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"No one messes with The Main Man!"

"The name's Lobo. That's 'L' as in 'lacerate', 'O' as in 'obliterate', 'B' as in 'disemBowel', and 'O' as in, uh, oh, I guess I can use 'obliterate' twice, huh, whaddya think?"
— 'Lobo', Superman: The Animated Series, "The Main Man"

He who devours your entrails and thoroughly enjoys it. Scourge of the Cosmos. Mister Machete. The Main Man.

THE '90s Anti-Hero ...IN SPACE!

Lobo is a fictional character that appears in comic books published by DC Comics. Created by Roger Slifer and Keith Giffen at first introduced as a hardened villain, but soon fell out of use with writers. He remained in limbo until his revival on a title of his own in the early 1990s. Now a Badass Biker alien born on the formerly utopian, now defunct planet of Czarnia, being the Last of His Kind and making a living as an interstellar soldier of fortune for the highest bidder. Super-strong and unkillable, well-known and feared across the universe, it is said that he never misses his mark. The Main Man has frequently clashed with Superman, although they have on occasion found themselves on the same side.

His is possibly one of the most convulted Character Development in comics' history, Depending on the Writer he was originally intended as an over-the-top Genre Deconstruction of the 1990s trend towards "grim and gritty" superhero stories epitomized then by Marvel Comics, to become into the genre's Poster Boy, either way he has always been enthusiastically accepted by fans not just of this trend, but comics fans in general. His popularity led him to have a much higher profile in DC Comics stories from then on, as well as starring roles in various series and media in the decades since, including the DC Animated Universe and Krypton (the latter was his live-action debut).

Click here to go to the character index page surrounding his series.

He also has his own Self-Demonstrating page here.


Lobo provides examples of the following tropes:

