Jab’s Builds! (Beaker! Sam Eagle! Miss Piggy! The Swedish Chef!)

Where in all of your character write ups will go.
FuzzyBoots
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by FuzzyBoots »

Jabroniville wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 11:16 am Man, you Fighting Game fans have utterly failed me. All this pleading for Tekken builds with no reasoning, and not a SINGLE ONE OF YOU mentions the existence of Master Raven to me? Why, that would have convinced me to do them right away! Failures, the lot of you :P.
You mean the distaff Wesley Snipes?
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by KorokoMystia »

Woodclaw wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 12:02 pm I think you can easily say that Argent was the most succesful character from the Jurgens Titan by one simple fact: seh was the only one that had an counterpart in the Teen Titans animated series (although that Argent was British).
Pretty sure Joto was there too, though, but as "Hot Spot".
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Woodclaw »

KorokoMystia wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 6:01 pm
Woodclaw wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 12:02 pm I think you can easily say that Argent was the most succesful character from the Jurgens Titan by one simple fact: seh was the only one that had an counterpart in the Teen Titans animated series (although that Argent was British).
Pretty sure Joto was there too, though, but as "Hot Spot".
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Jabroniville »

FuzzyBoots wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 5:02 pm
Jabroniville wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 11:16 am Man, you Fighting Game fans have utterly failed me. All this pleading for Tekken builds with no reasoning, and not a SINGLE ONE OF YOU mentions the existence of Master Raven to me? Why, that would have convinced me to do them right away! Failures, the lot of you :P.
You mean the distaff Wesley Snipes?
Nope- HIS BOSS.
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Captain Marvel, Jr.

Post by Jabroniville »

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TTC: That’s when Captain Marvel, Jr. became a Titan.
DJ: Yes. And I gotta tell you, it came out of nowhere and surprised the hell out of me. One of the things I’ve always felt happened – and I think I’m right about this – is somehow, in the formative years of how the Internet related with comic publishers, somebody mounted a helluva write-in campaign for Captain Marvel, Jr., [and] they got their way.
TTC: So how did you approach incorporating Captain Marvel, Jr. into the team?
DJ: I think the toughest thing, whenever you have to try and take anyone from the Marvel family and work them into any kind of DC continuity, is how the hell do you make it really try and make sense? To me, that’s the toughest one of all, and I’m not sure that, in retrospect, I ever felt comfortable with Captain Marvel, Jr. occupying that slot for us. You can try all the explanations of talking worms and tigers and everything else that you want, but there’s just a barrier there. I have always felt this. There’s just a barrier there that makes it very difficult to make it work.

-Dan Jurgens, in an interview with the writers of the "Teen Titans Compendium, about how the Marvel Family is too silly for a world of talking apes and Elongated Men at DC.


CAPTAIN MARVEL JUNIOR (Freddy Freeman, aka CM3, Shazam)
Created By:
Ed Herron & Mac Raboy
First Appearance: Whiz Comics #25 (Dec. 1941)
Role: Flying Brick, Kid Sidekick
Group Affiliations: The Marvel Family, The Titans, The Outsiders
PL 11 (233)
STRENGTH
14 STAMINA 14 AGILITY 4
FIGHTING 8 DEXTERITY 2
INTELLIGENCE 0 AWARENESS 5 PRESENCE 1

Skills:
Deception 3 (+4)
Expertise (Pop Culture) 4 (+4)
Perception 4 (+9)
Persuasion 4 (+6)
Ranged Combat (Thrown Objects) 5 (+8)

Advantages:
Interpose, Luck, Ranged Attack

Powers:
"The Wisdom of Solomon"
Enhanced Advantages 3: Beginner's Luck, Jack-Of-All-Trades, Well-Informed [3]
Enhanced Skills 2: Arcane Lore 2 (+2) [1]
Comprehend 3 (Languages) [6]

"The Strength of Hercules"
Power-Lifting 4 (6,000 tons) [4]
Enhanced Advantages 2: Fast Grab, Power Attack [2]

"The Stamina of Atlas"
Impervious Toughness 13 [13]
Enhanced Advantages 3: Diehard, Ultimate Toughness Check, Withstand Damage (Trade Off Defenses For Toughness) [3]
Immunity 16 (Life Support, Fatigue Effects, Aging) [16]

"The Power of Zeus"
Features 1: All Attacks Count as Magical [1]
"Shazam Bolt" Damage 11 (Extras: Area- 60ft. Cylinder +2) (Flaws: Distracting) (22) -- [23]
  • AE: "Ground Pound" Affliction 12 (Strength/Athletics; Hindered & Vulnerable/Stunned & Defenseless) (Extras: Area- 60ft. Burst +2, Extra Condition) (Flaws: Limited Degree, Both Must Be Grounded, Instant Recovery) (12)
"The Courage of Achilles"
Immunity 2 (Fear Effects) [2]
Enhanced Advantages 1: Ultimate Will Save [1]
Enhanced Will Check 2 [2]
Impervious Will 5 [5]

