Deadweight Supervillains

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okay, the deadweight superheroes is reaching critical mass...time to flip it over and reverse it as Missy E would say.
rule: no jokey supervillains who are supposed to be lame.

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 20:58 (twenty-two years ago)

So, no Paste Pot Pete? DAMN. How about Batroc?

I've never understood the point of Gorilla Grodd, and what's the point of Bane when you've already got Solomon Grundy?

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 21:03 (twenty-two years ago)

How about the ones who are always trying to steal Hostess Fruit Pies?

― Ernest P. (ernestp), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 21:06 (twenty-two years ago)

Richard Pryor in Superman III?

― Mark C (Mark C), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 21:07 (twenty-two years ago)

One of my favourite ever lines was spoken by Captain America to Batroc: "Only one of us is going to leave this room alive, Batroc - and it isn't going to be me!"

I don't think Paste-Pot Pete was meant to be a joke.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 21:11 (twenty-two years ago)

anyone who was ever in quasar

― jess (dubplatestyle), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 21:13 (twenty-two years ago)

There can be only ONE answer to this question... and his name is Solomon Grundy

http://www.seanbaby.com/superfriends/images/grundy5.jpg

― Aaron W (Aaron W), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 21:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Well reused/revamped, again by Grant Morrison, though.

Dreariest were the long run of dullards in Thor between Kirby and Simonson: this month, Thor fights another creature that's about the same strength as he is! (Ulik the Troll needs to be particularly picked out on a message board, obv.)

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 21:21 (twenty-two years ago)

That ranks up there with Giant-Size Man-Thing.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 21:22 (twenty-two years ago)

Paste-Pot Pete can be joined by the Frightful Four. The Wizard! He can float! While Medusa controls her own hair. Sandman was actually decent - so decent that he started fighting the FF on his own as the Frightful One.

― Al Ewing (Al Ewing), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 22:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Omigod UNUS THE UNTOUCHABLE!!!!!

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 22:36 (twenty-two years ago)

b-but he couldn't be touched!

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 23:04 (twenty-two years ago)

Since I want to talk about Superfriends again: remember how partway through they decided to introduce new, more culturally diverse members of the League of Justice, such as Black Lightning and Apache Chief? But then, in order to make the all-out Justice vs. Doom fights fairer and easier to follow, they had to introduce villians with the EXACT EQUIVALENT POWERS as the new superheroes, so that they would just cancel one another out and you could concentrate on the main characters actually fighting? Those villians sucked. For example Apache Chief would become a giant, and then there was some Doom chick who would become a giant, too, and they would be pictures wrestling pointlessly in the air for two seconds and then ignored for the duration of the battle.

Also, I don't remember too clearly, but Green Lantern's nemesis. I always loved Green Lantern, but on Superfriends they would just neutralize him like Apache Chief with that one villian who was basically like "The Yellow Lantern," and they would just create opposite-colored force things that couldn't do anything to one another.

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 23:26 (twenty-two years ago)

DON'T YOU BE DISSIN' ON SINESTRO!!! (Giganta did suck, though.)

RELIVE THE SHEER STUPIDITY THAT WAS THE SUPERFRIENDS!

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 23:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah, the SeanBaby site. I love it so.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 19 February 2003 23:58 (twenty-two years ago)

How's about that bald Red Ghost guy & his 3 Russian supermonkeys, eh? Tryin' to make a sly comment about Communism, are we, Stan & Jack?

N., you'll be happy to know that Black VULCAN & Apache Chief joined forces with other racial stereotypes (& Jesse Jackson!) (& a bear!) to form the Multicultural Pals.

― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 20 February 2003 03:46 (twenty-two years ago)

Isn't Mysterio completely rubbish?

― DV (dirtyvicar), Thursday, 20 February 2003 10:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Why exactly is the Penguin frightening?

― Tom (Groke), Thursday, 20 February 2003 10:30 (twenty-two years ago)

He isn't. Apart from when Burgess Meredith played him.

― robster (robster), Thursday, 20 February 2003 10:47 (twenty-two years ago)

(He was good in Suicide Squad too - but that was all about the lame supervillains obv.)

― Tom (Groke), Thursday, 20 February 2003 10:50 (twenty-two years ago)

The Penguin's supposed to be an Al Capone type character, right? Those are terribly hard to pull off right in superhero comics.

