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Post by hondobrode on Feb 21, 2019 2:11:10 GMT -5
This character In short, I'd take 100 Rob Liefelds over Todd McFarlane and his Spawn-verse I'll give him credit for putting Image together and hobbling together a successful soulless cypher of a character, but I've never been so turned off in every way by every single character or concept and anything spinning out of it. I agree that usually a character can be decent in the right hands, and I suppose this one could be too, but it's a bridge too far. I can't get past it and never will. Zero interest and everything about the character and concept, not to mention the creator. is highly offensive to me as well, and puts this at the top, or bottom, of my list. Ugh
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Post by Deleted on Feb 21, 2019 2:48:17 GMT -5
Cody, Batroc, is a Supervillain and sorry to say this ... Villains aren't included in this discussion. I have to disqualify this entry for discussion sake. I'm not looking for a fight; but, would point out that Batroc has been portrayed as an anti-hero, at times, who switches sides and Harley Quinn began as pure villain's moll. Lobo was also a bounty hunter/antagonist and was mostly a villain, at the start and never quite a heroic figure. So, seems like anti-heroes have been fair game. Whatever, though; if you want to stick to pure white hats, then, fine by me. I'm never, ever considered him an anti-hero and did not know that he switches sides and all that; to be honest with you ... this is the first time that he's been described as an anti-hero so your submission is now qualified and I'm truly sorry about that.
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Post by tarkintino on Feb 21, 2019 6:15:50 GMT -5
Yes, completely agreed, and I'll go one further.. What do Punisher fans GET out of the character? Comics are wish fulfillment. Superman fans want to be a good man who helps people. Punisher fans want to be - what? - angry, violent murderers? THAT'S their self-empowerment daydream? I think people need to remember how the Punisher was introduced, and why he made perfect sense as originally presented. In The Amazing Spider-Man #129, The Jackal hired him to kill Spider-Man (we know the reasons why), and instead of the creators simply making this murder plot another super-powered extravaganza, they kept the title in the gritty, dark territory it entered only a handful of issues earlier with the Stacy/Goblin deaths; Spider-Man had broken new ground and more than any other Marvel hero at the time, he found more parallels with the violent streets of real life America, one where the idea of dealing with unstoppable crime, retribution and vigilantism was very much a problem. A problem the Punisher was designed to address. The Punisher--in this original state--was as much a "child" of Brian Garfield's seminal 1972 novel * Death Wish as anything else. The novel addressed so many of the same ideological struggles (with law, order and violent justice) of early 70s America which found their way into the creation of the Punisher for ASM #129, and his first, true origin story in the pages of Marvel Preview #2 (1975). When I think of the Punisher, I look back to these two key stories, where original intent and its part of the cultural environment he was developed in paint a very different picture than all of the steadily modified, super-killer versions to follow, which lost sight of the grim "how and why" of the character in the unique American worlds of 1974/75. *This stands as opposition to people who loosely claimed he was based on the film adaptation--which was released in late July of 1974--some six months after the Punisher's debut
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Post by Nowhere Man on Feb 21, 2019 8:33:46 GMT -5
Lobo was okay, at the start, in JLI and at least the first min; but, he was too over-the-top for it to bother me, until DC took a page from the Marvel playbook and shoved him down our throats. I was at the 1992 HeroesCon and at least 4 different artists were working on Lobo projects, all of which were never released. Given how much was, you can imagine how much crap DC commissioned for that twit. For me, it's Punisher. Let's start with the fact that he is a cheap rip-off of Mack Bolan, from Don Pendleton's Executioner series of novels; pretty much a carbon copy, with a skull on his shirt. Next, add the fact that he was so poorly written, for so long. I read a chunk of the Executioner series and the subsequent revamp that was done (working for the government as a counter-terrorist