So I had posted this some time ago on a forum and decided to go back and revisit it.
I was listening to a podcast with a discussion about creating your “ultimate” team of heroes. You could use any characters from any comic universe. I had started debating this with a friend in trying to come up with what I would feel would be an interesting book. We were trying to look at it from a publisher’s standpoint of what would be interesting with the team dynamics that a writer could work with. One of the caveats was while the team interaction was key, they couldn’t be too over-powered where you couldn’t come up with a good mix of villains for them to fight. The idea is for a continuous monthly book, not just a mini-series or story arc so with that I tried to stay away from the all-star type lineup just full of heavy hitters. When one side is too heavily favored I lose interest in reading.
Anyway, here are the seven I came up with and the reasoning behind them. I forget the reason I was limiting to seven. I think that according to the podcast that was considered a standard number at one time for a team book. since the podcast was the inspiration behind all this, lets stick with their rules and not let this team grow to Legion of Super-Hero proportions. Besides, it’s just too easy to not have to make a decision between two characters and then just adding both of them to the team.
The other part I wanted to make sure of was the right mix of character traits. so for a team book my thoughts were it needs: Leadership, Fighting Ability, Strength, Speed, Intellect, Versatility and either Magic or Spiritualism.
Since this is a new book I’m going to need a few big names to help sell the book, so the two I went with are Batman and Wolverine. While a lot of fans will start screaming they are over-exposed, there is a reason for that as they tend be favorites to a lot of fans, myself included. I’d love to see how a writer would get them to co-exist considering Wolverine’s casual attitude towards killing and Batman adamant stance against it. You know at some point they would have to have some sort of throw down and seeing as how Batman would have teamed with Wolverine for some time, we’d get to test the Batman theory of given the time and resources, Batman can think of a way to take down anyone.
I had also thought about the possibility of maybe Captain America and/or the Winter Soldier here.
There would be a lot of history to build off of and it would make for some great interaction, but as with most of the choices it comes down to a personal preference and its hard to top Wolverine and Batman in my book.
So we have Leadership and Fighting Ability covered.
After getting the two core members in place I wanted to get whoever would be the one cracking jokes while in battle. I was leaning towards Spider-Man (maybe even Ultimate Spidey), but then I’m getting into a team full of all-stars and we already have two characters that appear in multiple books. No reason to screw up continuity any more than necessary.
So now I’m still looking for a relatively young character here so I settled on Invincible. He’s written as being fairly confident in his powers, but is definitely still learning all about responsibility and consequences.
I think his personality also fits what I’d want here as his attitude early on in the book would play off great against Batman and Wolverine. He’s also never been a team player so it would be great to see how a good writer could help evolve his character even further with the team dynamic.
We now have Strength and Speed covered.
For the next member I started thinking maybe a telepath, but I’m just so bored with all of them. Yes it’s always cool to have one around, but they really usually aren’t all the visually appealing. well except for Emma Frost, but I don’t care how long she’s been a member of the X-Men, I still prefer her as a villain. Instead I went with a character that would be immune to a telepathic attacks, The Vision. I think you could go with either the classic Avengers version or the newer model that is on the Young Avengers. Adding him (it?) in gives you some more strength, density control (was also thinking Shadowcat to go with the youth to play that off with Invincible, but I have another character that would play well off of him) and another analytical mind to go with Batman. Again, another character that I think would make for some solid interaction with Batman’s attitude of always being right.
The other choice for this spot could go to the Martian Manhunter as he does give you telepathy and so many other powers. He was a very tempting choice, but in the end I see him as just a notch below Superman in terms of power and that’s going overboard in that category when I want to leave that open to give me options later.
The last few slots had a lot of options. I originally thought I wanted some sort of elemental based character here. The Human Torch seemed like an ideal fit. Is a great team player and there is a lot you could explore with him outside of the family setting of the Fantastic Four, but I see him as another character that would be butting heads with Wolverine and Batman.
The other obvious choice if I want to go with an elemental character would be go the opposite and add Iceman to the mix. While he’s been around forever, he just seems to be a character that is always just that extra member on the team and has never really had those huge moments or gripping story. In the end, while i love his look I find him a little boring.
So with trying to stick with some sort of elemental based character I decided to go with someone that would be a blank slate for a writer to go with. I decided to add Aqualad, but I am looking at the version from the Young Justice cartoon. I’ve never been a fan of Garth from the Teen Titans and I know nothing of the other Aqualad that was introduced a few years ago before the New 52. Since there is a Young Justice book (and this is my team) I think he fits the criteria. He would definitely add some versatility to the team and since he’s basically a rookie, there is a lot of directions his character can go.
The next slot was going to go to another brute type character. I had a few characters I liked to fill this roster spot. Ultra Boy would be interesting seeing as how he’s close to being a Superman type character but with the limitation of only being able to use one power at a time. but even with that limitation he seemed a little too powerful and didn’t add anything else to the mix
The character I had originally felt would fit in great here when I had this discussion years ago was Freddy Freeman. He had just become the new Captain Marvel He’d be in that same age range as Invincible, but comes with a lot more experience. I think he’d make a solid mentor for Invincible while also dealing with all of the new responsibilities of taking over the mantle of his mentor. It also doesn’t hurt to have a magic-based character on the team. The only reason I’d look to exclude him now is with the New 52, the character is not what he once was. Sure I could go with Shazam, but this new version hasn’t grown on me yet.
