History Flanderization / ComicBooks

* ''Franchise/GreenLantern'':
** The Guardians Of The Universe have always been distant and aloof, but were once wise and respected, having created [[SpacePolice an organization of star-patrolling peacekeepers]] that has survived for eons. With each passing year though, they become more incompetent, single-minded, and corrupt, lying to their members, holding their own mysterious agendas, and constantly having their mistakes blow up in the faces and inevitably needing to be saved by the Earth Lanterns (and then clearly resenting the aid). One comic even had a Guardian admit he didn't remember why they started the Corp in the first place. By this point, it's a genuine curiosity how they got an organization as advanced and well-functioning as the Green Lanterns working outside of dumb luck. This could be unintentional FridgeBrilliance, as the Guardians are literally as old as the universe itself and ''long'' overdue to losing their wits to old age.
** Hal Jordan himself has undergone this. He used to be a bit of a hothead who hated authority, but was otherwise a pretty normal guy. These days he's mostly written as a gigantic idiot who flies off into a fight at a moment's notice and bickers with authority no matter what.

** ComicBook/{{Wolverine}} is a case study. During the [[TheEighties '80s]] considerable CharacterDevelopment evolved the character from a one-note {{Jerkass}} prone to UnstoppableRage to a wise, intelligent, multitalented, and skilled warrior/mentor (with just enough issues to avoid CanonSue status). Then he [[PopularityPower got popular]] and the LowestCommonDenominator of Captain Fuzzity [=McStabStab=] won out [[WolverinePublicity with all the guest-shots]] even as they ramped his HealingFactor to UpToEleven, making him pretty much the definition of a CanonSue. [[EnsembleDarkhorse And he's still the most popular character of the whole franchise]]. Because being badass is the ''only'' thing he seems to need. And while his edges seem to have been smothed in the ''X-Men'' comics, buzz has it as of SDCC '13 that they're going to do a major story where his killing tendencies threaten his place in the Avengers.\\\

** Similarly, Tim Drake started off as a normal teenager who happened to also be a fairly gifted detective, and was naturally skilled in crime fighting despite being 14. As things went on, he became TheSmartGuy of not just the Bat Family, but also the entirety of the teenaged population of the DCU, smart enough to research ''cloning'' technology that, while it didn't pan out, was said that he was only a year or so away from successfully cloning Superboy and Impulse according to the Titans Tomorrow story arc (and not just real life 'start as a baby' cloning, but actually recreate them, memories and all). He also became ''far'' more nerdy, to the point he's massively neurotic and over-analyses everything. And, inverting Steph, while he started off as a realist, he was also rather idealistic, but slowly his life became so filled with hell that he broke down until he was as broody as Batman himself. Like Steph, many fans ''like'' [[{{Adorkable}} this about]] [[TheWoobie Timmy]], but a lot of people really don't, as he became popular ''because'' he was the most relatable Robin.

* ComicBook/LuckyLuke: Jolly jumper, while capable of some impressive feats, was actually just a normal horse during the early comics and drawn as [[http://forbiddenplanet.blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/IMG_00024.jpg such]]. His intelligence got more and more played up once ReneGoscinny took over the writing, eventually leading to him being given a much more [[https://i.pinimg.com/736x/af/06/59/af06594c05778071fd1268d9921177db--lucky-luke-memorie.jpg cartoony]] look, capable of [[TalkingAnimal Animal speech]] and feats no normal horse should be capable of.

* Considering how often Cyclops and Havok end up fighting one another, they sometimes get Flanderized into being locked in an eternal CainAndAbel, being unable to abide one another at the best of times and one of them being a super-villain (usually Havok) at worst. This portrayal appears in the Ultimate, Legends, and Misfits universes, where (unlike their 616 counterparts) they don't need the influence of any psychic brainwashing to bait them into fighting.

** In 1983, Batman quit the Franchise/{{Justice League|of America}} and created a new team called the Outsiders after Superman saying he would not lead the League in saving Lucius Fox from being a hostage in a far away country for diplomatic reasons, and this lead to a dynamic within the DC Multiverse wherein Batman would be portrayed as a maverick and Superman a boy scout. While they patched things up later that year, 1986's ''ComicBook/BatmanTheDarkKnightReturns'' (which took place in a possible future) made Batman the ultimate outlaw anti-hero, and Superman a tool for the UsefulNotes/RonaldReagan of every political cartoon of the '80s. In the revised DC Universe, DC ran with this dynamic of Superman and Batman being at odds for about a decade before it just kind-of ran out of steam, though the recent ''Batman/Superman'' title and other Comicbook/{{New 52}} material revisited it.

