Sometimes subtle is good. Although some characters with less flashy powers might fall into the shadow of those with flashier powers the characters like Cypher are no less important. Case in point Cypher's role in Second Coming. As long as the power is useful or the character is cool I don't think unusual powers are a bad thing.
@Icemizer: was going to wait and say my piece about the useless characters. But your harping on Cypher made me speak up.
If you really want to see Cypher in a new light, I recommend reading the three issues it had with the Necrosha storyline. Because I can tell you having Cypher in the field is not a bad thing, especially say if he was taking on the Replicators in the Stargate Universe or Sentinels in the Marvel 616 universe. He was pretty killer. I just wish I could have read more of his adventures when I was kid, already had been killed off by the time I had gotten into comics.
But as for people I find useless. Marrow- she sucked. Pull bones out your body and throw them. (I know, I know - I'm the pot calling the kettle black.)
I always thought Forge , Synch, and Cannonball were cool. I mean I never thought that their powers weren't useful and would be cool to have. I also think Chamber's powers are cool and I think his abilities are unusual because of how its affected his body. Oh yeah Maggott's pretty cool too, but I wouldn't want my stomach to be like that, a little too gross.
When it comes characters with superpowers, it's not the superpowers that makes them cool, it's their core character that makes the superpowers look cool.
This made me think of angel and how I would make fun of him. "Hey guys need a lift?" "No angel we have the x jet" "Oh, do you need me to scout ahead?" "No professor x already knows the lay out" "oh than what should I do" "hmmmm you can fly around and be a distraction" But now I can't even say that because he can transform into Arch Angel and is on the badass X-FORCE now so =P
With the proper writer, these types of abilities can be done really well. I never collected comics when Cypher was with the new mutants but his recent return shows what an interesting ability he has; reading body language; showing all of the computer code, etc. Done really well
I think Mitchell Hundred, the Great Machine of Ex Machina is great recent example of a character with a weirdish ability who's still very cool. He may essentially be Forge-lite, but he kicked some ass and so did that series.
Around overall useless< I would say The Atom. The only thing he can do is shrink.
Microbe, I always believed, was one of those characters that they underused. He could potentially give you any disease, make you suffer in the long run or end it quick, but if their power doesn't go BOOM, ZAP, or simply tear through anything, then it loses interest to the occasional comic book reader.
@Burnstar1230: The atom is awesome. Shrinking down to that level you could cause some serious damage. Dig into someones eye, enter an earhole and then grow to full size while in their skull....
" When it comes characters with superpowers, it's not the superpowers that makes them cool, it's their core character that makes the superpowers look cool. "
My favorite was always Chemical King, from the Legion of Super-Heroes. Here was a character whose mutant ability to speed up or slow down chemical reactions should have made him one of the most powerful members of the team. Unfortunately, none of the Legion writers knew what to do with him, so he was, eventually killed in action. A real waste of potential.
I'm totally with you. The most interesting powers are the ones with interesting limitations or unusual traits. Another peak-human martial artist with throwing weapons or kryptonian-lite is hardly worth reading about unless their character is truly interesting. Or worse, the powers allow the character to ultimately control some fundamental force like friction or the strong nuclear force, and they become essentially a physics lesson incarnate. Sometimes it's nice to see someone who can make everything blue, or has one leg that can triple in length. It's a challenge to find a use for their power at all, so when they do, it's a real accomplishment.
Glad to see Maggott get a mention and warm reception. He was always one of my favorite mutants.
This post is great, I love seeing characters who are written well over ones that have great powers. The New Mutants were a great example of this, a couple of them had some very different powers. I found myself questioning them as superheroes, and then you would read were even they were questioning themselves and it really brought you closer to them.
" Are we back in the 90s again where super-powers were all about how many things you can blow up? Do we really have to go back to that? For reference, I will never ever want to read a comic about this guy:
"
Ha, the Wild with the power of having six toes...
I don't know. For the most part it depends how a characters weird power was intended to be used. There are alot of characters who were given lame powers on purpose.
Like Walrus-Man with the proportional strength and agility of a walrus (Walruses being bigger than humans means he would be weaker and less agile than regular people)
Or Arm-Fall-Off Boy? these guys could never be cool.
As a kid I never liked the ultra powerful characters like Supes or Hulk, and I used to make fun of characters like Flash and Aquaman to no end (can't say I really care for any of these guys today either)
I always liked characters who had one or two simple powers then figured out clever ways to make them useful in battle.
" Are we back in the 90s again where super-powers were all about how many things you can blow up? Do we really have to go back to that? For reference, I will never ever want to read a comic about this guy:
"
Ha, the Wild with the power of having six toes... I don't know. For the most part it depends how a characters weird power was intended to be used. There are alot of characters who were given lame powers on purpose. Like Walrus-Man with the proportional strength and agility of a walrus (Walruses being bigger than humans means he would be weaker and less agile than regular people) Or Arm-Fall-Off Boy? these guys could never be cool. As a kid I never liked the ultra powerful characters like Supes or Hulk, and I used to make fun of characters like Flash and Aquaman to no end (can't say I really care for any of these guys today either) I always liked characters who had one or two simple powers then figured out clever ways to make them useful in battle. "
Ain't nothing wrong with keeping it simple. It's all about how a writer portrays characters and we all know characters that have had great arcs only to be subsequently butchered by a bad writer (I'm looking at you Loeb!) With the Guardians Project and a lot of the writing from the 90s, it seems like it's all about ante-ing up the power levels and tacking on more and more powers till a character becomes invincible. To quote a recent X-Force issue...
@G-Man: COOL BUT THEY KILLED HIM. ALL THE CHARACTERS FROM THIS ERA WERE PRETTY MUCH KILLED OFF. THE HISPANIC CHICK (SHES ACTUALLY BACK SOMEHOW EVEN THOUGH HER AND MAGGOT WERE KILLED IN THE WEAPON X FACILITY). MARROW IS DEPOWERED. SHE WAS A GREAT CHARACTER.
New powers, new attitude Prodigy (David Alleyne) originally from the New X-Men was my favorite before he was depowered during M-Day. His mutant ability, psychomimicry, allowed him to gain the knowledge and mental skills of those around him for as long as they where in his range. Imagine him in command of a mission where he has the combined skills and experiences of not only his teammates and enemies to augment his own.
Ok, this is just a pet peeve of mine but in the article the author wrote "for all intensive purposes". That is incorrect. The correct phrase is "for all intents and purposes". Sorry, but it drives me crazy.
dude, cypher basically SAVED the x-men in second coming. he let the master mold in the future assimilate him to read his code, and made that master mold its BITCH. then, he shut down the Nimrod units in 2010 to save san fran. forge saved the x-men by helping build the war room, and most of the tech in the mansion... did we also mention he built the BLACKBIRD from x-men vol.2. #1?!?!
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