Ah, the SeanBaby site. I love it so.

Yeah, and he updated!!! I had lost any hope of that happening.

― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), Thursday, 20 February 2003 12:00 (twenty-two years ago)

Am I the only one who found Modok to be really laughable?

― JS Williams (js williams), Thursday, 20 February 2003 12:56 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm glad someone said Modok--he's the hydrocephalitic one in the floaty chair, right? Between Baron Harkonnnen and a bobblehead doll.

Man-Bat is also lame.

― adam (adam), Thursday, 20 February 2003 14:43 (twenty-two years ago)

The Riddler always seemed a little superfluous next to the Joker.
Green Lantern's enemies were pretty corny, all about the yellow. Sinestro had his yellow power ring, Goldface was all about the yellow, the Tattooed Man's inks were yellow-based and the Shark had (get this) and INVISIBLE yellow force field. So GL would always have to throw mud on his enemies and then kick their asses.

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Thursday, 20 February 2003 14:54 (twenty-two years ago)

come on, there's got to something better to be vengeful about, no?
http://theages.superman.ws/Encyclopaedia/luthor/images/panel-b.gif

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Thursday, 20 February 2003 18:41 (twenty-two years ago)

The Matador
Stilt Man

― Snowy Mann (rdmanston), Thursday, 20 February 2003 18:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Daredevil had lots of lame villains. I always liked the Red Ghost and his Super Apes, mainly just because they were apes and I like apes. Mysterio was sort of lame, but the smoke and general look were glorious in his first appearances, by Ditko of course.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Thursday, 20 February 2003 19:04 (twenty-two years ago)

The Chameleon! Spidey's first "super-villain", and he was so awe-inspiring that Stan didn't bring him back for over six years! And then he got some lame face-changing surgery in the late 80s (w/ belt buckle activator device), which made him a smokeless Mysterio, which is ultralame. (Lame as in weak, not as in material - alas, if only.)

The Mortness of these characters, though, is mainly the fault of unimaginative writers. And plaid.

I have / had one of those comic-as-record things featuring a Neal Adams Man-Bat story that scared the cockles out of me as a kid & establishes Man-Bat's lack of deadweight.

― David R. (popshots75`), Friday, 21 February 2003 09:54 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah Martin - my secret shame (until now)- my favourite villians were actually those odd/lame ones that, like you say, tended to crop up in Daredevil (though I think Spider-Man had a few too) - ones with either hardly any super-powers, or with a 'power' based on some bizarre technological gimmick - examples that come to mind are the aforementioned Stilt-Man & Matador, but also:
Leapfrog(? - guy dressed like a frog, with great big springs on his flippers!)
The Jester
Mysterio
A trio of henchmen consisting of: 'The Ox' (guess), 'Fancy Dan' (a dapper judo midget), and 'Montana' (? - a C&W suit & bootlace tie wearing trick lassoo-ist)
A quartet of crims dressed in animal costumes - Bird-Man, Cat-Man, Ape-Man & Frog-Man I think
The Owl (can barely remember him - dressed in some bizarrely English Gent type suit & mini-cape like Sherlock Holmes without the pipe & deerstalker ?)
The Circus Of Crime
Zodiac

I don't know if he was Deadweight, but The Vulture (mainly a Spider-Man villian?) used to seem a bit crap to me - what the hell were his powers? Whether he had super-strength was never clear, whether he could fly or just glide or just float about was never clear, he looked about 65 yrs old and was supposed to have hollow bones or something....yeah great villian as long as he didn't have a bad fall and land on his hip.

I think I liked something about the relative clarity and stretched feasibility of these lame-o villians when I first started reading those comics - as compared to the ill-defined 'super-strong' (HOW strong?) or 'energy-blasts' (what does THAT mean) type.

(The plethora of near-omnipotent cosmic uber-beings in later Marvel got a bit much: though my favourites used to be The Stranger, and Mephisto, when there were a manageable number of them...)

― Snowy Mann (rdmanston), Friday, 21 February 2003 14:53 (twenty-two years ago)

'Fancy Dan' (a dapper judo midget),

This has made my day.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Friday, 21 February 2003 14:54 (twenty-two years ago)

ha ha '...a manageable number of near-omnipotent cosmic uber-beings...'