* Considering how often ComicBook/{{Cyclops}} and Havok end up fighting one another, they sometimes get Flanderized into being locked in an eternal CainAndAbel, being unable to abide one another at the best of times and one of them being a super-villain (usually Havok, but more recently Cyclops) at worst. This portrayal appears in the Ultimate, Legends, and Misfits universes, where (unlike their 616 counterparts) they don't need the influence of any psychic brainwashing to bait them into fighting.
* During Joe Kelly's run, SelfDemonstrating/{{Deadpool}} was a talkative loon full of bad jokes and other wackiness. However he was also portrayed as a total psychotic with a loose, at best, grasp of sanity. All the wackiness was a cover to hide his immense mental problems and self-loathing and just the slightest nudge could send him over the edge in a violent, unsettling rage. Most subsequent writers pretty much ignore the latter part and play him up as little more than a goofy comedy character. That being said, [[TropesAreTools the character's popularity has, if anything, skyrocketed]] since his flanderization and his flanderized version has since become his more iconic and well-recognized version. It helps that Marvel already has characters to fill the [[{{Wolverine}} Canadian with Rage Issues, Regenerating Healing Powers, and a convoluted backstory complicated by Swiss-Cheese Memory]], and [[Franchise/SpiderMan a flamboyant joke-cracker in a red costume, whose snark covers up his inner angst]] roles. On the other hand, the Duggen[=/=]Posehn run has achieved no small amount of acclaim for its CharacterRerailment, which came at a time when Deadpool's "wacky all the time" shtick was considered to have gone stale.

* [[Franchise/WonderWoman Wonder Woman's]] willingness to kill got this when the New 52 reboot happened. Before she was willing to kill, but only in extreme circumstances where she had literally no other choice. In the New 52, DC cranked this up to ridiculous degrees, with her casually killing villains she fights and actually ''gloating'' about doing so to another superhero. This has had the effect of making it hard to believe that she would ever be made part of the Justice League, let alone allowed to continue operating; all of the other heroes retained their beliefs in no-killing or only killing when necessary.
* Comicbook/XMen:

** Cyclops has suffered this himself over the years. He was always a little aloof and had some trouble socializing with those around him, he even had trouble telling Jean Grey, the woman he loved, how he felt even after they hooked up, and he was always under a ton of pressure that some times caused him to chew people out, but he was always had the best intentions for those around him and just wanted to keep his friends and loved ones safe as they fought for a better world. And then some very, very, ''very'' bad stories happened to him and as time went by more and more writers - and fans - came to see him as just being "that jerk who isn't Wolverine." Some writers do remember to give him positive traits from time to time though.

** [[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Characters/XMenRoguesGallery Mr. Sinister]] is an interesting case. Originally introduced by Creator/ChrisClaremont as something of an evil cipher, little was known about Sinister other than that he was a MadScientist and that he was obsessed with Cyclops for some reason. Claremont had originally planned for a long, drawn-out reveal (in his [[KudzuPlot usual style]]) that would have established Sinister as an 8 year old boy with the mutant power of aging very, very slowly -- as in, he was already over 100 years old when he was in the orphanage with Scott despite his body still being 8 -- using the Sinister persona as a front. Claremont's abrupt departure shelved this plan, and so a new origin story was created for Sinister, one in which he was a scientist from Victorian England granted power and immortality by perennial X-Men BigBad ComicBook/{{Apocalypse}}.. This new origin story portrayed him as something of a TragicVillain, and most of the stories of the time followed suit to greater or lesser degrees. But beginning with 2002's ''Weapon X'' a new interpretation for Sinister was introduced, one which hewed closer to the Claremontian Mad Scientist but also cranked his evil quotient UpToEleven by making him an {{Expy}} of infamous Nazi scientist Josef Mengele. Since that time Sinister's become increasingly more affiliated with the Nazi regime, increasingly more [[NaziNobleman Nazi-like in general], and increasingly more prone to playing the PoliticallyIncorrectVillain.

** The Guardians Of The Universe have always been distant and aloof, but were once wise and respected, having created [[SpacePolice an organization of star-patrolling peacekeepers]] that has survived for eons. With each passing year though, they become more incompetent, single-minded, and corrupt, lying to their members, holding their own mysterious agendas, and constantly having their mistakes blow up in the faces and inevitably needing to be saved by the Earth Lanterns (and then clearly resenting the aid). One comic even had a Guardian admit he didn't remember why they started the Corp in the first place. By this point, it's a genuine curiosity how they got an organization as advanced and well-functioning as the Green Lanterns working outside of dumb luck.

