Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking in Comic Books.
- Amelia Rules!:
- The Legion of Steves is responsible for the Hindenburg, Three-Mile-Island and Dr. Phil.Captain Amazing: How ... how evil!
- Also this:Kyle: If my parents ever got together their mere proximity to each other would create a burst of antimatter that would DESTROY LIFE ON EARTH! Plus they'd probably argue a lot.
- The Legion of Steves is responsible for the Hindenburg, Three-Mile-Island and Dr. Phil.
- Animaniacs: Issue #58 starts with a villain saying "My name struck fear deep into the hearts of my enemies. I commanded a legion of evil masterminds who obeyed my every whim. I had a cleaning service!".
- In Aquila, Piro wonders if Rome will survive the riots of 68 AD. Triscus replies that it's survived Gaulish invasions, the reign of Sulla, and the poetry of Virgil, so it can survive a mob.
- Archie Comics:
- Variation: Resident Big Eater Jughead Jones once lost a bet to Reggie Mantle, and the former has to go through a Humiliation Conga, watched by fellow students, with some even participating in the punishments to Juggie. The punishments go as follows: buying a dozen eggs dressed up as a clown, getting all the eggs dropped on him, followed by mud. In order to wash himself up, Reggie then has Jughead take a bath, with the bathtub in the middle of the road. Juggie goes through such harassment stoically, until the last one, where he had to get a kiss from Ms. Riverdale, which actually pushed his Berserk Button. Justified, seeing as Juggie is a romance hater...
- Another from the same comics:Archie: Jug! I did it! I finally did it!
Jughead: Figured out the riddle of the Sphinx? Went for a ride in a UFO? Got better than a D in History? I know, I know, that last part was a bit far-fetched. - And again, sort of:Mr. Weatherbee: Jughead staying in school when he doesn't have to? Something's going on... And that could involve anything from creating atomic energy to a candy bar with 10 flavors!
- In the Batman: Black and White story "An Innocent Guy", the titular average joe lines up his plan to kill Batman. "One day he'll be face to face with Two-Face... or he'll be tangling with Poison Ivy... or in the lair of... those three guys with animal masks whose names I can never remember!" For the record, he means the Terrible Trio; the Fox, the Shark, and the Vulture.
- Deadpool tends to fuse it with And This Is for......generally with the Jaywalking item being utterly unrelated to whoever he's attacking.
- Including attacking Roxxon Oil (an Expy of Exxon) for the crash and oil spill of the Exxon Valdez.
- He also likes to subvert this by adding Squirrel Girl as the example that would otherwise be the jaywalking. During the Civil War, he compared the walking nukes like the Iron Mans, the Thors and the Squirrel Girls. Later on he compared the psychos like himself, Doctor Dooms and Squirrel Girls. The subversion being that Squirrel Girl is the most powerful character in Marvel, being a joke character who is regularly shown to have defeated very powerful villains quite easily, and a regular breaker of the fourth wall, a sign of apparent insanity that she and Deadpool share.
- During a dimension hopping story arc, he ended up being transported to a Wild West universe where according to the universe's Nick Fury, he was wanted for murder, kidnapping, robbery, and stampeding a herd of pygmy goats through an orphanage.
- Used regularly in De Cape et de Crocs. For example when pirates finally catch up with the heroes who stole their ship: "We'll make you bleed! We'll make you suffer! We'll make you apologize!"
- In the Disney comic "High Tech Trek", John D. Rockerduck's plane crashes into another plane and he frantically asks the pilot for a damage report. The pilot casually replies that one of the engines is out and the plane is falling, then freaks out because his cigarette lighter got broken.
- In the French comic, Donito: L'ile Aux Pirates, the titular character, after returning home, recounts his story to his parents. His father, before punishing him, lists off his many offenses, which include: running away for three days without telling anyone, running away with a complete stranger who he knew was a pirate, poisoning three other pirates, almost drowning in a fight with a giant octopus and....drinking from a bottle of rum. Granted, Donito's a kid, so he shouldn't be drinking but compared to the other things, it shouldn't even be worth mentioning.