  • '90s Anti-Hero: invoked It wasn't up to 1990 that he was turned into an attempt of a parody to this sort of characters. Later played straight at times after he got a lot of Misaimed Fandom popularity.
  • Action Pet: Dawg, his perennial Loyal Animal Companion. An alien critter that only happens to look like an earthling Bully Bulldog, able to read, smoke, drink and understand everything that happens in the Crapsack World Lobo moves in.
  • Adaptational Hairstyle Change: Lobo's hair is been portrayed in several different styles across many arcs and media.
  • Alien Animals: At times they can act as a Berserk Button or a soft-spot to him, proving Lobo is not that irredimable. In-Universe there are several of them acting as allies or a nuisance to him. Counting them all we can find Space Dolphins, his on-'n-off frienemies Killer Penguins, a Gorilla that at times is seen amongst his aquiaintances and of course, Dawg.
  • Aliens Are Bastards: Even though it was all created as a twisted parody, Lobo checks every box without getting into the Galactic Conqueror territory. He's simply a Hair-Trigger Temper hedonistic ruff 'n tumble self-serving spacefaring scrapper who happens to be just a freakin' invincible soldier of fortune ready 'n steady for business, fun and everything in between.
  • All Bikers are Hells Angels: Lobo embraces this trope wholeheartedly... IN SPACE!
  • All Your Powers Combined: Check every '90s Anti-Hero he's a parody of, a Badass Biker with hellish traits like Ghost Rider, tall, all but impossibly buff and equipped with futuristic gadgets as Cable, tough as nails with Healing Factor as Wolverine, combat savvy and all-time packed like The Punisher and insanely strong as the then revived The Mighty Thor. His re-invention was a Take that, Marvel! so massive that even Stan Lee declared himself an instant fan!
  • Alternate Company Equivalent: While his powers are specific parodies of several Marvel characters. Lobo himself was parodied there when:
    • Deadpool meets up with a very similar character named "Dirty Wolff".
    • The circle came 'round again with Lunatik, an even more over-the-top (if that can be believed) parody of Lobo. It should be noted that both characters were created by the same person, and Lobo is actually a Decomposite Character of the former (the other half went into Ambush Bug).
    • Rob Liefeld's Bloodwulf. Of course, all of Liefeld's characters are stupidly overmuscled grizzled anti-heroes - this time he just meant it as a joke. Bloodwulf even sticks his hand in an electrical socket to get his hair stand up as Lobo's. The cover of the first issue of his comic features Bloodwulf smiling menacingly as Lobo's limp body hangs from his own chain, by the way. And the second issue features a cameo by Lobo as a drunken has-been.
    • Death's Head's creator, Geoff Senior considers him to be Marvel's equivalent to Lobo with them being crazy space assassins.
  • Amusing Alien: An egotistical Jerkass with Hair-Trigger Temper who indulges in various forms of Black Comedy.
  • Anti-Hero: Not the first example of this trope, but the one who made the line between the outright Villain Protagonist and the Heroic Comedic Sociopath so blurry that nowadays is nonexistent and by a long shot. All of this of course Depending on the Writer and on how seriously he's being played in that particular issue.
  • Arch-Enemy: SEVERAL not counting practically every hero and villain in The DCU at one point or another, but the most common are Vril Dox II, the Omega Men, the Khunds, the Psions and Goldstar.
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: An issue of Lobo has as woman spurned by the Main Man for being too flat jumping onto a vat of breast growing cream, causing her to grow to gigantic proportions and track him down, then giving him a taste of Marshmallow Hell.
  • Ax-Crazy: Lobo is a massive one, which explains his chosen profession of intergalactic hitman. He will gleefully fight anyone and anything including Superman, the Justice League, the Teen Titans or Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny (both last he murdered).
  • Badass Biker: Lobo, the baddest bastich of them all, rides a motorcycle.
  • Bad Santa: The Lobo Paramilitary Christmas Special featured Lobo being hired by the Easter Bunny to whack a Badass Santa who ended up getting into a machete fight with the alien bounty hunter. Santa is also portrayed as a merciless taskmaster who has a monstrous gorilla named Kong as a pet.
  • The Big Guy: Well over 6´4´´/300 lbs. Super-strong, combat savvy and impervious to harm.
  • Bloodbath Villain Origin: He's actually the protagonist (one hesitates to say "hero" rather than the villain) a lot of the time, but Lobo's origin story checks each and every box on this trope.
  • Blood Knight: Alien scrapper, mass murderer, miscreant, and dedicated wearer of leather and spikes who enjoys and indulges in good ole' fashion ass-whupping brawls as much as the next Jerkass and as often as he can have'em. Quite appropriate for a space biker, too.
    • Hell itself rejected him for being too much of a troublemaker to deal with.
    • Warrior Heaven Valhalla, where the courageous dead fight all day, pull themselves back together at sunset, then feast and drink before they get some sleep so they can repeat the process the next day, kicked him out for being too violent... Let that one sink in for a bit!
  • Bloodless Carnage: Lobo's enemies, for a time, had a vested interest in not making him bleed. Because that only produced backup.
  • Bloody Hilarious: While Lobo is treated seriously when guest-starring in other DC Universe books, his own titles usually run on this, with over-the-top stories and equally zany slaughters.
  • Bloody Murder: Of the "Blood Horrors" kind, At times, Lobo posseses the ability to spawn a full-sized clone from a single drop of blood, though it was genetically removed by Vril Dox, his former employer in LEGION Different writers have seen fit to bring it back or take it off, at their own discretion.
  • Borrowed Biometric Bypass: In a Weird Worlds story, Lobo hijacks an elevator that reaches his destination, but the doors won't open. The elevator attendant explains that they're tied to his DNA, and the sensor for which is several floors up, where they just came from, the elevator won't go back up because he didn't have the chance to use it when Lobo hopped in. Since there's no ceiling between them and the sensor, Lobo just blown the attendant's brains out, splattering them on the sensor.