* [[Comicbook/IncredibleHulk The Hulk's]] raw power has been exaggerated to the point that he might as well just be a [[Anime/DragonBallZ Super Saiyan.]] In his first appearance Hulk was perfectly capable of fluent speech and clear-minded reasoning. Over the years the "dumb" part of DumbMuscle got amplified along with the "muscle", until we reach the iconic "HULK SMASH!" levels. Then, Creator/PeterDavid got the idea of explaining this as two different facets of Bruce Banner's fractured mind manifesting in different types of Hulk. How his level of strength tends to be inversely proportional to his intelligence has been explained by that his ability to reason tends to put limits to how much pure rage he can build up.

** [[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Characters/XMenRoguesGallery Mr. Sinister]] is an interesting case. Originally introduced by Creator/ChrisClaremont as something of an evil cipher, little was known about Sinister other than that he was a MadScientist and that he was obsessed with Cyclops for some reason. Claremont had originally planned for a long, drawn-out reveal (in his [[KudzuPlot usual style]]) that would have established Sinister as an 8 year old boy with the mutant power of aging very, very slowly -- as in, he was already over 100 years old when he was in the orphanage with Scott despite his body still being 8 -- using the Sinister persona as a front. Claremont's abrupt departure shelved this plan, and so a new origin story was created for Sinister, one in which he was a scientist from Victorian England granted power and immortality by perennial X-Men BigBad ComicBook/{{Apocalypse}}.. This new origin story portrayed him as something of a TragicVillain, and most of the stories of the time followed suit to greater or lesser degrees. But beginning with 2002's ''Weapon X'' a new interpretation for Sinister was introduced, one which hewed closer to the Claremontian Mad Scientist but also cranked his evil quotient UpToEleven by making him an {{Expy}} of infamous Nazi scientist Josef Mengele. Since that time Sinister's become increasingly more affiliated with the Nazi regime, increasingly more [[NaziNobleman Nazi-like in general], and increasingly more prone to playing the PoliticallyIncorrectVillain.

** DreadfulMusician Cacofonix starts out as at least an average bard - Asterix blows off listening to his music once due to being busy (which annoyed him) and the people sitting near to his performance at the final banquet are cringing with their hands over their ears, but the villagers also perform a plot-important traditional dance to his music with every indication that they are enjoying it. As the comic progresses other characters (especially Fulliautomatix the blacksmith) start beating him up to prevent him from singing, which develops into a running gag, and he's shown to live in a hut at the top of a tree, where no-one can hear him. By the time Uderzo took over writing, he was so bad that he causes rain whenever he plays, which develops to the point where he ends up being so bad that merely playing a few notes creates an apocalyptic rainstorm that lasts for days.

** ComicBook/TheJoker has gone through this. Originally he was just a very wily criminal whose modus operandi was little more than "shits and giggles". Then came the Dark Age of comic books, and all of a sudden the Joker is the Yin to Batman's Yang, with just about every story over the last 20-plus years being about his feud with the Caped Crusader. You'd be hard-pressed to find a story involving the Joker committing a crime that ''wasn't'' meant to be an attack on Batman, the one exception being his corruption of Harley Quinn. In the ComicBook/{{New 52}}, the Joker's clown aspect has been dropped completely and his characterization can be summed up as "Batman's Arch Nemesis"
** Killer Moth ''suffered'' because of this trope. When he first appeared, Killer Moth was more or less the EvilCounterpart of Batman, despite his bright, gaudy costume. An evil criminal mastermind that everyone turned to for help, he was quite the threat. Then ComicBook/{{Batgirl}} showed up. They needed someone to show that Batgirl was a worthy addition to the Bat-Family and chose Moth as the target. However, being beaten by an untrained beginner vigilante who only showed up because of sheer circumstance turned Moth into the laughingstock of the Bat-Rogues almost ''immediately.'' Suddenly, Killer Moth went from "Batman's equal" to "pathetic nobody". They tried to salvage his character in the 90s by trying to turn him into a FromNobodyToNightmare by transforming him into Charaxas during ''ComicBook/UnderworldUnleashed'', but it didn't stick, ultimately being killed by Superboy-Prime in ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis''. Even other adaptations such as ''WesternAnimation/TheBatman'' and ''[[VideoGame/LEGOAdaptationGame LEGO Batman 3]]'' wouldn't be kind to him.
** Jim Gordon when he became Batman. So y'know how 90% of the time Jim is okay with vigilantes who don't kill? How he's worked with Batman for years and is actually ''friendly'' with him, as well as the other Batfamily members? And how he only frowns on vigilantes who kill or got oo far? Well when he's Batman, he hates all vigilantes in Gotham because he's a cop. Heck, "cop" is his defining trait, and actually the only noticeable one aside from the typical "I have to be Batman my own way" shtick that ''every'' Batman successor goes through.

