This one is a true doppelganger fight! Magnus, Robot Figher (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnus,_Robot_Fighter) knows super-karate. The Karate Kid (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karate_Kid_%28comics%29) knows super karate. Both can shatter titanium blocks with a quick karate chop. Both also live in the future! Magnus Robot Fighter came first and deserves some credit for this. Magnus Robot Fighter also has one of the most interesting super hero outfits around. Matching magenta top and shorts with white boots! More the sort of outfit you would expect on a go-go dancer rather than a male super hero. Karate Kid had two outfits and both were pretty bad. The first one was a dark tan Karate outfit made out of spandex complete with the black belt that was actually brown, I guess to match the rest of the outfit. The second was some sort of black and white kung fu inspired martial arts outfit. There was kung fu craze going on at the time. Karate Kid also knows every martial art of the 30 th century not just on Earth but across the galaxy. Karate Kid is a member of the Legion of Superheroes and in this universe there is a United Planets. Magnus lives in a much more insular future were interstellar contact is generally a prelude to alien invasion. The Karate Kid even learned a martial art specially designed to fight aliens like Super Boy. So the Karate Kid has the edge in knowledge of martial arts.
However, Magnus has been fighting robots. Big robots! Gigantic robots! Deadly robots! Magnus has the edge in combat experience and beats the Karate Kid. Anyway Magnus has the courage to wear white boots and deserves to win.
Harbinger (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harbinger_%28comics%29) is a group of teenagers who are “harbingers” of the next stage of evolution which in super hero land always means super powers i.e. what Marvel calls mutants and DC calls metahumans. The basic idea is that some humans are born with superpowers due to some mechanism of evolution. I will pit the Harbingers against the New Mutants in one of my Marvel vs. Valiant posts.
The Harbingers include Sting, Zephyr, Flamingo, Torque, Livewire and Stronghold. Sting is an extremely powerful psionic. Torque has superhuman strength and durability. Stronghold can psionically absorb mass to increase his size and strength. The girls include, Zephyr who can fly, wow. Alongside the Fat Fury and Bouncing Boy, Zephyr is one of the few fat do good doers and maybe the only fat girl! Flamingo can generate and control flame, was a stripper and is gorgeous and sexy as if to make up for Zephyr. Livewire can control electromagnetic forces and uses a magnetically controlled whip as a weapon. Livewire and Stronghold are a team and were members of the Eggbreakers, evil harbingers, recruited for their propensity for violence and will fight dirty if they have to.
What is interesting about the Harbingers is that many of them are a teen flick type. Torque is the mechanic with long hair and blue-collar background i.e. an updated greaser. Stings girlfriend, who has no super powers or combat skills, and kind of a side kick, Kris Hathaway is literally the cheerleader. Zephyr is the fat girl, a staple of teen flicks if not comic books. Flamingo (http://www.valiantentertainment.com/wiki/index.php/Charlene_Dupr%C3%A9)
is the sexy bad girl in contrast to the good cheerleader and the good fat girl. Kris is Stings girlfriend. Zephyr (http://www.valiantentertainment.com/wiki/index.php/Faith_Herbert) is the fat girls so of course she does not have a boyfriend. In many ways the Harbingers are members of the Grease cast with super powers. Paramount plans to do a movie based on the Harbinger comic book and I think they should hire me as a consultant so I can explore the teen flick angle in greater detail than was done in the comic book.
The Teen Titans, like the Justice League and the Avengers, have included a small army of heroes at one time or another. The commonality of all the members is that they are teens as the name suggests. However, the core of the “new” Teen Titans for the first twenty issues was Robin, Wonder Girl, Cyborg, Starfire, Beast Boy and Raven before the Teen Titans proved, one more time, that more is not better when it comes to super teams and watched sales plummet in direct relation to the bigger and more complex the Teen Titan roster became.
Sting is the most powerful member of the harbingers and logically would be pitted against the most powerful Teen Titan, Raven (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raven_%28comics%29). Raven is half human and half demon and derives her powers from her demon father. The muscle of the Harbingers is Torque and he goes after the strong man of the Teen Titans, Cyborg. In comic books girls fight girls whenever possible. Starfire fights Livewire. Wonder Girl takes on Flamingo. Zephyr flits about the room looking for someone as weak as her in the Teen Titans and decides that this is Robin who is the only Teen Titan without super powers. The two shape changers match off: Beast Boy vs. Stronghold.
Sting initially tries tossing objects at Raven but she swats the objects back at him with her soul self, a dark energy in the form of a raven or teleports out of the way. They then switch to blasting at each other. She alternately uses her soul self as a shield and teleportation to handle the blasts. He just uses a telekinetic shield. Raven is an empath and senses when Sting is weakened and teleports behind and knocks him out with a blow from her soul self. Sting goes down.
