Drunken Comics Rage

The brilliant(ly drunken) minds here at DCR had a conversation online a short while back about their favoritest heroes. I came up with the idea for this exercise (mostly as a time waster): list out the heroes (not villains, not groups, just heroes) that are your "favorites" Favorites can mean whatever it means to you…heroes can go on the list because they are cool, because you collected a bazillion issues with them in it, whatever.

One rule: you had to put them into "tiers", with a limited (3-5) in each tier.  What I'd hoped was to force some hard thinking and interesting conversation around how one ended up dividing up their list of heroes. We had enough fun with it (although the other knuckleheads didn't bother with the tier thing…or frankly even the 'just heroes' part…but reading comprehension isn't a strong suit for most of them.  Come to think of it, that might largely explain the interest in these here pretty picture funny books) that I decided to collect my thoughts a little better in writing here on DCR and present them to you, our readers, to help you waste time too.  So over a few posts I will present my tiers with a bit o' explanation and rambling about each hero.  I'll even do it in reverse in order to build suspense and shit.

(As I was creating these tiers, I couldn't help but flash back to scenes or images that really stuck with me.  I'll be sprinkling these throughout…consider yourself warned that time and alcohol influence my recollection.  So, if it appears I'm making some of those up…well, I might be.)

So on to Tier 4!

Aquaman
Hercules
Shaman
Iron Fist

This is kind of a bizarre list, ain't it?  Nothing like kicking stuff off with a list that includes freaking Aquaman.  And I can't even swim.

Aquaman. Obviously the old costume became kinda stupid over time. I have this old, old memory of Aquaman leading one of the JXY teams for a while…me picking up a JLA/JLE/JLU comic at a convention or something, and not recognizing hardly anybody but Aquaman. The scene that got me was some guy with a magic crowbar (*sigh*…magic crowbar?) or something at the Justice Gang of Somewhere, and everybody scattering…except Aquaman, who caught the thing, and with "muscles honed in the pressures of the deep" whipped it back at the bad guys. Suddenly, I *got* that Aquaman could be a hard ass, and somebody not to fuck with, and that was a WAY new mindset for me. I mean, he flat out caught dude's mystic ubercrowbar and tossed it back *cackle*.  These are the things that stick with me, apparently.  I liked that they tried hard to make him interesting over time…cutting the hand off, changing the costume, etc…because I always dug him.  Although I gotta say I'm glad the live action TV show died, because nobody was gonna win there.  Nobody.

I was never a karate guy superhero fan, but the whole glowie fist thing and focused willpower or whatever got me with the Immortal Iron Fist. Having him pop up in and around Daredevil (foreshadowing!) the last few years didn't hurt, and I've heard great things about the current Iron Fist book (on its way to my humble abode NOW, as part of a package of other various and sundry birthday gifts intended for the girlfriend, from Amazon. What?).  For the life of me I don't remember how I initially got introduced to Powerman and Iron Fist, but I know I bought big ol' runs of those books on ebay for practically nothing, just 'cause it seemed like the right thing to do.  I'm glad to see him getting a bit of run lately.

My first interest in Herc originated from the same place my interest in Thor (ack! More foreshadowing!)  did…mythology. Secondly, I'm always a sucker for the strong dude, which you'll see as you slog through my other tiers.  That was one of the great parts of the Marvel RPG, digging through the character stats to see who was strongest.  Hercules was a 100 strength, if I recall, putting him in Thor, Hulk, Juggernaut, Wonderman class.  Herc's runs in the Avengers…including getting beat half to death by that gang of B-player villains eons ago…were always enjoyable for me.  I'm flashing back now to having a four issue Hercules miniseries at some point a lot of years ago…I might have to go back and dig those out of the comic boxes just to see what the hell was going on there.  And although I admit cringing a bit to see him get dusted off for Civil War, I ended up enjoying the role he played and I'm intrigued by him 'taking over' Hulk's book.  Very interesting thing, there.

In thinking about Alpha Flight (man, I'm giving shit away left and right here), I realized Shaman was quietly my second favorite team member…although I largely am not a fan of magic-y comics for whatever reason.  Who doesn't want a magic pouch thing?  I'd be pulling a bottle of vodka out of mine all the time…the thought just brings a little tear of joy to my eye.  Although, again, magic in comics never really resonated with me, I've read so bloody many fantasy books that the whole mystic, otherworldly, spirit, waving-hands-and-chanting thing is near and dear to my heart.  Shaman didn't throw fireballs and lightning bolts around nearly often enough though.  But the Native American, tribal, shamanistic, natural element he brought seemed, to my young and ignorant eyes and mind, to be a natural fit to a team from Canada.  Which, as I write this with old, still mostly ignorant but somewhat less so eyes and mind I realize makes no fucking sense at all.  Anyway, Shaman was very cool, so he gets the much coveted final spot in Tier 4.

Next: Tier 3, or "You'd do a lot worse than having these guys with you in a dark alley."

Filed under: General Comics Rage, Monkey Rage