* ComicBook/BoosterGold started as a well-meaning hero whose love of money often got him in over his head. Over the course of the '80s and '90s, writers forgot about the "well-meaning" part and turned him into a money-grubbing jerk. Thankfully, over the course of ''Comicbook/InfiniteCrisis'' and ''ComicBook/FiftyTwo'' in the mid-'00s, DC built Booster back up, and now he's a genuine hero again--though the lure of fame and fortune still ''occasionally'' tempt him. Even better, he now ''intentionally'' acts like that, so [[SecretKeeper no-one except Batman and Superman]] realises that he's grown into a competent hero in his own right, whilst he roams the timestream protecting history from enemies who — if they ever saw past his foolish reputation and realized he was the one foiling their schemes — would not only kill him but do it in such a way that Booster Gold never existed. So now instead of promoting himself, Booster must do everything in his power to make people think he's an inept idiot, in order to carry out his mission to defend time itself. Even before 52, some writers had started pointing out that there was more to Booster Gold than met the eye. At one point one of the other heroes muses that, being from the future, Booster must have been aware that Doomsday was a monster that was fully capable of killing Superman. And he still stepped up and took the first actual punch Doomsday aimed at a hero on his personal forcefield, to protect another member of the League. Both this acknowledgment and the moment itself hint that some people never completely forgot that Booster was kind of badass.
* Considering how often ComicBook/{{Cyclops}} and Havok end up fighting one another, they sometimes get Flanderized into being locked in an eternal CainAndAbel, being unable to abide one another at the best of times and one of them being a super-villain (usually Havok) at worst. This portrayal appears in the Ultimate, Legends, and Misfits universes, where (unlike their 616 counterparts) they don't need the influence of any psychic brainwashing to bait them into fighting.

* Originally, ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'' was something of a tough guy tackling (literally) wife beaters, war profiteers and abusive orphanages. By the end of the forties, however, he was the leading citizen of Metropolis, battling larger-than-life villains.
** Also when he was first introduced, he was a real scrapper and not afraid to get in the face of authority figures. That changed around UsefulNotes/WorldWarII along with Batman, however by the end of the fifties, he was flanderized into the ultimate boy scout and establishment figure. By the '80s, he'd become somewhat more morally ambiguous and a bit more cynical about people in power, especially after the ''ComicBook/TheManOfSteel'' reboot.
** When he was originally conceived, "faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive! Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound!" was ''the full'' list of Superman's powers. Now he's a PhysicalGod who can break the laws of physics on a whim and has more powers in his ''eyes'' than most superheroes have in ''total''.

* Northstar of Marvel's ''ComicBook/AlphaFlight'' (later the ''Comicbook/XMen'') started off as an arrogant former athlete with an interest in politics and a devotion to his mentally ill sister. While John Byrne wasn't allowed to write Northstar as explicitly gay, he managed to work in a few hints. When Marvel finally got the bright idea to "out" Northstar... well, suddenly, it seemed like all that mature characterization vanished, and suddenly he was gay. Gay, gay, gay. ''So'' gay. Did he tell you how gay he is? Even worse, he went back to being a self-absorbed douche despite maturing over the course of Alpha Flight.

* Hank Pym (aka ComicBook/AntMan) has suffered from this perhaps more than any other Marvel character. During a single incident in which he was suffering nervous breakdown and had just completed building a robot programmed to kill all of his his friends, [[NeverLiveItDown/ComicBooks Hank struck his wife]], Janet Van Dyne (TheWasp). This immediately had the effect of establishing him in canon both as a wife-beater and severely mentally ill. Dozens of writers over the years have gone back to this time and again, with at least three different stories having been told about the two of them coming to terms with what happened. Hank's remorse is so Flanderized and extreme that he called ''himself'' the Wasp when [[DeathIsCheap she was thought to be dead]].

