Harborwolf. I REFUSE TO GIVE YOU THE SATISFACTION ABOUT HOW PERFECT THAT IS – ESPECIALLY SUPERMAN’S REACTION – UNTIL YOU COMMIT TO WRITING A STORY!! Quit teasing me!
– Agitated Askia
I meant to respond earlier. Sounds good – but how would J. Jonah Jameson discover and expose that Superman is an alien? Here’s ome food for thought Either 1) Superman reveals that fact himself and Jameson uses it against him or 2) someone else somehow discovered that fact and “informed” jameson or 3) someone publicly theorizes that Superman’s range of superhuman abilties would either make him an alien or a mutant.
I’ve explained my problems. Supes and his powers have been abused by too many hack writers who wrote themselves into corners and had to kick supies powers up a notch (BAM!) to wrap up the villain and the story line. I have no problem with character exploration but this is a comic book and needs at least some form of comic bookie conflict. That means villains and Superman has too large a group of powers to choose from.
I will say that exposing a new weakness and character flaws to create doubts would give Mephisto room to operate to a satisfactory level for the character, but I need time to think damnit. Till then I’ll just shoot out the ideas I’ve got for everyone to chew on.
P.S. I thought it was “Agressive Story Editor Askia.” 
Well, it was till you got me all agitated.
Superman’s power-levels aren’t so omnipotent that he can’t be checked by imaginative use of other people’s powers. People think he’s vulnerable only to kryptonite, magic and red sun radiation but the truth is so much more fluid than that. Marvel has a plethora of psi-powered people, mostly female, both villainous and heroic that could pose him problems by psionically messing with his head. There are tons of adamantium and secondary adamantium weapons that can cause him physical harm. Vibranium, too, might at least cause a burning sensation that Superman finds painful. Graviton could take away his ability to fly and rob him of much of his super-strength. Superman remains susceptible to all kinds of oiffensive magical artifacts and spells. Superman’s entire range of vision powers can be disrupted with something as ordinary, simple, small and inexpensive as… well, I won’t share* that* one. I may still use it. 
I don’t believe for one instant this group of fanboys on the SDMB will let anyone get away with hack writing. You think I’m picky, wait until Menocchio or Fenris shows up.
If you decide that you don’t want a write, would you be happy with being a collaborator consultant who just works as a plot consultant, idea-springboard-bouncer-offer and idea-generator? You obviously have a lot to offer.
I’ll contribute whatever I can. If I can crank out a workable story idea, I’ll do it. If not, you’ll get whatever I can come up with.
I don’t see how vibranium would cause a burning sensation. It’s primary ability is to absorb vibrations/force with very little damage. It is more common than adamantium though so it’s a bit more workable. I also thought of the telepath angle, but remembered that Superman is somewhat telepathy resistant due to Kryptonian meditation training or some other whatnot like that. I think it came up in the JLA vs. the X-Men thread as to why the X-paths couldn’t just wipe the floor with the JLA. Again, blame it on hack writers.
Now if you want to go the self doubt route but can’t rely on telepaths, you are pretty much stuck with the gods and other uber beings: Nightmare, the Enchantress, Loki, and Mephisto. Nightmare is a bit of a lightweight in the power department and the asgardians have that nasty thee/thou/forsooth tis I speech impediment. That leaves Mephisto. The only question is how to get him involved and why he’d be so keen to slap around Superman.
A good speed bump villain requiring Superman to swallow his pride and call for back up would be the Absorbing Man. I know. The whole power absorbtion thing with superman is done every day and twice on weekends, but Crusher has the magical wrecking ball and the power versatility to keep superman back on his heels by say, absorbing the properties of adamantium or vibranium.
Vibranium comes in two varieties: the sound-absorbing kind, and the kind which is the anti-metal that destroys other metals upon physical contact. My guess is that if someone where to try to cut Superman’s skin with an anti-metal vibranium blade and beat him with a blunt vibranium weapon it wouldn’t cut him but it might burn – perhaps badly. Like a hot iron.
Askia: I’m assuming Supes would be just as free with information as he is in the DCU where it wasn’t much of a secret. Plus it gives us the hook Jameson would need. Thirdly it would give Marvels more scientifically oriented villians an area to start exploring. To me the weakness of the DCU is that most of the characters sans Batman aren’t that bright.
Stuffy. On the other hand, if Superman tried to keep the fact he’s an alien to himself, and it was somehow figured out by the Marvel press or scientific community that he’s not, just based on his demonstrated superpowers – Jameson could still get the hook he needed AND be able to say, “What else is Superman hiding?” Not only would Jameson have a point, it would add to the Marvel Universe Distrust of Superman pile-on.
But we would have to be careful to this animosity towards Superman is as unfair as it was when Spider-Man got regularly bashed by the Bugle. Nobody ever really feels sympathy for Superman, y’know? He almost never makes mistakes trusting people or underestimating people’s capacities for irrational hate, either.
It might be considered out of character for Superman to try and keep his alien heritage a secret unless he felt he had a very good reason to.
I love your idea of Marvel’s scientifically-oriented villains quickly planning to deal with Superman. Stuffy are you going to do a Spider-Man story in the DCU, too?
