90's anti-hero done right?

Okay, first off, I actually LIKED the dark age, same way I like some of the more mindless action flicks. It's just entertainment (not to mention being the comics that actually got me INTO comics in the first place)...and all that. But then I got to thinkin': after our local comic shop shut down (yeah, actually DURING the 90's) I missed out on a hell of alot of comics. I've started tracking down a few titles I remembered liking back then, but now I call out to the troper-peoples...

I wanna know, what stuff did the 90's anti-hero RIGHT? ESPECIALLY the stuff that actually SURVIVED the 90's and managed to stay in print for a while.

I liked Lobo: The Last Czarnian, but it's very "love it or hate it".

edited 7th Jun '11 6:30:46 AM by brc2000

I'll have to check it out. I usually end up going into these "love 'em or hate 'em" type things on the love end. 'Sides, I been meanin to check ol Lobo out for years...no IDEA why I never did.

I, in general, really liked Stormwatch.

The Darkness is pretty good and still going, though I don't know the quality of the comic when it was running in the 90s.

I actually enjoyed Hitman

Everyone should

The Authority, if you go with them as Reconstruction of the trope.

@Zeal: I actually remember that one fondly. 'S actually on my list.

@Everybody: Good stuff all 'round, from some of what I've been hearin'. Still gotta track down the rest of The Maxx, too...and most of the pre-Shattered Image Wildstorm stuff...

Oh! I forgot to namedrop Turok: Dinosaur Hunter!

The first comics I ever owned were a set of Venom issues, so I've got a soft spot for the era. Some of those old miniseries hold up surprisingly well. Others... not so much.

Even though no one has posted on this tread in a while, I hope no one would mind me offering my own opinion on this subject. I believe that the following are well-done examples of this trope in various forms of fiction. I say this based on them being downplayed and/or reconstructions (or in some cases parodies) of the archetype that avoid being over the top or then at least, to quote Joss Whedon, "Make it dark, make it grim, make it tough, but then, for the love of God, tell a joke."

• Anime and Manga: Alucard, Guts, Hiei*, Jack* ^note  Possibly the oldest example of this trope being created way back in 1973., Revy, Saito Hajime*.
• Comics: The Authority, Azrael ^note While he isn't a bad character in his own right, he was a bad Batman, The Darkness, Deadpool, Hitman, Lobo, and Warrior Nun Areala's "Shotgun" Mary Delacroix*.
• Film: Riddick*, T-800* from Terminator 2 Judgment Day
• Live Action TV: The Ninth Doctor, Faith
• Video Games: K', Needles Kane (AKA Sweet Tooth)*, Kratos* Squall Leonhart, Scorpion*

I give special mentions to Alucard and K'. (Asterisks indicate examples that may be disputed as being N.A.H.s).

I've heard Invincible called a reconstruction of such, although it's an 00's work, and I think that's a valid assessment.

How come no one has mentioned Cable yet?

Maybe because he wasn't really redeemed as a character until his series with Deadpool, in 2004, which had him without all the Liefeldian pouches and big guns that made him the poster boy for the Ninties Anti Hero?

Then again, maybe I'm the only one who feels that way.

Yeah, I was under the impression both Cable and Deadpool only started being good character after they left the 90's anti-hero thing behind. Specially Deadpool, who is, at best, a parody of a 90's anti-hero nowadays.

These were 1980s characters, but First Comics' titles, particularly Starslayer and GrimJack, were everything that Liefeld & MacFarlane later wanted to be but weren't—dark, antiheroic, grim ... but also semi-credible, mature (as opposed to "mature"), and readable.

I'd say that late-90s Deadpool was actually more of a deconstruction of the trope than a parody.

But, like you said, nowadays, he's definitely more of a parody, yeah.

Well, I have never read 90s Deadpool, so I can't tell. Still, a deconstruction is hardly the trope being plaid straight, which is what the thread is about, I believe.

I liked what i read of Savage Dragon.

You cannot do a 90s anti-hero right anymore, because it's not the 90s anymore.

edited 20th Aug '14 10:55:10 PM by KlarkKentThe3rd

This guy.◊

Man, when I was a kid, I thought Dark Warrior Duck was, like, totally so much cooler than Darkwing because he, like, used missiles and had spikes and cool red eyes and stuff, and he fought with tanks and didn't act goofy and...

Are you the 90's Kid from Atop The Fourth Wall?

the best example of how to do this trope correctly◊.

granted this isn't western comics but he fits the archetype to a t so...