"The Speed of Mercury"
Enhanced Advantages 1: Improved Initiative [1]
Flight 15 (60,000 mph) (Feats: Dynamic) (31) -- [35]
  • Dynamic AE: Quickness 8 (Feats: Dynamic) (9)
  • Dynamic AE: Speed 12 (8,000 mph) (Feats: Dynamic) (13)
Movement 1 (Space Travel 1) [2]

Offense:
Unarmed +8 (+14 Damage, DC 29)
Shazam Bolt +11 Area (+11 Damage, DC 26)
Initiative +4

Defenses:
Dodge +8 (DC 18), Parry +8 (DC 18), Toughness +14 (+7 Impervious), Fortitude +14, Will +7

Complications:
Motivation (Fighting Bad Guys)
Responsibility (Human Life)- The Marvel Family will not take a life for any reason.
Involuntary Transformation ("Captain Marvel!")- Freddy Freeman must say the magic phrase to transform into Captain Marvel Junior. Similarly, he will transform back if he says it again. This is not always a good thing, considering that the words are PART OF HIS CODENAME. Freddy is a crippled boy with unimpressive stats (ST -1, STA 0, AGI -2, FIGHTING 2, AWA 1).
Power Loss (Lightning Bolt)- Freddy must speak to call down the Lightning. If struck by the Lightning for any reason, he will revert to non-powered form.
Responsibility (The Wizard)- Shazam often gives the Marvels their marching orders.
Relationship (Billy & Mary Batson, Partners)- Freddy has a thing for Mary (usually), and looks up to The Big Red Cheese.
Responsibility (The King)- Freddy is a HUGE Elvis fan (since the real-life King was a CM Jr. fan). He comes across as a bit old-fashioned and dorky to others.
Enemy (Captain Nazi)- Freddy was crippled by Captain Nazi, who also murdered the boy's grandfather. Therefore, there is a great personal enmity there.
Enemy (Marvel Rogues)- Guys like Black Adam, Doctor Sivana, Mister Mind and other goofballs made up the majority of The Marvel Family's Rogues Gallery.

Total: Abilities: 96 / Skills: 20--10 / Advantages: 3 / Powers: 120 / Defenses: 4 (233)

Captain Marvel, Jr.- DC's Perennial Also-Ran:
-Freddy Freeman has been around a LONG TIME for someone who hasn't had a real push since the 1940s. Freddy is one of the early Junior Heroes, being given to Marvel as a "Kid Focus" type (much like Robin... though of course, Billy HIMSELF was a "Kid Focus" character), and was given his powers after Captain Nazi murdered his grandfather and crippled the boy- Billy Batson offered to share, given that he's such a nice guy and all. Freddy soon got his own book, and his tales were told in a darker, more serious tone than the elder Marvel's, which is funny considering that he's A) the KID VERSION of an adult-looking hero, and B) has a thing where he can't even say his own name (since his Magic Word of Transformation became "Captain Marvel!" instead of "SHAZAM!"). He was popular (the '40s were BIG for the Marvel Family), but his book got cancelled in 1953 along with the rest of the Fawcett Comics line when falling sales and DC suing them for ripping off Superman finally got to be too much.

-Freddy was basically a minor footnote of a character from that point on, but he had an effect on pop culture in that Elvis Presley himself was a HUGE CM Jr. fan, and based both his iconic haircut and his elaborate sparkly costumes off of Freddy's costume. Freddy reappeared in the 1972 when DC acquired the rights to The Marvel Family, and a decade later he was retconned out by the Crisis, reappearing in 1995 as the brother of Kid Eternity (another Golden Age character). It was at this point that he got added onto Jurgen's Teen Titans run by a fan vote (Jurgens blames a conspiracy of write-ins, and I'd bet money he was correct), taking the nickname "CM3" to avoid the complications of his name causing him to revert to his normal identity. It was relatively unpopular (he had a thing where he flirted with Argent, but stuff over his secret I.D. caused a ruckus and nothing came of it).

