Just A Reminder...

Even if I'm gone for a few days or so.

Villains with Potential-Swarm

A Nazi made out of bees. That right there is what we in the business (plumbing) like to call a 'high concept'.
Swarm has pop-culture cred. He's a ridiculous concept dressed up in silver age nonsense with a ready-whip topping of pure cracked out awesome. Nazi made out of bees. It's that simple.
Swarm's powers are about what you'd figure, what with him being made of bees and his weaknesses are derived directly from those powers, which makes him a nice package villain. He's a done-in-one baddie, and makes for some interesting visuals with the right artist.
Too, he can't really be destroyed, not by comic book logic, and he's got no attachments as far as opponents. He's an anywhere/anytime sort of villain, with a creepy vibe (Nazi + insects=disturbing), and the ability to give most heroes a run for their money. After all, how do you fight a swarm of bees? Besides with a water hose, I mean.
The only problem with Swarm is his lack of motivation. He's a sort of natural disaster on legs, with no real reason for his actions beyond a sort of 'Empire of the Insects' thing he has going on in some of his appearances. Of course, in the hands of the correct writer that could translate into something solid, story-wise.
These days, I think he'd make a good reoccurring nemesis for the newly reinvigorated Hank Pym...ants vs. bees anyone?

Friday Night Fights: OPP!! Round 4!

Round Four, you'd best hit the floor! Space Booger keeps the single-panel smackdowns coming!

This week's entry comes courtesy of Marvel Two-in-One issue # 78, written by DeFalco and Michelinie, with art by Ron Wilson, because sometimes you just need to see Wonderman get beaten like the proverbial circus monkey.

Villains with Potential-Killer Shrike

Killer Shrike. Dude is rocking that mask/crest combo ain't he?
Killer Shrike is a jobber. He's a pretty standard costumed mercenary/assassin/criminal type of character, with a pretty standard set of powers and motivations and a rocking costume (depending on the artist). That's about it, right?
Well, yeah. And that's the point. Killer Shrike is a custom-build bad guy with a pretty flexible motivation (i.e. money) and little compunction about mixing it up with anyone who stands in his way. His potential lies in his ability to be an opponent for anyone, anywhere, anytime.
He was a military man, then a mercenary, working for different corporate interests and that in and of itself is more interesting than him being a loon with a costume. It gives him a straight edge that other bad guys lack. Imagine him protecting Hammer Industries' interests in some third-world hell-hole. Just doing his job, but his job requires him to level villages or hunt down rebels, or assassinate his boss' political opponents.
Too, he's a virtual cipher. He remembers little to nothing of his life before he got super-powers, so you've got the freedom to give him an interesting back story should the need arise. Perhaps he was a former SHIELD agent. What if he decides, in best action movie tradition, to get his life back by any means necessary? Even if that means going up against [insert super-hero name here].
Heck, since he was shanghaied into the Thunderbolts during the Civil-War story-line, he's probably a member of the 50 States Initiative, which only adds to the fun Killer Shrike could be in the right storyline. Think The Bourne Identity with superpowers.

Villains with Potential-The Rhino

The thing with the Rhino is, is he's everywhere.
He's everywhere and you don't even notice him, despite the fact he's the size of an enraged and newly-fed Louie Anderson. Always in the background of every big super-villain shindig. He's fought everyone...Spider-Man, the Avengers, the Thing, the Hulk, Thor, the Silver Surfer (twice), Ka-Zar (and really, who the hell fights Ka-Zar, outside of Stegron or the Savage Land Mutates?). He's an evil Kevin Bacon. Or a less evil Kevin Bacon, depending on your views on Footloose.
The Rhino is the muscle. That's his deal. He's not brilliant, but he's not dumb. He's a schmoe, caught up in events he has no control over and he can't do anything but charge forward and hope to come out safe on the other side. A blue-collar super-villain.
Mostly, he's played for laughs. Or, rarely, as the impetus to an issue long fight sequence. But always, always he's incidental. It's rare we get a Rhino-centric story, with him as the main antagonist. Or even just an interesting side antagonist.
I always thought he deserved better than to be a face in the crowd, y'know? As I said above, he's a blue-collar bad guy. Think about that. Think about him as Doug Heffernan in The King of Queens, only instead of being a delivery man, he dresses like a large African mammal and tries to gore things. Somewhere, he's got a wife. Kids. He barbecues on the weekends. And on Monday morning, he carpools to the city with the Shocker and punches in at Roxxon or Hammer Industries or wherever and tries to squash somebody in a colorful costume because he's got kids to put through school, or a mortgage to pay down or a car payment coming up, or maybe he's just not built to do anything else.

Villains with Potential-The Hobgoblin

I've always liked the Hobgoblin.
The first one, I mean, not the one who got turned into a demon and bruised Ghost Rider's fist with his face for a good part of the nineties. Or poor Ned Leeds, who got shot by the Foreigner's goons. No, I like the first one. The one who was a fashion designer in his secret identity (you heard me). Roderick Kingsley.
That's who should be in charge of the Marvel Universe these days, not Norman "I once stabbed myself with my own glider" Osborn.
The Hobgoblin had connections on both sides of the law, in every odd corner of society. A corporate monster and an economic genius, with enough technological know-how to maintain his equipment and improve on it. He out-thought Spider-Man on a variety of occasions, unveiling plans within plans. Two steps ahead and three to the side. Then, when things were getting too hot, he faked his own death.
Too, he was a unique sort of super-villain...he wasn't doing it for the money (name-checked fashion designers have more money than God, after all), or for revenge (he went out of his way to avoid the super-hero community), or even for power, really. He was doing it because it was fun. It was a game to build his empire up and then, when he got bored, engineer its downfall.
Imagine that sort of character in Norman Osborn's current position. With Osborn, there's no question of what's going to happen. The crazy invariably leaks out. It's a lazy storytelling device, and, while effective, it's been done before (with Osborn in particular).
But consider the Hobgoblin. He could engineer an alliance between the big bads without coming across as patently out of his depth as Osborn was, because, frankly, the Hobgoblin would know just how out of depth he was and he would roll with it. Flattery and ingenuity as opposed to bluster and assumptions. It's the difference between the cold-blooded sociopath and the hot-blooded psychopath.
Granted, Norman Osborn makes sense given his recent importance in the Marvel Universe, but why did they have to pick Norman for that role in the first place? Lex Luthor he wasn't, despite the similarities. Then, I'm one of those people who thought the Green Goblin was more effective dead than alive. Just like Gwen Stacy. Or Uncle Ben.
But the Hobgoblin...ah, he could have done some interesting things. Such potential, sadly squandered. What could have been.

Friday Night Fights: OPP!! Round 3!

It's round three of O.P.P, yeah, you know me, I'm down with O.P.P round three-

Okay, I'm done. Sorry. I get carried away sometimes. Just like the Wrecker there will be when they load him into an ambulance off-panel...courtesy of the first issue of The Thing: Freakshow by Geoff Johns and Scott Kolins.

The Weekly Thing

I chose this one because of the little orange box there off to the side...see it? The Merry Marvel Marching Society was starting up around this time. For those who don't know, the MMMS was one of the earliest Marvel fan societies. I've seen the ads in a number of comics from around this time period, and then, of course, there's this...

Monday Clobbering Time