(Thankyou Dan.)

― Snowy Mann (rdmanston), Friday, 21 February 2003 14:56 (twenty-two years ago)

The Vulture could fly because of an anti-grav device. I don't think he had hollow bones. They did replace the old guy at one point with a young bruiser, but he was still third rate.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Friday, 21 February 2003 18:45 (twenty-two years ago)

The Owl had hollow bones, which were presumably counterbalanced by his being a fat tub of lard.

― Al_Ewing, Friday, 21 February 2003 20:49 (twenty-two years ago)

The young bruiser was VERY 3rd-rate, & I thought the young bruiser was actually the old bruiser rejuvenated via energy drained from the clones of Spidey's parents. (Do I really read this stuff?)

The Owl now seems to be some tweaked carnivorous psycho - it works for me.

― David R. (popshots75`), Friday, 21 February 2003 21:20 (twenty-two years ago)

Lex Luthor. In fact based on him and Starr from the Preacher comics(counting him as a supervillian for the purposes of this post), in my very limited experience of course, bald whitemen with loads of money are worse than useless.

― fractal (fractal), Friday, 21 February 2003 21:29 (twenty-two years ago)

Luthor is great in Eliot S. Maggin's fine novel Last Son Of Krypton. He keeps telling versions of Irish/Polish jokes but about Kryptonians.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Friday, 21 February 2003 21:43 (twenty-two years ago)

I know he's a deliberate lamer, but DD's Turk has got to get a mention.

― Leee (Leee), Saturday, 22 February 2003 09:15 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah, Modok. I had never actually read a comic with him in it as a kid, but I always assumed that he must've been a total badass, because he looked like a complete spazzo, and there had to be some reason why writers used him.

Daniel: Seanbaby updated? Since when? The update page lists the last update as having been back in April.

― Simon Generic, Saturday, 22 February 2003 10:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah, I see. Perhaps I should've actually checked Seanbaby's homepage instead of just his "updates" page before posting.

― Simon Generic, Saturday, 22 February 2003 10:29 (twenty-two years ago)

http://home.nc.rr.com/shadynook/SpottedLair/BANE.gif http://www.superman.com.ar/images/doomsd1.jpg

bane and doomsday

― chaki (chaki), Saturday, 22 February 2003 10:50 (twenty-two years ago)

Well done chaki

― jm (jtm), Saturday, 22 February 2003 12:20 (twenty-two years ago)

Thinking of deliberately lame villains, I fondly recall one jerk in a big robot thing attacking Avengers mansion. He engages Cap first, and when Iron Man flies up he calls out asking if Cap needs help and he says something like "No, no problem, all under control" and the villain gets really furious. Very funny. Can't remember when this was or who it was by. Late '80s, maybe?

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Saturday, 22 February 2003 12:27 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah yes, Bane and Doomsday. From DC's "maybe if we let all our heroes die/get crippled they'll be more popular?" era (had they been taking lessons from the music industry?)

― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), Saturday, 22 February 2003 12:42 (twenty-two years ago)

So I guess everyone just totally forgot Paranex the Fighting Fetus, huh? He wasn't exactly a villain (I don't think he was much of anything, but the villains had him along for the ride), but he did shoot lots of energy around and... uh, yeah.

I'm just being deliberately obscure, I'm afraid. And I could easily have picked the Goozlebobber from the very same comic.

Oh, there was Nuklo. He got that name because he couldn't talk but he could mimic a bit and someone called him a 'nuclear nemesis,' thereby prompting him to yell 'Nuklo nem-sis' quite a lot. That was in an Avengers I haven't seen since I was a kid and I'm not nearly pendatic enough to have an issue number. (An Annual, I think.)

Of course, all villains in modern comics are deadweights because all modern comics are crap...

― Christine SH, Saturday, 22 February 2003 17:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Black Manta! Who decided Aquaman was such an unstoppable hero that he needed an archvillain?

― Vinnie (vprabhu), Saturday, 22 February 2003 19:42 (twenty-two years ago)

He's got two. He's not only got the frisbee-headed Manta but also OCEAN MASTER, his EVIL BROTHER WHO TURNED TO CRIME!! Sea crime.