  • Bounty Hunter: His main gig is to catch interstellar fugitives, whether they're running from the law or just rich crime lords. This as itself minimizes his range of action as a whole since he moonshines from time to time also as everything, from Bodyguard to Mercenary, Private Detective, Psycho for Hire and even Hunter of Monsters. It's a job that basically allows him to be a complete Jerkass to everyone around him and still get paid.
  • But What About the Astronauts?: One Lobo story had him being sent to capture his fourth grade teacher who was offworld when he bioengineered flying scorpions to wipe out his race.
  • Catchphrase:
    • "Feetal's Gizz!"
    • "No one messes with The Main Man!"
    • "The Main Man always delivers!"
    • "The Main Man's word's his bond!"
  • Catchphrase Insult: Lobo often uses the Unusual Euphemisms "Frag" and "Bastich" as derogatives.
  • Cigar Chomper: Have you ever listened that one that Batman Can Breathe in Space? Well... that's wuzzy-pansy stuff, Lobo smokes and even is able to listen IN SPACE!... somehow!
  • Clothing Damage: He has the ability to near instantly regenerate any damage done to his body, even from being reduced to a puddle. Unfortunately, his clothing doesn't grow back, often leaving him bare naked after, and occasionally during, his fights. Lobo seems to understand how this makes people feel, being depicted as "Generously endowed" and takes great pleasure in the discomfort his nudity brings to others.
  • Combat Pragmatist: The Main Man's word might be his bond but make no mistake, he's capable of anything no matter how down low, dirty, tricky or cheap to get the upper hand in a brawl.
  • Cool Bike: Tripling up as Cool Starship and The Work Horse, his "Spaz-Frag 666" is a fully equipped speeder that travels at warp speed and one time it was a fully functional Time Machine. Faithful to its owner can be also a Flying Arsenal filled to the exhaust with several of the deadliest weapons in the known universe. It even responds to his whistle commands!
  • Costume Copycat: In the New 52, Lobo gets dramatically reinvented. Since "Classic Lobo" had already appeared in Stormwatch, it was explained that the existing character was a fake Lobo. This itself was eventually retconned.
  • Death by Adaptation: The Earth 2 continuity has him die with the rest of the Czarnians, the sole survivor of the species instead being a female who joins the Four Furies of Apokolips as Pestilence.
  • Death Seeker: Two instances in Lobos Back:
    • After (apparently) kicked the bucket for good, Lobo managed to get back As Himself, nevertheless Heaven's bureaucracy wasn't having any of it. So it was brought Back from the Dead first as a woman and then as a "fragg'n squirrel"... On the first part the best solution he could came up with was to snuff himself (...herself?) so this process could be completed at his full satisfaction.
    • Heck... he even attempted to woo Death in person (..all but for entirely different reasons) in the middle of his planned revenge against Heaven!
  • Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Not just punch out, Lobo has obliterated powerful Cosmic Entities like Solaris, Starro and half of the Heavenly Hosts no less after face them in combat!
  • Disney Death: Possibly the most badass of 'em all ever! Before he attained Complete Immortality he had one of this across three incarnations, even had to fight against the Heavenly Hosts themselves so he could go back to normal.
  • Distaff Counterpart:
  • The Dreaded: Lobo is by far one of (if not the) best Bounty Hunter actually in DC Comics. The kind of guy you don't want on your trail or mess around with for that matter.
  • Early-Installment Weirdness: Lobo was originally a no-nonsense villainous mercenary who debuted in an obscure title back in 1983. As a matter of fact, his race wasn't even Czarnian, but Velorpian, a greedy and dangerous race that vowed that for every one of their own who was killed, they would spawn a hundred replacements. His hair was also purple and he tended to dress in a rather gaudy way using just a skin-tight orange/purple full-bodysuit.
  • Eviler than Thou: His general reaction every time demons or hellish fiends come to subject is... more than predictable.
    "An' this is yer far-famed Hell, huh? Gotta' say I seen shabbier!"
    "Pucker up, ya big-eared, yellow-bellied bastich! The Main Man's a-comin' — an' he ain't takin' prisoners!"
  • Exact Words: Lobo is a man of his word, his very exact word. Don't piss him off, or he'll merrily violate the spirit of a deal without violating the letter.
  • Explosive Cigar: In an Alternate Continuity Batman/Lobo crossover, Lobo kills The Penguin this way. Also in the example below here.
  • Extended Disarming: Lobo: Bounty Hunting for Fun and Profit.
  • Family-Unfriendly Death: Expect this every time The Main Man wants to fulfill a contract on his mark... or someone just pissed him off... or anybody just crossed his path...
  • Fartillery: In one of Lobo's stories, he resolves an epic duel with his Nigh Invulnerable half-Czarnian daughter Su-Lehmon by eating a can of beans (an obvious Popeye spoof) and setting his fart on fire to create a nuclear explosion.
  • Fat Bastard: A year before the trope namer appeared in theaters Lobo slaughtered an outlaw gang that called themselves the Fat Bastards. Their hat was, naturally, obesity and gaining weight and they were robbing Al's diner of money while forcing him to feed their immense appetites. One member took up a booth that was occupied, by crushing the previous patrons under his immense bulk.
  • Finishing Stomp: Have you heard the saying "Kick them when they're down"? As you probably have guessed if you came this far, that never would be enough for Lobo.
  • Flaw Exploitation: His New 52 self at Red Daughter of Krypton, knowing Supergirl is on the verge of a fit of rage, Lobo pushes all her Berserk Buttons so she cannot fight effectively, and then he moves the fight to New York, thinking that she will not dare to fight in the middle of a city. Subverted because he made Kara so irrationally, blindingly furious that she couldn't think anything other than "Trash Lobo NOW!" However, he can't capitalize on her mistakes because she is too tough to be easily taken down, and her superior speed means her sloppy but increasingly stronger blows eventually connect.
  • Foil: He's Superman's opposite in nearly every meaningful way. They're both the last surviving members of their races, at least by official title given how Superman has other Kryptonians like Supergirl or Zod and his crew show up in his stories despite his "Last Son of Krypton" moniker. However, Superman is mostly moral and upstanding while Lobo is amoral, crude, and violent. What's more, Superman was sent to Earth as a baby and had no say or control over the fate of his people. Lobo, by contrast, killed off his own people because he wanted to.