Freddy's Modern History:
-After this, Freddy was just "Some Guy"- a plot complication that left a Superman-class being flying around the DC Universe without anything to do, since he was the third-tier character in a Family that was no longer being published with any regularity. It's kind of... uncomfortable for writers to have all these guys kicking around, because when it comes time to write an event story, part of you wonders "hey, aren't there like a dozen people who can lift thousands of tons? Why aren't THEY helping?" And so you get a lot of scenes where Freddy's just "that blue guy lifting that thing behind Captain Marvel as they explain what the MARVEL FAMILY is doing during this big crisis". He got a brief run in that HORRIBLE 2000s Outsiders series, but it went nowhere. Captain Marvel Jr.'s run on the Teen Titans was a standard short one for The Atom's two-year run as team leader, as he didn't really do much, despite being the team's heavy hitter. That's par for the course for the poor kid's career though, as he's never had a big run since the 1940s.

-Freddy got a big part in The Trials of Shazam!, written by Judd Winick- an updating of the story, Freddy became the new... "Shazam" (thank you, Marvel Comics & Copywrite Law), replacing a powerless Billy now that Shazam himself (the Wizard) was dead. Then Billy turned into the Wizard and... I don't really care. That story sounds stupid. It's like... DC puts SUCH a half-assed effort into promoting Captain Marvel HIMSELF, that I can't even really call it worthy of being half of an ass. It's more like a quarter-assed effort. And Freddy gets at-best an eighth of an ass of effort out of DC, by comparison. Now, he's just one of nineteen or so multiracial kids in the "New 52" version of Captain Marvel.

Freddy's Powers:
-Freddy is in an odd place Power Level-wise, seeing as how he's one of The Marvel Family and thus SHOULD be a top-tier Flying Brick, and yet he's hardly ever been afforded any kind of serious respect regarding Power Feats or Good Showings or whatever the Battleboard fans call it these days. So in the end, I see him as yet another in that crowded area of PL 11 Powerhouses, along with Supergirl (Matrix version), Superboy (Connor version), Mary Marvel, Wonder Girl (Cassie probably ended up here at some point), and whoever else DC has added while I wasn't looking. He's powerful enough (with Power Attack) to hurt Superman just a little bit, and tangle with any A-lister for a short period of time, but a concentrated effort would put him out, especially with "only" +14 Toughness. Also, he COULD possibly have Life Support, but much like Thor, the Marvel Family's immunity to the ravages of space depends entirely on the writer.

-And WOW does the DCA official build have a high Power Level- PL 14 for both Mary & Freddy, which is only ONE lower than Billy or SUPERMAN, and two higher than Kara Zor-El or Superboy. Personally, I'd put Supes & Capt. Marvel at PL 14-15 (possibly/probably a bit lower than their LOSH counterparts like Superboy & Mon-El, who operated under Pre-Crisis conditions), with the Kid Sidekicks all a few notches lower- PL 11-12.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Fri Jun 24, 2022 2:46 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by KorokoMystia »

Jabroniville wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 9:48 pm
FuzzyBoots wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 5:02 pm
Jabroniville wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 11:16 am Man, you Fighting Game fans have utterly failed me. All this pleading for Tekken builds with no reasoning, and not a SINGLE ONE OF YOU mentions the existence of Master Raven to me? Why, that would have convinced me to do them right away! Failures, the lot of you :P.
You mean the distaff Wesley Snipes?
Nope- HIS BOSS.
Master Raven is great, though she gets some flak for being a "Replacement Character" (Tekken has a LOT of these, which is why there's so many characters that have similar movesets), like when Eddy was replaced by Christie, and then Christie herself was replaced by Lucky Chloe.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Ken »

Freddy was NOT a sidekick. After his introduction Captain Marvel Junior...

1) Went to his own solo feature in Master Comics, and quickly becoming the lead feature.

2) Carried his own solo book for 119 issues from 11/42 until 6/53.

3) Rarely appeared in Whiz or Captain Marvel Adventures with Captain Marvel.

He was an attempt to capture lightning in a bottle a second time. His stories were generally more down to Earth, and less fantastic; where Billy was a boy newscaster, Freddy was eking out a living as a newspaper boy. And the art, by the likes of Mac Rayboy, was far less cartoony than C.C. Beck and his imitators were on Billy's story. It was the same basic concept: boy says magic word and becomes super-hero. But the stylings were completely different. They were aiming at a different audience: the 'Dan Jurgens' type fans who found Billy Batson too silly.

Of course, both Billy and Freddy (and Mary) appeared regularly together in Marvel Family. It really was a JSA/All-Star Comics team book where Fawcett had their three most successful solo characters appear together.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Bladewind »

But... but... who the (EXPLETIVE) thought CM3 was a good name !?!

I get it, he wanted to lose the Junior title. But... so many other options... Captain Thunder... Thunderclap... Thunder... even the bad ones sound better than CM3 !!!
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Ares »

If they were going to rename Freddy, I'd have gone with Lt. Marvel. In the 40s there was briefly a trio of sidekicks to Capt. Marvel called the Lieutenant Marvels who could only gain their powers if all three of them said "Shazam" at the same time. But they only had a handful of appearances.

