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GV10: [Results] Best Character Revival: Check pages 2 and 3 for results!
DJ Eebs
Moderator, Administrator admin
Moderator, Administrator admin
Our next category is Best Character Revival.
This category is for characters who were already around before April 2005 who had a reinvention, renaissance or relaunch between April '05 and today. Characters that found a new popularity, or have been turned into something new, or anything along those lines.
Rules
1) Nominate as many characters as you want! There's no limit
2) If you see one of your favorites has already been nominated, feel free to second or third or fourth that nomination!
3) Please talk about why you think your favorite characters deserve to be in this poll. Simply posting a character name won't disqualify your nomination, but...
4) ...this thread is also for you to state your case for your favorite characters! I won't be making a seperate voting thread, so here's where you make your case
5) And above all: keep it civil. This is supposed to be fun. I don't want to see people slagging on each other or their choices, try and keep it positive, alright?
6) One last time: the time frame we're looking at is April 2005 through to the present. If you want to make a case for a character from before April 2005, make it here, and I'll make a final decision when I put the ballot together
Alright, and nominations are open...NOW
Put your nominations in BOLD TEXT. You don't need to all caps them, though
This category is for characters who were already around before April 2005 who had a reinvention, renaissance or relaunch between April '05 and today. Characters that found a new popularity, or have been turned into something new, or anything along those lines.
Rules
1) Nominate as many characters as you want! There's no limit
2) If you see one of your favorites has already been nominated, feel free to second or third or fourth that nomination!
3) Please talk about why you think your favorite characters deserve to be in this poll. Simply posting a character name won't disqualify your nomination, but...
4) ...this thread is also for you to state your case for your favorite characters! I won't be making a seperate voting thread, so here's where you make your case
5) And above all: keep it civil. This is supposed to be fun. I don't want to see people slagging on each other or their choices, try and keep it positive, alright?
6) One last time: the time frame we're looking at is April 2005 through to the present. If you want to make a case for a character from before April 2005, make it here, and I'll make a final decision when I put the ballot together
Alright, and nominations are open...NOW
Put your nominations in BOLD TEXT. You don't need to all caps them, though
DJ Eebs on
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Glory was pretty good as well.
Choose Your Own Chat 1 Choose Your Own Chat 2 Choose Your Own Chat 3
and
I'm not sure how we wanna score the next one (whether as individuals or as a unit), but I'd like to throw in my hat for the reconfigured Guardians of the Galaxy. You all know why.
EDIT: In an effort to narrow it down to just individuals, I'm amending my nomination to Rocket Racoon. Marvel took what some considered to be a C-list character at best and turned him into the face of a successful franchise.
I don't have any particular scans to post, but here's an article/bio for her.
Carol Danvers: Captain Marvel.
As much as I don't really like the direction of her titular book, Carol's "reinvention" from Ms. Marvel to Captain Marvel pretty much broke comic books and puts her in the rare pantheon of, "Hey, a girl can read this without feeling that the female lead isn't being objectified mercilessly!".
Wonder Woman:The God of War(Nu52 Azzarello run)
Man. I can't really say enough about this run. Like, how do you even quantify it? Can you?
Can you even begin to fathom a single run, essentially completing a character that's been around 70 odd YEARS.
Can you even define a run on a comic book, on a character, that was it's first truly GREAT run, in it's entire 70 year EXISTENCE?
A character who's so saturated in modern culture, you can literally go to any American over the age of 7 and ask them, "Who's Wonder Woman?" and they would be able to tell you?
Like, how does that even happen? How does that work!?
That's the Azzarello run. It's easily in the pantheon of great singular runs, and it really should define the character going forward.
Someone should probably tell DC that......eventually.
Loki:Journey into Mystery forward
I'm just nominating him because he needs to be on the ballot, I'll let someone else explain why he needs to be here. But yeah, BLOODBATH.
