Supervillain Rehabilitation

That sound great. I'll check it out. Maybe she can help Black Cat.

edited 1st Aug '16 8:45:35 AM by windleopard

Here's a thought: only ten to fifteen years have passed in the world of DC and Marvel. That's 50-70 somethings years of storytelling in a much smaller period of time. What if plenty supervillains could be rehabilitated, but it just hasn't happened yet? Maybe we just have to wait another seventy years of comics...

I recall in the old New Teen Titans comic (Marv Wolfman run, when I think Ed Baretto was the artist) Gizmo elected to reform at one point. They did a later story where someone was tracking down and killing members of the Fearsome Five, and I think he got killed, as did Mammoth and Shimmer who had also reformed. I'm fairly sure the story got retconned away, though.

There are a ton of villains in the Marvel Universe who are criminals for no good reason:

Trapster could make millions legitimately by patenting his paste, instead he uses it to rob banks and fight super heroes, for no reason. There was a story where he tried to reform and it was his best story, but it was not in canon.

Shocker could have used his technical skills to make a legitimate living, instead he is robbing banks and getting into fights with super heroes.

At least guys like Electro and Rhino are idiots, which explains their criminal careers, if you are smart enough to invent your tech, then why can't try to make money legitimately?

Some people are super villains because they think are doing the right thing (Magneto, Doom and for a non Marvel example, Mr. Freeze), some villains are evil psychopaths who like doing evil things (Red Skull, Bullseye, Purple Man, Carnage, etc) both of those make sense over guy who invents marketable tech and starts robbing banks.

I would like see some of these tech villains with no real motive, either reform or try to reform and fail.

The guys who invent their tech and then become villains frequently have a "Those fools laughed at my ideas, refused to listen to me! I'll show them! I'll show them all!" thing going on.

There's a Shazam story from 1981 (it was considered one of their best stories that year) called "Sivana's Nobel" in which the villainous Dr.Sivana won a Nobel prize, much to his chagrin, after he had developed a ray to make people hyper-violent and it was rewired and gave the world 12 hours of solid peace. It was revealed in the story that Captain (Shazam) Marvel had turned over lots of Sivana's inventions to the world, after Sivana was incarcerated. Sivana could have easily been a boon to the world, but elected to try to conquer it because the scientific community had mocked him in his youth.

I don't think Shocker and Trapster even have that level characterization, they really do come off as generic thugs who happened to invent their own tech, which really doesn't make sense from an internal logic perspective. Its why in most adaptions, Shocker is just a thug who is given his tech by a third party in exchange for his services, that just makes more sense, then trying to justify Shocker being a thuggish career criminal who has the skills to invent his own tech.

I will say the out of continuity story with Trapster, a short story in the 90s novel "Ultimate Super Villains" is likely best story with him, because it is an actual character based story that treats him like a human being, rather then a joke or a generic super villain.

I also think that type of characterization can come as very thin and one not, if you are not careful. It might work Sivana's character, but I don't think you can write every tech villain that way, not all of them and not over a period of 50 years.

This why I don't like the Cut Lex Luthor a Check trope, its lazy when being played straight, you have to subvert it somewhat to make your villain even remotely compelling, because I just don't care for villains who could become millionaires by just patenting their tech, but choose not and decide to rob banks for no good reason. That character just doesn't make sense and is not compelling, you have add some other layers, give him or her some more motives and expand the character, otherwise the villain just seems a like a waste of time and a lame place holder for more exciting villains that will appear later. These guys have been around for 50 to 70 years now, I do think giving them better motives would be a good thing.

edited 6th Oct '16 6:29:04 PM by Overlord

Ultimate Shocker was ripped off and became bitter. That's why he used his tech to just rob people.

You could have it be something like that. They don't think they'd get a fair shake anyway, so they use the tech for themselves instead.

But they never did that with 616 Shocker or Trapster, I think doing something like that with some of these motiveless tech villains can add some layers to them. If this is the writers intent, then the writer should write a story around it, rather then it be something that may have happened, but the writer can't be bothered to show it.

Also you think when some of these tech villains get out, Tony Stark could hire some of these guys, so they are supervised and using their talents in more productive manners, rather then being idiots and robbing banks. Frankly the bank robbing villains seems like a tired outdated cliche at this point, considering bank robbery is declining in the real world:

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/05/14/todays-bonnie-and-clydes-getting-tougher-to-find.html

Give these villains something more interesting to do if they remain villains. They don't have to reform, if they try to reform and fail, it makes their characterization deeper.

They did that 616 Vulture and its why he is somewhat better written then most B-list Spidey villains (though he drifts into generic villainy far too often).

With Spider-Man villains, I think they purposefully play on the idea that most of Spidey's rogues gallery are guys who, like him, stumbled on their powers accidentally but, unlike him, decided to use those powers for selfish or destructive ends.

Among Flash villains, for instance, I know that it's a bit of a split between which guys invented their tech, and which stole it. I think Weather Wizard, for instance, stole his Weather Wand from his brother (they did a pretty good take on that scenario when they had Weather Wizard show up on Superman:The Animated Series). I'm pretty sure Capt.Cold stole his cold gun, too (makes you wonder how they maintain these devices). The Pied Piper and Heat Wave did both reform at one point, as did The Trickster, but then they ran into the worst bar to villain reformation: writers who wanted to use them as villains.