So boom. Lt. Marvel. It demonstrates that Freddy acknowledges that he's a rank below Cap, and homages a bit of the past. The alternative is to keep that name but change his magic word to "Shazam", though there have been stories where having "Captain Marvel" as his magic word was handy.
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Mirage

Post by Jabroniville »

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MIRAGE (Miriam Delgado)
Created By:
Marv Wolfman
First Appearance: The New Titans #79 (1991)
Role: Shapeshifter, Super-Rapist
Group Affiliations: The Titans, The Team Titans
PL 10 (125)
STRENGTH
1 STAMINA 3 AGILITY 3
FIGHTING 8 DEXTERITY 4
INTELLIGENCE 1 AWARENESS 1 PRESENCE 4

Skills:
Acrobatics 4 (+7)
Deception 5 (+9)
Insight 4 (+5)
Investigation 2 (+3)
Perception 4 (+5)
Persuasion 3 (+7)
Stealth 4 (+7)

Advantages:
Daze (Deception), Fascination (Deception), Ranged Attack 2, Set-Up, Teamwork

Powers:
"Illusory Powers"
Illusion 10 (Visual) (Extras: Free Action, Area) (40) -- [41]
  • Dynamic AE: Morph 3 (Humanoids) (15)
"Invisibility" Concealment (Visuals) 2 [4]

Offense:
Unarmed +8 (+1 Damage, DC 16)
Illusion -- (+10 Illusion, DC 20)
Initiative +3

Defenses:
Dodge +10 (DC 20), Parry +10 (DC 20), Toughness +3, Fortitude +5, Will +4

Complications:
Relationship (Julienne- Daughter)- Julienne, the child of Mirage and her rapist Deathwing, is the reason Miriam no longer actively fights as a superhero.
Relationship (Nightwing)- Mirage had a thing for Nightwing, and naturally chose to just disguise herself as Starfire so she could jump his bones.

Total: Abilities: 50 / Skills: 26--13 / Advantages: 6 / Powers: 45 / Defenses: 14 (125)

-Mirage is an odd one, as she joined the Titans after being part of the Team Titans, a group from an alternate future that were sent to assassinate Donna Troy before her unborn son could become Lord Chaos. She eventually joined the Titans themselves once DC Zero Hour/Hypertimed that possible future out of existence and she was retconned into being from the main timeline. As the resident Illusion girl, she got into some trouble for pretending she wasn't pregnant (after she was raped by Deathwing, her teammate), and at one point she slept with Nightwing while pretending to be Starfire or something (so yes, the rape victim in fact committed rape herself). She popped up in Technis Imperative fooling J'onn into thinking she was his late wife (though since the JLA could apparently never look bad, he STILL won against her, a fire-powered Red Star and another Titan- THREE AGAINST ONE and against his ONE weakness, and he still wins!), and joined the Titans for a few brief moments in more recent times (such as "One Year Later's" big montage of people who joined & quit). She's pretty much a forgotten character, as even I tend to forget she was ever on the team, joining when it started to suck.

-Standard "Team Player" build, her Illusions are powerful, also allowing her to modify her appearance (I think I'd make any "Illusion Guy" characters also take Morph as an Alt-Effect to give them different appearances too), as well as showing different versions of herself, or putting a fake image in front of her while she makes herself Invisible at the same time. She's not very powerful in combat, but that's really not her purpose. Obviously, she's rather under-pointed, given her one-note nature and lack of "OMG she's such a good martial artist too!" fighting skills.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Thu Jul 07, 2022 9:04 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Ares »

It kind of baffles me how insensitive in general a lot of comic writers are to the topic of rape. The Avengers writer decides to write Carol Danvers out of the story, so they have her become magically pregnant out of nowhere, go from normal to full term in less than a day, give birth to a child who rapidly ages into an adult, and then reveal that the child is actually Marcus, a guy from Limbo. Who brought Carol to Limbo, is SPECIFICALLY MENTIONED TO USE TECHNOLOGY TO ALTER HER MIND TO MAKE HER FALL IN LOVE WITH HIM, has sex with aka rapes her, then sends her back to Earth so he can use this convoluted method of becoming his own dad to escape Limbo.

And the Avengers were COOL with this! It's like, did none of the writers and editors stop to think how messed up that was?

Identity Crisis likewise turned standard super-genius supervillain Dr. Light into this weird, leering rapist solely for drama and as a red herring. Sue Dibney was just a chew toy for that story.

But then you get other things, like Thor, Captain Britain and Northstar all being mind controlled by women into having sex with them, and at no time is that treated as rape. It's especially bad with Northstar, who is GAY and has no attraction for women.