– Affable Askia
Heh. The first thing that came to mind on reading the title of this thread was that this was going to be about Batman/Wolverine slash…
Agressive to agitated to affable. Somebody wake me up when we reach adjectiveless.
Two quick questions:
Askia, what is going to be going on right before the swap. Have our heroes settled in to bed after a long night of battling evil? Give me a rough idea of what you are going to do with Spideys first appearance in DC.
What exactly are Spider Womans powers? I know about super strength, speed, wall crawling, etc. Does she still do the venom blasts? Any sort of webbery happening?
I’m intrigued, but sort of put-off by the implications of your seeming loathing for Big Blue. I could never sign onto something that has the ultimate motivation ‘Superman sucks, Spider-Man Rules!!’- and I’m wondering how much of that is the case here.
She (Jessica Drew) still does the venom bit, in the new Avengers. I don’t believe she flies, however. The webbing under her arm is so that she can control her falls. Also, I don’t beliueve she doesn’t make spiderman style webbing.
P.S. I will give you the same advice given to me in my writing thread . Write the story (or a least a good chunk of it ) first, then ask for advice.
slotar. I would be surprised if someone doesn’t pitch a slash chapter, given this group.
Harborwolf. Setting the mood: after a long exhausting day of crimefighting both our heroes return to their apartments late one evening and crawl in bed with their wives – too tired to change costumes. At 12:59 am they’re both asleep in their own beds. At 1:00am they’ve swapped universes and can’t get home.
CandidGamera: You’ve talked to me for how many years and you think I loathe Superman??!! NO. I love the big lug. I’m just giving him the ol’ Peter Parker/Charlie Brown treatment while he’s in the Marvel Universe: nobody loves me, everybody hates me, time to go out and fight crime. This is more like “Spider-Man rules when he’s not being a depressed jerk and Superman is way more interesting when the world isn’t automatically on his side.” Both heroes rock, but it’s long past time Spider-Man was appreciated by the public at large and Superman was humbled just a bit. New Yorkers are a different breed than Metropolitans.
Well… I don’t recall having a lot of Supes discussions with you one way or the other, and he’s an icon people love to clast. And Aesiron’s comments in the other thread made me a bit concerned - I’ve got the theory that if you set out writing about a character with ill intent - ‘Let’s take him down a peg’ - not only do you get one-sided results that alienate a lot of folks, the writing doesn’t tend to measure up.
CG: In the hands of hack writers your theory has merit. This group, I have every confidence in.
Well, in a good story you can’t have charcter arcs go down without going back up… The other half of the let’s take Superman down a peg equation is that after the jokes, after the self-pity party is over, when Superman realizes he is a force of good no matter what world he’s on and actively begins to win the respect of the NYC public as well as the hearts and minds of the Avengers.
The main problem I have with the premise is - so are the local superhumans.
While it does work for Superman to be getting yelled at by just about everyone in Marvel NYC at first, it doesn’t work, for me, for Spider-Man to suddenly become a star in Metropolis.
Spidey: ‘There, that mugger’s been taken care of.’
Jimmy: ‘Uhm…great, dude…but that’s why we have police. On the other hand, Amazo just broke out of STAR Labs and Intergang’s in town again…could you maybe deal with that?’
Spidey: ‘Uhm…Kay…’
Amazo: crunch
Spidey: ‘…Ow.’
Superboy: ‘Dumbass.’
Conversely, stick Spidey in Gotham, and he probably would be Instant Hero. The villains are types he could handle with his Spider Sense tied behind his back, and he’s a hell of a lot more personable than the Bat or Huntress.
Tengu. Spider-Man’s becoming a star in Metropolis works because of the broadcasted fight between him and the Brain Quintet on the moon and Lois Lane’s OP/Ed piece that reassures everyone that he’s a capable hero who can fill Superman’s shoes. Spider-Man becomes the inheritor of all Superman’s goodwill – and that does make him a superstar. Like when Superman shows up at S.T.A.R. labs to borrow weaponry? Spider-Man gets that unflinching support, too. When the JLA shows up from all over the nation if Superman needs help and presses the communicators? Spider-Man gets that allied help, too. Plus simply being around all that technology and weaponry might give the scientific-minded Peter Parker a few ideas about slightly adapting his webbing and creating new-spider based equipment while he’s in Metropolis, now that he can suddenly afford to do it…
Really, the key here is to get creative.
Do you want to write a chapter where Spider-Man visits Gotham, Tengu? No problem. The whole DCU is yours to play around with so long as he returns to Metropolis at the end so the next writer can use him.
Writing Spidey in Gotham could be FUN.
Especially with the Bat still there.
Yes…definitely fun.
You should totally sign on to do this.
Come up with a plot and a list of characters you’d want to use. Obviously you’d want Spider-Man and Batman – who else?
You should try your hand at a Superman chapter in the Marvel universe, too. I have every confidence you can think of something interesting.
-Astute Askia.
Hmm…I am getting a potentially fun idea of Superman with the Avengers. Not exactly action packed, but I think it’d be fun.
I’m good with using the DCAU if everyone else is - although I would prefer the freedom of the comics universe.
What’s the timeline in the Marvel U? I’m way out of date on 616 Marvel books, and I’ll need to check who’s with the Avengers, whichever time period it’s in, if it’s within the last 10 years.