2 Character subtypes

In superhero role-playing games (particularly Champions), superheroes are informally organized into a variety of categories based on how their skills and abilities are oriented:

• "Brick": A character with a superhuman degree of strength and endurance, e.g. The Incredible Hulk, The Thing
• "Blaster": A hero whose main power is a distance attack, e.g. Cyclops, Starfire.
  • "Archer": A subvariant of this type where the hero uses bow and arrow-like weapons that typically have a variety of specialized functions like explosives, glue, nets, rotary drill, etc., e.g. Green Arrow, Hawkeye.
  • "Mage": A subvariant of this type where a character is trained in the use of magic which partially or wholly involves ranged attacks., e.g. Doctor Strange, Doctor Fate
• "Martial Artist": A hero whose physical abilities are mostly human rather than superhuman, but whose combat skills are phenomenal, e.g. Batman, Robin, Daredevil, Captain America.
• "Gadgeteer": A hero whose main asset is access to useful equipment that often imitates superpowers and usually has the relevant technical skills to maintain the equipment and use it to the character's best advantage, e.g. Forge, Nite Owl.
  • "Armored Hero": A gadgeteer whose powers are derived from a suit of powered armor, e.g. Iron Man, Steel.
• "Speedster": A hero possessing superhuman speed and reflexes, e.g. The Flash, Quicksilver.
• "Mentalist": A hero whose main abilities are psionic in nature such as psychokinesis, telepathy and extra-sensory perception, e.g. Professor X and Jean Grey of the X-Men, or Saturn Girl of the Legion of Super-Heroes.
• "Shapechanger": A hero who can manipulate his/her own body to suit his/her needs as stretching, e.g. Mister Fantastic, Plastic Man or disguise, e.g. Mystique, Ela Vista .
  • "Substance oriented Bodychanger - A shapechanger who can change his/her body into the equivalent of a mass of a substance that can have variable density such as sand or water. e.g. Sand, Dust, Husk.
  • "Sizechanger": A shapechanger whose powers involve altering their size to their advantage, e.g. The Atom (shrinking only), Colossal Boy (growth only), Hank Pym (both).

These categories often overlap with various characters. For instance, Batman is a martial artist and a gadgeteer, and Superman is extremely strong and damage resistant like a brick and also has ranged attacks (heat vision, superbreath) like an energy blaster and can move quickly like a speedster.

3 Divergent character examples

While the typical superhero is described above, many break the mold. For example:

• Wolverine of the X-Men has shown a willingness to kill and behave anti-socially. Wolverine belongs to an entire underclass of superhero anti-heroes who are grittier and more violent than classic superheroes, often putting members of the two groups at odds. Other examples include Rorschach, The Punisher, Cable, Green Arrow and, in some incarnations, Batman.

• Spider-Man has been portrayed as an every-man hero, often showing poor judgment and being overwhelmed by the responsibilities of both costumed crime fighting and civilian life. After Spider-Man became popular, superheroes generally became more human and troubled so whether or not this makes Spider-Man a divergent character example is questionable.

• The Incredible Hulk is usually defined as a superhero, but he has little self-control and his actions have often either inadvertently or deliberately menaced the population. As a result, he has been hunted by the military and by other superheroes.

• Luke Cage (AKA Power Man) and his partner, Iron Fist, operated a business called Heroes for Hire which charged a fee for their services although it was negotiable in certain circumstances.

• Spawn, The Demon and Ghost Rider are actual demons from Hell who find themselves manipulated by circumstance to be allies for the forces of good. Hellboy, on the other hand, is a demon who was raised from infancy by U.S. government agents after being rescued from the Nazis in World War II and is loyal to the forces of good on his own accord.

• Some superheroes have been created and employed by national governments to serve their interests and defend the nation. Examples include Captain America, who was created by and worked for the United States Army during World War II, and Alpha Flight, a superhero team which was created and usually run by the Canadian federal government.

• Many superheroes have never had a secret identity, such as Wonder Woman (in her current version) and the members of The Fantastic Four. Other superheroes that once had a secret identity, like Steel/John Henry Irons or Captain America/Steve Rogers, have later made their true identity public.