In the same vein, Nightwing is never treated with any sympathy by anyone else, nor does anyone treat Mirage like a monster for impersonating Starfire and raping Dick. They basically laugh it off like it was no big thing, and Starfire is basically as mad at Dick as she is with Mirage.

A similar thing happened in a Devin Grayson-penned Nightwing story, where a traumatized Nightwing is begging Tarantula to stop while she forces herself onto him. Devin later said that it wasn't consensual, but she didn't consider it rape . . . which just boggles my mind.

Long story short kids, unless you've got the skill to give it the gravitas it deserves, rape is probably something most writers shouldn't touch. Death and murder are far more permanent crimes, but rape leaves a traumatized, living victim that has to cope with the horrible thing done to them, making it a much more complex issue.
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Re: Argent

Post by Ares »

Jabroniville wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 7:03 am Image
Image
Image
Image

That first costume is a bit "yikes", but the other ones are REALLY good.
The second outfit is really kind of 'meh' to me. Honestly her final costume is the only one really worth writing home about.

I could also never figure out if that thing dangling from her belly button ring (because even in a universe where superheroes where capes and high heels, that still stands out to me as an impractical accessory) is a T for Titans or a crucifix.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Spam »

Ares wrote: Wed Jan 23, 2019 2:25 am It kind of baffles me how insensitive in general a lot of comic writers are to the topic of rape. The Avengers writer decides to write Carol Danvers out of the story, so they have her become magically pregnant out of nowhere, go from normal to full term in less than a day, give birth to a child who rapidly ages into an adult, and then reveal that the child is actually Marcus, a guy from Limbo. Who brought Carol to Limbo, is SPECIFICALLY MENTIONED TO USE TECHNOLOGY TO ALTER HER MIND TO MAKE HER FALL IN LOVE WITH HIM, has sex with aka rapes her, then sends her back to Earth so he can use this convoluted method of becoming his own dad to escape Limbo.

And the Avengers were COOL with this! It's like, did none of the writers and editors stop to think how messed up that was?

Identity Crisis likewise turned standard super-genius supervillain Dr. Light into this weird, leering rapist solely for drama and as a red herring. Sue Dibney was just a chew toy for that story.

But then you get other things, like Thor, Captain Britain and Northstar all being mind controlled by women into having sex with them, and at no time is that treated as rape. It's especially bad with Northstar, who is GAY and has no attraction for women.

In the same vein, Nightwing is never treated with any sympathy by anyone else, nor does anyone treat Mirage like a monster for impersonating Starfire and raping Dick. They basically laugh it off like it was no big thing, and Starfire is basically as mad at Dick as she is with Mirage.

A similar thing happened in a Devin Grayson-penned Nightwing story, where a traumatized Nightwing is begging Tarantula to stop while she forces herself onto him. Devin later said that it wasn't consensual, but she didn't consider it rape . . . which just boggles my mind.

Long story short kids, unless you've got the skill to give it the gravitas it deserves, rape is probably something most writers shouldn't touch. Death and murder are far more permanent crimes, but rape leaves a traumatized, living victim that has to cope with the horrible thing done to them, making it a much more complex issue.
Can't recall the specifics, but didnt Hawkeye end up breaking up with his wife, Mockingbird, because she failed to save the life of the villian who raped her? A villian whose power was coming back from the dead?
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by FuzzyBoots »

KorokoMystia wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 10:28 pm
Jabroniville wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 9:48 pm
FuzzyBoots wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 5:02 pm
You mean the distaff Wesley Snipes?
Nope- HIS BOSS.
Master Raven is great, though she gets some flak for being a "Replacement Character" (Tekken has a LOT of these, which is why there's so many characters that have similar movesets), like when Eddy was replaced by Christie, and then Christie herself was replaced by Lucky Chloe.
Given Wesley Snipes was in To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything. Love, Julie Newmar, and the moveset is very similar... but I kid. :)

In Tekken's defense, Christie was the original capoeira character they planned. They introduced Eddy because they didn't think the graphics of the time could make Christie alluring enough.
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Re: Captain Marvel, Jr.

Post by Ares »

Now you didn't think I was NOT going to take a chance to legitimately ramble about the Marvel Family, did you?

:lol:
Jabroniville wrote: Tue Jan 22, 2019 9:50 pm
TTC: That’s when Captain Marvel, Jr. became a Titan.
DJ: Yes. And I gotta tell you, it came out of nowhere and surprised the hell out of me. One of the things I’ve always felt happened – and I think I’m right about this – is somehow, in the formative years of how the Internet related with comic publishers, somebody mounted a helluva write-in campaign for Captain Marvel, Jr., [and] they got their way.
TTC: So how did you approach incorporating Captain Marvel, Jr. into the team?
DJ: I think the toughest thing, whenever you have to try and take anyone from the Marvel family and work them into any kind of DC continuity, is how the hell do you make it really try and make sense? To me, that’s the toughest one of all, and I’m not sure that, in retrospect, I ever felt comfortable with Captain Marvel, Jr. occupying that slot for us. You can try all the explanations of talking worms and tigers and everything else that you want, but there’s just a barrier there. I have always felt this. There’s just a barrier there that makes it very difficult to make it work.