Cyborg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyborg_%28comics%29) blasts Torque with a sonic blast from one of the many offensive weapons that he carries. The sonic blast stuns Torque but he quickly recovers and punches Cyborg through the wall. Cyborg is amazed at the strength of Torque and realizes he has a fight on his hands. The two teens trade colossal blows but finally Cyborg is knocked out. Cyborgs mechanical body is extremely durable but he still has some human parts that are vulnerable when shaken while Torque is durable through and through. Besides Torque is the father of Magnus Robot Fighter, who has similar powers, and can fight armies of robots with powers similar to Cyborg.
Zephyr flies around Robin from 20 feet above and yells “Too bad you can’t fly like a real robin”. Zephyr is about thirty pounds overweight. Like most fitness nuts, Robin secretly detests fat people especially fat girls. His girl friend, Star Fire is as fit as they come, a model, Kory Anders, and did a bikini shot for a major magazine and that issue sold out in a matter of days because of her presence. Being taunted by a fat flying girl is just too much and he decides girl or not she is going down hard. Robin casually tosses a batarang at Zephyr’s head and she drops to the floor. Robin does not bother to run to where she is falling and catch her like her normally would and she makes a pleasant thud as she hits the floor. Robin rationalizes that a fat gal like that would probably break his back if he tried to catch her from that height but really he just does not like fat girls period.
Kris Hathaway does not engage in combat since she is actually pretty smart even though she was a cheerleader. Kris has been watching the fight and decides it’s time to talk to Robin. Kris is very cute, approaches Robin and castigates him for taking out Zephyr in such an extremely brutal manner. Kris tells Robin in her snootiest tone that he is supposed to be a hero and heroes don’t toss batarangs at girls and let them fall from twenty feet without even trying to catch them. Robin knows what Kris says is true and does not bother to answer and just looks down at his green clad feet. Robin also finds Kris, the wholesome girl next door, type a welcome contrast to the exotic beauties he is normally around. Starfire, his girlfriend and Wonder Girl are great gals but both have super strength and no matter how many pushups he does, they will always be a thousand times stronger than him. Raven was half demon and he wouldn’t have sex with her on a bet even though she is gorgeous and Robins is a normal healthy red blooded teen male. Robin thinks, this Kris girl could hug me with all her might and I wouldn’t have to worry about my rib cage being crushed like tooth pick.
Robin loves Starfire but all her superpowers often make him feel inadequate and she wasn’t a virgin at all when he got together with her. Worse she had been forced into interplanetary sex slavery by her evil sister in her solar system and had experienced the vilest treatment from a long line of alien masters which made Robin have sympathy for her but also made him wonder how he compared to all the aliens Starfire had encountered. Kris can see that Robin looks bad and asks him for his first aid kit in his belt so she can help Zephyr out as best she can. Kris starts to administer first aid to Zephyr who has a really bad gash across her forehead.
Robin walks away and mutters under his breath something about how super humans always assume someone without superpowers is the weakest member of a super hero team when in fact he is probably the most resourceful member of the Teen Titans. Robin thinks “I am after all their leader. I was the only one who was not taken down by Deathstroke when he attacked the Teen Titans with help from the traitor Terra. blah, blah, blah”
Starfire (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starfire_%28comics%29) has super strength, invulnerability, the ability to fly and can fire starbolts from her hands. Starfire can also learn any language by kissing a person who knows that language but Starfire is the girlfriend of Robin in the time period this fight is set and besides does not kiss girls.
Starfire is probably the most exotic beauty of the DC Universe. She comes from another planet and has bronze skin, not tanned but bronze, green eyes minus pupils, long, brown, full, curly hair that comes to down to her knees and wears an swimsuit type outfit, lavender colored to go with her eyes that shows off every curve and especially her ample bosom with a plunging top. Robin is one lucky teen age guy! Livewire wraps her metal cable around Starfire’s arms. Livewire has a dominatrix side and watching Starfire in bondage is starting to turn her on. Starfire ignores the metal whip and flies into Livewire’s stomach headfirst knocking her out.
Wonder Girl (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonder_Girl) has all the powers of Wonder Woman but to a lesser extent and was adopted by Wonder Woman in of many versions of her origin. These powers include super strength, flight, invulnerability and a golden lasso, which does not have the power to force people to tell the truth, unlike Wonder Woman’s. Wonder Woman flies out of the range of Flamingo’s flames and lassoes her from above and swings her around the room and bangs her against a wall knocking her unconscious.
Beast Boy, also named Changeling, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beast_Boy) is green skinned permanently and kind of short as well. Beast Boy fell in love with the traitor Terra but she just used him. Beast Boy is surrounded by three gorgeous gals that have no interest in a short green skinned guy and is pretty frustrated. Beast boy can turn into a green skinned version of any animal. There are limits to how big an animal he can become. Beast Boy once had his strength augmented by Amazonian by science on Paradise Island, the home of Wonder Girl, and became an out of control brontosaurus but generally the biggest animal he can become is an elephant.