* Hank Pym (aka ComicBook/AntMan) has suffered from this perhaps more than any other Marvel character. During a single incident in which he was suffering a nervous breakdown, [[NeverLiveItDown/ComicBooks Hank struck his wife]], Janet Van Dyne (TheWasp). Dozens of writers over the years have gone back to this time and again, with at least three different stories having been told about the two of them coming to terms with what happened. Hank's remorse is so Flanderized and extreme that he called ''himself'' the Wasp when [[DeathIsCheap she was thought to be dead]]. It's worth noting that both Spider-Man and Mr. Fantastic have hit their significant others in moments of extreme stress. While fans didn't much like either incident, neither character is regarded primarily as a "wife-beater" the way Pym is.

** A number of writers sadly only ever saw ComicBook/JeanGrey as either the Phoenix or "that cute girl Cyclops and Wolverine fight over." Jean Grey's reputation as the person who [[FirstLawOfResurrection resurrects frequently]] has been further exaggerated, with ''Phoenix – Endsong'' demonstrating multiple deaths and resurrections over a few pages, further lampshaded in ''Deadly Genesis'', when Scott and Logan react to the possibility of her resurrection in the same panel. In ''[[ComicBook/AdjectivelessXMen X-Men]]'' vol 4, Jean Grey's DNA becomes a plot point in the creation of a new host for Madelyne Pryor, bringing about another discussion of the possibility of Jean Grey resurrecting.

** A number of writers sadly only ever saw ComicBook/JeanGrey as either the Phoenix or "that cute girl Cyclops and Wolverine fight over."

* Creator/AlanMoore's TopTen has [[ShockAndAwe Shock Headed Peter]] who comes off at first as simply a prejudiced working class cop who actually has some character depth to a 2-D {{Straw|Character}} [[FantasticRacism Robo-Racist]] when a Robot character gets introduced to Precinct 10.
* ''TheUltimates'' have been criticized for being an extreme Flanderization of the Avengers. In their initial run, Creator/MarkMillar tended to take the most famous aspects of each Avenger -- ComicBook/{{Cap|tainAmerica}} being of the '40s, [[Comicbook/IronMan Tony]]'s hedonism, [[ComicBook/AntMan Pym]] slapping Janet, [[ComicBook/TheWasp Jan]] being slapped by Pym, [[Comicbook/IncredibleHulk Hulk]]'s rage, etc. -- and amplified them all several times over: Cap was painfully old-fashioned in speech and social views, Tony was always drinking and/or flirting with some blonde, Pym was a textbook wife-beater, Jan was a textbook battered wife, and Hulk was a murdering cannibal. This went into overdrive when Creator/JephLoeb took over the third volume. Tony was always in a drunken stupor and Cap spontaneously picked fights over [[ComicBook/ScarletWitch Wanda]]'s choice of attire.

** Sonic's attitude has been cranked UpToEleven, to the point where he's making wisecracks during a battle with Enerjak, a being with seemingly limitless energy (though this may have been more for comic relief than anything, it was a tad excessive). [[TropesAreTools To be fair]], though, it seems to have slightly boosted his {{Badass}}-ness--at the cost of emotion (again, though, to be fair, he never really showed much emotion anyway). The part about emotion is slowly being subverted as of #200; ever since Sonic's apparently driven Robotnik totally, droolingly insane, he seems to actually regret having broken down the guy so completely.

** ComicBook/{{Wolverine}} is a case study. During the [[TheEighties '80s]] considerable CharacterDevelopment evolved the character from a one-note {{Jerkass}} prone to UnstoppableRage to a wise, intelligent, multitalented, and skilled warrior/mentor (with just enough issues to avoid CanonSue status). Then he [[PopularityPower got popular]] and the LowestCommonDenominator of Captain Fuzzity [=McStabStab=] won out [[WolverinePublicity with all the guest-shots]] even as they ramped his HealingFactor to UpToEleven, making him pretty much the definition of a CanonSue. [[EnsembleDarkhorse And he's still the most popular character of the whole franchise]]. Because being {{Badass}} is the ''only'' thing he seems to need. And while his edges seem to have been smothed in the ''X-Men'' comics, buzz has it as of SDCC '13 that they're going to do a major story where his killing tendencies threaten his place in the Avengers.\\\

*** One of the [[AuthorsSavingThrow chief gains]] of ''ComicBook/AllNewXMen'', which brings the original team of X-Men into the future to stay with time travel, is, alongside reintroducing Jean Grey without actually [[DeathIsCheap bringing her back from the dead]], that Teen Cyclops is a version of the character with both flaws and things working for him instead of a few redeeming qualities that very occasionally shine through an irrationally militant mindset, and who hasn't alienated most of the X-Men to some degree by being a total hardass.