  • Future Slang: Lobo is prone to calling people "Fraggin' Bastiches," though the reference to actual swearing is decidedly obvious.
  • Gargle Blaster: Lobo has never been depicted as The Alcoholic, nevertheless there's an especial concoction called "Okaaran grape juice" that cause amnesia. Lobo restorsts on this when he really... really wants to forget something. He doesn't have to worry about its secondary effects since thanks to his Healing Factor, he Never Gets Drunk.
  • Genre Deconstruction: Lobo (Character and title, that is!) started as a Satire/Parody/Pastiche towards Darker and Edgier characters, and became popular among both people who hated those characters and those who loved them.
  • Genius Bruiser: While he comes off as a dimwitted oaf, Lobo is actually extremely intelligent. He once demonstrated the "genius" and "bruiser" parts simultaneously by calculating the speed at which the Flash was moving in his head, then hitting him at the right moment with enough force to bring him down.
  • God Is Dead: Lobo: A Contract on Gawd has him graphically murdering "Gawd" and his brother Dave (Both God and the Devil Expies).
  • Gory Discretion Shot: Subverted in Lobo's Paramilitary Christmas Special. While discussing the details of the Easter Bunny's contract hit on Santa Claus, a fluffy little bunny hops up to Lobo and sniffs at his fingers. A camera cut and a horrible squelching noise later, the camera cuts back to Lobo flicking bloody chunks off his hand with a large red stain where the bunny used to be. Ouch!
  • Good Thing You Can Heal: He is able to regenerate from even one remaining drop of blood. In one issue of his book, he resorts to blowing himself up just to take out all the enemies surrounding him.
  • Greaser Delinquents: At times, Lobo can be seen riding a sweet Space Caddy instead of his Cool Bike.
  • Groin Attack: Not even the Man of Steel was safe from this despite his Nigh-Invulnerability, Lobo once kicked Superman in his red suns with enough force to weaken him.
  • Hoist Hero over Head: "The Ultimate Bastich" couldn't be complete without practicing this one, quite useful when interrogating the whereabouts of his next mark or just as an intimidation maneuver.
  • Horrifying the Horror: The Main Man has risen hell in... well, THE HELL! And it got so rowdy that the place's upper-brass had to ask Heaven to take Lobo back!
  • Human Hammer-Throw: Especially when assisted by his trusty-rusty Chain 'n Hook.
  • Hunter of His Own Kind: If you want a not-so-sunny example of this trope, look at original-model Lobo. He hunted down and killed every single member of his own race... for fun! And a passing grade on his science project... which he gracefully gave himself.
    • Furthermore, every time his Self-Duplication kicks in, he takes each and everyone of his clones down the hard way so no one can claim his position as "The Main Man".
    • Recently he even accepted with gusto a contract against his own daughter, Crush, and the rest of the Teen Titans. The reasons are the pay is good and she is (Albeit, being half-Czarnian), the only thing messing with his Last of His Kind title.
  • I Gave My Word: He won't kill you if he's promised not to, no matter how much he may hate you. Do note, however, that under the right circumstances, it's quite possible to survive multiple cases of dismemberment.
  • Impossibly Cool Weapon: His most recognizable and signature one is a titanium alloy chain with a large gutting hook connected at the end he uses akin to a Blade on a Rope.
  • Indecisive Parody: This trope is a recurring issue for Lobo. He's iconically considered a parody of a comic-book badass — he has no redeeming qualities, his powers are designed to be inconsistent and include a healing ability that's so powerful it makes putting him in danger almost impossible, he has a dark backstory that's entirely his fault, he constantly swears but uses fake swear words, and his "badass" accomplishments include killing Santa Claus. But a lot of people, both fans and writers, see him as less a parody and more an exaggerated version of such characters.
  • Intimidating Revenue Service: Averted in "Death and Taxes". He solves the problem with violence as usual.
  • Irony: His homeworld was (supposedly) a paradise populated with Perfect Pacifist People and everything nice to the point of almost absurdity, and was completely unprepared for Lobo's birth.
  • iSophagus: Lobo once swallows a harmonica during a fistfight without noticing. His subsequent wheezing and the dark spot that shows up on the X-ray chart ends up being mistaken for lung cancer and promptly Played for Laughs as a desperate Lobo tries to quit smoking.
  • The Jailbait Wait: At the end of his second crossover with The Authority, he offers to come back for Jenny Quantum, who is a toddler at the time, when she becomes old enough. Much to her adoptive father Apollo's horror, Jenny is implied to reciprocate.
  • Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Does exterminate your entire civilization... as a science project ....For the Evulz counts?
  • Kavorka Man: Awesome by Analysis. Lobo is not what any sensible female could call the best catch, nevertheless he surely has a way with ladies.
  • Kicked Out of Heaven: Lobo was infamously kicked out of Heaven, Hell and even Valhalla because he was too much of a psychotic rowdy bastich for either side to stand.
  • Kryptonite Factor: His is in fact a given, he might have acquired immortality but since one of his main abilities is Super Smell, turns out several types of gases and toxins can render him unconscious or affect him severely.
  • The Lancer: Definitely this on the spacefaring L.E.G.I.O.N. team, and in Young Justice as the de-aged Slobo.
  • Large Ham: Though his insanely over-macho dialogue tends to mask it, Lobo is this trope in spades!
  • Last Grasp at Life: The famous Terminator 2: Judgment Day scene gets parodied in a comic where, while sinking in quick drying cement, Lobo (modified into a robocopesque cyborg at that time) uses his last gesture to give everyone a finger.
  • List of Transgressions: 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 Corps ... 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.
    • Possibly the most disturbing thing about this list is that it suggests you can get a permit for demolishing a city. (More than likely, the offense didn't mean "non-licensed building demolitions".)
  • Lobotomy: In one comic, Lobo had his brain transplanted into a Robocop expy. Once he got back to his real body, he repaid the people who used him by returning the favor...with a rusty butter knife.