-Dan Jurgens, in an interview with the writers of the "Teen Titans Compendium, about how the Marvel Family is too silly for a world of talking apes and Elongated Men at DC.
This will forever strike me as just incredibly odd. It's just weird how some writers will just decide certain things about a character without giving it much rational thought. Gail Simone did something similar a long time ago on another board, where she chimed in about the relative powerlevels of Superman, Wonder Woman, Black Adam and Captain Marvel. Basically, according to Gail, Superman was a 10 in overall power, and ditto for Black Adam, while Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel were both 9s. However, Supes, Adam and Cap were all 7s or 8s in terms of fighting skill, while Diana was Diana was a 10. So she effectively made Cap less effective than Clark, Diana and Adam, with the reasoning being "that's just what my gut tells me", and she felt it made Cap "braver" because he had to fight against people he was outmatched by. I actually listed the characters histories and previous encounters to show that really didn't line up, and her response is basically, "Wow, it's so cool! I didn't know any of that! Doesn't change my mind tho".

The idea that the Marvels are any sillier than any heroes in DC or Marvel Comics is just weird. This is a setting with talking apes, the Green Lantern Corps. with a chipmunk member, Mr. Myxzptlk, Ambush Bug, Lobo, Batmite, Krypto, Comet the Super Horse, Robin's tiny shorts, G'nort, and let us not forget Dan's own creation, Booster Gold. Honestly, you'd think Dan would have a little more sympathy for how a creation can be twisted into a joke by mishandling and perception. Keith Giffen turned Blue Beetle and Booster Gold into jokes that they still haven't completely overcome.

Captain Marvel, Jr.- DC's Perennial Also-Ran:
-Freddy Freeman has been around a LONG TIME for someone who hasn't had a real push since the 1940s. Freddy is one of the early Kid Sidekicks, being given to Marvel as a "Kid Focus" type (much like Robin), and was given his powers after Captain Nazi murdered his grandfather and crippled the boy- Billy Batson offered to share, given that he's such a nice guy and all. Freddy soon got his own book, and his tales were told in a darker, more serious tone than the elder Marvel's, which is funny considering that he's A) the KID VERSION of an adult hero, and B) has a thing where he can't even say his own name (since his Magic Word of Transformation became "Captain Marvel!" instead of "SHAZAM!". He was popular (the '40s were BIG for the Marvel Family), but his book got cancelled in 1953 along with the rest of the Fawcett Comics line when falling sales and DC suing them for ripping off Superman finally got to be too much.
Freddy was interesting as both he and Mary were spin-off characters who were trusted with their own books right from the get go. The issue after he gets his powers in Cap's book, Freddy gets his own series to go fight Capt. Nazi. Mary got the same treatment, meaning she got her own book decades before the likes of Supergirl, Batgirl, Hawkgirl, Robin, etc. People forget what kind of trendsetters the Marvel Family were during the Golden Age of comics.

It was also interesting how Freddy's origin was basically tied into Billy failing as a hero, to some extent. During the classic story, Capt. Marvel was fighting Capt. Nazi atop an airplane that was out of control. Marvel belted Nazi as hard as he could to get him away from the plane, knowing that there was a lake nearby that was normally deserted. He then set to saving the plane, figuring he could go pick up Nazi after.

Instead, Freddy and his grandfather were fishing there, and Nazi crashed near their boat. The two go to rescue him, and Nazi murders the grandfather and maiming Freddy, simply because he could. It really set Nazi up as a vile villain, and it was only Cap's arrival that caused Nazi to flee, with Cap now having to save Freddy's life by giving him an infusion of Shazam's power. It was an interesting origin that starts Freddy out with a ready made arch-foe and plenty of pathos.
-Freddy was basically a minor footnote of a character from that point on, but he had an effect on pop culture in that Elvis Presley himself was a HUGE CM Jr. fan, and based both his iconic haircut and his elaborate sparkly costumes off of Freddy's costume. Freddy reappeared in the 1972 when DC acquired the rights to The Marvel Family, and a decade later he was retconned out by the Crisis, reappearing in 1995 as the brother of Kid Eternity (another Golden Age character). It was at this point that he got added onto Jurgen's Teen Titans run by a fan vote (Jurgens blames a conspiracy of write-ins, and I'd bet money he was correct), taking the nickname "CM3" to avoid the complications of his name causing him to revert to his normal identity. It was relatively unpopular (he had a thing where he flirted with Argent, but stuff over his secret I.D. caused a ruckus and nothing came of it).
I'll give Jerry Ordway credit: his Power of Shazam series was kind of boring, but he did everything in his power to quickly and effectively establish the classic Marvel Family mythos, bringing in Mary and Freddy, tons of the classic villains, a lot of the classic Fawcett heroes, etc. I'm very grateful for the knowledge he showed about those characters, even if the stories he told and the artist he had weren't the most dynamic or exciting.