Also because he can bring Tony Stark down a notch with some gusto
beat! both seconded. in both cases terrible liefield characters have basically been turned on their heads, especially GLORY, who basically exemplified painted on armour and brokeback poses in the 90s. in sophie campbells capable hands we have proof you don't need your heroine to look like a victoria's secret model to be beautiful.
also seconding ARES, both for incredible herc and gillen's excellent mini
the TRANSFORMERS, where RiD and MTMTE (the latter especially) end several years of woefully inconsistent comics and turn a toy tie in into some of the most compelling books on the shelves.
not sure i need to justify this one - MOON KNIGHT!
I also nominate, as a group, the individual characters that have become The Guardians of the Galaxy from Annihilation to Present-Day.
Also, Quentin Quire, brought back a little bit by Fraction/Gillen in the Utopia era and then made into a more mature, awesome character in Jason Aaron's Wolverine and the X-Men.
Dr. Simon Hurt from Morrison's Batman run, an obscure silver age character who made the Black Glove and Batman RIP stories so mysterious and who got a really impressive character arc and became a really fun villain between those arcs, Batman and Robin Vol. 1, and Return of Bruce Wayne.
I could also make a case for some of the heavy hitters in the Marvel U (Mr. Fantastic under Hickman and Cyclops multiple times from Messiah Complex to now), but I think I will leave it at my choices above.
Next, I'll give the nod to Hawkeye - even though issues have taken way too long between them, the now wrapping up run has been a huge success and made more than a few people a fan of the character again.
Next, assuming that it's ok that the reasoning is non-book related, I'm going to say Iron Man. While not strictly because of a book, Robert Downing Jr made Iron Man the king of the Marvel Universe for many people and I think it's worth a nomination.
Finally, because she's been my favorite recently, I'm saying She-Hulk. Her book wasn't a huge success, but it was amazing if you could get past the polarizing art style. It must have done something right as she looks to be front and center in the A -Force series.
And I second Moon Knight.
Richard never had anything wrong with him before, there was just no hook to him. He was that guy who sometimes had a mullet who was on the New Warriors and flew hard into things. But he was sort of overshadowed by Cannonball if creators wanted to use a character that you only had to draw the top half of his body.
Making him house the Nova Force and be a one man wrecking crew, and be a legitimate leader and hero in the cosmic world without forcing it upon the readers (like I feel has been done with Carol since she became Captain Marvel), and ni doing so maintain a pretty consistent level of sales far better than other solo heroes who are given a lot more to work with and promotion, he is a character so well revived he lifted so much more around him into viable properties again. Without Richard, there is no GOTG, no Thanos, no Inhumans.
Plus, even in spite of Bendis doing that terrible Original Sin story, Richard had one of the few deaths that actually made you feel, because for as great as he was, he was still disposable. Perennial B-list lovable underdog. That's the sign of a character people care for, even in this world of six month deaths and time bullets.
Squirrel Girl's new series has been fantastic and 1 issue in I can say I love the new Howard the Duck
I'm also going to nominate Cameron Stewart and Babs Tarr's "soft reboot" of Barbara Gordon/Batgirl, which has been nothing short of spectacular.
For decades, Hyperion has been Marvel's stock "Superman Expy goes bad/insane" character. The Marvel Universe has at least seven, mostly evil, versions of the character floating around. His last major incarnation was the series villain for the Exiles, where he went insane and killed everyone on his world before the Exiles freed him. Before that, his claim to fame was as Patient Zero in the Marvel Zombies books.
For his Avengers epic, Hickman introduced a new version of the character. A conflicted man working for an dystopian dictatorship, he fails to save his universe before being yanked into ours by A.I.M. A member of the Avengers, he's still conflicted but is willing to risk everything to save his adopted universe and the adopted family he has built.
It's Thor.
Back in the day, I thought it was ridiculous that Marvel co-opted deities from real-world pantheons and recast them as superheroes. I don't think I can articulate now (or could then, really) what my perceived beef was, but for whatever reason it didn't make sense to me, and I thought it was dumb. All without reading any Thor, mind you! Haughty young men be all haughty and young and men, right? If I were a better writer, I'd draw a parallel between young Thor and young @Delduwath.