Ms. Marvel also seemed like a solid choice here. She’s a team player, has a history with Wolverine, adds in a lot of elements that stories could be built around and at this point there are no female members of the team. While it was very tempting, I decide to go in a different direction.
Instead of going with brute strength, you can always go with power. Looking at he current roster and trying to decide who I can add that would cause the most turmoil, it seemed pretty obvious. The Scarlet Witch would be perfect from the persepctive of being able to build a great story. Between the past history with The Vision, Wolverine’s feelings towards her role in the House of M mutant genocide, Batman’s general distrust of just about everyone (and his trying to figure out a way to neutralize her should she lose control again). Throw in that the team needs a female character and she fills the necessary magic component that was missing and adds versatility.
Since the team seems to have all of the necessary components covered, this last spot allows for some flexibility and was left up to who I thought would be the best to mix in. This spot came down to which favorite character of mine either isn’t currently in a book or being used to their potential. I always loved Taboo from the Backlash series, but in looking at her history and power set, it just didn’t feel like the right mix.
Another favorite that I strongly considered was Raven. She would definitely make for some great story-telling as I had always loved her interaction with wolverine from the Teen Titans/X-Men crossover years ago. she would also bring another element to the book with her family tree, but I ended up passing on her as there is another character that I’d love to see again in a team book.
One of my favorite books was Marvel’s Exiles. The whole idea behind that book of pulling variations of characters from different realities fits right in with this entire exercise of building a team book. So why not take my favorite from that series. While Invincible fills the role of a wise-cracker in battle, Morph would be the comedy center for this book. Forcing the ever serious Batman and Wolverine to deal with Morph would make for some great moments. I would also love to see a writer trying to deal with the banter between Morph and Invincible in a battle. His powerset allows for a ton of creativity and while his demeanor was always that of the joker, he was an integral part of the Exiles lineup.
So my team would come down to:
Batman
Wolverine
Invincible
Vision
Aqualad
Scarlet Witch
Morph
Now all I need to do is put together a creative teams and plan out the first few years of the book. For as much fun as it was thinking of the team of heroes, I’d have even more fun coming up with their adversaries!
Create Your Own Team Book.
So I had posted this some time ago on a forum and decided to go back and revisit it.
I was listening to a podcast with a discussion about creating your “ultimate” team of heroes. You could use any characters from any comic universe. I had started debating this with a friend in trying to come up with what I would feel would be an interesting book. We were trying to look at it from a publisher’s standpoint of what would be interesting with the team dynamics that a writer could work with. One of the caveats was while the team interaction was key, they couldn’t be too over-powered where you couldn’t come up with a good mix of villains for them to fight. The idea is for a continuous monthly book, not just a mini-series or story arc so with that I tried to stay away from the all-star type lineup just full of heavy hitters. When one side is too heavily favored I lose interest in reading.
Anyway, here are the seven I came up with and the reasoning behind them. I forget the reason I was limiting to seven. I think that according to the podcast that was considered a standard number at one time for a team book. since the podcast was the inspiration behind all this, lets stick with their rules and not let this team grow to Legion of Super-Hero proportions. Besides, it’s just too easy to not have to make a decision between two characters and then just adding both of them to the team.
The other part I wanted to make sure of was the right mix of character traits. so for a team book my thoughts were it needs: Leadership, Fighting Ability, Strength, Speed, Intellect, Versatility and either Magic or Spiritualism.
Since this is a new book I’m going to need a few big names to help sell the book, so the two I went with are Batman and Wolverine. While a lot of fans will start screaming they are over-exposed, there is a reason for that as they tend be favorites to a lot of fans, myself included. I’d love to see how a writer would get them to co-exist considering Wolverine’s casual attitude towards killing and Batman adamant stance against it. You know at some point they would have to have some sort of throw down and seeing as how Batman would have teamed with Wolverine for some time, we’d get to test the Batman theory of given the time and resources, Batman can think of a way to take down anyone.
I had also thought about the possibility of maybe Captain America and/or the Winter Soldier here.
There would be a lot of history to build off of and it would make for some great interaction, but as with most of the choices it comes down to a personal preference and its hard to top Wolverine and Batman in my book.
So we have Leadership and Fighting Ability covered.
After getting the two core members in place I wanted to get whoever would be the one cracking jokes while in battle. I was leaning towards Spider-Man (maybe even Ultimate Spidey), but then I’m getting into a team full of all-stars and we already have two characters that appear in multiple books. No reason to screw up continuity any more than necessary.
So now I’m still looking for a relatively young character here so I settled on Invincible. He’s written as being fairly confident in his powers, but is definitely still learning all about responsibility and consequences.