• Emma Frost, a member of the X-Men, was a supervillain for several years before she turned to the side of good. Other characters who have treaded the line between superhero and villain include Catwoman, Elektra, Venom and Juggernaut.

4 History and evolution of the character type

4.1 Predecessors

The origins of superheroes can be found in several prior forms of fiction. Many of their traits are shared with protagonists of later Victorian literature, such as Arthur Conan Doyle's detective Sherlock Holmes and H. Rider Haggard’s adventurer Alan Quatermain. The dime novel stories of Buffalo Bill, Zorro and Tarzan also influenced superheroes. Also, the pulp magazine crime fighters Doc Savage, The Shadow and The Spider were very direct influences.

4.2 The rise and fall of the golden age of comic books

In 1939, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster introduced Superman in Action Comics #1. Although the character was preceded by the costumed crime fighter The Phantom, featured in comic strips, Superman is still considered the first superhero, introducing many of the conventions that have come to define the term including a secret identity, superhuman powers and a colorful costume including a symbol and cape. His name is also the source of the term "superhero."

DC Comics (which published under the names National and American at the time) received an overwhelming response to Superman and, in the months that followed, introduced Aquaman, Hawkman, The Flash, Green Lantern, Batman, his sidekick Robin, and Wonder Woman, the first female superhero and the only significant one for quite some time. Although, DC dominated the superhero market at this time, Fawcett Comics rivaled their popularity with Captain Marvel, Marvel Comics found success with the Human Torch and Sub-Mariner, and cartoonist Will Eisner's The Spirit, a character with some superhero trappings who appeared in a newspaper comic insert, developed a loyal following. Meanwhile, Quality Comics introduced the character who could be called the first parody of the genre, the surreally humourous Plastic Man.

At this time, superheroes largely conformed to the model of lead characters in American popular fiction in the first half of the 20th century. Hence, the typical superhero was a white, middle to upper class, heterosexual, professional, young-to-middle-aged man.

During World War II, superheroes grew in popularity, surviving paper rationing and the loss of many of talented comics creators to service in the armed forces. The need for simple tales of good triumphing over evil may explain the war-time popularity of superheroes. Comic book creators responded with stories in which superheroes battle the Axis Powers and the introduction of patriotically themed superheroes, most notably Marvel’s Captain America.

After the war, superheroes lost popularity. One factor was a moral crusade which blamed comic books for juvenile delinquency. The movement was spearheaded by Dr. Fredric Wertham who argued, among other things, that “deviant” sexual undertones ran rampant in superhero comics. Other comics genres, such as horror and crime, were also targeted. In response, much of the comic book industry adopted the Comics Code, which allowed for only the most tame superhero stories. By the early 1950s, the superhero genre had all but vanished, with bland versions of only the most popular characters (Wonder Woman, Batman, and Superman) still published regularly.

4.3 The silver age and the beginning of ethnic and gender diversity

In 1956, DC Comics introduced a new version of The Flash, which became an immediate success. This led the company to revive Hawkman, Green Lantern, and several others - usually with a more modern, science-fiction angle - and to launch the all-star team the Justice League of America.

Empowered by the return of the superhero at DC, Marvel Comics editor/writer Stan Lee, artists/co-writers Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko and other illustrators launched a line of superheroes, beginning with The Fantastic Four in 1961, which stressed personal conflict and character development as much as action and adventure. This led to many superheroes who differed greatly from the standards created in the 1940s. Some examples:

• The Thing, a member of The Fantastic Four, was a super strong, but monstrous creature with rock-like skin and his appearance often filled him with self-pity.
• Spider-Man was a teenager who struggled to earn money and maintain his social life in addition to his costumed exploits.
• The Incredible Hulk shared a Jekyll/Hyde-like relationship with his alter ego Bruce Banner and was driven by anger and rage.
• The X-Men were " mutants" who gained their powers through genetic evolution and who were hated and feared by the society they sought to protect.

By the late 1960s and early 1970s, superheroes of other racial groups began to appear in Marvel Comics, including Black Panther, monarch of a fictional African nation, Luke Cage, an African-American "hero-for-hire," and Shang Chi, an Asian martial arts hero. Comic book companies were in the early stages of cultural expansion and many of these characters played to specific stereotypes. For example, Cage often employed lingo similar to that of blaxploitation films and Asians were often portrayed as master martial artists. Eventually, creators recognized this problem and developed more sophisticated characters such as the African-American Cyborg of the Teen Titans.