The CM3 thing was, sadly, this attempt to modernize the Marvel Family, along with Mary also calling herself "Captain Marvel" (making her and Billy the 'Captains Marvel') rather than Mary Marvel. That, along with things like Power Sharing, didn't really last. Like I said, they either should have just changed his name to Lt. Marvel, or changed his magic word to Shazam, either instance solving the name issue. There's a reason why people think Billy's code name being Shazam is stupid. The only reason Freddy got around the issue was because he was a secondary character, the Marvel's were world famous at the time (so introducing himself was mostly unnecessary), and it was a convenient way to get him power up or power down at times.
Freddy's Modern History:
-After this, Freddy was just "Some Guy"- a plot complication that left a Superman-class being flying around the DC Universe without anything to do, since he was the third-tier character in a Family that was no longer being published with any regularity. It's kind of... uncomfortable for writers to have all these guys kicking around, because when it comes time to write an event story, part of you wonders "hey, aren't there like a dozen people who can lift thousands of tons? Why aren't THEY helping?" And so you get a lot of scenes where Freddy's just "that blue guy lifting that thing behind Captain Marvel as they explain what the MARVEL FAMILY is doing during this big crisis". He got a brief run in that HORRIBLE 2000s Outsiders series, but it went nowhere. Captain Marvel Jr.'s run on the Teen Titans was a standard short one for The Atom's two-year run as team leader, as he didn't really do much, despite being the team's heavy hitter. That's par for the course for the poor kid's career though, as he's never had a big run since the 1940s.
Though to be fair, it's hardly the Marvel Family's fault that, after merging them into the main DCU, DC also brought along Power Girl, eventually added classic Supergirl, brought in a new Captain Atom, Superboy, the Eradicator, added a third Wonder Girl, created Miss Martian, had Mon-El in the main timeline, ect, etc. But it's really no surprise that given how hesitant DC has always been to push the Marvel Family proper, that they're the ones that get left out of major events. The two biggest events where Cap really made a difference was Legends and Underworld Unleashed, which is kind of criminal. But the writers who obsess over Superman like Morrison and Loeb can't push the narrative of "Superman is our only hope" when you've got several guys in Clark's weight class.
-Freddy got a big part in The Trials of Shazam!, written by Judd Winick- an updating of the story, Freddy became the new... "Shazam" (thank you, Marvel Comics & Copywrite Law), replacing a powerless Billy now that Shazam himself (the Wizard) was dead. Then Billy turned into the Wizard and... I don't really care. That story sounds stupid. It's like... DC puts SUCH a half-assed effort into promoting Captain Marvel HIMSELF, that I can't even really call it worthy of being half of an ass. It's more like a quarter-assed effort.
Oh it was dumb. Even moreso because allegedly the whole thing was Dan DiDio's idea. Apparently he spoke with Winnick about his plan to kick Billy upstairs to become the New Wizard Shazam, or Marvel the White, and replace him with Freddy. Winnick, who had actually written some decent stories with Cap and Freddy, agreed to it, partially because he felt he could write Freddy as more "emo".

So because the Spectre destroyed the Rock of Eternity and several other places of mystical importance, magic itself is kind of screwed up. The phrase they used was "The Books of Magic Have Been Re-Written". A phrase I got sick of by the time the series was over, because they used it EVERY ISSUE. Sometimes multiple times in a single issue. So because magic was screwed up, Billy had to assume the role as Wizard, while Freddy had to undergo The Trials of Shazam in order to prove himself worth of the Shazam powers. Basically, Freddy had to approach the 6 gods that powered the Shazam pact and prove himself worthy of their power, while another rival group tried to use their own champion to steal that magic power for themselves. It didn't help that said group basically were stand ins for classic fans, complaining about how things had changed and missing the good old days.

It gets even dumber when Winnick decides to complicate things, saying that instead of the gods being drawn from the Greeco-Roman pantheon with a side order of Judaeo-Christian, the gods of the Shazam Pact are The Gods of Magic, who aren't related to the mythological gods despite having the same name. Instead, there's dozens of Magical Gods named Zeus, you just have to find the right one who is willing to work with you. Only they later disregard that and say there is only one of each god. It was likely meant to draw a distinction between Cap and Wonder Woman, and it was stupid.

