Corrupted Character Copy / The Venture Bros.

The Venture Bros.

Befitting its status as a Deconstructive Parody of boy's adventure series and Genre Deconstruction for others including superheroes/villians, Spy Fiction, and more, this series loves this trope.

---

Team Venture

• Dr. Thaddeus "Rusty" Venture and Action Johnny are both this to Jonny Quest (in fact, the latter originally was Jonny Quest himself, but that was vetoed after the first two seasons by Executive Meddling and he became a lawyer-friendly expy instead): both former boy adventurers who were both left traumatized by the many near-death (and in Rusty's case, actual death) experiences they had over the course of their adventures. They've become differently jaded as a result; Rusty has become a super-scientist who's a neglectful father himself, only less successful than his father, and Johnny has rage issues and drug addictions. Both are essenetially pulp versions of Former Child Stars, showing what someone with that sort of childhood would be like as an adult.
• Rusty's father, Jonas Venture, is likewise one to Doc Savage, an adventuring Science Hero and Genius Bruiser par excellence. He stands on a Broken Pedestal, because he was a terrible father to Rusty, exposing him to numerous traumas and making minimal effort to help him with that trauma. And that's not even getting into what a horrible friend he was...
• And the titular brothers themselves are one to The Hardy Boys, boy adventurers who initially start out as The Dividual. While they think they're out solving mysteries and braving danger, in truth they are Too Dumb to Live and in over their heads, and only survive thanks to getting cloned after the many times they died. By the time Character Development kicks in, Dean does everything he can to get out of the adventuring super-scientist life, while Hank outgrows his uselessness.

Venture Allies

• Dr. Byron Orpheus is one to Doctor Strange. He has no real PhD, only a degree in Communications and a minor in Women's Studies from a community college, while Stephen Strange was an accomplished neurosurgeon before becoming Sorceror Supreme. He calls himself a "necromancer" simply because all of the other magic-user titles have fallen out of favor (note that he actually can communicate with and raise the dead as a proper Necromancer does, it's just not his primary field of magic), is constantly outdone by his former student (the Outrider, who also stole his wife), and his Large Ham tendencies are considered annoying and embarrassing by his daughter. Nonetheless, he's by far the nicest member of the main cast.
• His Order of the Triad teammate Jefferson Twilight is one to Blade, as he specifically hunts "blaculas" (black vampires) to the point of Crippling Overspecialization (he notes that he'd be lost if he had to fight a regular vampire and get killed if he had to fight a magic-user without the rest of the Triad around), and Blade's Dhampyr thirst for blood or artificial replacements spoofed by low blood sugar making him crave sugary drinks (most notably Nik-L-Nips).

The O.S.I.

• The O.S.I. is this to groups like G.I. Joe and S.H.I.E.L.D. They're a patriotic group of superspies who fight evil, but they have more than a few skeletons in their closet and several members, frustrated by bureaucracy holding them back, jump ship and rebuild S.P.H.I.N.X. to fight threats that the O.S.I. can't/won't.
  • General Treister is this to both Nick Fury and "Thunderbolt" Ross. He's the head of the OSI and patriotic as all get-out, but his behavior (he believes that he's become a "hulk" out of gamma radiation therapy to cure his cancer, goes to the bathroom in his own office, and wrestles people as a form of negotiation) doesn't inspire much confidence. Subverted with The Reveal that he was only Obfuscating Insanity to fool Cardholder and Doe and trick Hunter into returning to the O.S.I. Double Subverted in the "All This and Gargantua-2" special where it's revealed that cosmic radiation really did give him Hulk-like powers and he joins Jonas Jr. in performing a Heroic Sacrifice aboard the exploding space station.
  • Agents Cardholder and Doe are this to Joe Friday and Bill Gannon, as a pair of fast-talking government agents who are actually The Mole for the Guild and are trying to take over.
  • Shore Leave is one to Shipwreck, as he comes from a clique of G.I. Joe-Village People parodies with the Hello, Sailor! gag played completely straight. He got kicked out of the OSI on a "don't ask, don't tell" beef, and later joins SPHINX and shows how badass he really is. Meanwhile, his "Holy Diver" persona is a much straighter example to Bibleman as a religious-themed superhero who's largely ineffective as his suiting-up sequence takes too long for him to join the fight.
• S.P.H.I.N.X. starts out as a clear-cut parody of Cobra, being a Nebulous Evil Organisation opposing the OSI that got completely eradicated in the Pyramid Wars of '87 Late in the series however, S.P.H.I.N.X. is rebuilt by Hunter Gathers to fight non-Guild evils, thus becoming an organizational take on a Virtuous Character Copy.
• Molotov Cocktease is one of Black Widow, being a red-headed Russian spy-cum-assassin in a black Spy Catsuit. Unlike Black Widow who eventually reforms, Molotov remains an amoral assassin for hire who becomes a spy for the O.S.I. because the job pays better rather than any actual Heel–Face Turn reason.

