I’m really curious about the powers of superheroes and supervillains. Sometimes, when I’m bored, I look up comic book arcs of famous Marvel and DC characters. What I notice is that a significant amount of them possess powers like telekinesis, super strength, superhuman fighting ability, regenerative healing, immortality, matter manipulation, etc.
I always wonder who’s really super powerful if lots of characters have similar super powers. Shouldn’t they be unique?
If you look at the following link:
It gives a bunch of characters that possess this amazing ability. Not so amazing when more than one or two people can do it.
A similar page on Immortality lists many characters who are immortal. The ability to not die should be a game-ender, no?
I mean, I’m guessing most of these superheroes and supervillains are fighting against each other, not against ordinary people. So I just imagine that it gets harder and harder to create a believable fight between two massively powered characters that can both destroy and create anything and possess the powers of super-healing and magnetism and electricity and flight and laser beams and super speed and amazing reflexes and whatever.
I’m more curious about the mechanisms comic book writers use to create battles between these unbelievably powerful characters. How do they make things fresh and exciting? There are only so many powers you can use. Water beats fire and electricity. Those are obvious, and I assume in the early days of Spiderman vs Electro, he beat him with water? But I posit that with the expansion of characters with more amazing and powerful abilities, it’s become harder to pit these characters against one another.
And yes, I know comics is all about story, and suspension of disbelief. But I wonder if writers are running out of ways for characters to defeat each other without destroying the Earth in the process.
I’m not a big comic book fan, so I humbly bow to your expertise.
Superhero comics are coming up on their first centennial. You’ve got hundreds of thousands of individual comics, from (at various times) dozens of competing publishers - many of whom are not above cribbing idea from their competition - and you’re going to get a certain amount of overlap in concepts and power sets.
That said, looking at the link you gave, “matter manipulation” is a pretty broad (and not really well defined) category. It lists Firestorm, who can manipulate matter on an atomic level, literally transforming one element into another, alongside Jean Grey, who’s telekinetic - meaning she can pick stuff up with her mind and throw it at people. And then it’s got Sauron from Lord of the Rings on there, I guess because he made a bunch of magic rings? All three of those are listed as the “same” super power, and the third one is just a guy who knows how to use a hammer and an anvil.
That’s not really a great site, is what I’m saying.
Anyway, the thing that really defines a good superhero character isn’t their powers, its their personality. Take, for example, Batman and Green Arrow, two characters made by the same company. On paper, they’re very nearly identical. Both super-rich playboys by day, costumed vigilantes by night. Neither has superpowers, instead relying on constant training to keep themselves at the peak of human strength, endurance, and agility. Batman has a Batcave. Green Arrow has an Arrowcave. Batman has the Batmobile. Green Arrow had the Arrowcar. Batman had Robin. Green Arrow had Speedy. But you read their comics, and they’re very distinct characters. Batman is a grim obsessive who is willing to sacrifice everything in his endless war on crime, even his friends and family. Green Arrow is a swashbuckling adventurer in the Robin Hood mold, with a major weakness for pretty girls. Despite all the similarities in background and approach to crimefighting, their comics usually read as very different from each other, because their actions are driven by very different personalities.
Have I shared my theory here of the metahuman version of the Pauli exclusion principle? No two superheroes can be in the same state defined by the quantum variables of powers, alignment, gender, and publisher, but they tend to congregate in similar states. Thus, for instance, there’s only one male superhero with an unbreakable skeleton, claws, and regeneration published by Marvel (Wolverine), but there can also be a male supervillain with all those other traits (Sabertooth), or a female supervillain with those other traits (Deathstrike). Similarly, every company has somewhere between one and four heroes who can fly, are invulnerable, and are super-strong and fast, including one male superhero and possibly one female superhero, one male supervillain, and/or one female supervillain.
And don’t mention the Green Lanterns-- They’re obviously bosons.
Flashes and Reverse-Flashes can only be created in pairs, and mutually annihilate; but actually, the seeming creation/annihilation events are time reversals, i.e. the Reverse-Flash is literally the time-reversed Flash. So, they’re actually all the same Flash, but at different points along their timeline.