It was also the first time they tried to re-name Freddy's hero identity as Shazam, with again the notion that Freddy has to want the change when he says the word, otherwise no change will happen. Again, overcomplicated and stupid.

The sad thing is that when Flashpoint happened, this mess was where the Marvel Family was left. Billy was eventually depowered by Black Adam and Isis, Mary later lost her powers as well, Adam and Isis were frozen in stone, Osiris was brought back and somehow managed to steal Freddy's power, and the Wizard Shazam was returned, but angry at everyone, claiming Billy had failed him. So the Pre-Flashpoint era ends with Billy, Mary and Freddy all having lost their powers completely.

The intent was suppose to be that Jerry Ordway was going to write a mini-series where Billy, Mary and Freddy would have to journey to the Rock of Finality, the Rock of Eternity's sister rock, and somehow regain their powers. But Flashpoint happened, followed by the Nu-52.

Sometimes it feels like DC only acquired the rights to the Marvel Family solely so that they could exercise some decades long, slow, revenge scheme against them for daring to outsell Superman in the 40s and 50s.
And Freddy gets at-best an eighth of an ass of effort out of DC, by comparison. Now, he's just one of nineteen or so multiracial kids in the "New 52" version of Captain Marvel.
As bad as Billy was treated in the Nu-52, Freddy got it just as bad. Now he's a blonde kid whose main personality traits are a) Being a Smartass and b) being a thief. He deliberately compares himself to one of the characters in Shawshank Redemption, which is funny, because whenever I read Curse of Shazam, it feels like the Marvel Family is getting butt-raped in the boiler room.

They also again tried to go with the idea of "You need to want the change to happen when you say the word" and divorcing the Marvel Family from the gods of mythology (since Wonder Woman had made the gods into these weird Hellboy-esque entities). Now the kids were powered by "The Magical Living Lightning", which let them fly through the sky and move fast because that's how lightning travels through the sky. They can also punch really hard because lightning does a lot of damage when it hits something. And they're invulnerable because shut up they just are. :roll:

Johns seems to be trying to address these issues in his new Shazam series, but what he should really do is just let this version of the Marvel Family die and bring the classic version back. Thankfully, Convergence: Shazam and Thunderworld confirm that the classic Marvel Family are out there in the multiverse, they just need to find some way to get home.
Freddy's Powers:
-Freddy is in an odd place Power Level-wise, seeing as how he's one of The Marvel Family and thus SHOULD be a top-tier Flying Brick, and yet he's hardly ever been afforded any kind of serious respect regarding Power Feats or Good Showings or whatever the Battleboard fans call it these days. So in the end, I see him as yet another in that crowded area of PL 11 Powerhouses, along with Supergirl (Matrix version), Superboy (Connor version), Mary Marvel, Wonder Girl (Cassie probably ended up here at some point), and whoever else DC has added while I wasn't looking. He's powerful enough (with Power Attack) to hurt Superman just a little bit, and tangle with any A-lister for a short period of time, but a concentrated effort would put him out, especially with "only" +14 Toughness. Also, he COULD possibly have Life Support, but much like Thor, the Marvel Family's immunity to the ravages of space depends entirely on the writer.

-And WOW does the DCA official build have a high Power Level- PL 14 for both Mary & Freddy, which is only ONE lower than Billy or SUPERMAN, and two higher than Kara Zor-El or Superboy. Personally, I'd put Supes & Capt. Marvel at PL 14-15 (possibly/probably a bit lower than their LOSH counterparts like Superboy & Mon-El, who operated under Pre-Crisis conditions), with the Kid Sidekicks all a few notches lower- PL 11-12.
Pre-Crisis, Cap, Mary and Freddy were all on the same power level. Each one of them was just as powerful as the other, but they generally deferred to Cap due to his greater experience and leadership skills.

Post Crisis, generally Cap and Mary are on the same power level (ala Superman and Supergirl), but Freddy is a tier lower than them. The idea is that both Billy and Mary draw their power directly from Shazam, while Freddy draws that same power through Captain Marvel. It's why Mary and Billy say "Shazam" while Freddy says "Captain Marvel". As such, his powers are reduced, putting him more on a Donna Troy/Superboy/Teen Titans power level.

Granted, that's still a lot of power. Freddy was the only guy during the Technis Imperative who could really keep Superman contained, even momentarily. Freddy would match up better against someone like Ben Grimm than Superman.
"My heart is as light as a child's, a feeling I'd nearly forgotten. And by helping those in need, I will be able to keep that feeling alive."
- Captain Marvel SHAZAM! : Power of Hope (2000)

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