Narm Charm / Comic Books

• Many "relevant" and "edgy" Bronze Age stories like the Green Lantern / Green Arrow team-ups featuring the evils of drugs, poverty, racism, etc, are hilariously over-the-top, Anvilicious, and two-dimensional, but the fact that the stuff was ground-breaking at the time, plus the writers' complete sincerity about the sentiments expressed in the stories, save them from most of the contempt usually afforded to such preachy PSAs.
• Batman: The Golden-Age and Silver-Age stories. One issue of the original Detective Comics focused around the tale of Batman Jones, a child named in honor of the Dark Knight who rescued his parents, who in turn became a giant fanboy and tried desperately to join Batman and Robin in their adventures. (The only reason he stopped is because he found another hobby—stamp collecting) Even the iconic Joker was presented as nothing more than a clown with campy crime schemes. These eras also gave us some of the more ridiculous villains from Batman's Rogues Gallery, including Crazy Quilt and Penny Plunderer, the latter of whom was the original supplier of the giant penny in the Batcave, before a continuity rewrite made it a weapon of Two-Face's. The Bronze Age and especially The Dark Age of Comic Books moved away from this, but the Adam West-era Batman (1966) and Batman: The Brave and the Bold certainly have their followings.
• Dark Empire: "Aren't I the master of all the Jedi? Your father was my apprentice." "Formless, I exist as pure energy. I am the dark side." Palpatine is just a huge ham.
• Doctor Strange: In Doctor Strange: The Oath, a critically-injured and unconscious Strange has been carried through the doors of a hospital by his manservant Wong. Though they have obviously come in through a pouring rain, his Cloak of Levitation is at full billow. In fact, it has hooked around the crash bar and is holding the door open.
• Doom: The comic, for those who consider it So Bad, It's Good. Trying to fill a plotless vacuum still doesn't explain the unhinged comic's story or dialogue, which became a Fountain of Memes:
  "Now I'm radioactive! That can't be good!"
  "You're huge! That means you have huge guts!"
  "RIP AND TEAR!"
• EC Comics: With just one overwrought line and goofily gaping expression, the issue 23 cover◊ of Tales from the Crypt manages to tell the most awesomely concise horror story ever...
  LOCKED! I'm locked in this MAUSOLEUM with... with this THING!
• Green Lantern: When the series tried to give a sympathetic Backstory to Dex-Starr, by all rights it should have fallen flat on its face. Dex-Starr's inherent comedy (he's a homicidal kitty-cat) should not mesh well with a tragic origin. It's not even a terribly good origin, it's Batman in cat form, except without the "heir to the vast Wayne fortune" part: Dexter was raised from a kitten by a woman who was later murdered when some thieves broke into her house. He then got thrown out of the apartment building by police for fear of contaminating the crime scene, and leads an increasingly desperate life as a stray until he's eventually placed in a bag, tormented, and thrown into a river. It just so happens that this was exactly the time when the ring forces were actively recruiting during the Darkest Night arc, and since the force behind the Red Lanterns is rage... And yeah, it's as Narm-tastic as it sounds, but it really works. Dex-Starr good kitty.
• Iron Man: Iron Man (1968) #178 is an Affectionate Parody of Iron Man, Iron Man's ongoing plots, and the Marvel writing style in general. By all rights the notion of adapting the harrowing events that had been happening (the story is followed by another story of Stark trying to remain sober for 24 hours and barely succeeding) with a group of kids dressing up as the heroes seems like it would create some rather uncomfortable laughs. While the story is quite funny, it does so good a job at mimicking the style of melodrama Marvel was (and to a degree still is) fond of that the story ends up with just as much pathos as any other canonical one. You will probably feel just as overjoyed when Mikey is reinstated as a member of the 'Avengers Club' as you would have been when Iron Man himself did it.
• My Little Pony: FIENDship Is Magic: Issue #1 has Sombra's declaration that "destruction was my talent, and darkness was my cutie mark." It takes a certain talent to insert the words "cutie mark" into an intimidating Badass Boast and still make it work.
• The New Guardians: Snowflame◊, a supervillain who was powered by cocaine! No, really.
• Power Girl: The famous "boob window" on Power Girl's costume. It's become such a big part of her charm and character that both fans and writers object whenever DC tries to get rid of the thing. This may have something to do with the fact that every replacement costume DC comes up with looks absolutely fucking ridiculous◊ in a bad way, rather than a fun way.
• Superman: A visual example, but Superman's trunks, the red briefs Superman wears over his tights, are an incredibly cheesy aspect of his costume, but his suit just doesn't look complete without them. It helps that since Superman's overall look is so iconic and is the inspiration of so'' many copycats, that the trunks-over-tights look is just synonymous with superheroes as a genre, and Superman in particular. It also helps that the suit was inspired by old-fashioned circus strongmen and wrestlers, which works really well with Clark's old-fashioned and idealistic sensibilities.
• Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen: The comic is considered the most Silver Age-y thing to have ever come of out of the Silver Age, and crammed with every single stereotype of the era turned up to eleven. It is by far the biggest supplier of nostalgic or affectionate Shout Outs in modern-age comics.
• Tarot: Witch of the Black Rose: The infamous "You have to get out of here! Your vagina is haunted!" line from.
• Transformers: Simon Furman's comics are well known for this. Many fans enjoy his rather distinctive dialogue.
• The Walking Dead: The Title Drop ("WE ARE THE WALKING DEAD!") that comes after a speech about how the survivors (or at least Rick, giving the speech, displacing some guilt) are not so different from the zombies. Extremely anvilicious, but nonetheless dramatic and effective.
• Watchmen: The words "exploding psychic teleporting squid alien" should never appear in the plan of any villain who expects to be taken seriously, but seeing how masterfully said plan was carried out and the horrific aftermath turns it into pure Nightmare Fuel.

---