  • Logical Weakness: In Red Daughter of Krypton, Lobo uses a sonic grenade to neutralize Supergirl. On the one hand, it works and Kara passes out because of the extreme pain. On the other hand, she's real mad when she comes to.
  • Manly Facial Hair: Handlebar moustache and cool, long Hot-Blooded Sideburns are his default, at times complete with a soul-patch.
  • Marshmallow Hell: An issue of Lobo combines this trope with Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever. He breaks up with a woman because she was too "flat", so she jumps into a vat of breast enlarging hormones that turns her into a Giant Woman, who exacts her revenge by smothering Lobo in her gargantuan cleavage.
  • The Maze: Destiny of the Endless' realm is the "Garden of Forking Ways", a fluctuating landscape which warps four-dimensional space, traversed by forking paths, where trespassers are doomed to wander around until their deaths. Lobo and Supergirl are the only ones who have managed to navigate their way out of the Garden in The Lords of Luck storyline, and it was only because Lobo's superpower is the ability to track down people across the universe, so he ignored the shifting geography and zeroed in on Destiny's presence... and because Destiny actually wanted to meet them.
  • Megaton Punch: Having Super-Strength this one's a given. In Lobos Back he provided two examples of this:
    • Just arriving to the line one must stand to access the final resting place, he delivered a swinging haymaker to the Heaven's P.D. Captain, ripping his jaw off in the process.
    • When facing the Heavenly Hosts, Lobo pulled a gigantic and powerful green Cosmic Entity towards him by the being long mustaches and punched the latter so hard that his eyes popped out from the tremendous impact.
  • Metal Head: Lobo's look, wearing always a leather vest and thick belt complete with spikes all over, demonic-looking skull betlbuckle and kneepads, blue / black jeans, biker footwear, long black hair, handlebar mustache, long sideburns and alien facial features akin to "Cadaver make-up". It also has been stated this is his favored music style.
  • Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds: Has blown up several planets, at least one star system, countless species, and an entire universe. All by accident though (save his own planet; he destroyed it on purpose), owing to nothing but apathy and a habit of leaving high explosives lying around. Not that he wouldn't have blown them all up anyway given the chance...
  • Misanthrope Supreme: Lobo's only concern is his welfare, having fun and party really hard, so he never has the time to socialize.... nor the interest into it. He's an all-bussines and none of the compassion kinda guy. So, the few times he has to form team-ups they're never permanent. If you happen not to be the one who contracted him or an impossibly attractive woman... your life expectancy is running dramatically short!
  • More Dakka: Lobo's also fond fo using as much fire-power as he can carry ...and that can be A LOT! Ranging from Hand Cannons to all but huge-ass BFGs and at times a Weapon of Mass Destruction. Due to a combination of Super-Strength, Toon Physics and Hammerspace, Lobo can be ridiculously packed if the situation calls it for.
  • Multiple Gunshot Death: Downplayed. Happened when he and a rival bounty hunter traded shots from their oversized machine guns. By the end of the fight, Lobo was reduced to almost a skeleton with more shells in him than skin and flesh, before keeling over but not dying.
  • My Species Doth Protest Too Much: Lobo's backstory is generally that he was an extremely belligerent member of a Perfect Pacifist People he genocided on a whim. In a crossover miniseries with Superman, it's established that his people were just as ultraviolent as him, they just highly suppressed it. When a cosmic tardigrade resurrects the Czarnians, they all take the opportunity to express their repressed murderous tendencies by engineering superweapons of mass destruction of their own to use on each other. Turns out that they all wanted to murder everyone else, Lobo just beat them to it.
  • Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Lobo's name in Khund means "He who devours your entrails and thoroughly enjoys it." More than one character has thought it meant "wolf" as one would expect. It should perhaps be pointed out that these are not mutually exclusive.
  • New Old West: Parodied in a Lobo Elseworlds annual in which Lobo takes the role of various Western characters (Geroni-bo, The Main Man With No Name, Anne Bo-kley, etc). The final story is about "The Last Despera-bo" ... who promptly gets hit by a truck.
  • Nominal Hero: Most of the time, Lobo is portrayed as one instead of a Satire/Parody/Pastiche of an unstoppable villain-full-stop. Considering that he is literally worse than Hitler, without any hyperbole involved, as he wiped out his own Pillars of Moral Character for kicks and giggles when he was a teenager... this reveals a lot about media conventions in general.
  • Offing the Offspring: Lobo has a nasty habit of killing the long-lost children of his that he comes across during his bounty hunting missions. The only known child of the "main man" that he's accepted as his legitimate progeny is his half-Czarnian teenage daughter, Crush. Nevertheless, if it wasn't for the rest of the Teen Titans, Lobo was about to fulfill a contract on her.
  • Only in It for the Money: His main motivation to do.... well, anything!
  • Our Wormholes Are Different: In a crossover between Lobo and The Mask, Lobo is hired to track a criminal who destroyed several planets. He gets sucked through a wormhole and destroys various planets after finding an insulting drawing of himself. He finds out in the end that the wormhole sent him a month back in time and he had been hired to arrest himself.
  • Pardon My Klingon: Lobo uses the words and phrases "frag", "Feetal's Gizz" (foetal's gizzard maybe?) and "bastich" - mixture of bastard and (son of a) bitch - as generic swearwords.
  • Persona Non Grata: Lobo has been banned from heaven, hell, and even Valhalla! Making him functionally immortal because he will always come back from whichever afterlife he ends up in.
  • Pet the Dog: Lobo parodies this: he is a relentless killing machine who often kills his bounties instead of capturing them, yet at the same time has a soft spot for "space dolphins". But he did once spare Aquaman's life because he felt he couldn't hurt somebody who loved dolphins as much as he did. He also displays an inexplicable fondness towards Ryan Choi and is the reason Ryan, as The Atom, is inducted into the JLA, despite Batman's wishes for Ryan to not join.