Strong female characters also gained prominence. In the early 1960s Marvel introduced The Fantastic Four’s Invisible Girl and The X-Men’s Marvel Girl, but these characters were physically weak and were portrayed primarily as romantic interests of other team members. However, the 1970s saw both these characters become more confident and assertive and the introduction of popular new female heroes, such as Spider-Woman and Storm of the newly revived X-Men. Initially, some characters were preachy radical feminist stereotypes like Marvel's Ms. Marvel and DC's Power Girl until writers grew more accustomed with society's changing attitudes.

4.4 1980s “deconstruction” of the superhero

By the early 1980s, Marvel Comics had introduced several popular anti-heroes including The Punisher, Wolverine and writer/artist Frank Miller’s darker version of Daredevil. These characters were deeply troubled from within, tormented by experiences such as the mob-related slaughter of The Punisher’s family, Wolverine’s battle with mutant animal instincts and Daredevil’s rough childhood and continual exposure to slum life.

The trend was taken to a new extreme in the 1986 mini-series Watchmen by writer Alan Moore and artist Dave Gibbons. Although published by DC, the story took place outside the "DC Universe" and featured new characters. The superheroes of Watchmen were emotionally unsatisfied, psychologically withdrawn, and even sociopathic.

Another series, The Dark Knight Returns ( 1985- 1986) adapted the trend to a familiar character. The mini-series, written and illustrated by Frank Miller, featured a future Batman returning from retirement. The series portrayed the hero as a madman who takes out his inner rage, drawn from the childhood murder of his parents, in a violent quest to mold society to his will.

Some critics believe that this trend is tied to the cynicism of the 1980s, when the idea of a person selflessly using his extraordinary abilities on a quest for good was no longer believable, but a person with a deep psychological impulse to destroy criminals was.

Regardless, both series were heavily acclaimed for their artistic ambitiousness and psychological depth, and led to numerous imitations. By the early 1990s, anti-heroes had become the rule rather than the exception. Many critics complained these series missed the essential artistic elements of redemption and tragedy of their inspirations. Without those elements, the imitations often came off as unlikable psychotics with little redeeming value.

In the 1990s, there was a reaction where notable talents like Kurt Busiek and Moore himself tried to reconstruct the superhero genre with titles like Busiek’s Astro City and Moore’s Tom Strong that combined artistic sophistication and idealism into a superheroic version of retro-futurism.

4.5 The struggles of the 1990s

By the early 1990s, Marvel and DC rarely introduced new superheroes with regular, ongoing series. Instead, most of their lines consisted of traditionally successful titles, revivals of past titles, and many spin-offs. For example two newer popular Marvel superheroes were Venom, a former enemy of Spider-Man, and Cable, leader of the X-Men offshoot X-Force (making his solo series a spin-off of a spin-off).

Image Comics, founded in 1992 by a group of former Marvel illustrators, became the biggest challenger ever to Marvel and DC's 30 years of co-dominance, and introduced many new popular heroes including Spawn, Witchblade, The Savage Dragon , and teams such as Gen 13, WildC.A.T.s and The Authority. These characters were owned by their creators, and without a corporation exercising editorial control, they deviated substantially from the traditional superhero mold. For example, Spawn was a man resurrected by a Satan stand-in to fill Hell by killing criminals, and Witchblade featured a scantily-dressed female detective with a magical weapon. However, many critics complained that the dominance of illustrators at Image made for superficial writing and character development.

To keep ahead, Marvel and DC make drastic changes to beloved characters. The hugely successful " Death of Superman" found the hero killed and resurrected, a new villain broke Batman’s back leading to a replacement Batman, and a clone of Spider-Man vied with Peter Parker for the title. While these stories drummed up publicity (often in the mainstream media), fans began to complain and, by the beginning of the 2000s, a majority of classic superheroes had returned to their roots.

