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Examples of characterization changing dramatically Depending on the Writer in Comic Books.


Comics as a medium are heavily subject to this trope, especially when they run for decades and necessarily have many different writers, some of whom are cavalier about consistency.

The following have their own pages:


Other

  • The Archie Comics are famous for this:
  • When RenĂ© Goscinny was writing Asterix, he kept Asterix himself as a fairly bland Standardized Leader Ideal Hero character who was almost never wrong about anything, and gave the Character Development to The Lancer Obelix, who was a sweet, profound and adorably frightening take on a Manchild. When Albert Uderzo took over, Asterix got a lot of Character Development and became more complicated and sympathetic, developed weaknesses and was no longer infallible, but at the same time Obelix was severely Flanderized into being significantly more stupid and selfish, and usually The Millstone to boot. This is most noticeable in The Magic Carpet, where Asterix almost fails on multiple occasions because he has to constantly babysit Obelix. On the bright side, Uderzo introduced a lot more memorable female characters than Goscinny managed to do (Bravura, Melodrama, Orinjade, Latraviata...) and fleshed out some of Goscinny's Spear Carrier and Satellite Love Interest female characters (like Fulliautomatix's wife and daughter, and Obelix's perennial love interest Panacea) into more well-rounded human beings.
  • Portrayals of The Authority vary from writer to writer, to the point where it's not consistent whether they're the Wildstorm Universe's greatest force for good or a bunch of sociopathic fascists. Also doesn't help that they get used as punching bags in series other than their own.
  • Diabolik has been handled by different writers and publishers, and he can vary from a ruthless assassin who will pre-emptively kill anyone who might interfere with his plans (this is usually in books where he is The Ghost), to a thief who plans around not killing his victims and only does so as a last resort, to having a twisted sense of justice in rewarding those who help him, or (as in the Lighter and Softer cartoon) almost a Robin Hood figure.
    • His partner Eva Kant usually has a similar competence and outlook as whatever he is, to the point where they can be The Dividual, but in some older books would be reduced to a damsel in distress rather easily. In others she takes on a vigilante role to bring down particularly heinous criminals.
  • The comics made of the various Disney icons. Such as Donald Duck.
    • Scrooge himself: heartless bastard tormenting Donald for the sake of a few more cents, perfectly willing to exploit workers, destroy the environment and let his own family die in the name of profit? Indiana Jones-style treasure hunter? Jerk with a Heart of Gold who prides on having made his fortune "fair and square" and deeply cares about his family and his friends? Complete and utter badass? An eccentric old man who's not really good or evil?
    • Scrooge's money bin may be a simple box made of stone or a blue and red dome; it may be his residence, or just the place where he keeps his cash while he actually lives in a mansion; the Beagle Boys may frequently hide out in an old trailer or a shack or under the very foundations of Duckburg; Flintheart Glomgold may live in South Africa or in Duckburg as a member of the Billionaires' Club (or alternatively, he may not exist at all, with John D. Rockerduck in his place); Donald may range from being an average chef to a Lethal Chef; Magica de Spell may be a real powerful sorceress or a normal person who dabbles in sorcery; Granma Duck may be Scrooge's sister or not related to him at all; Gladstone Gander may be really lucky because a Triple Distelfink sign was painted on the barn door on the day of his mother's birth or because the goddess of fortune is in love with him.... The list goes on.
    • The Beagle Boys' competence (and numbers) also seem to flip-flop (from as few as three to as many as eleven). And do they use guns, or are they simply too poor to even afford those?
    • Even Rockerduck himself, despite not even existing in most writers' minds, has flip-flopped between honorable businessman Scrooge likes to screw with for fun, slightly crooked bastard who enjoys spying, swindling and bribing to get his way, white-collar criminal, and murderous gang leader.
    • For a while, European stories had what effectively amounted to an alternative continuity, with the largest change being Scrooge being American-born with Grandma Duck as his older sister and a younger brother named Gideon. An epic-length Italian story even detailed it in its last part. Nowadays this is completely ignored, with some products of that time (namely Paperinik with his comprimaries, Dickie Duck, Brigitta McBridge, Jubal Pomp and Gideon) still around but included in the standard continuity (Gideon being Scrooge's brother is quietly ignored, with fans taking him as Scrooge's younger half-brother from his father's supposed second wife or mistress).
      • Even Paperinik's backstory as heir of Fantomius, the Gentleman Thief, has two different versions. The original version, shown through various details in Paperinik's stories, presents Fantomius as a Gentleman Thief active in the Twenties, operating as "a gentleman masquerading as a thief" with his fiancee Dolly Paprika to humiliate the arrogant rich people of Duckburg and sometimes giving part of his loot to the poor, before dying (as stated in Paperinik's debut story) at some point in the Thirties, with his manor becoming the property of the City of Duckburg and won by Gladstone in a lottery before being destroyed and the land ultimately ending as Scrooge's property. The Dutch series "The Legacy", however, shows Fantomius as still alive (he just retired and disappeared), having operated strictly by stealing to the riches to give to the poor with an accomplice named Ireyon, and the land of his manor still being Gladstone's property. The Italian series "The Amazing Adventures of Fantomius-Gentleman Thief", detailing Fantomius' adventures, completely ignores the Dutch version.