  • Pleasure Planet: Lobo once landed on a similar planet. After a while he got bored so he hacked into the planet communication systems and sent a broadcast, declaring that within a short time he will start killing everyone in sight. He never did but the resulting hysteria created much more amusing violence than he could hope to himself.
  • Politically Incorrect Villain: Whether he's presented as a violent Anti-Hero parody or a snarky bad guy, Lobo is presented as misogynist and a pervert in the same way guys like Archie Bunker are, because it's funny and he's not the type of guy fans are supposed to emulate. He's made lewd comments to most of DC's power players and in one story, ripped Starfire's top off as "payment for services".
  • Power Creep, Power Seep: One notorious example of this happened in the Marvel Versus DC crossover, where based on a fan poll, Wolverine beat Lobo. As Logan had bone claws at the time (plus his own healing factor was acting wonky due to the same incident that led to said bone claws) while Lobo is as powerful as Superman, this should have been impossible. The comic sidestepped the problems by; Number one: The rules set for every fight it was to avoid them to continue endlessly, given the power levels of much of the contestants, to just "immobilize" rather than submitt or completely defeat the opponent, and number two: not showing the battle! In fact the whole thing was less than a page, from the introduction of Lobo to Wolvie standing and dusting off his hands. And all the fighting happened behind a bar. It was later implied in Lobo's own comic that the Main Man was paid under the table to throw the fight.
  • Professional Killer: Potentially and if the price is right, you know for damn sure that the Main Man won't stop at nothing to get his mark (good or bad guy) and cash his dough.
  • Psycho Knife Nut: One of his many, many Superhero Sobriquets is "Mr. Machete" for a very good reason. His preferences are all but exclusive, ranging from Swords, to axes, machetes, combat knives and even a rusty butter knife once!
  • Put Their Heads Together: The maneuver that tends to follow a Double Neck Lift, a combo that never ends nicely to his victims.
  • Ramming Always Works: Either with his shoulder or on-board his Spaz-fragg 666, and there are very few thing than can stand on his path!
  • Red Baron: Subverted, as his actual name is unpronounceable by humans but translates to "He Who Devours Your Entrails and Thoroughly Enjoys It".
  • Rubber-Forehead Aliens: The Czarnians (Lobo's species) were (or just barely are, since Lobo is the last one) basically human except for red eyes, pale gray/chalk-white skin, and huge '80s Hair (usually black).
  • Scarily Competent Tracker: Lobo has an extremely good sense of smell in an atmosphere, and an additional sense that lets him track bastichs across the galaxy.
  • Self-Made Orphan: Lobo is not only a self-made orphan but a self-made Last of His Kind (see other entries as for how).
  • Self-Surgery: During a battle between Lobo and his daughter, they slash each other up so badly their regenerative powers can't keep up, so they take a break to stitch themselves up.
  • Shadow Archetype:
    • Lobo surprisingly checks all the right boxes to be Superman's Evil Counterpart and generally succeeds in being a Foil to Supes whenever they face each other.
    • Incredibly and company-wise, when paired with Dawg their relationship is a twisted mirror of that of Rocket Raccoon and Groot in Marvel Comics as spacefaring soldiers of fortune. Comes as no surprise when you notice Lobo and Rocket share the same writer as one of their creators.
      • Rocket is The Smart Guy to Groot's The Big Guy and depends on the latter's brute strength quite a lot. Lobo does all the work alone while Dawg is a resourceful, although mute comic relief, not often but whenever is required and in the nick of time, Lobo has being saved by the canine.
      • Groot and Rocket care very much for eachother, and if at times the raccoon can be a complete Jerk, he does have a heart of himself, Dawg's caring for Lobo is not very often reciprocated, to the point Lobo once apparently killed the poor critter, having enough of every time the canine has being held hostage for him to rescue. Dawg got better a little time later, though!
      • Rocket and Lobo by themselves can be pretty impressive Genius Bruisers, but while Rocket is the all-time Gadgeteer Genius due to his condition of Uplifted Animal without super-powers, Lobo is a Blood Knight with Super-Strength and Healing Factor.
      • Both the raccoon and the Czarnian have a penchant for BFG's, both are Gargle Blaster enthusiasts and they have made a living out of get paid to catch their marks putting all of themselves into it, but while Rocket can be pretty mindfull about how to bring a prisioner in and in conditions to collect his money, the Czarnian doesn't mind to bring them... well, lets just say alive an well necessarilly full stop.
  • Sickening "Crunch!": "Ruff' N' Tumble" doesn't even encompass Lobo's fighting style, he adores this one above any other, and not only one-on-one but taking it with as much opponents he's facing at once. If there's a style called "Gory and Wettie", you can bet'cha butt out that Lobo is its Grandmaster. Doubling up since this is his mostly favoured and literal Finishing Move.
  • Signature Move: Several examples can be found in here about his fighting style.
  • Sky Face: Parodied in the Lobo story "Infanticide": After Lobo fights and kills his daughter Su-Lehmon, her image appears in the sky, vowing that there'll be a next time and it'll be HIS image in the sky. (There wasn't).
  • Smarter Than You Look: Don't be fooled by his crass personality and ultraviolent behavior. Lobo is genuinely brilliant, thanks to his Super-Intelligence.
  • Solar-Powered Magnifying Glass: When Lobo got The Mask, he went on a galaxy-shaking rampage of random violence, at one point doing this to people of some unfortunate planet.
  • Space Whale: Lobo once joined a crew of space whalers whose ship was swallowed whole by an immense albino space whale. Lobo even met a Jonah analogue inside, shortly before eating him.
    • There are also "space dolphins", which as of 52 have their own religion. In 52, Lobo gets a talking space dolphin Morality Pet sidekick. Hilarity Ensues.