agent); and, Pendleton and the other writers had better plots and wrote a more realistic, if fantasized character. Also, although Bolan took on armies of mob hoods, he did it with military strategy and weapons and Pendleton, at least, worked out the gun battles to give them some semblance of logic and possibility. Punisher just randomly sprays bullets and gets saved by magic kevlar armor. For what artists depict, he would be carrying around 200lbs of trauma plating and kevlar fiber, to the point he'd be bulkier than the Hulk. He started out as a Marine, then was turned into a special warfare god, by writers who can't even identify correct service uniforms, let alone have any knowledge. You don't need to have first-hand experience, if you do even basic research; but, no one ever did. Don't get me started on those excremental Nam issues with that s@#$-bird! Totally ruined what was still a pretty decent comic (though it was a shade of the first year and a ghost of Vietnam Journal). It was okay when he made occasional appearances, like in Captain America (the one with the Miller cover), where Cap still thinks he is scum, but they work together against a common foe. Then, thanks to the 80s cinematic fascination with automatic weapons an vigilante heroes, he got what pro wrestling calls "a push." Next thing you know, he's got two regular series, all kinds of specials and guest appearances and never so much as changes a magazine. Anybody causing that much carnage is going to be facing a government task force (Bolan did, by his third novel), let alone a superhero posse that has had enough. To sum up: UUUuuggggggghhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yes, completely agreed, and I'll go one further.. What do Punisher fans GET out of the character? Comics are wish fulfillment. Superman fans want to be a good man who helps people. Punisher fans want to be - what? - angry, violent murderers? THAT'S their self-empowerment daydream? (Side-Note: Garth Ennis' Punisher MAX is as good as anything Marvel has ever published, although it made the Punisher a study in the cross-section between mental illness and trauma.) I do like the Punisher character, but I've always viewed him as a cautionary tale about what happens when tragedy and trauma fully obsess an otherwise noble soul. I can't imagine even the biggest Punisher fan actually wanting to BE the Punisher--he's a miserable character who only lives to kill the bad guys who no longer derives any joy out of life. However the idea of getting revenge on someone who commented a violent act on you is something that resonates with just about everyone, if deep down. Who hasn't thought about putting a bullet in the head of violent criminals talked about on the news, particularly sadists, child-abusers, rapists, etc.? Of course normal people don't go out and do it, but the argument is there that the Punisher's methods are more "effective" and exemplify pure justice more so than Batman's devotion to the law and rehabilitation (Arkham) seeing as how it's never worked for the more violent cases like the Joker. I can see both sides. This is what I like about the Punisher--if you get past the guns and violence shock value of the character, he's an interesting counter-point to standard superheroes.
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Post by mikelmidnight on Feb 21, 2019 12:42:44 GMT -5
Speaking of The Punisher... I am with those who always liked the character as a guest-star and anti-hero, and grew to hate him during the 90s era whan Marvel was promoting him as being cool. I completely agree. One thing for the Red Skull, I suppose, but lately I refuse to even read any comic with the Joker in it for precisely that reason.
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Post by beccabear67 on Feb 21, 2019 12:47:49 GMT -5
I remember seeing the Executioner paperbacks but never read one, so interesting the connection to The Punisher. I'd always thought he was inspired by Bronson's Death Wish movie which was a big hit in the '70s. I didn't think he was meant to be a hero though, but then I didn't think Rambo in First Blood was meant to be taken as a hero either (and the set up for him to finally 'go off' was cartoonish (as in broad, minimalistic, simple) beyond things in Punisher comics, at least the early ones I ever saw). That bad sheriff in First Blood was so ludicrous... the idea of Rambo getting a cartoon version and merchandise aimed at the kiddies astounded me. Seeing little boys in military camouflage from Sears around that time I wondered often if 'somebody' was trying to get them ready early for something! Creepy.