Stronghold starts to grow and Beast Boy turns into an elephant and charges into Stronghold but Stronghold is already twice the size of an elephant by the time Beast Boy slams into Stronghold. Stronghold easily tosses Beast Boy aside. Beast boy turns into a humming bird and flies into the ear of Stronghold and hits his inner ear knocking him unconscious.
Raven, Starfire, Robin, Wonder Girl and Beast Boy all gang up on Torque. Robin offers him the option of surrender and he tells them to go to hell. Robin is secretly pleased. The fight with Zephyr was a fiasco and beneath him and he feels a little guilty about his behavior towards her. Wonder Girl binds torque with her lasso while Starfire blasts him. Raven blasts him as well. Robin tosses a batarang at him for good measure. The batarang toss probably wasn’t needed but tossing a batarang around always makes Robin feel better not as good as Starfire can but close. Torque is tough but not that tough and goes down. DC wins the battle of the teens!
The H.A.R.D. Corps (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.A.R.D._Corps) are a group of Vietnam vets that are US government operatives. They can download super powers as needed. They can download one of the following powers: So, the H.A.R.D. Corps are sort of like ultimate universal soldiers.
Airborne – The user can fly.
Arc Charge – The user can generate electrical energy.
Decoy Mode – The user can create illusions such as holograms
Detonation Mode – The user can cause explosions.
Forcefield – The user can generate a forcefield that completely encases the user and protects the user.
Ghost Mode – The user can become intangible.
Grenade Mode – The user can throw energy grenades from their hands.
Inivisibility – The user can become invisible.
Invulnerability – The user cannot be damaged but can be knocked out.
Jolt Mode – The user can administer an adrenaline jolt that counters soporifics.
Neural Spike – The user has the ability to throw spikes that attack the nervous system.
Shield Mode – The user can create an energy shield.
Static Mode – The user can disrupt communications and transmissions.
Strength Mode – The user has superhuman strength.
Strobe Burst – The user can generate a blinding flash of light.
Stun Ram – The user can project a ray of concussive force.
Sunburst – The user has the ability to fire flame blasts from the user’s hands.
Tsetse – The user can put someone to sleep with a touch.
Ultra-Mass – The user can increase their density.
This is quite a list of super power! The main weakness of the H.A.R.D. Corps is that they can only download one power at a time and rely on a headset to radio such requests. They members do carry fire arms.
The OMACs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OMACs) are humans that have been forced into being transformed into being OMACs by the evil computer OMAC. The OMACs can also download superpowers and can use several powers at the same time. They are also protected by a cybernetic shell and can turn their hands into blades or pincers. Batman built this computer by the way before it went out of control. Batman obviously never watched HAL in action in 2001 Space Odyssey. OMAC the computer can turn a human into an OMAC in seconds and created hundreds if not thousands of OMACs to take over the Earth.
The US government has to put in a brain implant to create a H.A.R.D. Corps member. The OMACs are created via a nanotechnology virus so the OMAC computer will be able to whip up a thousand OMACs before the US government can create one H.A.R.D. Corps member so in a drawn out war the OMACs will win through sheer weight of numbers but what about an equal number of H.A.R.D. Corps members against a equal number of OMACs? The H.A.R.D. Corps group generally consists of four members including Gunslinger, Shakespeare, Maniac and Hammerhead.
The four OMACs square off against the four H.A.R.D. Corps members. The OMACs are kind of mindless automatons with very limited reasoning ability. H.A.R.D. Corps on the other hand are smart guys with tons of combat experience. They figure the OMACs are similar to them and they know how they would take out themselves. Hammerhead uses the static mode to interfere with the OMAC computer transmissions and gunslinger shoots the now none powered civilians down with his submachine gun. The H.A.R.D. Corps feel bad about shooting civilians but figure the OMAC computer would quickly figure out some way to get around their static mode. The OMACs are more powerful than the H.A.R.D. Corps and the static mode trick was their only chance. War is hell as any Vietnam vet knows.
advise a client as to the best place to build a building. The feng shui expert uses knowledge of the five Chinese elements as a guide. The feng shui expert can also tell you how to place objects in your apartment to maximize positive energy flow.
earthquakes and fly and blast things. His illegitimate half sister, Terra (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_(comics)), infiltrated the Teen Titans in the Judas Contract story line and pretended to be one of them while at the same time working for the super villain Deathstroke (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deathstroke). Since Terra had no scruples about killing someone she showed how scary this power really could be. There is Avalanche (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avalanche_(comics)), a super villain, over in the Marvel universe, that has the same earthquake power. There is no DC character that really has the same power as the Valiant universe Geomancer. This is a first since DC and Marvel have every super power imaginable covered.
DC even has Arm Fall Off Boy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arm_Fall_Off_Boy) who has the power to make his arms fall off! This power then leaves him armless and unable to punch someone in a fight. I suppose if someone grabbed his wrist he could have the grabbed arm fall off and punch the shocked mugger with his other arm. X-Men III had Wolverine fighting some character who could re-grow his arms after having them slashed off by Wolverine and this power is practical compared to Arms Fall Off Boy.