- D.R. & Quinch:
- Presented for your consideration, the opening to D.R. & Quinch Go Straight from 2000 AD is a long List of Transgressions that include:
Judge Thorkwung: Ernest Errol Quinch and Waldo Dobbs, also known as "D.R." or "Diminished Responsibility", you are charged with arson, kidnapping, theft, grievous wounding, possession of unlawful atomic weapons, taking and driving away, conspiracy to overthrow the government, coveting thy neighbour's ox, graverobbing, torture, criminal libel, blackmail, polluting the environment, shoplifting, 714 separate driving offenses, forging sacred relics, transmuting base metal into gold, genocide, spitting, and thirty-two offenses so unusual and horrible they do not have names.- Another D.R. & Quinch adventure has the boys in the Space Marines. The Corps anthem is full of threats against people they don't like and include:We'll nick your dogs, We'll nuke your schools,
We'll stretch you on the rack,
We'll borrow all your garden tools,
And never give them back!
- Phil Foglio likes this one:
- Now Museum, Now You Don't features the four goddesses Okaraska, Boolatraaca, Xynotreen and Trixie.
- The intro to Blue Opal: "The Matriarchs of the Corporate States had renounced the ancient Treaty of the Blind Carp; the Mountain Tribes were overcoming their fear of being at ground level; the Master of the Gutta-Percha Throne had begun his mad jihad against the color orange; and the Warriors of the White Deserts were tracking sand all over everything."
- InThe Adventures of Rex Kevlar, Chapter 17, Iolanthe lists all the weird places where she and Rex have had sex: "In Zero G, underwater, in a time dilation field, by remote control and in the back seat of a Volkswagen Bug." That isn't ordinary, that's damn near miraculous.
- Practically every time he's described in G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero (Marvel) comics, Major Bludd is noted to be a high priced mercenary, a sadistic killer, and an avid but terrible poet. Then again, it can be said that he's never been so cruel to any human being as he has to the English language.
- The rare times that his poetry has been displayed, it's clear that, quite frankly, it is terrible.
- Green Lantern: In Hal Jordan's brief tenure as The Spectre, a situation once necessitated calling for aid from "Superman! Batman! Zauriel!" Yes, after naming two of the most iconic characters in all of fiction, the next person he names is unknown even to most comic readers. That said, Zauriel was a teammate of Superman and Batman in the JLA just a few years previous. (And he's an angel, so he's the right guy to call for theological problems.)
- I Am Weasel: In comic book store "X Marks the Baboon", I.R. Baboon finds a treasure map and imagines himself living "a lifestyle of diamonds, high-class parties and rubber band collecting".
- Iceman and Angel #1 had the locations of anyone who could help the X-Men in question stop "Goom, the Thing from Planet X!" The Avengers: taking on Kang. The Fantastic Four: taking on Annihilus. The military: um...Namor: For the last time, I can't "surrender"! This isn't an invasion of your surface world! I just wanted a bagel!
- In one issue of Justice Society of America set in an alternate timeline, Power Girl is talking about why she uses a particular soap:"Best I've found for blood, monster guts, chili..."
- Laff-A-Lympics:
- Using a stolen magic credit card in "The Discount of Monty Cristo", Dread Baron buys a car, jewels, gold and a pound of sugar.
- In "The Miraculous Moon Meet!", an alien offers 50 tons of gold to whoever defeats him. Dread Baron thinks about using that gold to buy "Cars! Yachts! Airplanes! Even a pound of coffee!"
- Issue 2 of The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck ("Master of the Mississippi"): Scrooge demands that the Beagle Boys be arrested for "stealing gold, demolishing a riverboat without a permit, and wearing women's clothing!"
- Lobo's List Of Crimes:"Wanted for crimes against the Galaxy including: Genocide ... Fratricide ... Patricide ... Matricide ... Impersonating a member of the Intergalactic Church of Truth ... Impersonating a member of the Green Lantern Crops ... Carrying a concealed thermo-nuclear device ... Breaking into the Justice League Satellite ... Fishing without a license ... Jaywalking ... Grand theft plasma rocket ... Disturbance of the peace across three space sectors ... 1,978,643,896 unpaid parking permits ... Illegal bounty hunting ... Wanton destruction of government property ... Demolishing a city without a permit ... Reckless endangerment toward animals ... Hijacking ... Selling/distributing radioactive material to cute fluffy bunny rabbits ... Noise infractions level 5.0 ... Illegally poaching Starros ... Bounty Huntering in a restricted zone ... Stepping on the grass ... Defecating in a public garden ... Loitering ... Advocating the overthrow of the heads of state ... Not honoring the bounty hunter code.
