Art by Ron Lim. All characters featured in images for this column are owned by Marvel.
As Avengers: Infinity War is now available to everyone to own, it seems Marvel's Dark Titan is a rather unsurprising choice for the first new Best Character Ever in nearly two years. But my connection with the character dates back way farther than that.
More specifically it dates back to the late 1980s when I first stumbled upon a copy of The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Deluxe Edition 20: Book of the Dead (Stick to Zuras). I distinctly remember having to convince my mother the cover shot of characters' spirits rising from their graves was merely symbolic. But when I got it for the glorious cover price of $1.50, I knew I held gold in my hand.
I don't know where exactly I first fell in love with Deathstroke. I started to follow the Titans off and on around 1989 with Secret Origins Annual 3 as my first major exposure to the team. I only rarely picked up issues at that time as eleven year old Nick had limited access to comic shops where New Titans and later Deathstroke were exclusively sold at.
But I knew I was intrigued by Slade Wilson. Just as Nightwing quickly became a favorite DC hero, Deathstroke became my favorite anti-hero. A combination of a traditional Marvel hero and a roguish assassin in the men's adventure vein mixed with a bit of megalomania, he was an intriguing character built around a personal code of honor. He intrigued me as a villain who wasn't quite a villain, but was far from being a hero, especially as he spun off into his own series.
Bond. James Bond. It is a name synonymous with English language culture. Over twenty movies after Sean Connery first donned a tux to bring the character to life in Dr. No, he has become one of the most beloved characters in the history of entertainment.
Through the years, Bond has been brought to life by a half dozen actors of varying ability. Connery wasn’t the actual first. That honor actually goes to Barry Nelson, an American actor on the 50s television anthology show Climax!, where he played “Jimmy Bond”. But he set up the look and style of the character for decades to come.
Since that time, the question of who is the best James Bond floats through the ether of everyday conversation and internet argument. Sean Connery, Daniel Craig and Pierce Brosnan all have a strong contingent of backers. Roger Moore, the longest running Bond, often ends up as something of a red-headed stepchild while George Lazenby is barely an after-thought. But none are my favorite Bond. No, the best Bond is often the most derided: Timothy Dalton.
Dalton came to the character right after Roger Moore and his movies came with an instant tonal shift. The Living Daylights and Licence To Kill are not the wild campy rides of Moore’s era. They are dark, gritty Cold War tales that feature really threats and limited gadgets. James Bond is a cold-blooded killer, but still our moral compass through a world where no one is someone we really want to root for. Over the fifty years of James Bond films, these two come the closest to Ian Fleming’s originals. If you haven’t watched them, give them a shot, especially if you’re a fan of Casino Royale or Skyfall.
Talking all the different James Bond actually brings up my favorite aspect of the character, one that always surfaces every time Bond is recast. A theory has been around for decades that all James Bond movies are in continuity and that the name and number are passed from agent to agent as one retires or dies. This creates a fascinating continuity akin to some of the craziest comic book universes. It’s also an idea that if I ever wrote a James Bond novel, I would definitely put into play.
Here is my personal James Bond timeline:
1962-1968: The first 007 is actually named James Bond. He comes into operation and takes on the forces of SPECTRE. Injured in battle, he temporarily retires.
1969-1970: A new Bond takes the place of the original, but his wife is quickly killed at the hands of SPECTRE agents. His quest for vengeance leads to horrible injuries that leave him badly scarred.
1971: With a need for a 007 active, the recovered first Bond returns. His work is short lived though and he quickly is retired. The resurfacing of SPECTRE in the early 80s brings him back into operation, temporarily giving the world two active Bonds.
1972-1985: After experimental plastic surgery, the second Bond returns to duty with a new face. He would quickly become an expert agent, now regularly towing the party line for M and the Special Service.
1986-1990: A hard-nosed military veteran becomes the third man to take the Bond name after the previous Bond is forced into retirement. He is much less concerned with materialism than previous 007s, but his hard-nosed views clash with those of M.
1993-2005: After two years without an active Bond, a fourth Bond is brought in to the Special Service. In the post-Cold War era, he faces far different threats and spends much of his time jet-setting rather than in active service.
2006-present: After the previous Bond is forced into retirement, the fifth and current James Bond becomes active. In the post-9/11 world he is far more tactile an operative than previous 007s. The nephew of the original Bond, he also carries the birth name James Bond. (Feel free to insert all his young adventures as James Bond Jr. if you would like.)