The Valiant Geomancer senses that the DC Geomancer is going to attack him because the
Villain does not like the fact they both share the same name. Don’t laugh this is the reason Power Man, the villain, attacked Power Man the hero of the same name in the Marvel universe. Power Man the villain had his butt handed to him by Power Man the hero and must have felt pretty stupid afterwards. The Valiant Geomancer calls his buddy the Eternal Warrior to act as a body guard. The DC Geomancer is an obscure third rate villain with an inappropriate name while the Eternal Warrior is the premiere hero of Valiant universe who defeated Batman (https://foxhugh.wordpress.com/2008/05/25/dc-vs-valiant-universe-5-eternal-warrior-vs-batman/) in an earlier post on this site. The Eternal Warrior dodges an earthquake attack of the DC Geomancer and takes him out with a single well placed punch.
The Eternal Warrior (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_Warrior) is an immortal and DC has its version of an immortal warrior called appropriately the Immortal Man (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immortal_Man). The problem is that Immortal Man was a third rate super hero that even die hard DC fans often forget. You don’t pit third raters against Olympians.
The Eternal Warrior is an immortal but above all else is the foremost martial arts hero of the Valiant Universe. The foremost martial arts hero of the DC universe is Batman. After having kicked his brother’s butt (https://foxhugh.wordpress.com/2008/05/22/dc-vs-valiant-universe-1-archer-armstrong-vs-batman-robin/), the Eternal Warrior is ready for a fight with Batman. Also, Batman and the Eternal Warrior are both strategic fighters so expect a lot of attacks and retreats and counter attacks. Traps using the local terrain can be expected from both sides.
Batman has his utility belt and a lot more toys. The Eternal Warrior has just one toy and that is a leather jacket that has studs on one side for offense and metal plates on the other side for defense. I like the jacket so much I got an imitation made in Thailand. Let’s hope I never have to use it. The Eternal Warrior is a master of every weapon and martial art of the last three thousand plus years. He does not carry toys because he has outgrown the need for them as would Batman if he was thousands of years old. Batman once turned down a Green Lantern power ring in the Justice League International because he said it would slow him down. The Eternal Warrior has carried this minimalism to the next level.
Batman throws a batarang at the Eternal Warrior. The Eternal warrior grabs a book from the pocket of his jacket and uses the book as a shield. The Eternal Warrior then moves in on Batman and hits him repeatedly with the book until Batman is knocked out. The Eternal Warrior had seen the Bourne Supremacy at a movie theater last week and like what he saw and has been itching for a chance to use those moves. The Eternal Warrior is an old dog who can learn new tricks. The Eternal Warrior wins because he knows what Batman is thinking and then some.
Clash of the weirdo energy super heroes! Dr. Mirage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life_of_Dr._Mirage) is made up of necromantic energy. As I have stated in prior posts, the Valiant universe is more positivistic than the DC universe and basically Dr. Mirage is a ghost with a pseudo science explanation that is a little better than the one provided by Ghostbusters but not by much.
In this version of science, Ghosts are made up of type of energy and all the energy logic we have in natural science applies to ghost energy variously called etheric, psychic or astral energy. For the record, most traditional physicists hate this kind of New Age energy logic but what do they know?
Wildstorm (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wildfire_(comics)) is made up of antimatter energy, technically an exotic rather than weirdo energy. DC has a plethora of beings made up of pure energy but most of them are made up of electricity which is a pretty mundane energy than an exotic/weirdo energy like antimatter. How many electrical devices do you have in your house? Plenty but unless you are an alien I doubt you have any devices powered by antimatter much less necromantic energy. Even Superman went the electrical energy being route briefly (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superman_Red).
There are also beings made up of nuclear energy such as Firestorm and Valiant’s own Dr. Solar. Nuclear energy beings are not as common as electrical energy beings but still more common than beings of stuff like necromantic energy or antimatter energy. Anyway, the electricity in your house may ultimately be from nuclear energy making this type of energy mundane.
Wildstorm isn’t the only DC weirdo energy being. Negative Man (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_Man) has a negative energy being inside of his regular body, host body, technically. Negative energy fills the weirdo energy part since like necromantic energy I have no idea what negative energy really is but he isn’t a being of pure energy like Dr. Mirage and the Negative energy being can only exist for 60 seconds making him no match for Dr. Mirage.
Being made of pure energy has many advantages regardless of if the energy is mundane, exotic or weird. You don’t need to go to the bathroom, eat, sleep or even need oxygen and you are probably immortal but generally you don’t have a sex life either and that bother’s the like of Wildstorm. The best of both worlds is being able to switch back and forth from having a regular body to having an energy body so you can have sex at home but turn into pure energy when needed as a crime fighter and some lucky DC beings can do this.