- In the MAD story "Mad goes to an Alfred Hatchplot Movie", the protagonist is greeted in one scene with "I know who you are, Sidney Zinn! I'm another Hatchplot villain! By ze vay, ze plot for zis movie has gotten quite complicated since you first got here! Namely, you are wanted for murder, grand larceny, treason, and holding an overdue library book! Climb aboard!"
- At The Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera story "The Man who Stole Thursday", a judge charges Mr. Mastermind with "Grand larceny, resisting arrest and doing the Pennsylvania polka in Rhode Island".
- Mars Attacks!: Judge Dredd, a bust leads Dredd to bring charges against one of the crime bosses of MegaCity One, those charges being "mutant trafficking, snuff-slug production, and keeping of exotic pets without a license."note
- Marvel Year In Review 1993 had an article on the Darker and Edgier trend in comics which mentions the "boy scout oath" of Silver Age superheroes: "I promise to do what's right, to treat others decently, as I would like to be treated, to help old ladies across the street, to take my hat off in the presence of our flag, to hold myself to the highest standards of The Comics Code Authority, to never take human life under any circumstances, even when they really deserve it, and to eat all of my vegetables, even the brussels sprouts."
- And later in the same article:
And it's getting harder and harder to remember a time when heroes-gone-hardcore such as Phoenix and Yellowjacket had to be brought to heel for their less-than-heroic actions. Today, they'd be headlining two books apiece, with guest appearances galore. Think about it: cosmic genocide and spouse abuse pale in comparison to the ever-present thread of street hoods with guns. - In the one of the Archie Mega Man comics' "Short Circuits" segments, Dr. Wily builds a robot called "Police Man" to infiltrate the police force, but Wily ends up getting "arrested" by his own creation, who proceeds to run off a long list of the evil doctor's crimes:Police Man: You're under arrest for theft, breaking and entering, knowing endangerment of the populace, disturbing the peace, assault, forgetting to call your mother on her birthday, reckless driving...
- Moorish Evilness (Perfidia Moruna) is an hilarious Spanish comic. Its villian, Mohammed-el-Klithoris (the name "Mohammed" sounds almost exactly as the Spanish word for "wet my", so...) is showed to the reader with this description:The Big Bad, Mohammed-El-Klithoris: cruel and sinister unscrupulous criminal, specialist on: mugging, kidnapping, smuggling, minors perversion, murders, slave trading, piracy, raping, abortion, prostitution, conspiration, desertion, corruption, fornication, desecration, vampirism, sadism, cannibalism, materialism, vandalism, bolchevism, nepotism, tribadism, separatism, terrorism, astigmatism, schizophrenia, homicide, parricide, genocide, blasphemy, bribery, paranoia, morphine, heroin, naphtalene, tax evasion, Aedippus, hives, double parking, adultery, obstinacy, divorce, premeditated suicide, and even masturbation...
- In Max and Moritz by Wilhelm Busch, after the boys put gunpowder into teacher Lämpel's pipe and it explodes, the author (or Lämpel?) muses: Who shall teach the children now? Who shall multiply the knowledge? What should the teacher use for smoking now?
- Mortadelo y Filemón:
- At the end of one episode, Filemón tells the Villain of the Week that he'll now be arrested for "deceit, breaking and entering, and spoiling our view". (To which the villain responds with an Insanity Defense.)
- The list of forces the Superintendent calls to find Mortadelo and Filemón after one of their escapes:
Super: Security personnel! Civil Guard! Mossos!note Ertzaintza!note Goat shepherds! GET THEEEEEEEEM!!! - Winston inverts this in the first issue of IDW's "The New Ghostbusters":Winston: Y'all invented a whole new technology, outsmarted Sumerian deities, and managed to never once try to seriously kill Pete here... Those are some big achievements, and it's time to top yourselves, guys.