The Guild of Calamitous Intent

• The Guild of Calamitous Intent is one example that zig-zags the trope all over the place, being written as a parody of particularly large Legion of Doom organizations like the post-Identity Crisis (2004) Secret Society of Super-Villains. The zig-zaggging comes from the fact that the guild are not so much an organization of supervillains as they are a combination Super Registration Act/Weird Trade Union for the bad guys, keeping the supervillains focused on "arches" who can face them fairly rather than let them run rampant against the civilian populace and in turn, keep them from getting into fights with heroes far out of their league and getting themselves killed.
• Red Death is one to the Red Skull, being a terrifying villain who is genuinely imposing and has the latter's Skull for a Head, but is a Punch-Clock Villain like all Guild members and is a pretty darn nice guy when he's not engaging in acts of villainy.
• Baron Ünderbheit is one to Doctor Doom, initially built up as Dr. Venture's serious archenemy in contrast to the Monarch. He rules Ünderland with an iron fist and was disfigured in a lab accident he blamed Rusty on, but ultimately proved too one-dimensional to properly fulfill the Knight of Cerebus role and was quickly eclipsed as Rusty's nemesis by the Monarch and as the Knight of Cerebus by Phantom Limb, who he would later end up working for.
• "It Happening One Night" opens by introducing The Doom Factory in a way that deliberately imitates Superfriends' introduction of the Legion of Doom. Its members, ten of "the most ruthlessly self-involved villains," are parodies of various villains from DC Comics. Each one also doubles as a No Celebrities Were Harmed parody of a 20th-century artist: the group's leader Wes Warhammer is a fusion of Lex Luthor and Andy Warhol, and the others represent artists of the Warhol Superstars.

Others

• The Impossible Family, a Fantastic Faux:
  • Professor Richard Impossible is introduced as a Captain Ersatz of Reed Richards, but soon shows a much darker side as a sexist, bigoted Jerkass who's uncaring and abusive to his family with a destructive For Science! attitude. Hilariously, he actually predates a lot of Marvel's own deconstructions of Reed, like his Ultimate Universe incarnation, who ends up becoming a villain in his own right, and the Council of Reeds.
  • The rest of the Impossibles have terrible powers: Sally's skin becomes invisible (just her skin, leaving her musculature fully visible) whenever she's not actively concentrating to keep it visible. Cody "flames on" in contact with oxygen and can feel the burns despite being impervious to them. Ned is more like a giant callous than a giant rock, and was already mentally challenged before the accident, causing him to deconstruct Dumb Muscle.
  • Even Richard Impossible's turn to villainy is corrupted as deciding to become a villain did not suddenly make him competent at areas outside his expertise and his absent minded-ness leads to multiple traps failing.
• The Groovy Gang is one to Mystery Incorporated, as they're all send-ups of famous criminals in addition to their character basis. They use solving mysteries at spooky old places as a flimsy excuse to loot said places and kill any witnesses.
• The Blue Morpho is one to the The Green Hornet, as having a reputation as a villain means that he can and will do some depraved things in the name of duty, such as performing every known sex act to Dr. Z while disguised as Billie Jean King. Taken further with the reveal that Jonas blackmailed him into doing such work.
  • As Venturion, he's one to RoboCop. The rest of Team Venture was horrified by Jonas's decision to revive the Blue Morpho as a cyborg, which caused him to lose interest in doing anything with Venturion other than making him Rusty's nanny, which turned out to be a huge mistake as it awakened his memories of his own son and a plane crash, which led him to strangle Rusty and in turn having his neck snapped by his former sidekick Kano, who took a vow of silence in remorse.
  • His "Vendata" persona is one to Darth Vader, a cyborg Fallen Hero who was found and rebuilt by Dr. Z and repurposed into a supervillain. However, most of his villainous acts are because of a Morality Dial installed on him and the remainder are out of justifiable anger at Jonas for turning him into Venturion in the first place. And unlike Vader whose part-machine qualities add to his menace and mystique, Vendata's cybernetics get him no respect and are shown to be outdated more than once.
• Minor character Steve Summers is one to The Six Million Dollar Man, as a former astronaut rebuilt by the government with $6 million worth of bionic parts. The difference is that they expected him to pay it all back, which is hard to do on a government salary. Steve, already disgruntled by the whole affair, finally had enough and went rogue after meeting a Sasquatch and falling in love with him.
• "The Terminus Mandate" features Blind Rage, an egotistical jerkass Daredevil corruption who turned to villainy.