By the 1990s, ethnic and gender diversity among superheroes was greater than ever before. Many characters in the X-Men, the most widely successful franchise of the time, were female, such as Storm and Rogue, or minorities, such as the Cajun Gambit and the African-American Bishop. There were also a few prominent gay superheroes, such as Alpha Flight’s Northstar, Gen 13’s Rainmaker and The Authority's gay couple Apollo and The Midnighter .

5 The genre's dominance in American comic books

The super hero genre has dominated comic books in the US for half a century. Before the 1960s, there were popular comics in many genres, including funny animal comics, westerns, romance, horror, war stories, and crime, with dozens of publishers both small and large. This diversity disappeared rapidly in the 1950s, largely due to two factors.

The first was a series of highly publicized campaigns against "unwholesome" children's comics, leading to the establishment of the highly restrictive Comics Code Authority; the Comics Code made most of the popular genres forbidden and wiped out many small publishers, but left the large superhero companies intact.

Second, the increasing popularity of television drew away much of the audience for light entertainment. By the time publishers felt free to move away from the Comics Code and produce something other than light entertainment, television and movies were far more profitable. However, comics were still able to depict outlandish action-oriented adventures such as superhero tales without expensive special effects budgets, and in a higher volume than the movie industry. ( Animation - which shares many of comics' advantages in depicting the genre - remained another popular medium for superheroes, but also proved successful in keeping other genres of entertainment popular with children, for similar reasons.)

Furthermore, the storytelling innovations in the genre originally featured in Marvel Comics allowed for a greater variety of characters and stories which allowed a further enhancement of the genre's characteristic thematic versatility.

6 Treatment in other media

6.1 Television

6.1.1 Animated Series

Superheroes have always found success in animated series geared towards children, starting with Fleischer Studios’ groundbreaking Superman cartoons of the 1940s, which featured the famous "It’s a bird, it’s a plane" introduction. The 1960s saw the rise of Filmation’s Superman-Batman Adventure Hour and several attempts at series based on Marvel characters, the most successful of which was Grantray-Lawrence Animation’s Spider-Man, featuring the “does whatever a spider can…” theme song.

In the 1970s and 1980s, superhero animated series were severely constrained in the action they could depict due to the strict broadcasting restrictions that activist groups like Action for Children's Television successfully lobbied for. For instance, the most durable of the series in this period, Super Friends, an adaptation of DC's Justice League of America was designed to be as nonviolent and inoffensive as possible. The Plastic Man Comedy/Adventure Show and Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends were similiarly tame.

Starting with the , which debuted on the Fox Network in 1992, superhero animated series gained a new maturity and respect for the comic books on which they were based. This continued with new Fox X-Men, and Spider-Man series, which, like Batman were geared towards older audiences in addition to being accessible to children.

In the early 21st century, the Cartoon Network has found success with adaptations of DC’s Justice League of America and Teen Titans.

6.1.2 Live Action Series

While animated series found imitate success, live action series were often hampered by limited budgets and goofy writing. The 1950s Adventures of Superman series starring George Reeves - an extension of the popular movie serials - featured very limited and unconvincing special effects. The live action Batman series of the late 1960s starring Adam West and Burt Ward, was a campy spoof of comics and superheroes. There unsuccessful imitators like Captain Nice and Mr. Terrific. The Green Hornet starring Van Williams as the Hornet and a young Bruce Lee as his sidekick Kato was tried a more dramatic approach, but was short lived. Although ratings successes, these series stereotyped superheroes as laughable and stupid.

By the late 1970s, the format found some success in a disguised fashion with The Six Million Dollar Man and its spin-off, The Bionic Woman starring Lindsay Wagner. This lead to series which were explicitly superhero shows such as Wonder Woman starring Lynda Carter, and the short-lived Spider-Man series starring Nicholas Hammond. These efforts were marred low budgets and an overhanging stereotyped campiness. However, the Incredible Hulk series of the late 1970s, starring Bill Bixby as Bruce Banner and Lou Ferrigno as the Hulk, took a more thoughtful and dramatic approach with the focus being Banner facing dramatic situations that always included villains dumb enough to anger him.

The 1980s saw the launch of various live-action superhero series that did not have their origins in comic book lore. Some, such as The Greatest American Hero, had limited success. Others, such as The Misfits of Science and Manimal, were cancelled after only a few episodes.