To be brutally honest, I was always surprised that some of Aquaman's arch enemies weren't fish. All his friends were. Why isn't Black Manta an actual manta ray?

― Al Ewing (Al Ewing), Sunday, 23 February 2003 00:09 (twenty-two years ago)

http://shazam.imginc.com/media/images/panels/mister_mind_voice.gif

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Thursday, 27 February 2003 18:02 (twenty-two years ago)

Mister Mind was the cream of villainy compared to the Big Gang, who only stole big things, like the biggest book in the world and the largest chess piece ever created by man. (In other words, things that were DIFFICULT TO FENCE.) Their members included Big Head, Big Cheese who used the power of cheese to defeat the forces of law, Big Wig who had exploding wigs, Big Shot - he carried a gun - and Big Bertha. She was a woman named Bertha. Oh, and Big Time who looked at clocks a lot and did little. And Big Deal. Exploding cards. There may have been another Big someone and I invite members of ILE to guess who he, she or it might have been.

― Al Ewing (Al Ewing), Thursday, 27 February 2003 23:52 (twenty-two years ago)

The Flash villain the Turtle was very lame - his rubbish gimmick was that he moved really slowly, and there are feeble confrontations where the Flash misjudges just how slowly he was moving, and misses him and runs into a wall.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Friday, 28 February 2003 13:04 (twenty-two years ago)

That's great! Did he nip over to the Flash as he was lying in the remains of the wall and pour booze into him? Then he would truly be the Flash's most dangerous foe!

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Friday, 28 February 2003 13:15 (twenty-two years ago)

haha the Queer Evil Castle of Science!! I am posting from it!!

― mark s (mark s), Friday, 28 February 2003 13:54 (twenty-two years ago)

Big Brother. A man who used the hypnotising power of a TV Gameshow to bamboozl' the cops.

― Pete (Pete), Friday, 28 February 2003 14:03 (twenty-two years ago)

Oh no! One of them is hard-boiled!
http://www.sergioleone.net/mt-31.jpg

― Horace Mann (Horace Mann), Friday, 28 February 2003 15:10 (twenty-two years ago)

ten months pass...

http://www.hyperborea.org/flash/image.php?img=capcold.gif

― Huckleberry Mann (Horace Mann), Tuesday, 6 January 2004 19:56 (twenty-one years ago)

JS Williams: Am I the only one who found Modok to be really laughable?
adam: I'm glad someone said Modok--he's the hydrocephalitic one in the floaty chair, right? Between Baron Harkonnnen and a bobblehead doll.
Well, sure, Modok was a lame-ass, but King Kirby outdid even than (cough) gem with a character named Arnim Zola.
Nobody sucks worse than Arnim Zola

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 03:22 (twenty-one years ago)

Hey, Martin! There's an arc in the post-Crisis Flash series (during Messner-Loebs' run) where the Turtle is used rather well (if I remember correctly). Tom, you like/d the M-L Flash, didn't you? You know what I'm talking about here?

Dan Jurgens' run on _Justice League_ (during his Death of Superman shenanigans) is full of superawful villains - the Weapons Master (he warps in weapons by yelling stuff like "Warp weapon 76!") (& egads, what's with the Blood- names circa 1990?), Doctor Destiny (some dream-manipulating skull-faced twit that likes to attack comatose heroes with a steak knife), and ROTT.

ROTT (and I only capitalize his name because he's extra special) was a former slave owner trapped in the Bloodgem by his slaves, who turns into ... oh, hell, I can't do it justice - just read this. What IS with the Blood- names? (Note: I now have dibs on the name Blood Blood.)

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 03:49 (twenty-one years ago)

Doctor Destiny dates back to a very early JLA, and has cropped up frequently since - he's sometimes used well.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 18:03 (twenty-one years ago)

that's the trick. Using 'em well.
I was noticing on the cartoon Justice League (which has had Dr. Destiny as a villain) that they really haven't figured out what to do with the Flash. And at his most basic, he can seem like a pretty limited character (which is probably why Barry Allen had such a goofy Rogues Gallery), yet the current version is arguably the most successful post-Crisis take on the second tier of DC characters. The current Green Lantern has been around for 10 years (longer than the original's original run!) but is still treated as an unwelcome usurper by many comic people (the comics version of rockism?). But the Flash (no doubt because he was a fully realized character already--in Marv Wolfman's New Teen Titans--by the time he started running with the A-List) has only rarely had his legitimacy questioned.