  • Space Whale Aesop: Lobo: I Quit is another deliberate example played as comedy. Shortly after Jonas Glim lectures Lobo on the dangers of his constant smoking, Lobo gains a wheezing cough and a shadow on his chest X-ray, suggesting not even his healing factor can keep up with the damage he's doing. At the end of the issue, Lobo has completely cured himself of his habit, a fed-up Jonas slugs him in the stomach for accidentally punching him—and Lobo coughs up the harmonica he swallowed in an earlier fight with a street gang dressed as a Salvation Army band; turns out he never had cancer in the first place, to which he promptly celebrates by smoking the tobacco the rest of the gang was smuggling. The moral can best be summed up as "Smoking is bad for you, unless you're the Main Man".
  • Strong and Skilled: While most of the time he can rely on enough brute strength to kick anybody's rear end, is not a rare occurrence to see him taking on several opponents at once, lying them all down flat on their butts.
  • Strong as They Need to Be: Depending on the Writer as you may have guessed, Lobo can inexplicably manhandle Superman just because "he dukes it out like a mad dog". Another time Lobo pulled down Solaris, who has stellar mass, without leverage and justified it by saying "he doesn't do logic". Recently he's been the only DC character able to break Deathstroke's Nth Metal chainmail armor bare-handed.
  • Stronger with Age: Lobo as an adult is on par with Superman in terms of strength and stamina. As the younger Lil' Lobo, he's far less durable. Lil' Lobo found this out the hard way during Our Worlds at War when he tried to fight an army of Para-demons and was shot to pieces. Extending to DC One Million, Lobo is left a balding, overweight and almost immobile slob... but stronger than ever.
  • Superhero Sobriquets: The Main Man, Mister Machete, The 'Bo, The Last Czarnian, The Master of Frag, Scrouge of the Cosmos, The Wedgie Master, Archbishop of the Alpha-Centauri Diocese of the Church of the Holy Space Dolphin.
  • Super-Persistent Predator: The kind that stops at nothing until he's got the prey... and collects his paycheck.
  • Superpower Lottery: Although his power level seems to be one of the most fluctuating not just within the DCU, but the whole gendre and it all is Depending on the Writer, Lobo's most known powers are derived from a combination of Bizarre Alien Biology and Toon Physics, and as far as we know, they were all traits shared by his now defunct race:
    • He has Complete Immortality due to a combination of being Barred from the Afterlife and a Healing Factor that regenerates him literally From a Single Cell, which also grants him Self-Duplication; should Lobo shed blood, this will reconstitute itself into another fully functional Lobo. Thus, a battle that could go poorly for the Main Man could quickly turn in his favor. In one story, Lobo was "killed" by having a very special bomb shoved down his throat, exploding in a spray of crimson... only for EACH bit of him to grow into a clone in seconds. The group then brutally murder the aggressor, and then turn on each other murdering themselves specifically in bloodless ways, until only one remained announcing that he was the one and only Lobo, and then goes off... um... doing Lobo type things. The "Lobo clones from blood" thing was, at one time, curbed. Vril Dox II, son of Brainiac and founder of the Legion of Super-Heroes' predecessor L.E.G.I.O.N., gave Lobo a concoction to drink, then sent him out on a mission. After one last army of Lobos, the cloning bit was deactivated, and only returned after Our Worlds at War, when the young Lobo (long story) was murdered by the Black Racer, respawning in various adult Lobos. DC Rebirth also removes the clones from his powerset, though.
    • While most DC examples have justifications for their all-but impossible strength (Bizarre Alien Biology, Technology, Magic and Powers, being Semi-Divine, etc.) Lobo's one on the other hand is just plain crazy.
    • He has Super-Toughness that lets him trade blows with Superman, Lobo has also taken planet destroying attacks with minimal damage, this extending to thermal attacks, since he "rides through the cold of space and the heat of blazing suns" no problem.
    • Lobo has also demonstrated a tremendous leaping ability, even in planetary atmospheres heavier our Earth's own.
    • Although he doesn't like relying on it, he has Super-Intelligence, especially when it comes to doing anything that can cause destruction. A very smart and extremely resourceful character, once he analysed the speed and momentum Flash was running at, and managed to to hook him with the chain at the right moment to bring him down... go figure! He can't cure a deadly disease, but he did create a horde of mutant insects that acted as carriers for one, the vaccine to make sure he survived and the insecticide to get rid the aforementioned plague of. That's why he's the last Czarnian: he killed them all that way. He even knows how to forge a Weapon of Mass Destruction out of junk and has hijacked his Space Bike to turn it into everything, from a warp speeder to a fully functional time-machine.
    • He Reads, speaks and fully comprehends 17,897 languages, even Morse code!
    • He has Insanity Immunity. In DC and The Mask crossovers, both The Joker and Lobo put on the titular mask, and it didn't affect their personalities much at all. Eventually Joker became much more destructive, and when Batman pointed out that this wasn't funny (by Joker's standards, anyway), Joker realized he was right and promptly took the mask off, showing that the mask actually did unlock inhibitions—it was making him pull stunts and commit crimes that he normally wouldn't think were "funny".
    • Lobo may not have Super-Speed, but he is a ridiculously Lightning Bruiser, being able to react to a Flash's movement fast enough to chain him in the face.
    • Being the over-the-top parody of any Scarily Competent Tracker you can think in, he's got extremely powerful senses.
      • An extra special sense that allowed them to notice the weak point in a potential opponent. This was the reason this civilization attained to be (...until Lobo came and blew it all up.) one of the most pacefull and respected within the known universe.
      • What has to be the most absurdly powerful sense of smell ever. Part of the reason Lobo is one of the greatest bounty hunters in the DC Universe is that he can track any number of targets across interstellar distances. It's said that once he catches your scent, there is nowhere in the universe you can hide from him.
    • The Main Man is able to listen sharply to even conversations in deep space... yes, as absurd as you read it!
    • His ridiculous amounts of strength extend even to his stomach. Once Lobo rolled an entire city (trillion tons of concrete, steel and glass) into a ball and ate it. And as demonstrated under the Fartillery entry, he can produce nuclear-level explosions with his flatulences.