I love playing these kind of Wold Newton games with literary figures and Bond started that for me. That alone makes him an important addition to this list.
Currently, Daniel Craig may or may not have filmed his last Bond with Spectre. After that, it could go to anyone. (Idris Elba is my choice for Bond 6 though.) If Craig leaves, I look forward to building the growing narrative of multiple Bonds.
Oh, and anyone that spends time debunking the theory (like the folks that made Skyfall), should stop. Have fun and live a little.
Leonardo Da Vinci’s impact on history is legendary. The quintessential Renaissance Man, Da Vinci did things hundreds of years ahead of his time. But as great as he was as a historical figure, I often think he offers many more possibilities as a figure in literature and pop culture. He’s certainly one I am always fascinated to see in fictional endeavors.
I think I first came across fictional Da Vinci in the film Hudson Hawk. I would have been about twelve when I first saw the legendary box office bomb starring Bruce Willis. But its backstory focused on Da Vinci and the quest to unlock the three pieces of the Philosopher’s Stone the legendary engineer inadvertently made. While Hudson Hawk certainly isn’t a masterpiece of cinematic history, it did instill me with a love for the fictional Da Vinci that has survived for over two decades.
The Sideshow collectibles figure is on my Amazon Wishlist should anyone
have $200 burning a hole in their pocket.
You can’t get much cooler than Snake-Eyes.
I mean, think about it. He doesn’t talk. He’s nearly invincible and you can almost never take him by surprise. He’s a master of stealth and a master of both hand to hand combat and the use of the Uzi, a.k.a. the coolest submachine gun ever created by man.
And he looked completely different than the rest of the G.I. Joe line.
And he got a pet wolf too!
The fact that he was hard to find made him that much cooler to my brother and I. Eventually we got a hold of him, about the time we first learned that he could shrug off radiation like it was nothing.
He would go on to be a featured player in several multi-part G.I. Joe episodes, but the show never really gave him the respect I thought he deserved, instead focusing too much time on Duke and Scarlett, and later Flint and Lady Jaye. Thankfully, the comic would not do the same.
Still can't believe my
mom bought this cover
for young Nick.
But it was the first issue of the G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero comic that I bought that really cemented my love for Snake-Eyes. The look into the intricate and mysterious origins of Snake-Eyes inside had me hooked (though the appearance by Scrap-Iron and Firefly, my two favorite Cobras didn’t hurt). More importantly, it got my older brother to start buying every issue.
From then on, we were both fans of the coolest ninja ever, especially when he embarked on a quest to save his fallen brother Storm Shadow. The two would settle their differences and become strong friends, a recurring theme through many years and variations of G.I. Joe stories (right up to the second stronger film G.I. Joe: Retaliation.)
His origin, told through a few different short run stories on the title, was filled with pathos. His family was killed by a drunk driver while he was away on a mission that ultimately left him horribly disfigured. He would find inner peace with the Arashikage ninja clan, but would never rest until he found his family’s killer. (A man that ultimately turned out to be Cobra Commander.)
My brother and I would go on to buy every Snake-Eyes figure to come out from the original line of figures, six different toys in all, sometimes more than one.
I am sure much of my fondness for the character comes from the age I was at. I was a child of the 80s, in love forever with the ninja, and to me Snake-Eyes was a ninja but better. He was an American ninja and not just some schmuck from a weak action film. (Sorry, Michael Dudikoff.)
Snake-Eyes would eventually pretty much take over the G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero title for much of its later run, going so far as getting top billing during the Andrew Wildman era.
As a mainstay of the Joe team ever since, through dozens of new incarnations Snake-Eyes has remained. Ninjas are damn cool and they will never get much cooler than the silent warrior with the lost family and the hot redhead girlfriend.
And he will ever be the best damn warrior this or any army will ever see.
Mouse Guard's David Petersen did this amazing cover for the
IDW Raphael one-shot.
The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles hold a special place in my reading history. The toyline debuted right around my ninth birthday, but it was another year before I moved past the triumvirate of G.I. Joe, Transformers and M.A.S.K. to embrace the Turtles. But once I did, I was hooked. Over the next five years, TMNT rose to become the biggest toy line in the world, but I was busy digging deep into its history and in doing so fell in love with Raphael.
Nick's version of the character is a bit more visually
complicated than the previous cartoons.