- From Ms. Marvel (2014), Kamala tells off The Inventor for his plan to use millennials as a green power source.Ms. Marvel: What do I think? I think you're a wannabe evil genius who thinks he's saved the future when really he's just given up on it. I think you're a megalomaniac with some kind of weird Pied Piper complex. I think you're a bird!
The Inventor: I am NOT a bird! - In the sixth issue of the Muppet Babies (1984) Comic-Book Adaptation by Star Comics/Marvel Comics, the Muppet Babies confront Professor Feend's robot Oxo, with three of them having some choice words to say about the automaton assisting his creator's scheme to steal the toys of every child in the world.Gonzo: You're a bully!Kermit: You're not nice!Fozzie: You're funny-looking!
- In Nightwing (2016 series) #4, Dr Leviticus claims to have found the cures for death, ageing, and lactose intolerance.
- From the Dean Koontz graphic novel In Odd We Trust: Odd is beating on a child killer with a bucket, each statement accompanied by a stronger blow than the last. "This is for killing Joey! This is for kidnapping Sherry! And this... IS FOR SAYING MY PANCAKES SUCK!"
- The main characters of The One Hundred Nights of Hero are executed for witchcraft, reading while female, and sassiness.
- In one issue of The Pink Panther comic book, our hero ends up in the Middle Ages and is mistaken for Robin Hood. The reasons given by the Sheriff of Nottingham for hanging him include highway robbery, poaching the king's deer, taking from the rich and giving to the poor, and dancing without a permit.
- From PS238:Ron: They didn't make the pizza so you need super powers to eat it, did they?
Tyler: I'd stay away from the "Special Diet" section: there's radioactive, alien protein, cheese that moves, minerals, and ones with pineapple on them.
Ron: Pineapple? Ew.
Tyler: I know, right? - In one issue of The Punisher (Issue #2 of the three-issue Back-to-School special), Frank hunts down a group of killers who act as a goth-metal band, wearing nightmarish costumes and performing their murders onstage so as to make it seem like it's All Part of the Show. Their ghoulish acts include kidnapping of their victims, forcibly drugging them into compliance, locking them in chains and cages like animals, brutally torturing them onstage before murdering them, and lip-synching the songs they perform.
- Red Sonja vs Thulsa Doom: In Issue #3, a Hyrkanian soldier lists the many crimes Sonja is wanted for. These include regicide, 57 counts of homicide, public brawling, public drunkenness and public urination.Sonja: Well, the drink had to go somewhere.
- Rick and Morty (Oni):
- In an inversion, Rick calling out Morty for always asking for help in issue 31:
Rick: grandpa, pick me up from the mall. grandpa, help me with my homework. Grandpa, help me fight a giant kaiju monster because I’m a f&#*ing dum-dum- The Fascist dimension in Issue 29 is caused by centuries of income inequality and poverty that dipshits can use to turn folks against each other. A nearby planet that’s been at war for millennia full of immigrants and refugees who are just trying to find a better life. A history of intellectuals wiped out by lies. Some Weimar republic shit. Even unimaginative graphic design.
- Secret Six:
- From #5:
- And again from Secret Six #32, when Theus explains why he's in Hell.Theus:I am an adulterer, Lord.
Ragdoll: That hardly seems fair, to be consigned just for...
Theus: And a mass murderer, and a wearer of shoes made of human leather, Lord Ragdoll of the Infernal Bend.
Ragdoll: Well, okay, ewww, but still...
Theus: I also lied about my commitment to recycling.
- Shade, the Changing Man: Issue 51 of the Peter Milligan series has the Burning Angel taunt Shade by asking if his next suicide attempts will use gas, electrocution and MTV.
- One The Simpsons comic showed Homer being arrested for "Purchasing obscene material! Publicly reading obscene material! Bagging and boarding obscene material in the hopes it will go up in value!"
- Issue #4 of Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics) features Robotnik returning to Mobius after fleeing a giant salamander robot that escaped his control. While celebrating with the badniks, he exhorts them to "Leave nothing living alive! Burn! Pillage! Terrorize! Jaywalk!"
- Spider-Man: In issue #225 of Amazing Spider-Man, school registrar Harvey McNamara is attacked by the Foolkiller and urges Spider-Man to go after him because "He ruined my paperwork! He wrecked my office! He... he called me a fool!" Lampshaded by Spider-Man, of course.Spider-Man: Not to mention that he tried to kill you, eh?