Dr. Mirage blasts Wildstorm with necromantic energy and nothing happens. Wildstorm blasts Dr. Mirage with anti-matter energy and nothing happens. Turns out the two weirdo energies have no affect on each other whatsoever. This is clearly explained in chapter 13 of the weirdo physics book but I guess these guys dont have that book. Go ahead and ask your local high school teacher “what happens when you mix antimatter energy with necromantic energy?” and see what sort of answer you get. This blog is becoming more and more popular so this situation may very well happen and I apologize to high school physics teachers all over the world ahead of time. After an hour of this they get bored and decide to call it a draw and discuss what it’s like to be a being of pure energy or not.
Bloodshot (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloodshot_%28comics%29) has nanites in his blood stream that give him enhanced strength, speed, healing and technopathy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_comic_book_superpowers#Technopathy). Bloodshot is a cyborg. A cyborg is generally a human who has been enhanced through the addition of technology. Some would argue that a person with heart pacer is a cyborg but no someone wearing glasses because the enhancement must be fairly permanent in nature. Bloodshot does not look like a cyborg but like a vampire. He has white skin, giant red circle in his chest and eyes lacking pupils. Compared to his opponent, Bloodshot is a cyborg beauty queen. Bloodshot also has some hard wired programming that allows him to fight in a super efficient manner. Bloodshot does not have any built in weapons but generally carries firearms.
Cyborg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyborg_(comics)) is also a cyborg but a more traditional cyborg. Cyborg has big pieces of shiny metal stuck all over his body. One of his eyes looks like a camera and kind of is a camera. Cyborg looks like a cyborg and he does not like the way he looks. Dad made Cyborg into a cyborg to save his son’s life. Dad had never watched the Six Million Dollar man, yet another cyborg and had thought of making the prosthetics more cosmetically appealing by coating them with flesh colored plastic and using thinner pieces of metal. This never occurs to Cyborg either and mostly he sulks about looking like a monster. Cyborg has super strength as opposed to enhanced strength i.e. he is stronger than Blood Shot but not as fast and agile and all those big pieces of metal probably even slow him down a bit. Cyborg has any number of built in weapons and gadgets unlike Bloodshot. One of his many gadgets is a device that enables him to control most computer systems. An old fashioned version of technopathy compared to Bloodshot’s. Most of Cyborg is covered with promethium, an exotic metal. Promethum is pretty much indestructible but Cyborgs human innards are still vulnerable.
Bloodshot and Cyborg are both shopping at Cyborg R US the trendy new chain of clothing stores for the burgeoning cyborg population. Both spot a really cool limited edition T-Shirt by Polo. The T-Shirt has “Cyborgs Make Better Lovers” as its motto. This is the T-Shirt every upscale cyborg must have but there is only one left! This is a limited edition T-Shirt and both parties realize there probably isn’t another one on sale anywhere. Cyborg needs every fashion break he can get and really hates how the fact that Bloodshot is a cyborg and actually looks pretty cool rather than looking like a monster. Bloodshot is actually a better lover since becoming a cyborg since the nanites give him enhanced stamina and control of every part of his body. Cyborg hasn’t had any good loving since becoming a cyborg despite having a gadget just for such a purpose. Bloodshot does not care for Cyborg’s hostile attitude. After some arguing and attempts to use their technopathy on each other, which fails, they square off to fight for the T-Shirt.
Bloodshot is more agile than Cyborg and gets the first shot. Blooshot shoots Cyborg with a machine gun but the bullets just bounce off Cyborg’s promethium. Cyborg then aims his sonic scrambler at Bloodshot and stuns Bloodshot. A normal person would have been knocked out but Bloodshot has enhanced regeneration. The sonic scrambler affects everything in front of it so there is not much in the way of aiming or much possibility of dodging the beam.
Bloodshot could have leapt over Cyborg and hit Cyborg from behind but Bloodshot is not that sort of fighter. This is despite probably having the ability to pull of this move. If I had enhanced strength and agility this would be my standard move since it routinely gets you out of the way of whatever they can toss at you and gets you behind them. Basically apply dog fight logic to hand to hand combat.
Cyborg closes in a punches Bloodshot. In theory a punch from the likes of someone with super strength should take the head right off of someone lacking Superman style invulnerablity as is the case with Bloodshot but this never happens in comic books since this would upset the six children that still read comic books. Bloodshot is conked out and Cyborg wins!
The Armorines (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armorines) are a group of U.S. Marines that wear armor based on bits and pieces of alien technology that has fallen into the hands of the US government. If Iron Man is good then a team of Iron Men should be even better. The armor is not as good as the X-O Manowar armor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-O_Manowar) that is the premiere armor of the aliens but is the best the U.S. government could come up with bits and pieces of alien technology.
Once again, we see a “realistic” POV towards weapons in the Valiant universe that is not present in the DC universe in particular that I mentioned in the overview of this series. Countless aliens have come and gone to Earth on DC yet the US government never tries to appropriate any alien technology and just watches these aliens come and go passively. The Marvel universe is similar but we do see in Armor Wars minseries how governments and super villains alike will try to use Iron Man’s technology.