While most everyone else my age just watched the TV show and bought a few toys, I was already a ravenous comic reader. So when I found out that the TMNT came from one of those weird black and white comics I would sometimes see, my search began. And my local small town bookstore was able to help out. They carried the colored First Comics collections of the first dozen TMNT books.
The first thing that became clear to young me was how cool Raphael was. He was the one that didn’t quite get along with the rest of his brothers. He had his own way of thinking about life and the world around him. While it was initially inspired by Wolverine (check out his monologue in the very first TMNT comic), he quickly developed into an independent thinker thanks to the Raphael micro-series. He also met another fellow that will be the star of a future Best Character Ever.
Sophie Campbell's art for the IDW series was a
true highlight for the characters.
The creators of the live action film clearly caught on to the strength of Raphael as a character. When the Ninja Turtles film hit the market, I was overjoyed to see Raphael take the major starring role, even taking over Leonardo’s role as the guy that took on the Foot Clan single handed. While the movie had some flaws, the story proved to cement Raphael as the best of a line I already loved.
Over the years, I’ve remained a TMNT fan. I bought through the Archie book, the color Mirage series, the black & white Mirage return title, the revived Tales of the TMNT and the 2000-era cartoon, all into Nickelodeon’s purchase of the characters. And throughout all of them, Raphael always remained the strongest character on the team. I continue to enjoy his adventures in the new CGI-animated series and the IDW series where Tom Waltz and Kevin Eastman continue to craft the most compelling Ninja Turtles ever. Meanwhile, they have become box office stars once more with a second theatrical release due to drop this summer.
It’s never too late to fall in love with the TMNT. Go check out the IDW series in trade or digital. You will not be disappointed.
Why do I love Mace Windu? Isn’t it obvious? He’s clearly the baddest mofo in the galaxy.
The Star Wars prequels are far from perfect movies. Jar Jar’s annoying, Anakin is grating rather than sympathetic and the less said about the stupidity of Count Dooku, the better. But when it gets things right, it gets them very right. Case in point: casting Samuel L. Jackson to play the coolest Jedi Master ever.
Most of my focus on Best Character Ever so far has been on childhood favorites. This time I picked a character I only discovered in recent years, albeit one that existed nearly forty years before I was born.
He throws that head a bit later.
Stardust was known as The Super-Wizard, although creator Fletcher Hanks never really bothered to stop and explain why. Of course, Hanks rarely stopped to explain much of anything for his character. Instead Stardust is a crazed tale of a being from outer space come to Earth to unleash his own insane brand of justice to criminals. He often did so in ways that made the Spectre seem tame in comparison.
He really puts the squeeze on criminals!
Stardust isn’t a character build around great character development or even competent storytelling. He’s a character built around pure, unadulterated insanity from an era where comics had little or no rules. His adventures were collected in recent years by two Fantagraphics anthologiesI Shall Destroy All The Civilized Planets!andYou Shall Die By Your Own Evil Creation!, both of which come highly recommended for their entertainment value. Together they pretty much collect every Stardust story, alongside some of the other oddball creations Fletcher Hanks brought to comicdom. In the aftermath of their release, Stardust’s profile has certainly risen, just out of the character's sheer craziness. He may be the most well known independent Golden Age character in the modern era outside Black Terror and Daredevil. Whatever the case, he’s a great character, one that will make an appearance in a future volume of Living Legends, late in the upcoming volume two.
Sometimes a character is awesome because of all the great stories he has been in. Sometimes a character is great because of all the potential he has. Sadly, Shotgun falls in to the latter.
J.R. Walker first appeared in the pages ofDaredevilwhen the man was on his walkabout in the waning days of Ann Nocenti’s run. Created by artist John Romita Jr., Shotgun is presented as little more than a thug by Nocenti’s writing, albeit one with a sharp tongue. With a cool look and sporting the perfect early 90s load of giant guns (though these appearances were in 89, contemporary with Cable’s early appearances), it seemed like he would go somewhere.
The modern writing of her has been so-so, but
Frank Cho certainly knows how to draw Wanda!