― Huckleberry Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 18:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Doctor Destiny (some dream-manipulating skull-faced twit that likes to attack comatose heroes with a steak knife), and ROTT.
You should see how the same character was handled in the early issues of Sandman:Master of Dreams.

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 19:13 (twenty-one years ago)

The current Green Lantern has been around for 10 years (longer than the original's original run!) but is still treated as an unwelcome usurper by many comic people (the comics version of rockism?).
Too true, too true. The Hal Jordan fans need to move on and get more fiber in their diet. Hal Jordan was halfway to needing a zimmer frame walker by the time they retired him.

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 19:14 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah, well, Hal Jordan was written very poorly from the time GLC was cancelled in '88 up to and including his going crazy and death. And the new guy was no great shakes for a long time, very representative of all that kept me away from comics in the 90s, but cripes! There are 30-odd years worth of Jordan stories, many of them really great. But by the time he got his plug pulled, he had been mishandled for so long (and had his origin completely knackered) it was the only charitable thing to do.

― Huckleberry Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 19:25 (twenty-one years ago)

None of which made Kyle Rayner any better. His schtick for at least a year was to meet other heroes, fight them due to a misunderstanding, earn their respect, whine about how he didn't feel up to the burden, and be assured that he was doing just great.

Grant Morrison put a few interesting spins on him, which I have no doubt everyone on his main title ignored.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 19:30 (twenty-one years ago)

At least he's finally got a decent costume.
While I can appreciate some of the Kirbyisms of the original Kyle Rayner outfit, it looked like ass.

― Huckleberry Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 19:43 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah, Martin & Custos - I gleaned that most of the baddies Jurgens used in his run were old-skool JLA villians (his attempt to hearken back to the halcyon days when JLA was a "serious" comic book, I imagine - ugh ugh ugh), & I have no doubt that they were used to better effect by other folks (cf. appearances by the Shaggy Man & Starro - that octopod eye thing? - in GM's JL). Though I hope that Rott & the Weapons Master stay buried for a long, long, LONG while.

I'm harping on this, you see, because I snagged a run of Justice League on eBay a while back, & have made my way through issue #78 - the Giffen / DeMatties (sic?) run wasn't as great as I thought it was (at age 12 - shock!), & the humor was a bit much at times, but there were plenty of cool moments (& Kevin Maguire is godlike). Then there's the awful, awful crap I'm bitching about. But I'll stop bitching about this while on the clock.

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 19:51 (twenty-one years ago)

Have you seen Formerly Known As the Justice League?
Maguire's pencils seem so 80s, like the cover of Rio. Not that that's a bad thing.
But reading it, and dimly recalling the first 40 or so issues of the Giffen/DeMatteis JL/I/A, sure reminds me of Seinfeld, even though it preceded it by a few years.

― Huckleberry Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 19:54 (twenty-one years ago)

Yes I have! I guess the success (relatively speaking) of FKATJL has allowed the crew to begin work on a 2nd limited series, which is fine by me, since more of that = more Kevin Maguire (one small sliver of the 80s comic zeitgeist I wouldn't mind seeing more of) (as compared to all of the other hallmarks hak hak of the 80s / early 90s comic zeitgeist that are either on their way or already eating all the cocktail weenies).

― David R. (popshots75`), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 20:04 (twenty-one years ago)

Going back a bit...but The Tinkerer! An old guy who owns a clock shop, Spider-man's deadliest foe!

― jel -- (jel), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 20:06 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm also really liking the current Flash storyline (even though I've only read two issues, #s 201 and 205--but cripes, it's comics). I just wanted to share that.
When I started buying comics again this fall for the first time since like '91 or something, I was really expecting to get into indie and small-press cool-qua-hip stuff, but I just keep going back to those goofy, brightly-coloured, and ultimately dorky DC heroes. And I'm okay with that.

― Huckleberry Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 20:09 (twenty-one years ago)

I stopped buying it after ish 2. Got a bit samey. However JLI was, of course, the best comic, ever, period, in the world.

(x-post)

― Chuck Tatum (Chuck Tatum), Wednesday, 7 January 2004 20:33 (twenty-one years ago)

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