In the, upcoming, Marvel vs. Valiant series I will have any number of armored teams to choose so but this is not the case in the DC Universe. DC is a magic centered universe with a wealth of magic based characters. Marvel is a technology centered universe were a wealth of technology based characters exist but a whole vein of this technology takes the form of the “power cosmic” that is similar to magic in that the power cosmic that is a super technology that is so fantastic and super to the point of interfering with credibility. Valiant is a logos universe were both technology and magic are rule governed and not as mysterious or unique as in DC or Marvel and the readers and characters in the universe can learn, understand and adapt. The US government can learn how to use alien technology. The Valiant universe is also a more positivistic universe than the DC or Marvel universe.
DC has a very small number of armored superheroes or super villains much less armored teams. One team is the Rocket Red Brigade (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket_Red_Brigade) that was developed by the Soviet Union to defend the motherland from metahumans (DC speak for superhumans). The problem is the Rocket Reds are not a team so much as a brigade. The Rocket Reds never had their own series and the characters of individual Rocket Reds were never fleshed out. There is also nothing “DC” about the Rocket Reds and the Rocket Reds show up after a plethora of such teams at Marvel. The Rocket Reds could exist just as easily in the Marvel universe and in fact the Soviet Union, in the Marvel universe, developed the Crimson Dynamo and the Titanium Man as a direct challenge to Iron Man and made them into a team to defend the motherland years before the Rocket Reds showed up.
The Atomic Knights (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_Knight) are totally DC! Medieval armor becomes irradiated, in a post WW III world, and instead of killing the wearers due to radiation poisoning, becomes more durable. I remember reading the Atomic Knights as a young man and when you are eight you don’t question such events based on something as boring as science. The problem is that the average age of comic book readers jumped from an average of from something like 12 to 25 between the sixties and eighties and post-18 readers do bring actual science into comic book discussions. Comic books changed from being a type of fantasy with a thin patina of SF to being more SF. Star Wars vs. Star Trek is DC vs. Marvel in terms of fantasy vs. SF.
This change in readership age forced DC to retcon the Atomic Knights. DC explained the Atomic Knights as a giant hallucination! Such is the fate of heroes from a simpler comic book era in modern times. Obviously the Armorines can’t fight a hallucination and this retcon will be totally ignored and replaced by a substitution of my own.
The Atomic Knights are brought out of retirement to fight the Armorines as test in front of the US military brass. Many of the generals in the US military are skeptical of this new fangled alien technology and want to see how the new guys fare against the armored veterans that returned from a recon mission in an alternative future and fought various menaces in the present before retiring.
Hey, my retcon makes at least as much sense as the official hallucination one. The Atomic Knights are a lot older than the Armorines but incredibly the irradiated armor slows down the aging process! Hey if radioactive spider bites are good for you then why can’t irradiated armor be good for you? The Armorines blast the Atomic Knights from the sky. The Atomic Knights don’t have blasters nor can they fly but they do carry swords! In true DC fashion the Atomic Knights don’t carry 45’s since weapons monomania is a trademark of the DC universe as mentioned in the overview to this series. One of the Atomic Knights throws a sword at the energy pack of the Armorines, rather than his chest, since they are on the same side and this is just a test, and brings the Armorine down and then pummels the Armorine since it turns out irradiated medieval armor is pretty tough!
The Atomic Knights once fought Hercules before they became hallucinations and Hercules is about as strong as Superman and Superman is stronger than anything in the Valiant universe. If Herculean blows can’t destroy the Atomic Knight armor then Armorine blows stand no chance at all. One Armorine down!
The other Armorines fly out of the range of thrown swords, about five feet, and come up with a plan. They gang up on one Atomic Knight and fire all the blasters on the one Atomic Knight at the same time. The Atomic Knight goes down. The Atomic Knight armor is not damaged in the least but the person in the armor is hurled against the armor with such force that he or she is knocked out. This is similar to how the kinetic energy of a bullet breaks a rib even when the bullet does not penetrate the vest. Modern super armor would have some sort of shock absorbing layer but this is literally irradiated medieval armor with none of those new fangled systems. Actually no one has figured out how to do this in real life but this is standard pseudo science in comic books.
The Atomic Knights try throwing swords again but once you know what’s up, dodging a sword when you have flight on your side isn’t that hard. Throwing knives is really hard. I can throw a knife at someone’s chest from three to five feet with some degree of accuracy after hours and hours of practice. I tried throwing swords in my backyard a hundred years ago and it’s basically impossible. The sword throws were so wild that I started worrying about killing one of the neighbor kids and gave it up. Braveheart makes it look so easy! Still this is a comic book battle not an actual one. One by one the Atomic Knights go down.