I think his personality also fits what I’d want here as his attitude early on in the book would play off great against Batman and Wolverine. He’s also never been a team player so it would be great to see how a good writer could help evolve his character even further with the team dynamic.
We now have Strength and Speed covered.
For the next member I started thinking maybe a telepath, but I’m just so bored with all of them. Yes it’s always cool to have one around, but they really usually aren’t all the visually appealing. well except for Emma Frost, but I don’t care how long she’s been a member of the X-Men, I still prefer her as a villain. Instead I went with a character that would be immune to a telepathic attacks, The Vision. I think you could go with either the classic Avengers version or the newer model that is on the Young Avengers. Adding him (it?) in gives you some more strength, density control (was also thinking Shadowcat to go with the youth to play that off with Invincible, but I have another character that would play well off of him) and another analytical mind to go with Batman. Again, another character that I think would make for some solid interaction with Batman’s attitude of always being right.
The other choice for this spot could go to the Martian Manhunter as he does give you telepathy and so many other powers. He was a very tempting choice, but in the end I see him as just a notch below Superman in terms of power and that’s going overboard in that category when I want to leave that open to give me options later.
The last few slots had a lot of options. I originally thought I wanted some sort of elemental based character here. The Human Torch seemed like an ideal fit. Is a great team player and there is a lot you could explore with him outside of the family setting of the Fantastic Four, but I see him as another character that would be butting heads with Wolverine and Batman.
The other obvious choice if I want to go with an elemental character would be go the opposite and add Iceman to the mix. While he’s been around forever, he just seems to be a character that is always just that extra member on the team and has never really had those huge moments or gripping story. In the end, while i love his look I find him a little boring.
So with trying to stick with some sort of elemental based character I decided to go with someone that would be a blank slate for a writer to go with. I decided to add Aqualad, but I am looking at the version from the Young Justice cartoon. I’ve never been a fan of Garth from the Teen Titans and I know nothing of the other Aqualad that was introduced a few years ago before the New 52. Since there is a Young Justice book (and this is my team) I think he fits the criteria. He would definitely add some versatility to the team and since he’s basically a rookie, there is a lot of directions his character can go.
The next slot was going to go to another brute type character. I had a few characters I liked to fill this roster spot. Ultra Boy would be interesting seeing as how he’s close to being a Superman type character but with the limitation of only being able to use one power at a time. but even with that limitation he seemed a little too powerful and didn’t add anything else to the mix
The character I had originally felt would fit in great here when I had this discussion years ago was Freddy Freeman. He had just become the new Captain Marvel He’d be in that same age range as Invincible, but comes with a lot more experience. I think he’d make a solid mentor for Invincible while also dealing with all of the new responsibilities of taking over the mantle of his mentor. It also doesn’t hurt to have a magic-based character on the team. The only reason I’d look to exclude him now is with the New 52, the character is not what he once was. Sure I could go with Shazam, but this new version hasn’t grown on me yet.
Ms. Marvel also seemed like a solid choice here. She’s a team player, has a history with Wolverine, adds in a lot of elements that stories could be built around and at this point there are no female members of the team. While it was very tempting, I decide to go in a different direction.
Instead of going with brute strength, you can always go with power. Looking at he current roster and trying to decide who I can add that would cause the most turmoil, it seemed pretty obvious. The Scarlet Witch would be perfect from the persepctive of being able to build a great story. Between the past history with The Vision, Wolverine’s feelings towards her role in the House of M mutant genocide, Batman’s general distrust of just about everyone (and his trying to figure out a way to neutralize her should she lose control again). Throw in that the team needs a female character and she fills the necessary magic component that was missing and adds versatility.
Since the team seems to have all of the necessary components covered, this last spot allows for some flexibility and was left up to who I thought would be the best to mix in. This spot came down to which favorite character of mine either isn’t currently in a book or being used to their potential. I always loved Taboo from the Backlash series, but in looking at her history and power set, it just didn’t feel like the right mix.
Another favorite that I strongly considered was Raven. She would definitely make for some great story-telling as I had always loved her interaction with wolverine from the Teen Titans/X-Men crossover years ago. she would also bring another element to the book with her family tree, but I ended up passing on her as there is another character that I’d love to see again in a team book.
One of my favorite books was Marvel’s Exiles. The whole idea behind that book of pulling variations of characters from different realities fits right in with this entire exercise of building a team book. So why not take my favorite from that series. While Invincible fills the role of a wise-cracker in battle, Morph would be the comedy center for this book. Forcing the ever serious Batman and Wolverine to deal with Morph would make for some great moments. I would also love to see a writer trying to deal with the banter between Morph and Invincible in a battle. His powerset allows for a ton of creativity and while his demeanor was always that of the joker, he was an integral part of the Exiles lineup.
So my team would come down to:
Batman
Wolverine
Invincible
Vision
Aqualad
Scarlet Witch
Morph
Now all I need to do is put together a creative teams and plan out the first few years of the book. For as much fun as it was thinking of the team of heroes, I’d have even more fun coming up with their adversaries!