Then, around the time I started getting into comics on the regular, Avengers: Disassembled happened. Since I was new to this, and not yet burned out by events, I made sure to read all the Disassembled tie-ins. I found most of them to be average-to-bad, but Thor: Disassembled was special. I didn't think that you could do stories like that in superhero comics. A cosmic-level tale about mythology-as-reality. A story that knew it didn't need any street-level mortals to make it meaningful to the reader. A story that wasn't afraid to take established characters and shift their roles (Thor being the head of the pantheon rather than Odin, for example) or remove characters entirely (all Asgardians at the end of the storyline). That last point just about caved me head in: they took Thor - an established character - and flat-out removed him from the Marvel universe with no indication of when he'd be back, if ever.
(I realize now that had I read any Thor previously, this stuff may not have seemed so revolutionary to me. But, as I said, this is more about my origin story than it is about the objective Thor experience.)
When I heard that JMS was going to revive Thor, I was pretty excited. I wanted to see how he'd justify undoing Ragnarok, and I wanted to see if this version of Thor would resonate with me the way Disassembled's did. I know that JMS gets some flak for the way he handled Thor, and especially the way he jumped ship mid-storyline, but I honestly enjoyed the series. I think one of the reasons I thought Thor was dumb before was because he always seemed so stilted; the Thor I got in the 2000s felt like a 3D character, and JMS was one of the contributors to that. The idea of placing Asgard on Earth was also cool, and led to some great moments in his series and after. And look, if JMS hadn't jumped ship, Gillen wouldn't have had the chance to grab the ball in mid air and dunk it so hard that I'm still feeling reverberations from it now.
Thor has been one of my favorites ever since, and I've eagerly followed all the series he's starred in; I liked some more than others, but they've all had some element that appealed to me. Jason Aaron's Godkiller arc stands out specifically for once again telling a story that revolved more around myth and legend than around puny mortals. Also, bonus points for having super-metal moments like this one:
Plus, Thor's a lady, now.
In short: I honestly don't know if Thor has been revived or reimagined in the last decade because I don't really know what he was like before. My interest in Thor, however, was jump-started a decade ago and has been going strong since.
In the end, though, I think I might have to go with Ares.
Ares was a bad guy. Not even a very good one, either, he was extremely one-note, barely interesting at all, no good stories, not even a good design.
Then, in 2006, he got a mini-series
Ares is the God of War. Or perhaps more accurately he is the God of War on a personal scale. If Athena is winning a war, the tactics and strategy and technology and politics, then Ares is scrabbling around in a field of mud and blood, desperately trying to end the life of someone you have never met before and do not know the name of any way you can. Ares is a God of slaughter, of desperation, of horrific shocking last stands and crushing, ruthless assaults When you read the history books, those battles whose names ring out as exceptionally hideous and violent (Stalingrad, Thermopylae, the Somme), those are the terrible events that fascinate us with their sheer extremity, the twenty car pile-ups amongst the car crashes of our species' long and violent histories. We cannot look away. We marvel in stunned disgust at these events. And these events, they are Ares.
And then Marvel took such a God, and made him a Dad. Made him a construction worker. Made him take his son to school and go to parents evenings, try to escape the hatred of all his family (because he is, after all, their Dog of War, their scion of hatred, they need him but they at the same time loathe the presence of such a blood-soaked creature). Gave him a reason to live, to be more than just what he represented.
But his past caught up, and then he had to fight for his son. Which gave us this fantastic story of a warrior par excellence raising his weapons once more to battle amongst the gods in order to defeat those who had taken his son. A tale of tragedy and heroism, where an anti-hero becomes a hero, cut down by his own son, unwilling to raise a hand to his beloved child. And then, the sweetness of life and victory; running through the endless plains with Alexander. Sharing that simplest of joys, love between a parent and child.