One of the US military Brass watching the conflict wonders how the Atomic Knight armor would do in a battle with the Armorines with an upgrade. After all the Atomic Knight armor is really tough and if you add blasters and flight capability you might have something even tougher than the alien armor. Better still use the Atomic Knight armor as a core and build a layer of Armorine armor around the core. The armor would be less maneuverable than Armorine armor but suitable for environments were durability is more important than maneuverability such as deep space or deep sea missions. This is after all the Valiant universe where such thinking can occur. Stay tuned for the Atomic Armorines! Just kidding!
The top hero and sidekick teams of the two universes are pitted against each other. In the Valiant case, the hero is the immortal Armstrong (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archer_and_Armstrong) but he often acts like petulant child compared to his teenage partner. Archer is the sidekick but the relationship between Archer and Armstrong is much more complex than the relatively simple Batman and Robin one. Batman is the omniscient father figure and leader to Robin’s apprentice role. In many ways Archer is more mature than Armstrong despite his youth and perhaps is not really a sidekick after all. Archer’s name is after all first in the title and perhaps not just due to alphabetical conventions. Archer and Armstrong represent the postmodern parent/child relationship were the child often has to take care of the parent with addictions and/or human frailties. Did I mention that Armstrong is a lush? This was by far the strongest title in the Valiant line and had a great deal of black humor and irony in the title. Irony is a rare commodity in comic books.
Armstrong, as mentioned, is immortal and thousands of years old. Armstrong has super human regeneration but nowhere near Wolverine levels. Armstrong is freakishly strong but not Spiderman strong. I would say slightly over the limit of a human at peak performance. Armstrong is also a lover not a fighter as opposed to his elder brother, the Eternal Warrior. Armstrong will not seek out evil as he has made clear to his older brother.
Fortunately for the reader, evil seeks him out mostly in the form of a conspiratorial sect that sees him as a sort of Anti-Christ while the leadership of the organization has figured out that actually killing Armstrong removes the organizations reason for being and try to make a deal with Armstrong and Armstrong is not totally opposed to the idea. Complex motivations of this sort for both hero and villain are very rare in comic books, unfortunately.
Batman (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman) not be as strong as Armstrong but he’s a fighter not a lover although he pretends otherwise as Bruce Wayne. I might add that Armstrong would probably know about Batman’s rep and might very well run away! We have to assume that for this fight to even happen both fighters live in a common universe. Anyway this is the assumption I will make in all “What if fights” since the whole how they meet write up via interdimensional travel is repetitive and tiresome. Armstrong hasn’t survived for thousands of years by making futile last stands. For a big guy, Armstrong has proven himself very adept at running away in the past but Batman is a master tracker and always, always gets his man. might
There are probably a dozen ways Batman can take out Armstrong. Perhaps Batman tosses a batarang (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batarang) to the head of Armstrong. Batman could also toss a vial of knockout gas from his utility belt. Defeating stronger but less skilled fighters is kind of Batman’s trademark, the Blockbuster comes to mind, but how will Batman fare against Armstrong’s older brother, the Eternal Warrior? What about the battle between the sidekicks?
Archer has a type photographic memory that is sometimes referred to as photographic reflexes, like the current Batgirl (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassandra_Cain) and Marvel’s Taskmaster (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taskmaster). If Armstrong sees a martial arts move, or any movement actually, he can mimic that move instantly and perfectly. This is a major super power. I would put it in the top ten of super powers. Persons with this power can take on the likes of Batman, as Batgirl does, and Spiderman, as the Taskmaster does, much less sidekicks.
Personally I have never understood why the characters with this power don’t take up golf. Golf requires almost zero fitness as opposed to martial arts and is far more lucrative than being a crime fighter and a lot less risky than being a super villain. The Taskmaster opened a school to teach villians. Why oh why did he not become a sports trainer to sports super stars. I am sure the likes of Michael Jordan have deeper pockets than the villians and such activity does not put you on a collision course with the Avengers as his henchmen school did.
Batman finishes off Armstrong and arrives just in time to see Armstrong take out Robin with a perfect sequence of kung fu moves. Batman observes the action and realizes exactly what power Armstrong has and takes him out with one of his many toys from a distance. Batman is a strategic thinker and you don’t close in on fighters with this particular power. Armstrong has fought skilled martial artists but not one with the plethora of toys Batman has and has no memorized moves to fall back on. Anyway, how do you memorize a move to counter knock out gas anyway without a gas mask?
That’s why the Taskmaster carries his own set of toys including a duplicate of Captain America’s shield and Hawkeyes bow and arrow, the Black Knights sword, etc. Armstrong with a shield could throw the shield to knock the vial back at Batman or use an arrow to shatter the vial before the vial came to near to be effective. Archer might even be able to use the sword to swat the vial or batarang or whatever away. Hey, wait a second! Archer often carries a hand held cross-bow. Archer shoots the vial of knock out gas in mid flight and then is conked by a batarang before he can reload. This is why an assault rifle with an extended clip is preferable to a hand held cross-bow.