I don't hate the Punisher at all as a creation though, in the right hand he illustrates the path not taken for our familiar superheroes. Never knew enough about Spawn to hate, from a distance it seemed like Deadman mark II crossed with the Spirit a bit, and I still think good for them for going out with their own things, how can that be bad? You don't have to buy them. I saw McFarlane's work at a big convention early on along with Erik Larsen's full Dragon guy comics and I was thinking Larsen was the much better of the two as McFarlane drew some Infinity Inc. character that was all cape, a mostly black ink head and tiny black ink feetsies poking out the other side a lot. I wasn't surprised Spawn also has a lot of cape and a simple full mask, easy to draw, can't blame him. Larsen did full solid comic stories, McFarlane did a lot of decoration and static design, maybe a good cover artist? I guess Mr. Giordano saw something I didn't to hire him while Larsen did Americomics and Megaton.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 21, 2019 12:51:53 GMT -5
I remember seeing the Executioner paperbacks but never read one, so interesting the connection to The Punisher. I'd always thought he was inspired by Bronson's Death Wish movie which was a big hit in the '70s. I didn't think he was meant to be a hero though, but then I didn't think Rambo in First Blood was meant to be taken as a hero either (and the set up for him to finally 'go off' was cartoonish (as in broad, minimalistic, simple) beyond things in Punisher comics, at least the early ones I ever saw). That bad sheriff in First Blood was so ludicrous... the idea of Rambo getting a cartoon version and merchandise aimed at the kiddies astounded me. Seeing little boys in military camouflage from Sears around that time I wondered often if 'somebody' was trying to get them ready early for something! Creepy. I'm glad I am not alone! The first Rambo movie - not even called "Rambo" - is a profound, touching, heart-breaking and sad tale of a man broken by Vietnam and harassed by an overzealous sheriff. It's one of the few films that brought me to tears. But they "upped the ante" for the sequels and turned him into "Cash Cow Action Hero". When I saw the cartoon, I was astounded, too. To a lesser extent, the same happened with RoboCop.
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Post by codystarbuck on Feb 21, 2019 12:56:01 GMT -5
Yes, completely agreed, and I'll go one further.. What do Punisher fans GET out of the character? Comics are wish fulfillment. Superman fans want to be a good man who helps people. Punisher fans want to be - what? - angry, violent murderers? THAT'S their self-empowerment daydream? I think people need to remember how the Punisher was introduced, and why he made perfect sense as originally presented. In The Amazing Spider-Man #129, The Jackal hired him to kill Spider-Man (we know the reasons why), and instead of the creators simply making this murder plot another super-powered extravaganza, they kept the title in the gritty, dark territory it entered only a handful of issues earlier with the Stacy/Goblin deaths; Spider-Man had broken new ground and more than any other Marvel hero at the time, he found more parallels with the violent streets of real life America, one where the idea of dealing with unstoppable crime, retribution and vigilantism was very much a problem. A problem the Punisher was designed to address. The Punisher--in this original state--was as much a "child" of Brian Garfield's seminal 1972 novel * Death Wish as anything else. The novel addressed so many of the same ideological struggles (with law, order and violent justice) of early 70s America which found their way into the creation of the Punisher for ASM #129, and his first, true origin story in the pages of Marvel Preview #2 (1975). When I think of the Punisher, I look back to these two key stories, where original intent and its part of the cultural environment he was developed in paint a very different picture than all of the steadily modified, super-killer versions to follow, which lost sight of the grim "how and why" of the character in the unique American worlds of 1974/75. *This stands as opposition to people who loosely claimed he was based on the film adaptation--which was released in late July of 1974--some six months after the Punisher's debut Don Pendleton's first Mack Bolan, War Against the Mafia, was published in 1969 and was a massive part of the 70s. Marvel Preview #2 even features an interview with Pendleton, probably as part of a deal to keep from getting sued. By 1974, there were multiple Executioner novels on the stands, as they were released more on a periodical schedule, much like the pulps that inspired them. As it is, those same "men's adventure" pulps took many of their cues from the bloodier pulps, like The Spider and Operator 5.
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Post by Icctrombone on Feb 21, 2019 13:19:17 GMT -5
TriathalonI can't stand this character. Although, I will acknowledge that he was written to be an unsympathetic person forced into the Avengers with a chip on his shoulder. But even now , he's never been redeemed in my eyes.