I don’t remember where exactly I first ran into the Scarlet Witch. Much like Wolverine, she was probably first introduced to me by the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Deluxe Edition. Her illustration was by the legendary John Byrne and the pose showed a little more life than many of the character shots in the book. Her name and powers fascinated me. And like many young comic fans, I probably thought she was pretty hot in that skintight red costume. When I finally started to read more Marvel books, West Coast Avengers immediately drew my attention. Wanda Maximoff and her husband Vision were on the team—much later I would find out they were just recent additions—and I instantly took to the split units under the pen of Steve Englehart and the pencils (for better or worse) of Al Milgrom. But it wouldn’t be long until John Byrne moved in to take over the book.
On this Labor Day, I figured there was no better time to talk about Spider-Man.
Romita's swinging Spidey is still one of the character's most iconic images.
Let's be honest, here's no greater working class hero than Spider-Man. Of course, Marvel dropped that element of him years ago to replace him with another super-amazing Marvel scientist, but his media appearances still understand the importance of his working class Queens background.
I grew up nowhere near New York, deep in the Midwest. I was raised in a tiny Iowa town, the kind of place books and movies would call sleepy. Smallville was a city compared to the 3000 person community I spent the first ten years of my life in. But despite that background, I had a love for superheroes from my earliest memories and a show called Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends. Iceman was my true favorite of the show because I thought ice slides were cool (pun intended). I am pretty sure I had my first crush on Firestar. But Spider-Man was the one with his name on the title card.
I really loved the Lobo brothers.
Art by Sal Buscema. Click for larger view.
By the time I was nine, my brother was regularly buying all three Marvel Spider-Man books at that time: Amazing Spider-Man, Web of Spider-Man and Spectacular Spider-Man. All three books shared a narrative, but the second two were incredibly closely tied by sharing a writer in Gerry Conway. Along with his artists Sal Buscema and Alex Saviuk as well as the Amazing creative team of Dave Michelinie and Todd McFarlane, Spider-Man entered what I would call his last great renaissance in comics. Newly married to Mary Jane Watson, his wife and him found themselves at the mercy of a crazed businessman turned stalker that crippled their finances, evicted them from their home and got Mary Jane blackballed from her modeling career. Spidey was at his lowest point, only having a home because of the generosity of Harry and Liz Osborn.
I could understand it all perfectly at nine years old. I got being poor as my family never had much money. I could see how someone could be obsessed by Mary Jane and saw stories about corrupt businessmen seemingly daily on a dozen different TV shows. (Yes, it was a cliche even then.) I groked Peter's struggle because it was something I could relate to, even if I wasn't regularly fighting super-powered were-gangsters or helping my friend stay alive against an Albino hitman. I never wore an alien costume or had to fight to keep New York free from a citywide demonic possession. But I could always get Peter Parker.
I think that more than great power and great responsibility, more than his catching thieves just like flies, more than every variation of his origin, is what makes Spider-Man a truly special character. He was someone that no matter how hard life treated him, he always strove to do the right thing.
Alex Saviuk was always my Spider-artist,
making me the weird(er) kid.
Click for larger view
Spider-Man's influence on the superhero landscape cannot be under-estimated. Outside Superman, no one character did more to change the narrative of superheroes in the 21st century. Half the Marvel Universe is built around the storytelling cues first put together by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. Even DC got in on the inspiration with books like Firestorm, Blue Devil and New Teen Titans. Comics became as much about the tribulations of everyday life as about the crazy super villain this month.
Even my own characters owe tons to Spider-Man. I always wanted to write characters with more depth than the comics I grew up upon. Even after that late 80s golden age of Spider-Man, I learned a lot about prose superheroics from Diane Duane's excellent Spider-Man: The Venom Factor. (They also served to show how easy it was to make Mary Jane useful, something modern Marvel might have took note of before any Mephisto based retcons.)
Of course, Spidey continues to be a frequently seen character in all Marvel media with his own TV series, two different movie franchises and a third on the way as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
All for a kid from Queens with a sense of responsibility. Not too shabby.
The Masters of the Universe Classics version of Hordak.
Image by MWCToys.com.
I am a huge fan of 80s and 90s cartoons. But often when I am interested in a show with a tie-in toyline, it is the villains that prove as cool as the heroes to me. Never was that more so than with Hordak, leader of the Evil Horde.
I first came across the character through television ads introducing a whole new wave of villains to the Masters of the Universe toyline. The Evil Horde were villains even Skeletor feared. Heck, voiceover Optimus Prime was even warning us to be wary of these fiends. (An aside: it is fun with his current fame just waiting for Peter Cullen to pop up in odd roles in just about every 80s cartoon.)