An alternative ending is that Batman looks at Robins sorry a** , this is a PG blog, kids after all still read comic books, thank you, on the floor and offers Archer a job as a side kick. Archer might very well accept. Did I mention Armstrong is a lush? Besides that, Archer is a consummate martial artist and Batman is the foremost teacher of the martial arts while Armstrong has nothing to teach Archer in this area.
I probably own every issue of the short lived Valiant Universe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valiant_Comics) and in my view the demise of this line was a sad day in comic book history. The Valiant line was conscious attempt to make a better super hero for reasons I will outline in the introduction.
One way to arrange comic book universe battles is to match up opponents that are more less doppelgangers of each other. This is what happened in the DC vs. Marvel miniseries (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DC_vs._Marvel)
that matched up such doppelgangers as Aquaman (DC) and Namor the Submariner (Marvel). The advantages of the doppelganger approach are many. The main one is you get contests between more or less equal heroes. Secondly, you can keep a score card. Maybe universe X has the strongest hero but Universe Y has the fastest one. DC may have more heavy hitters in the area of magic but Marvel has more heavy hitters in the area of the power cosmic. You put the top mage of the DC Universe, Mordru, against the top mage in the Marvel universe, Dr. Strange, and of course Mordru wins but in another category such as the power cosmic, DC wins. The Silver Surfer, for example, easily defeats the Black Racer. I did not apply the doppelganger approach to my earlier D&D vs. Marvel post and am trying to do this with a future post, DC vs. D&D.
I have tried to apply this logic to the DC vs. Valiant post as much as possible. The problem is that many of the DC characters were created in simpler times when the one gimmick rule applied. The Flash was the fast guy. Green Lantern had a power ring. If they had any other talents or weapons then this never came up. Thanks to Stan Lee (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_lee), at Marvel, heroes starting having something resembling characterization and DC followed suit but not to the same degree as Marvel.
This use of characterization meant that psychological stuff could impact the fight not just their super powers. This so called Marvel Revolution started with the Fantastic Four. The Thing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thing_%28comics%29), of the Fantastic Four, is not as strong as the Hulk or Thor but he is a disciplined fighter. When the Champion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champion_of_the_Universe), an Elder of the Universe, challenges the “strongest” heroes of the Marvel universe to a boxing match, the Thing wins not the Hulk or Thor. The Thing wins because he follows boxing protocol. The Hulk just goes nuts and is dismissed from the ring. Thor pulls out his hammer and is also dismissed for breaking the rules. In Secret Wars II (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_Wars_II), the Thing single handily stops and army of evil doers from touching the Beyonder through sheer will power rather than strength. Ben Grim, the alter-ego of the Thing is a tough New York from the wrong side of the tracks who never gives up. Daredevil (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daredevil_%28Marvel_Comics%29) has gone up against the likes of the Hulk and Namor and his determination to keep fighting to the end have enabled him to achieve pyrrhic victories against both these Marvel powerhouses.
Later still, heroes started carrying weapons! This makes total sense to me. If I was the Green Lantern I would still carry a 45 to shoot those giant yellow eagles that seem to be all over the place when you are a Green Lantern. The Green Lantern ring is helpless against yellow colored objects. Interestingly 45’s don’t share this weakness. Green Lantern could have just plugged any number of yellow colored menaces during his career. Better yet why not get one of those nifty utility belts from my buddy Batman? If I was the Flash I would definitely grab some shrunken and knifes that I could hurtle at super speed like the Whirlwind, of the Marvel universe, eventually did. Ok the Flash is a good guy and can’t use bladed weapons that kill but how about rubber balls that he throws at varying levels of super speed for different levels of lethality?
The Valiant universe is a later more complex universe than DC and Marvel and this complexity makes doppelgangers harder to find than between DC and Marvel. The Batman aversion to guns, a prime example of the weapon monomania that plagues comic books, does not exist in the Valiant universe. Most of the Valiant heroes will grab and use weapons as opportunity allows. Being a martial arts enthusiast and big fan of weapons of opportunity I like this characteristic of the Valiant universe. The X-O Manowar, a Valiant hero for whom a post will be written, is a barbarian that understands swords and does not fully understand super armor, when abducted by Aliens, but understands a weapon is a weapon and you might as well grab a good one when you can.
line, often have a category of villain they go after rather than just fighting bad guys in general and this is characteristic is hard to match in the DC or Marvel universe. There will be 22 posts in this series including this one. In comic books there is a fashion to start a series with zero rather than #1 and I like to be fashionable. Anyway, this is the numbering system of the major arcana of the Tarot and therefore good enough for me.
The Valiant heroes covered in the series will include:
I have about 100 plus “What if fights” planned for this blog so stay tuned. We have to assume that for these fights to even happen both fighters live in a common universe. Anyway this is the assumption I will make in all “What if fights” since the whole how they meet thing is repetitive and tiresome. The same assumption will be used in the “What if dates” post the second major category of this blog site.
Dr. Hugh Fox III 