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Post by rberman on Feb 21, 2019 13:25:31 GMT -5
TriathalonI can't stand this character. Although, I will acknowledge that he was written to be an unsympathetic person forced into the Avengers with a chip on his shoulder. But even now , he's never been redeemed in my eyes. I saw him sympathetically, though he was confused. He was in the Avengers just to meet a racial quota and knew it, making for one set of uncomfortable conversations made worse by his own prickliness. He was also in a Scientology stand-in cult that made everyone uncomfortable, but they also didn't want to see like religious bigots. I was disappointed when the cult turned out to be run by supervillains; it removed the ambiguity from an interesting story.
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Post by tarkintino on Feb 21, 2019 13:39:20 GMT -5
Don Pendleton's first Mack Bolan, War Against the Mafia, was published in 1969 and was a massive part of the 70s. Marvel Preview #2 even features an interview with Pendleton, probably as part of a deal to keep from getting sued.& I did say-- Meaning the Garfield novel was an influence on the Punisher, along with other things--that "anything else." The magazine reference/interview does not invalidate that, or the other influences on the Punisher (and other characters at Marvel) in the early 1970s, with the heated real world landscape of the aforementioned law, order and violent justice that was on the minds of innumerable Americans. Garfield's novel was a commentary on/reflection of that, along with the way the Punisher was portrayed right out of the gates.
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Post by rberman on Feb 21, 2019 13:56:04 GMT -5
Yes, completely agreed, and I'll go one further.. What do Punisher fans GET out of the character? Comics are wish fulfillment. Superman fans want to be a good man who helps people. Punisher fans want to be - what? - angry, violent murderers? THAT'S their self-empowerment daydream? (Side-Note: Garth Ennis' Punisher MAX is as good as anything Marvel has ever published, although it made the Punisher a study in the cross-section between mental illness and trauma.) I do like the Punisher character, but I've always viewed him as a cautionary tale about what happens when tragedy and trauma fully obsess an otherwise noble soul. I can't imagine even the biggest Punisher fan actually wanting to BE the Punisher--he's a miserable character who only lives to kill the bad guys who no longer derives any joy out of life. However the idea of getting revenge on someone who commented a violent act on you is something that resonates with just about everyone, if deep down. Who hasn't thought about putting a bullet in the head of violent criminals talked about on the news, particularly sadists, child-abusers, rapists, etc.? Of course normal people don't go out and do it, but the argument is there that the Punisher's methods are more "effective" and exemplify pure justice more so than Batman's devotion to the law and rehabilitation (Arkham) seeing as how it's never worked for the more violent cases like the Joker. I can see both sides. This is what I like about the Punisher--if you get past the guns and violence shock value of the character, he's an interesting counter-point to standard superheroes. I'm not a Punisher fan, but his ethos seems like an extension of other heroes. Their existence is an implicit critique of the police force. Batman can catch people the police can't, because he's allowed to do things they're not allowed to do. Readers approve of the way he operates outside the box, because he does so with wisdom and doesn't abuse his power, and he doesn't get the wrong guy. The outcome of Batman's work is often that the criminal dies resisting capture, which is the tidiest solution. But what if he's captured? Comic books are idealized, so the criminal is quickly sentenced to prison. But in the real world, trials take forever, and all manner of legal maneuvers result in the criminals being released either without prison or with a brief sentence. Incarceration is expensive for regular criminals, let alone super-villains. If Batman critiques the inefficiencies and ineffectual work of police, the Punisher adds a critique of the courts, bypassing the whole inconvenience of a trial and the expense of incarcarceration, removing the criminals permanently from society. Instant gratification for the reader presented with murderous malfeasants. And without the collateral damage such actions would likely have regularly in the real world. He's a fantasy of the idealized executioner, and he poses no danger to you as long as you keep your nose clean.