  • John Constantine in Hellblazer suffers from this trope. Is he just an ordinary blue-collar bloke who happens to attract a lot of supernatural attention and who learned some magic in order to deal with this, or a master sorcerer who can casually bend the laws of time and space at will? A more or less decent guy at heart who struggles with his conscience like anyone else would in his situation, or an utter and unrepentant bastard who'd throw anybody under the bus without a second thought? Is he in fact sane, or isn't he? Some of his writers have tried to explain away the changes they make to his personality (like externalizing all his guilt into a demon infant and tossing it off a cliff) and some haven't.
  • The team formerly known as the Micronauts has kept reappearing occasionally since 1996 revealed that Arcturus Rann, Mari, and Bug were somehow still alive. They've appeared in Cable, Captain Marvel, Earth X, Realm of Kings, Son of Hulk, and Alpha Flight. Rann and Mari have had different personalities in each. In the Cable appearance, Rann was rather genial and avuncular, Mari was taciturn and humorless (along with sporting a lesbian look). In following appearances, they've ranged from having no personality other than a sci-fi plot device (Mari technobabbles like a Star Trek episode), to Realm of Kings, where Mari acts like a ditzy motormouth amazon and Rann acts bored. Admittedly, since Bug is no longer part of the team, the comic relief falls of the shoulders of Mari and her android sidekick Carl.
  • The original Phantom Lady, between cosmic reboots, has gone from a superspy goverment agent to a bored senator's daughter with a gimmick - and personality-wise from a delicate Ice Queen who's impossibly ace to a tough talking bruiser.
  • Sonic the Comic:
    • Doctor Robotnik's characterisation initially swapped between a cartoonishy evil coward (who fled at the possibilty of having to fight both Sonic and Tails) and a sociopathic tyrant who openly enjoyed seeing how miserable Mobius' population were under his rule, before settling on the latter, although still with some moments of bumbling under some writers.
    • Just how much of a Jerkass Sonic is also comes down to this, with the main writers settling on a Jerk with a Heart of Gold persona that was common in UK media, while some Filler strips ramped it up to pure Jerkass.
    • Tails swaps between "competent enough to fight for himself but is a bumbling hero" to such an example of The Load that both Sonic and Robotnik are openly surprised when he's the one who saves the day.
  • Spirou changed writers many times over the years. Aside from being very visible, the storylines vary, too. Rob-Vel started Spirou being an actual bellboy, Franquin turned him into an journalist adventurer, Fournier made him run into more surreal stuff, various other writers had their own stint before Tome and Janry made the series return to the Franquin era, with the stories getting progressively Darker and Edgier, while starting a Spin-Off about Spirou in his youth, and, after a commercially failed attempt at a (sort of) realistic story, Morvan and Munuera took a more Manga-style take at it, the stories no longer stuck to the present day. The current team, Yoann and Vehlmann, have been leaning heavily on surreal sci-fi elements.
  • In most Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles adaptations, Raphael is portrayed as a brooding loner who frequently breaks from the group and fights with his brothers — particularly Leonardo, who has a much more commanding presence as a leader. In others, like the original Fred Wolf animated series, Raphael is a good-natured albeit sarcastic jokester while Leonardo seems more toned down and unofficial in his leadership role. Michaelangelo and Donatello remain constant for the most part.
  • Transformers:
    • In the original Marvel Comics' series, most of the stories were written by either Bob Budiansky or Simon Furman, who often had sharply different depictions of key characters. To pick but one example, Grimlock was a vain and power-mad Designated Hero under Budiansky, whereas Furman writes him as a Noble Savage of a Proud Warrior Race.
    • In general, the Marvel comic, the toy bios, and the cartoon tended to have somewhat variable takes on the characters, which are usually thought of as simply different versions, but many writers have ended up tug-of-warring back between different "iconic" takes. A particular example is Soundwave: he spoke normally in the comics, but used a stiff Robo Speak tone in the cartoon. This can lead to Soundwave using complete sentences under one writer and going "LASERBEAK: EJECT. OPERATION: DESTRUCTION" under another.
    • Blaster is particularly noticeable for shifting under different writers, since his cartoon and comics takes were very different: the cartoon one being a goofy, music-loving party animal working in communications, the comic one being a haunted, introverted rebel. Because of this, in general, if Blaster is a major player in the story, he'll be the latter; if he isn't, he'll be the former (though there may be some attempts to marry the two).
    • The large number of writers working on The Transformers Megaseries caused a lot of characters to shift heavily. Soundwave (again) hops between a conniving, treacherous bastard (Furman) to a cartoon-inspired emotionless robot (McCarthy) to a soulful, empathic Anti-Villain (Barber), with the wiki jokingly describing him as an "untrustworthy loyal silent verbose villainous hero." Drift in particular changes almost completely depending on whether he's being written by Shane McCarthy or James Roberts, with the latter being almost a parody of the former.
    • Caminus's portrayal in The Transformers: More than Meets the Eye (as a reasonably prosperous place that can afford to focus on social and performing arts and has at times played host to Cybertronian renegades) is very different from the resource-starved theocracy of The Transformers: Windblade.


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