In 1993, the ABC Network had a success with Lois and Clark, which reformatted the Superman mythos as a romantic drama. This lead to several non-traditional approaches to superheroes in live action television shows, such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, where the protagonist is a dyed-in-the-wool idealist superhero (superpowers, a secret identity and supervillains come with the package) who exists in the horror genre. The series presents a believable superhero, while nevertheless poking gentle fun at the superhero genre (along with other genres).

Smallville has proven very successful in reinterpreting the characters of Clark Kent and Lex Luthor in their younger years, with a greater focus on their personalities, in a narrative format more familiar to the mainstream television audience. Other recent TV superhero series enjoying varying degrees of success include: Angel, Alias, Roswell, Timecop , Sheena, Dark Angel, and Mutant X.

6.2 Film

Almost immediately after superheroes rose to prominence in comic books, they were adapted into Saturday movie serials aimed at children, starting with 1941’s The Adventures of Captain Marvel. Serials featuring The Phantom, Batman, Superman and Captain America followed. These films were successful despite their limited budgets, silly storylines and dialogue, and primitive special effects.

In the coming decades, the decline of Saturday serials and turmoil in the comic book industry put an end to superhero motion pictures, an exception being some movies which were edited together episodes of the television series of The Adventures of Superman and an original 1966’s Batman, an outgrowth of the television series.

By 1978, special effects had reached such a point that the first modern superhero film, , directed by Richard Donner and starring Christopher Reeve, was possible. Almost a biopic of the character instead of an action movie, the film was an astounding success. It won critical praise not only for its lavish production values, but also for the sincere performance by Reeve and the John Williams film score which gave the film a mythic grandeur the fantasy subgenre had not previously enjoyed in film. However, its three sequels, produced throughout the 1980s, became increasingly silly to the point that even Reeve later dismissed the last one as an embarassment.

The 1989 film Batman, directed by Tim Burton, was the first attempt to create a superhero film with the darker mood of recent comic books. Fantastic set designs and acclaimed performances from Michael Keaton as Batman and Jack Nicholson as The Joker made the film perhaps the definitive superhero movie.

Although it launched some imitators, the Batman series degenerated into the same silliness of the 1960s TV series under director Joel Schumacher. This trend culminated with the fourth Batman film Batman and Robin ( 1997), which was a huge critical and commercial failure. That film, along with unsuccessful movies based on DC’s Steel, and Todd McFarlane's Spawn, made movie studios nervous about superhero movies for several years.

Nonetheless, several superhero movies began production in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Marvel Comics had a minor success with 1998's Blade. 2000's Unbreakable - a film based on an original premise not from comics, but heavily focused on the medium of comics and the idea of superheroes - demonstrated to critics and movie-goers that a movie on these subjects could be thoughtful and realistic, rather than simplistic and flashy.

2000’s blockbuster X-Men opened the door once again to highly successful mainstream superhero movies. 2002’s Spider-Man broke the record for money grossed in a film’s opening five days. Less successful movies include 2003‘s Daredevil, Hulk, and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and 2004’s Punisher and Hellboy. Sequels, such as 2003’s and 2004’s Spider-Man 2 have been highly successful. Pixar's digitally-animated The Incredibles takes a more comedic approach, crafting a commentary on the superhero genre and its long history.

As of 2004, DC plans to join the revival in 2005 with Batman Begins, a more serious prequel to Batman, and a new Superman film to be directed by X-Men director Bryan Singer, unofficially offered as a sequel to either the Reeve films or the Smallville TV series. Meanwhile, a handful of additional Marvel films are in various stages of production.

7 See also

• List of female superheroes
• List of Jewish superheroes
• List of DC Comics characters
• List of Marvel Comics characters
• Evil genius
• Top superhero (and supervillain) hide-outs and bases
• Real-life Superheroes

8 External link

• The Great Net Book of Real Heroes
• The Big Comic Book DataBase an online searchable database of comic book and creator information.
• Guardians of the North! a virtual museum tour through the history of Canadian superheroes, hosted by the National Library and Archives of Canada.

* Stock characters

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