wanted to like the Deb character and found her different, but in the end she just didn't work and fhe relationship felt forced. I also felt the same about Aunt May once she returned from the dead.
And in the ROM books the over abundance of Spaceknights bothered me; if ROM had been one of the last few I would have liked it better, but other old Spaceknights kept popping up.
I never liked the Falcon. Boring! And as a kid I didn't like how deferent he seemed to be to Cap. Nowadays I am a lot more interested in the character from a scholarly point of view, but as a character? He has never done it for me (esp. in the early stories when he can't even fly!)
Also, while I loved Spider-Man growing up, I never liked (and still don't like) any of the stories involving him and magic stuff. I don't want him visiting other worlds or hanging with Dr. strange
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