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Post by codystarbuck on Feb 21, 2019 14:10:09 GMT -5
I remember seeing the Executioner paperbacks but never read one, so interesting the connection to The Punisher. I'd always thought he was inspired by Bronson's Death Wish movie which was a big hit in the '70s. I didn't think he was meant to be a hero though, but then I didn't think Rambo in First Blood was meant to be taken as a hero either (and the set up for him to finally 'go off' was cartoonish (as in broad, minimalistic, simple) beyond things in Punisher comics, at least the early ones I ever saw). That bad sheriff in First Blood was so ludicrous... the idea of Rambo getting a cartoon version and merchandise aimed at the kiddies astounded me. Seeing little boys in military camouflage from Sears around that time I wondered often if 'somebody' was trying to get them ready early for something! Creepy. I don't hate the Punisher at all as a creation though, in the right hand he illustrates the path not taken for our familiar superheroes. Never knew enough about Spawn to hate, from a distance it seemed like Deadman mark II crossed with the Spirit a bit, and I still think good for them for going out with their own things, how can that be bad? You don't have to buy them. I saw McFarlane's work at a big convention early on along with Erik Larsen's full Dragon guy comics and I was thinking Larsen was the much better of the two as McFarlane drew some Infinity Inc. character that was all cape, a mostly black ink head and tiny black ink feetsies poking out the other side a lot. I wasn't surprised Spawn also has a lot of cape and a simple full mask, easy to draw, can't blame him. Larsen did full solid comic stories, McFarlane did a lot of decoration and static design, maybe a good cover artist? I guess Mr. Giordano saw something I didn't to hire him while Larsen did Americomics and Megaton. The original First Blood novel, by David Morrell is pretty good and was more nuanced than the film. The time frame is earlier, as it was written in 1972. The sheriff pushes John Rambo to leave town, due to his long hair and the fact that he is a stranger, hiking. Rambo doesn't care for this; but doesn't fight the sheriff. He is driven to th edge of town and told to move on. After the sheriff leaves, he goes back into town. This was not an uncommon thing, in parts of the southern and more rural US, especially in that period. Hippies and long hairs were harassed by right wing law enforcement officers on numerous occasions, as well as locals. Obviously, that was exaggerated even more for fiction and drama, as witnessed in the Billy Jack films. In the book, Rambo is a former special forces soldier; but, he has a respect for the sheriff, as a Korean War veteran. After the sheriff's deputies push things too far and due to flashbacks of his POW time, Rambo attacks the deputies and fights his way out of the jail. He takes off to hide in the mountains, nearby, eventually returning to the town, after being hunted, with the aid of former CO Sam Trautman. In the book, his military training helps him evade the searchers and isolate and take out some. However, he is surprised by the sheriff, when he doesn't react in a military manner and,, {Spoiler: Click to show} the sheriff shoots and wounds Rambo in the chest, while getting hit, himself. Trautman finds the wounded Rambo and gives him a coup de grace. The novel was set in Kentucky, which wasn't a friendly place to be, with long hair, or in defying the local authority.. The book also doesn't get as wild as the film, with Rambo spending more time evading capture, than hunting deputies. The film really took it to the extreme, though nowhere near as badly as the sequel. Rambo, First Blood Part 2, was beyond ridiculous, as Rambo is now a one man army, with exploding arrows, which take out tanks. The most ludicrous part is when he destroys the Russian Hind gunship, with a LAW rocket, from inside the cockpit of a Huey helicopter. The rocket has a backblast, which would have fried the rescued POWs in the rear, and probably the helicopter itself! The arrowheads aren't big enough to hold an explosive charge to do much more damage than the average firecracker, let alone pierce armor. Funny thing is, Morrel wrote a tie-in novel, for the film, despite his original novel's ending. he had to have an opening note, for those who read the original. Again, he attempted to give it a greater sense of realism, though not on the same scale as the original.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 21, 2019 16:47:30 GMT -5
Squadron SupremeI just having a hard time looking at this group because this group has the most hideous costumes ... and I just can't stand the looks of them and never once took this group seriously enough of Marvel's attempt to create their version of the Justice League of America. At this point of time back when this group was formed; I've can't even named half of the members here and that's alone makes this group -- not so appealing to me and that's falls into combination of all of these traits that I had a hard time following them. That's pretty much sums this group ... and sorry to the fans of Squadron Supreme here in CCF Land ...
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Post by Phil Maurice on Feb 21, 2019 18:20:33 GMT -5
Squadron SupremeI just having a hard time looking at this group because... I'm having a hard time parsing the contents of some of those ballons. Arcanna and Lady Lark in particular seem to be suffering from brain trauma. What's the context here?
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