What if you aren't the second string? What if you are just as important as the big dogs, but get none of the love? That makes you a special teams player. They're integral to the comics they are in, but you don't see them in the credit card commercials.
Wildfire in the Legion of Superheroes. Extremely popular for a long time in the Bronze Age, and then pushed out when fans of the Adventure Era got their mitts on the group. He ran the academy. He was a good leader. He offered food prize incentives for problem solving. He had the hot girlfriend and the no body thing. But for a while, Wildfire was one front and personal in the Legion. They took Supergboy out. They turned Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad into a whiny married couple. They drove Brainiac 5 insane. They turned Sun Boy into a womanizer. They kicked out Bouncing Boy and Triplicate Girl. They turned Phantom Girl into a total bitch with a bad hair cut. Wildfire was always there, though. He was also the first truly adult member (which means he both made the tough choice and had a sense of entitlement about doing so.)
The Vision is another guy. People say Captain America represents the Avengers. But whose picture was on the front of the comic book every issue for years? The Vision. The Vision is powerful. He has the hot wife. He's also a nexus of sorts. He ties to the Avengers, the Inhumans, the X-men, the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, and even the Legion of the Unliving. He works extremely well within the context of the Avengers. Ask any comics fan, they'll know who he is. Ask any casual comics fan, they'll know. Ask the workers at Subway, they might know who Wolverine is, but I doubt they know Vision.
Anyway, that gives you a sense of what I'm going for. Who are your choices?
Posted by Mike Chary at July 6, 2005 8:52 PM
Iceman is a pretty good example of that, although I think a lot of his 'staying power' comes from that he has a very basic yet highly flexible power and that he has historic value as one of the Silver Age X-Men.
Chris Claremont had no use for him, but writers on the X-titles in recent decades seem to keep coming back to him, probably because he is still a relatively uncomplicated, down-to-earth character - he hasn't been a genocidal cosmic being, hasn't spawned any children taken into alternate timelines, or is a billionare, after all.
From my limited knowledge of DC, I'd say the Martian Manhunter probably qualifies: integral to keeping the Justice League alive in many of its various incarnations, but not possessed of enough mojo to go it alone with great success. (The Vision and MM have certain similarities to each other too.) I'd be inclined to give the nod to the Wesley Dodds Sandman (unless you prefer him to be included in a "grandfather"/predecessor category), and, perhaps, the Ted Knight Starman as well.
Since Byrne's horrible reboot/retcon of Vizh, I'd have to say that he doesn't have a link with the Legion of the Unliving any more (while I like the original Human Torch, I don't like him so much that I appreciate the violence that Byrne wreaked upon the convoluted back-story that Roy Thomas and Steve Englehart concocted for the Vision); unless someone has subsequently thrown out Byrne's reboot..?
Cyclops might be a good candidate for the "special teams player" category: Lord knows he's been far outstripped in flash and fan-appeal by any number of the new(er) X-Men, but he's almost always been the base on which the X-Men have rested; he's been more dependable than Xavier, in any event. And he certainly qualifies in the "hot girlfriend/hot wife" department.
I'd nominate Hawkeye for this honor too: he's never been as good solo as he has been on a team, whether as the professional gadfly (as in when he was part of "Cap's Kooky Quartet") or leading the West Coast Avengers ("Whackos") and trying to fast-talk the Thing into joining up (and succeeding, only to be pre-empted by the Thing's further mutation -- *sob*). Or hanging with the Defenders for a spell, back when their "non-team" status was still taken seriously.
The Wasp should probably get at least an honorable mention; her position as Avengers chairman was as tough -- or tougher -- than any of Cap's terms, and she came through far better than anyone -- except possibly Hank Pym -- ever expected.
Finally, I'll toss in Mr. Fantastic's name for consideration: he doesn't use his powers as flashily as some of the rubberneckers do (I'm looking at you, Plas...), but his high morals, basic decency, scientific curiosity, relatively low ego, minimal need to showboat, and desire to help and protect his fellow man have cemented for him a position as arguably the single most important superhero in the Marvel Universe. Can't say too much about how the FF functioned when the second Ant-Man joined up to replace Reed when the rest of the FF thought he was dead, since I bailed when Tom DeFalco took over scripting chores from Walt Simonson; but, while Englehart's line-up of Thing, the second Ms. Marvel (mostly in "She-Thing" mode), Torch, and Crystal was fun and immensely enjoyable, Reed's absence was a huge hole that, in the end, couldn't entirely be compensated for by Johnny coming up with innovative ways to use his flame (remember his mano-a-mano with Graviton?) or by Ben's turning the FF into superheroic knights-errant in an attempt to jolly Sharon out of her funk at being turned into a "starfish" Thing. (I still disagree with the powers-that-be's decision to undo everything that Englehart did, though.)
In Avengers Forever Kurt Busiek made it so that the Vision is still made from the body of the original Human Torch, but John Byrne's story that brought back the original Human Torch as a character is still valid. (Indeed, the original HT just had a heroic death in the pages of New Invaders.) If you're interested enough to ask how, you're interested enough to go read the story.
Having read the first several issues of New Invaders, I think I can safely say that even though I am moderately interested in knowing how Hammond died, I am NOT interested enough to pick up another issue of that title. Bleh.
Valkyrie was pretty much entwined with the Defenders and the only character that established continuity between the old "non-team" to the team oriented New Defenders.
Black Canary is a stalwart team member of the JSA/JLA, but I don't think she's seen as a true A-List character even with the success of Birds of Prey.
The Beast should somehow qualify given his origin in the original X-Men, his popularity in the Avengers, and his role in the New Defenders. I think Hank McCoy's been wasted for most of the past 1-2 decades on the mutant teams. A return to the Avengers might make him more interesting.
I'm sure someone qualifies on the Teen Titans, but since I know them only from the TV cartoon, I can't make a good guess. Cyborg?
We are getting perilously close here to another subject: which characters could be A-List now if the publishers hadn't screwed up? The Thing, Vision, Punisher, Power Girl, Iron Fist, Hawkeye, Ghost Rider, and Martian Manhunter were all once extremely popular either as iconic characters on their team books, their prominent role on team-up books, strong start on their solo title, obvious breakout characters upon their initial appearance, or cross-over of guest star appearances, and even now still have nostalgic appeal, but have been greatly diminished from their heyday due to ill-conceived editorial tinkering, title cancellation for reasons other to do with their popularity, over-exposure, abrupt setting change, or simply bad writing either because their writer changed or simply ran out of ideas. These characters' popularity was not faddish (like Lobo for example), but long lived and could have been cultivated more.
Cyborg's probably as A-list as Titans go: he made it onto the Super Friends [with a silly trendy name at the time]. Pre-Crisis, Wally West would be the choice for this list hands down, but then he went and graduated to the A Team.
So I'll say Starfire from the Titans fits. The current team still feels like Young Justice without a Tamaranian around...
Moving on to the Suicide Squad as one of the best not-yet-mentioned team books, considering Waller, Bronze Tiger, Flag, Boomerang, and Deadshot as the ones who get the glory would put Nemesis and Vertigo in as the 'special teams' members...?
I had always imagined Black Canary as being more a stalwart of the Justice Society rather than the league. After all, she was the "token female" when the JSA was brought back for their annual team up with the JLA in the sixties, and appeared regularly in those team ups for years before she joined the JLA.