Hordak re-designed by Stjepan
Sejic. Click for larger view.
Hordak was easily my favorite of the early figures, a menacing figure with a more menacing skull-head than Skeletor and some really cool accessories. But I remember being really angry that I never saw him or his allies on the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe cartoon. This was actually a reason for me to give up regularly watching the cartoon, which was silly even in my seven year old mind. I still wanted the toys though, but with a heavier focus on M.A.S.K. and Transformers and a parent that did not like all those “demon looking things”, I never saw them.
I later learned that Hordak and the Horde did have their own animated series. She-Ra: Princess of Power needed more villains so they were moved over to menace Adora in a much more tightly written series than He-Man ever got. Hordak actually ruled the world of Etheria, a dark dictator with magical powers and deadly allies.
Of course, much like Skeletor, he would eventually be turned into a joke before the figure and toyline died. Still, I could not get over how visually cool he was. I was disappointed when He-Man was revived in the early 2000s without a new Hordak ever appearing, but the recent Masters of the Universe Classics line finally fixed that with new versions of Hordak, Hurricane Hordak and Buzzsaw Hordak figures.
Hordak promotional art by Alvin Lee.
Click for larger view.
The recent DC comic has made him one of the series’ major villains. It even gave him an origin that ties him to long-time character Zodac. But no media has ever turned him and his group into the super-menace that he always was in my head. While series material established the Horde as something of a malevolent force wiping across the galaxy destroying and pillaging whole planets, no show or material ever gave that to me the way I wanted to see it.
But something about that little plastic man always did. Hordak is a dangerous threat, the leader of a powerful universe spanning evil. It doesn’t hurt that he looks like a million bucks doing it.
In the end, I suspect my vision of Hordak as a child (as opposed to the more bumbling version from She-Ra) really did frame my mindset on what a cosmic scale villain should be like. He seemed like true evil personified, far more than his bright blue, skull-faced counterpart. That image of a galactic level threat certainly played an inspiration to me when I started to frame the Grand Magister in the pages of Lightweight: Beyond, though I'm certain even he won't be as massive a foe as the Hordak of my eight year old imagination.
When I originally wrote this post, Wrestlemania XXX was just days away with a future for Ultimate Warrior and WWE that looked bright. He was back working with Vince, a new DVD reliving his legacy was out and I was watching clips left and right on the very new WWE Network. I hadn't paid this much attention to the Ultimate Warrior in a decade.
Sadly, less than 48 hours after his induction into the WWE Hall of Fame, the Ultimate Warrior was dead. But this article isn’t about Jim Hellwig, Jim Warrior or whatever name he used outside the ring. He was just a man. But the Ultimate Warrior was a legend. This is an article about the character he created inside the squared circle.
The Ultimate Warrior is all about character. Or more accurately for this column, being the best character ever.
He started out much in the same way as current NXT star Mojo Rawley, a guy that blasts to the ring and never stops for a second in his victories. And the then-WWF used television for months to make it clear why we should love him. He ran to the ring for months to completely destroy jobbers in ultrashort matches that made him look like a million bucks.
By the time he got his first loss to Rick Rude, it didn’t matter. He started to cut long winded promos about his ability and power, often adding new and interesting words that didn’t exist until that moment.
But it was his victory over the Honky Tonk Man, the wrestler that had held a stranglehold over the Intercontinental title for 14 months, longer than any star before or since. The Warrior made short work of HTM.
This happened to Rick Rude a lot.
The title win was the start of Ultimate Warrior’s rise to the top of the card. His impressive victories, great look and amazing—albeit crazed—promos cemented him as a fan favorite of the WWF’s young fans. Discussions over who the greatest WWF star began among young fans. Was it WWF champion Hulk Hogan or the new Intercontinental champion?
That answer came in 1990 at WrestleMania VI. In the main event of that show it was title versus title. The Intercontinental champion beat the World champ and Ultimate Warrior rose to the top of the heap.
Unfortunately, the Warrior’s story didn’t really work once he was the king of the heap. He always worked best in weird psychological battles with the likes of Rick Rude and Jake the Snake. Standing at the top of the heap as the guy with the belt only exposed his weaknesses as a talent. After nine months as the top guy, he lost the title to the turncoat Sgt. Slaughter.
In the year after his loss, he once again entered some great feuds, starting with a battle with Randy Savage that gave him his finest match at Wrestlemania VII. But after his exposure as the champ, the Warrior’s shine had faded. And with steroids becoming an issue for WWF, the most obvious roid user on the roster became more of a liability than a moneymaker.