Miller got it in one. It’s like any fictional genre: after this much time, and this many books, it’s bloody hard to come up with something innovative.
The miracle is that people do keep coming up with new (or new-ish) ideas for heroes. Astro City is noteworthy for ringing new changes on old themes. Concrete was both following well-trodden trails – a very tough and strong brick-like character – and breaking new ground entirely – the character is the only metahuman on earth. No heroes and villains, just him.
And Miller is also right that characterization and personality are key. You can have the same idea – a hero who is a ghost – in variations as diverse as Casper the Friendly Ghost, Ghost (Dark Horse,) and Dead Boy Detectives. One idea, three wildly different interpretations.
If anything, you’d expect the opposite: if it’s possible for somebody to develop a particular power set once, it’s more likely for it to be possible for it to happen again.
There’s immortality and there’s immortality. At one end you’ve got a guy who cannot die of old age but is vulnerable to the normal perils of life, and at the other you’ve got someone like the Juggernaut who isn’t just unhurt by whatever you can throw at him, he’s not even slowed down.
I like the take Aaron Williams’ PS238 took on recurring powers: Among Earthlings, there are no less than 84 different individuals with the combination of flight, invulnerability, strength, and speed, including Mr. Terrific, the planet’s first metahuman, and Atlas, the Last Son of Argon, who came here as an infant escaping a doomed world.
Or so he thought. It turns out that Argon started its Heroic Age some time before Earth did, and culled all of their metahumans who exhibited “deviant” powers (i.e., anything but FISS). The remaining FISS metas became the planet’s aristocracy, and Atlas was their crown prince, sent away as a political exile. The planet is still just fine (aside from being ruled by ruthless despots), and the common majority of its population is just as unpowered as the majority of Earthlings.
I understand it’s all about personality, but how do the writers have one character defeat the other? If each character has superhuman this or that, is it just that the winning character happens to be more superhuman than the other one? Should two superhumanly strong characters with superhuman powers just cancel each other out? E.g. Wolverine vs Sabretooth–if they are both equally strong then each duel should be a draw. If one is stronger than the other then there should be a clear victor…am I wrong? Personality aside, is the usual formula that the winning character finds a weakness (psychological or otherwise) and exploits it? Or is it more about superpowers just dominating the loser? If the former, then the superpowers are just used as a backdrop for the personality and psychological conflicts. If the latter, then the writers need to be careful how they address confrontations so that both characters can be kept strong going out.
Kind of like in pro wrestling, where a successful match makes both wrestlers look strong, instead of a convincing victory for one and a defeat for the other. That’s kind of what I’m saying here. If a character is defeated, he or she has to be specially handled so as not to totally de-power him or her for the reader.
Re: immortality, I mean, if someone is immortal, they can’t die. Therefore, especially in the Juggernaut’s case, if they are “defeated”, it’s more a temporary imprisonment, or a psychological exploitation, etc. It’s not physically destroying Juggernaut. Are all immortal villains defeated in this way? I mean, if you can’t DIE, then eventually, time will win the battle for you.
You can probably tell, I’m new to comics. TLDR, I’m interested in the ways the battles take place between superheroes, especially now that everyone and their mother has at least “superhuman reflexes,” “genius-level intellect” and “superhuman fighting ability.” What kinds of battles take place? Are they based around drama and psychological warfare (deceit, lying, blackmail, etc.), or is it all about whose concussive force blasts are more powerful?
Battlefield conditions, situation, team make-up, the element of surprise…
Captain America vs. Batman: okay, where? 50 yard line of MetLife Stadium under full lights…or the alleys behind West Division Street on the West Side of Chicago at 2:30 in the morning on a moonless night?
Otherwise, it’s largely a matter of whom the writer wants to win. That’s kinda the point of fiction: the writer says what happens.
There’s another way, however, of modeling superhero combat: use a game system! Use DC Heroes or Champions or Marvel Superheroes, stat up the characters, have some friends over, pop a few beers (or Dr. Pepper) and game it out. Simulate the event; wargame it. It’s good clean fun, and can be hugely instructive.