- Superman:
- In How Luthor Met Superboy, teenager Kal-El puts out a fire which is burning down a young Lex Luthor's lab. When Superboy enters the shed, Lex angrily yells the combination of fire, chemical fumes and Superboy's Super-Breath has ruined his antidote for Kryptonite, has destroyed his breakthrough scientific discovery, and has made his hair fall out.
- Krypto the Superdog: One story of the Comic-Book Adaptation features Isis and Snooky gaining superpowers from Orange Kryptonite and using them to steal gold, art works and fish.
- DC Retroactive Superman: As reading the Daily Planet, Luthor grumbles he hates Superman because "The heroics! The headlines! The hair!"
- The Superman Adventures: Issue 22 has Perry White demand to know who is behind the sabotages plaguing Metropolis, how much money he's demanding and how he likes his eggs in the morning.
- A Taskmaster miniseries from 2020 has the title villain describing his mercenary life:So you do dirty deeds for dirtier dollars. Industrial, espionage, muscle work, bodyguarding, murder... Hell, even the lowest of the low... golf.
- In Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures #23, a space criminal named Bellybomb is sentenced to a toxic prison planet for seventeen life sentences for extortion, armed robbery, hijacking, kidnapping, torture, murder, man-eating, brain poaching, soul thievery...and impersonating a primitive deity named Bob. After the jailers read off these crimes, Bellybomb points out that they didn't mention his unpaid parking tickets.
- In Don Rosa's The Three Caballeros Ride Again, a wanted poster for bad guy Alfonso "Gold Hat" Bedoya reads "Bandito, Killer, Plain Rude Hombre".
- Through the Moon: When Callum tells Rayla about the possibility of rebuilding the Moonhenge and opening the death gate, his reasons against doing so are, in order: that Lujanne told him not to; that going through the death gate is extremely dangerous to the body, mind, and spirit; and that Rayla would have to swim. In water.
- At the start of the Tintin book "The Shooting Star " the astronomer who fears the comet will hit the Earth rants "There will be pestilence, and famine, and measles!"
- In IDW's Megatron: Origins miniseries, Starscream is brought before the Senate to give testimony about the Decepticon "fight club"...Senator: Prisoner Starscream, I am required to list your charges as follows...assault, murder, armed robbery, destruction of state property, inciting civil disobedience, extortion, receiving and selling stolen goods, passing counterfeit funds, firing up on a state senator, multiple counts of attacks on state officers and state property, supplying known criminals with illegal weaponry, vehicle theft, and misrepresenting yourself as a state official.
Starscream: Heh. Nobody's perfect. - In The Transformers: More than Meets the Eye, the "Lost Light Insider" posts a story about post-Heel–Face Turn Megatron getting into a fight with Ultra Magnus, and Nautica delivers a scathing indictment of the Insider:Nautica: It's a scandal sheet, Riptide. It uses gossip, mockery and slander to titillate its readers, and whoever writes it should be ashamed of themselves. And "Mags v. Megs" would have made a much better headline.
- What The--?!, in its "Secret Origin of the Pulverizer" story, had Frank Casket hop into a little grocery store and order a gigantic list of guns and explosives, plus a packet of Juicy Fruits.Shopkeeper: Okay, but there's there's a three-week waiting period on the Juicy Fruits.
- In Wildsiderz, Dr. Tyberius Spydre lists among his inventions "the anti-anti-aircraft missile, the internet, and, of course, those lovable, huggable Pumpkin Patch Kids."
- During World War Hulk, Amadeus Cho recruits Hercules and Angel to help him save the Hulk, using a bunch of the latter's money buy up land that could be used as a preserve where the Hulk could roam free. Angel is not pleased, and angrily chastises Amadeus for stealing his money, ruining his reputation...and being a socialist after the boy makes a remark about Angel not actually earning his fortune to begin with.
- Wynonna Earp: When Wynonna deals with the zombie mailmen, she reels off a long of list federal laws they are guilty of breaking, ending with 'sending human body parts through the mail'.
- From X-Factor #89: "I've used my mutant dinosaur power until now to commit robberies...murder...mayhem...postal fraud!"