Of course, we got other great series beyond Oeming's mini. Gillen's fantastic story about Ares turning some soldiers into his ultimate combat squad, knowing they will die, but promising that they will be champions before the end. Showing once more how his history will always catch up with him, but that he will never fail to battle it in any form. We saw his son take the opposing side, and a man realise that his child was growing up, making his own choices. Then when meeting him in the afterlife, feeling pride that his progeny had become more than he had been. It was all really cool.
Shame he died. But you know, whatever. He'll be back. But I love the character man! Ares is a great example of how you can take a monster and make them interesting and cool. I nearly noted Alexander down as my favourite new character, because he is also very cool, but we've barely seen him and there's others that deserve the title more I think.
Seriously. The concept is pure comic book magic. If any character in any comic deserved to be brought back and switch spots with the old lead, Gwen Stacy was it.
Iron Fist, you guys
Went from being a one-note kung-fu stereotype wearing a ridiculous costume to being the star of one of Marvel's best books in the decade, with rich mythology and history being added to the character giving him depth where previously he had none.
I really can't think of any series that did more to flesh out an existing character's backstory, supporting cast and general place in the universe than Immortal Iron Fist. It introduce The Seven Cities of Heaven, The Immortal Weapons (FAT COBRA GUYS), Iron Fists throughout History, and Orson Randall who was such a fantastic character that he got two extra-sized one shots and an annual story after the character was already dead.
And while he didn't rise to the heights of his partner Luke Cage after his revival, Danny joined the New Avengers and then the Defenders while continuing to have an increased presence in the Marvel Universe peaking when he and K'un Lun were integral to the end of Avengers vs. X-Men.
Like the only characters I can think of that had a comparable journey of going from one-note boring stock characters to fantastic, layered unique parts of their universe are Richard Rider, Luke Cage and Ares.
And Danny is still alive and has a solo book (admittedly a very bad one) whereas Rich and Ares are dead and have been for years and Luke still has no solo title and only appears in ensemble books.
So in terms of solo story success I've gotta give it to Danny Rand
Kinda explains itself
First off, I'm going to second the nomination for Kid Loki, for taking the basic concept of a character and doing such a stellar job building him into a sympathetic, fully realized character, and then for putting that character in one of the best, complete comic book stories that we've ever had. And he's also one of the harbingers of comics starting to reach out to new demographics, I think, with that whole Journey Into Mystery run getting a lot of attention from people on tumblr and the like. We can extend it to Loki's current Agent of Asgard persona, but I think Kid Loki is the ultimate expression of this category, in that it took a great, well worn character, spun it around, and made something new and excellent.
I'll also second Carol Danvers as Captain Marvel, for being another, great force in opening up comics to new readers, and for inspiring one of the greatest new characters of the decade, Kamala Khan.
The first issue of New Avengers came out three months shy of the deadline but the majority of his revival was in 2005-2015
With large credit due to Brian Bendis, who loves the character, Luke Cage went from a C-list street hero who wore a tiara and yelled SWEET CHRISTMAS to the leader of three different Avengers teams, owner of Avengers Mansion, Government selected leader of the Thunderbolts, prominent member of nearly every major event since New Avengers, proud father and probably the most prominent black hero Marvel has had over the decade. Who also yells SWEET CHRISTMAS.
Luke's journey from hothead to responsible, loving father and wholly capable team leader is one of the best arcs of the decade and he has been a Marvel mainstay ever since. I mean dude led the "real" Avengers after Captain America died so well that after Cap came back he didn't want to ruin it and just gave Luke free reign to be an Avenger however he wants.
I think if you went back to 2000 or the mid 90s and said "Luke Cage is going to be the leader of the Avengers for years" people would have thought you were insane
And now it's not treated as anything weird because he's become a character worthy of doing so.
Tailgate from the IDW Transformers MTMTE series. James Roberts took a pretty much non-existent character and turned him into one of the most lovable characters in all of the Transformers series.
