Lurker > scarletspeed7

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#95 - Rafael Nadal (Real World Figure) (Ed Nom. #2/4)
From Earth-4's dc.wikia.com's article on Superman Sports Collector's Edition #4:

"... As early as the 1960s, real world figures would meet Superman within the pages of special collector's editions. Luminaries such as John F. Kennedy, Jerry Lewis, Bob Hope and Leon Spinks all appeared in the pages of the Man of Steel. However, that sort of stunt guest cast would fade by the mid-80s. Yet the idea of real world guest stars emerged with the advent of an Amazing Spider-Man issue featuring newly-elected President Barack Obama in the year 2009. With sales seeing a massive surge, DC attempted to reduplicate the effort with Rafael Nadal.

Published in 2012, the plot featured a science fiction epic - an alien races known as the Scrubb demanded that Earth's greatest champion battle their most famous athletes. Previous editions of this special series so the appearances of Calvin Johnson, Lebron James and Usain Bolt. Rafael Nadal appeared in the fourth volume, where Superman temporarily lost his powers and faced Nadal on the court. Ultimately, the duo work together to defeat the Scrubb, with Nadal taking on their tennis champion while Superman battles a space-armada. With art from Mike Deodato and writing by J.T. Krul, the special supplement saw meager sales and proved to be the last of the Superman Sports Saga for years to come."

My Thoughts:
Comics aficionados likely will be well-versed in the million-seller comic, Superman vs. Muhammad Ali, still standing to this day as one of the most famous Superman stories ever written. This is likely the only use for Rafael Nadal in terms of his comics potential, sad to say, Ed. Outside of this blatant sort of cash-grab appearance, what use is there for a tennis player - even one of Nadal's stature - in comics? Real people have often been included in comics, but for referential purposes. The stories of gods and monsters don't exactly jibe well with the blatant guest starring roles that would make Roseanne look nuanced and subtle by comparison. I can't build a series around Nadal, certainly not in a starring role. Just look at all of the vanity projects featuring politicians in one-shot comics. They're meant to be cheap low-cost value supplements; no talented writer or artist wants to spend their lives penning or illustrating the basest form of commercial one-shot. That applies to Nadal. Maybe if you'd gone for a more timeless athlete like Babe Ruth or Michael Jordan, I could work with it. But Nadal? That's just a bridge too far.

I do think he works REALLY well for a DMZ cover with that photo!

Nathan Fielder is a producer, so if you enjoy his work, absolutely you'll like How To.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/8/6/9/AAUHRBAAE1DN.jpg

#96 - John Wilson (How To) (War Nom. #1/4)
From the Comics Should Be Good review for the Earth-4 version of the DMZ storyline "Body of a Journalist":

...but ultimately, this break from the tale of Matty Roth was something of a misstep for Brian Wood's otherwise fantastic tale. While the idea of introducing a different narrative style through the documentarian was a good idea on paper, the stilted style and the rather mundane, almost pedantic, musings of John Wilson simply fill page space better utilized to focus on the photojournalist star of the show. However, the death of Matty's new friend shows how the cruel, wild nature of Manhattan's demilitarized society can quickly steal away hope from even the most idealistic of citizens. This first year has been a crash course in Matty's new career as an on-the-ground reporter. But its Matty's musings we'd rather focus on than John Wilson's, and hopefully the lingering memory of John won't continue to infringe on the series. As it stands, Wood's freshman year in DMZ has been filled with promise, especially embodied in the death of the biggest anchor on the title.

My Thoughts:
Here we delve headfirst into the NIMBY category. I won't hide my disappointment in this nomination, a disappointment that is less in War than myself. I'm an avid fan of the HBO documentary series "How To", which utilizes a very dry humor, often combined with wickedly irreverent, quiet visual cues, to provoke a surprising amount of deep thought on a variety of modern issues. John Wilson, as a character, however, is a milquetoast moron, this hybridization of a bad middle school book report combined with the sort of Forrest Gumpian unawareness that just can't translate elsewhere. Imagine trying to make sarcasm work on the written page - by and large, it's the most biting, cruelest sarcasm that works in a comic. Trying to play the nuance of timing in a moving picture, combined with a voice that only transitions into film because of the juxtaposition of that voice against the visuals and the interview segments? That just can't play in comics. Instead of demonstrating a devilish depth, you're clogging pages with panel after panel of banal non-sequiturs. You always have to remember the limits of the storyboard-like framework of a comic - these boundaries mean that a character like John Wilson isn't subversive, but simply bad. And I can't imagine a single storyline trying to push a different style of narrative doing anything other than wearing out its welcome. And so you try to find another outlet for your style, but... the only option is TV. Because documentaries don't work on the written page. And you can't convince people otherwise, because despite having document in the title... the written page just doesn't work. And that's why you need to find out How To find a manager who gets you.