  • Tall, Dark, and Handsome: Two out of three on any case, but well!
    • His default features and frame are not considered particularly handsome-like, but as told above, "The ladies say diff'rent!"
    • The New 52 version of him is all of this but tall.
  • Teens Are Monsters: The Main Man was on high school when one day and out of the blue decided to exterminate his entire civilization.
  • Testosterone Poisoning: Lobo, the Main Man of course, is a Darker and Edgier version.
  • There Can Be Only One: At one point the main man Lobo died. Luckily, he can regenerate from a single drop of blood. Unluckily, there were several thousand drops of blood splattered across a battlefield. So, several thousand Lobos found themselves in one place — and what followed was a awesome and horrifying deathmatch, until only one Lobo remained. The funny thing about this was that Lobo always had this power — Vril Dox, Brainiac 2, suppressed it. It wasn't until Lobo was forcibly regressed to a teen that it came back.
  • There Is Another: Lobo in his first own series "The Last Czarnian" has to discover that another Czarnian survived his genocide on his own race, and worse, it's his fourth grade math teacher (probably one of—if not the one—member of his race he hated most). And he has to bring her to Vril Dox unharmed. However after his contract with Vril Dox is fulfilled he quickly fixes that mistake by snapping her neck.
  • Throwing the Fight: In Marvel Versus DC, Wolverine defeated Lobo in a fight off-panel. Given at the time Wolverine didn't have his adamantium skeleton and only had bone claws, and Lobo has Superman-level strength and an insane Healing Factor, this seemed highly unlikely. Later, Lobo commented that some bald guy bribed him into throwing the fight.
  • Too Spicy for Yog-Sothoth: In one story, Lobo died. The story ends with Lobo back among the living and Heaven and Hell making him immortal for everything he did. OK, his rampage that devastated Heaven was justified, after they reincarnated him as a woman and then as a squirrel squished by his own corpse dying his original death (it wasn't on purpose), but everything he did before that wasn't.
  • Troubling Unchildlike Behavior: Lobo intentionally destroyed his whole people with a high school science project for not being up to his violent standards.
  • Twilight of the Old West: Parodied in the final story of A Fistful of Bastiches, an Elseworld that reimagined the Main Man as various Western characters. "The Last Despera-bo" is a wistful page of the character reflecting on how times are changing and there doesn't seem to be much place for him any more. Then he gets hit by a truck.
  • Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny: On their match at the famous DEATH BATTLE!, the primary reason stated why Lobo (who ironically fights Superman frequently) couldn't damage Ghost Rider in the slightest as the latter's level of toughness far exceeded Lobo to point where only holy weapons could actually hurt him. Unfortunately for Lobo, he didn't have any holy weapons in his arsenal at that moment and there was no way he could leave the fight to find any, as Ghost Rider could chase him across the universe. Things didn't end well for the Main Man.
  • The Unapologetic: The violence-addicted Hair-Trigger Temper Blood Knight Jerkass all comic fans everywhere love to not-to-hate.
  • Unreliable Narrator: The canon of his zaniest stories is questionable and has never been fully addressed, seeing as an example, Santa isn't depicted in stories that happened before or since Paramilitary Christmas Special; Lobo himself has spoken about it.
  • Use Your Head: Here and there all through many arcs.
  • Vitriolic Best Buds: Dawg, Etrigan and Aquaman are this and Bash Brothers to Lobo, there's also Guy Gardner who is his Drinking Buddy. The closest thing akin to a "friendship" he can afford himself.
  • War for Fun and Profit: One of his most lucrative ways for a living.
  • Weaponized Exhaust: In Injustice: Gods Among Us, Lobo's super move involves him ramming his opponent with his Space Hog, making them fall behind and then burning them with the exhaust flames while giving them a sign of utmost respect.
  • Weird Crossover: He's very prone to this, in fact!
  • Where I Was Born and Razed: Czarnia, a peaceful space-faring civilization akin to a paradise, until Lobo came in and everything went south!
  • Wild Card: Lobo has fought against and alongside several of the most powerful DC heroes and villains. Most of the time he does it because he's a bounty hunter, and he gets paid for what he does, or he felt like doing it.
  • Winged Soul Flies Off at Death: Happens to Lobo of all people after he is killed in an ambush by two other bounty hunters. True to form, it doesn't last long.
  • Worf Had the Flu: In Marvel Versus DC, one fight that attracted particular opprobrium from fans was Lobo — a character who can go toe-to-toe with Superman and at the time could regenerate from a single drop of blood — losing to Wolverine (who at the time didn't even have his adamantium skeleton, though his healing factor was significantly boosted as a result). This was explicitly down to Popularity Power — the results were voted on by fans — but the match-up was so uneven the writers had to have Wolverine's victory take place off-panel. A little while later Lobo mentioned that he'd actually been bribed by "some bald guy" to take a dive in the fight.
  • Written Sound Effect: His stories are so full with effects like squishhhh!, gurrrrgle!, squirrrrt!, KRRRRACK! and the such, that they're practically part of the argument.
  • You Can't Fight Fate: Averted ... and how! We're dealing here with The Big Guy who just brushed-off death itself and a well deserved eternal punishment by being as rugged, mean and callous as he could!!!
  • You Don't Look Like You: The New 52 infamously redesigned Lobo as a Pretty Boy, claiming that the more conventional Lobo who had previously been introduced in Deathstroke was an imposter and having the "real" Lobo kill him. DC Rebirth eventually brought the classic Lobo back for good, with the New 52 version last seen in Hal Jordan and the Green Lantern Corps, where he's trapped in one of Braniac's bottles ... and is pointedly left there.

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Sunny Jim asked me to swallow

Darlene Spritzer starts to tell Lobo about Sunny Jim but her wording sounds lewd.

How well does it match the trope?

5 (8 votes)

Example of:

Main / AccidentalInnuendo

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