(A friend of mine was writing a historical novel, where some Vikings raided a small coastal town. He wanted to Vikings to almost win, but get driven off. We whipped out a set of miniatures rules, moved poker-chips around on the living room floor, and gamed it with various numbers of Vikings, till we got the result we wanted. Okay, that’s how many Vikings landed!)
Someone once asked Chris Claremont exactly how strong Cyclops’ eye-beams are. He said, “As strong as they need to be for the story I want to tell.”
You can also get something of a paper-rock-scissors effect with superheroes. For instance, Sue Storm’s invisibility is really handy against most opponents, but if she ever had reason to fight Daredevil, it’d be useless. So Daredevil might beat Sue, but if you put both of them up against, say, the Hulk, Sue will fare a lot better against him than Daredevil will.
(and yes, I’m ignoring her forcefields for the sake of this example)
Chronos: Exactly so! And it’s way more fun when you have team vs. team combat. The joy of this is setting up the grid or spreadsheet so that each team engages the other team’s members optimally.
Sometimes, you have the “types” go against each other: Colossus whams Juggernaut, while the mentalists pair up, the speedsters take each other out, etc.
But other times, you get a “hit them where they’re weakest” effect, where the mentalists slurp the minds of the heavy hitters, the speedsters try to whip around the mentalists, the heavy hitters throw school-buses where they think the speedsters will be, and so on.
It’s the ultimate “combined arms” challenge! If you thought Napoleonics was tough sledding, you only had infantry, cavalry, and artillery to cope with. With superheroes, there can be a dozen or more basic kinds!
It can be all of those things, depending on the needs of the story. A frequent conceit in Wolverine versus Sabretooth fights is that Wolverine needs to get somewhere fast - maybe he’s carrying a wounded teammate, or knows where a bomb is located. Then up pops Sabretooth, and Wolverine knows he can’t stop and fight him, because they’re so evenly matched that a fight could take days, so he’s got to find some way around him, instead.
Other times, you’ll have a villain show up and just casually beat the heroes down. This gives them an excuse to do a do a big training montage/find the true meaning of working as a team/go on a quest for the MacGuffin that will let them beat the bad guy.
And sometimes a writer will throw in a character he doesn’t like, just so the hero he’s writing can beat him up. Green Lantern (super power: a ring that can literally do anything) got humiliated by z-list anti hero Hitman (super power: x-ray vision, has a gun) because writer Garth Ennis just really hates Green Lantern.
Eh, not really. There’s just so much inertia behind most of these characters that’s it’s actually very hard to make change stick to them. And for all the stereotypes about continuity geeks, comic book fans are very good about selectively remembering which stories “count” and which don’t. If someone writes a story where Superman gets his ass kicked by Paste Pot Pete (actual comic character!), it’s not going to lead to anyone saying, “How can he possibly fight Darkseid when he lost to that loser?” The comic is just going to be quietly forgotten and no one will ever reference it again.
Except Grant Morrison, who will not only bring it back, but do it in a way that makes it totally awesome. Because Grant Morrison is an actual wizard.
Immortality is a bit of a mug’s game in comic books, because technically, everyone has it. Nobody ever dies for real in comics. There’s always going to be a clone, or a Lazarus Pit, or time travel shenanigans, or something that negates a character death and brings him back for more money. I mean comics. Brings him back for more comics.
But yes, to a certain extent you’re right. Comics always take place “now,” so immortal characters like Vandal Savage or Ra’s al-Ghul are always losing for the time being. But frequently, they’ll do time travel stories where they go yo some distant (or not to distant) future where an immortal villain had outlived all the superheroes and rules the world. But the thing is, you write a book today where the heroes go to 2050 and find out Vandal Savage is king of everything. But when 2050 actually rolls around, DC is still going to writing stories about how Vandal Savage just can’t beat the Justice League. Until the League time travels to the future year of 2100, where it turns out Vandal is king again.
Immortal villains live in an eternal “now” where their inevitable victory is always just a few decades around the corner.
It’s still largely about punching people in the race as hard as you can. Occasionally, deceit, lying, or blackmail may be necessary to maneuver someone into position for the punch, but there’s always a punch.