Moon Knight. His current book is just so good and acknowledges the craziness about the character, while still managing to play it straight.
Ultimate Spider-woman/Black Widow. Ignores the terribleness of 616 Jessica Drew and takes inspiration from 616 Ben Reilly instead.
Also want to nominate Hawkeye for making me give a damn about his character. This guy's life sucks and he keeps making it worse for himself. However despite this, he keeps on trucking.
I was going to nominate Iron Fist as well, but apparently his current book has ruined all the goodwill established in Immortal Iron Fist.
Steam / Origin & Wii U: Heatwave111 / FC: 4227-1965-3206 / Battle.net: Heatwave#11356
She fits pretty well with the intent here, in that she was gone for a long time, and got brought back in a new form with a new focus that brought new life to the character. She had a strong redebut in 52, and anchored a solo series that was super critically successful before the new 52 stuff kind of forced a lot of unpleasant things on it.
Immortal Iron Fist still happened and was an amazing revival
Iron Fist shouldn't be knocked out of the running just because Living Weapon is a trash fire, and isn't really part of the revival he had either
I mean, the best part of that revival was that it breathed life not just into Danny Rand, but into Iron Fist as a concept.
That's laudable.
EDIT: I should also add that the fact that I haven't changed the image in my signature since the 7 Capital Cities of Heaven storyline shouldn't be taken as a sign of crazed Iron Fist support on my part; rather, it should be taken as a sign of indescribable laziness.
Nominating Iron Fist
Steam / Origin & Wii U: Heatwave111 / FC: 4227-1965-3206 / Battle.net: Heatwave#11356
This is a weird one because Daredevil has been consistently fantastic for a long time now, with only a few dips in quality, with Bendis' 01-06 run and Brubaker's 06-09 runs being some of the best the character has ever had.
The revival part comes from Mark Waid.
He reminded everyone that Daredevil, and in a way superhero comics acrosd the board, can be fun again. He brought back the swashbuckling sense of adventure that Matt had when he was first created and brought him out of his Hell's kitchen comfort zone into the heart of the Marvel Universe, fighting everyone from Klaw to Doctor Doom to rogue Wakandan generals.
It breathed new life into a character who had begun to be a fairly one-note depressing joke (albeit a well written one) and paved the way for comics like Hawkeye and Ant-Man which are finding great success today.
I personally think it is totally a radical new direction
We've had somber, depressing, dreary Daredevil for like 30 years at this point.
Having a series where he rides the Silver Surfer's board or is saved by Ant-Man crawling in his brain or teams up with the Legion of Monsters and it all feels perfectly natural and in-character is a vast difference from every Daredevil story since Miller took over and gave Daredevil a new role to play other than "angry depressed lawyer whose life sucks".
he just is trying to pretend otherwise
admittedly it has been a while since I read that series
just seems like a revival suggests that a property was in need of reviving and Daredevil was very popular and successful previously, is all
I think it was in need of a major tonal shift after 3 decades of depressing grim shit (similar to how Morrison pitched his Batman run), and I feel that fits in the spirit of this category. @The Geebs That Knows Everything About Animorphs can decide if it does or not I guess!
Ares, Iron Fist, Nova and Moon Knight to name but a few!
Then came Avengers Arena.
And he succeeded there in ways a villain seldom does. Nobody knew he had kidnapped a handful of teen superheroes, that he was making them fight to the death. He killed heroes. He made teen heroes fight and kill other teen heroes. No happy endings for, well, anyone involved. And if there was his trademark fair play escape option, nobody ever found it.
And at the end? Even though he was defeated before everyone died, he still won, because he YouTubed all the footage and the whole world saw what happened.
It's a shame that there was little follow-up (aside from Avengers Undercover; really the first issue bits of the survivors adjusting to a world where they were internet sensations for killing/almost killing friends could've been explored more), and ultimately Arcade is back to being a joke. But for a time, he made some pretty big waves.
I don't think the dude should really win or anything but if you're talking about a reinvented character, he's as good evil an example as any.