It's a bit of a shock when you realize that most of Batman's rouges gallery today (outside of Joker, Penguin, Catwoman, and maybe the Riddler) have only been in heavy use since the 70's. Prior to that he mostly fought one-off foes and regular crooks.

edited 6th Oct '16 9:56:39 PM by Robbery

Except I am talking about the Spidey villains who gained abilities through invention rather then freak accidents.

Vulture, Mysterio and Shocker get their abilities from stuff they invented, so its harder to fit them into the box you were talking about, with people getting powers through freak accidents and becoming super villains. Vulture occasionally gets a brilliant moment, that is weighed under a ton of mediocre stories, Shocker and Mysterio are both interesting concepts that go nowhere. I would make Shocker more noble, moral and likable, while making Mysterio more ruthless and sinister, anything to get them out the generic villain box they are in now.

I would have Shocker try to reform and fail, so you can say his character is not irredeemable, because he has tried to change, but circumstances thwarted it, that shows more self reflection then him being a guy who has no characterization besides "bank robber".

Thuggish villains of limited intelligence like Electro, Rhino and Sandman getting powers, but being stuck in a criminal life makes more sense then trying to put people who get abilities from their own inventions in the same box, you have give the guys who invented their tech even stronger motives for becoming criminals.

Captain Cold is a good example of how this can work, he has a back story that shows why he likes to buck authority, his tech is stolen, so he can't profit from it legally and he actually seems to like being a criminal. He has enough characterization to be compelling, having his own code, he is what Shocker would want to be even he grows up.

Trapster is the worst for this, because his criminal career is a almost total failure (his supposed friends have tried to kill him, he has suffered some rather humiliating defeats, once being beaten by the FF's security system and has been subjected to Ghost Rider's penance stare). If he wasn't interested in reform at this point, I would wonder if he suffers from some mental illness the writers can't be bothered to explain. Which is I am unhappy that story I mentioned about Trapster trying to reform is not in cannon.

edited 6th Oct '16 11:30:54 PM by Overlord

It could be a case of being super-arrogant and not wanting to give their tech to the world. Of just wanting to use it to take what they wanted. Of course, if that is the case, there'd be no reason for the writers not to just tell us. It would be characterization, after all.

Superior Foes of Spider-Man somewhat plays up Shocker's intelligence and tech-savvy while also playing up his being a Butt-Monkey. And it more or less explains his being a criminal by the fact that all of his friends are criminals and he sort of has Honor Among Thieves ethos of bonding with his "friends" and being a team player (even though said "friends" have no actual loyalty to him).

It's played humorously but as I understand it, it's a pretty accurate depiction of why people remain gang members against their better judgment.

Being a tech genius also doesn't mean that you have common sense. Just look at Nicola Tesla.

Flash's villains (or the Rogues more particularly) are a bit unique because they're intentionally portrayed as regular joe-type career criminals who choose to do bad things but are otherwise not much different from the average blue-collar personality wise. Nearly all of the Rogues have had a plot where it's shown they're decent enough and skilled enough to do other things, but ultimately choose to be supervillains for some reason or another, and it wouldn't be remiss to say that most of them are a stone's throw away from reforming and trying out a normal life at any time.

It's rare for a superhero to have more than one minor villain like this, let alone several major villains (Spider-Man also has a couple like that, most notably Sandman and Shocker, but it's often downplayed because his rogues gallery is one of the posters for the "megalomaniac mad scientist" supervillain type), and its even rarer for the company to be committed to portraying them that way (and the Rogues have had their moments where they're more generic, as well). But it's one the main reasons they're so interesting.

As a matter of fact, is Captain Cold still on the Justice League?

edited 11th Oct '16 12:14:32 AM by KnownUnknown

@ Robbery

Incorrect on Captain Cold. He did make his gun. It was originally created to be a device that puts people in suspended animation. Which would allow him to beat the Flash. Then he found out as a side effect the beam created Ice as a side effect and was cold.

It's completely harmless freezing as it does not actually freeze people. Unless he wants to make it lethal. (Which he can by adjusting it slightly.

Pied Piper also did reform and to this day has stayed reformed. The rest of the rogues pretty much do what they do because they enjoy it rather then for any other reason. As mentioned at one point they discussed among themselves that they could make millions legally by patenting their gear. (Trickster was particularly called out for this, as he created boots that could let a person walk on air, and this would allow him to effortlessly become richer then Bruce Wayne.) After talking about it for a while, they admitted that that kind of life is just not for them and they enjoy what they do far too much. They pretty much solely remain as career criminals because they enjoy it. (It helps that they are legally allowed to have a mirror in their cells, so whenever they are captured they just have Mirror Master pick them up after a while. It's even funnier in Dr Alchemy's case who uses prison stays as reading time after which he transmutes the wall and leaves and then he tends walk back into his cell with some new books.)

edited 11th Oct '16 7:51:36 PM by Envyus