The Warrior left in late 1991 and outside brief runs in ‘92, ‘96 and ‘98, his career was basically at an end.
Of course, those long absences were sometimes just fine with me. Post-1992, he dropped the Ultimate from his name and started writing in an insane but great comic series starring himself simply called Warrior.
Huh?
The comic is probably best remembered for the issue he tortured Santa Claus. Yes, really.
Looking back now, it is clear that the Ultimate Warrior was all about personality and look without the needed skills to truly work as a great wrestler. But not even Hulk Hogan was able to so aptly and easily catch the young wrestling fan’s joy. Everything about the Warrior is worthy of study, simply to show the ability of great booking and an amazing personality to make a star. And because of that he truly is the best character of that era of pro wrestling.
The Warrior is one of the few characters out there that directly inspired a work of fiction by me. I will talk a bit more about American Arsenal later today, but his pattern of speech is based directly on the Ultimate Warrior’s often strange promos.
Rob Schamberger's Warrior painting.
Image credit: RobSchamberger.com.
I started the Best Character Ever series on the reborn Super Powered Fiction just a few weeks ago with a look at Iceman, probably one of my favorite characters as a child, mostly due to his appearances as part of Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends. I talked a lot about how I felt he was a character that could develop into a major solo star at Marvel, but the company always seemed unwilling to pull that trigger.
Frankly, I find this bit a bit insulting. And not just because this conversation pretty much makes Jean Grey the worst human being on the planet for outing him like this.
I have no problem at all with Iceman being interested in other men. Over the past thirty years, it certainly has been hinted and poked at, all the way back to the Cloud storyline way back in his New Defenders days. But I do have a problem with calling him gay. While the young Bobby presented here has not had the history of his older self, he is still supposedly the exact same man. And in fifty years of comic history, Iceman is very much a character with more than a passing interest in the ladies.
Champions made him unrelentingly attracted to Darkstar, complete with thoughts of his love for her. In Defenders he was completely confused for his attraction to Cloud, a being with both a male and female form.
Iceman is very clearly a bisexual man, somewhere definitely lower on the Kinsey Scale than a 6. But sadly modern fiction, especially modern comics, suffer from a distinct lack of nuance when it comes to sexuality. Multiple heroes have been created or outed as gay, but bisexual characters are few and far between. Only Mystique and Daken have really been presented as bi in the X-books, which seems to make bisexuality and status as an antihero equal.
Though Brian Michal Bendis is on record that he does not want to commit any level of bi-erasure with this move, as presented All-New X-Men 40 is completely that. Hopefully more nuanced writers will be able to build on this scene in the future in more appropriate ways for the character's history.
In a perfect world, Marvel would use this as a way to spinoff Iceman into his own series. Let the older X-Man finally go out on his own and accept the fact that he likes men and women. Heck, you could make him even more varied in his dating patterns than Spider-Man while finally giving the world a book interested in presenting a fascinating bisexual character, something comics have failed at for years.
Right now, I will wait and see whether this will lead to a bright or dismal future for Iceman. Either way though, it is great to see his name mentioned more than it has in years.
If you are interested in the full story check out the comic from your local shop or on Comixology.
For a lot of kids the first superhero they fell in love with is Spider-Man or Superman or Batman. Maybe the Hulk. My earliest memory of superheroes probably was Richard Donner’s Superman, but he wasn’t my favorite hero from early childhood.
and Licence To Kill
are not the wild campy rides of Moore’s era. They are dark, gritty Cold War tales that feature really threats and limited gadgets. James Bond is a cold-blooded killer, but still our moral compass through a world where no one is someone we really want to root for. Over the fifty years of James Bond films, these two come the closest to Ian Fleming’s originals. If you haven’t watched them, give them a shot, especially if you’re a fan of Casino Royale
or Skyfall
.
and You Shall Die By Your Own Evil Creation!
, both of which come highly recommended for their entertainment value. Together they pretty much collect every Stardust story, alongside some of the other oddball creations Fletcher Hanks brought to comicdom. 
, late in the upcoming volume two.
. (They also served to show how easy it was to make Mary Jane useful, something modern Marvel might have took note of before any Mephisto based retcons.) 
from DC Comics.
and Ultimate Warrior: Always Believe
.