Just throwing this out there as well - one of the absolute best mid-2000s comics was DMZ from Vertigo. Go read it - and skip the so-called adaptation they crapped out onto television screens a few years ago.

Lopen posted...

This is the first character I have some fondness for but the writeup makes sense and the earth 4 use of the character was entertaining to read about so that's a good sign for not feeling terrible when my dudes rank low ha ha.

The tough part is separating my own fondness from the comics of it all, definitely.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/7/9/4/AAUHRBAAE1CC.jpg

#97 - Thomas the Tank Engine (Thomas the Tank Engine) (Xeybozn Nom. #1/4)
An excerpt from Earth-4 ScreenRant.com's "Ten Doom Patrol Characters We Want to See in the Next Season":

Okay, yes, we got to meet Danny the Street during the first few seasons of Doom Patrol, but part of the reason we love Danny so much is his the variety of bizarre, illogical transients and vagabonds who travel with the street around the world. Danny has taken on many different forms throughout the Doom Patrol's history, from ambulance to brick, but if the Street has anything to say about it, he'd probably like to become Danny the Depot once more and bring along his partner in crime, Thomas the Tank Engine. One of the more minor and oft-forgotten characters of the Morrison Doom Patrol era, Thomas and Danny's brief but beloved sojourns as a duo of genderqueer sentient objects, distanced only by the incapability to share more than a locale within one another were simultaneously wickedly amusing and also strangely melancholic, even if Thomas was relegated to the role of a background character for most of his existence. Let's just hope there's a happier ending this time around for the anthropomorphic train engine.

My Thoughts:
We're inching into a category that's not necessarily rule-breaking but certainly head-scratching. While certainly not as incessantly irritating a nomination as Pokemon Trainer Red, there is still a "Universe in a Bag" mentality linked to my low rating of Thomas the Tank Engine. So many explanations need to be made for how this character can be inserted into the universe of DC, Marvel, Dark Horse, you name it. I even considered briefly throwing Thomas into Astro City, where I think he would end up with less screen time than in the Doom Patrol - which is ultimately the landing I stuck with. At least with a Morrisonian title, readers are far more likely to handwave the entire reason for Thomas' being, especially if he was depicted as one of the residents of the always trippy Danny the Street. Unlike Red, however, Thomas does come with a strange sense of sweet simplicity that I think helps reinforce the innocent ideals of Danny the Street. In order to give it the Vertigo punch, however, I decided to age up the Tank Engine and explore the ideas of sexuality and free love that have always been propagated through any endearing issue of Danny the Street. Sadly, however, most Doom Patrol one-shot characters are just that - briefly, fleeting glimpses into the mad mind of one of comic's greatest-ever scribes. Morrison expends brilliant ideas in the background of his comics often, just to texture the piece with a little more complexity. And I think that's about as good as Thomas the Tank Engine can get; if you put too much pressure on the concept in DC, it would begin to break. But by simply presenting the concept and focusing on the heart and soul of the thing underneath, there is a little room to manuever.

Still, this is a good time to point out that we've entered into the "Not In My Backyard" category of nominations - Thomas is the sentinel standing at the gates to a realm of nominations that are largely interesting characters. Excellent, even. But because of their uniqueness, they simply wouldn't transition well to the four-color format, as it were. Motion, vocalization, the nuance of how their story was presented in a specific medium makes these next nominations decidedly difficult to properly present otherwise. Time to pull into the NIMBY station.

Thanks! Much appreciated.

hombad46 posted...

I was actually considering Mayhem from All-State lol

That would have been about as strong an advertisement character as possible.

ScareChan posted...

No beef here, only bull

Strong pun game

Jesse_Custer posted...

Love the images, Wikipedia entries from Earth-4, and write-ups, this is a great start!

Thanks, Jesse! Glad to have you on-board.

v_charon posted...

Hey hey hey, the baconator is one of the best fast food burgers!

It's because the bacon disguises the awful patties, though.

Eddv posted...

This and you specifically mentioning commercial characters in the rules yup

Hey, I love a good negative write-up. Some people find them far more entertaining than the positive ones!

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/1/5/3/AAUHRBAAE04B.jpg
#98 - Toby (Wendy's Advertisements) (Eddv Nom. #1/4)
From the Earth-4 Wikipedia entry for Wendy's, sub-heading "Advertisement campaigns":

After years of middling success with a host of campaigns that failed to live up to the "Where's the Beef?" slogan, Wendy's ad executives struck a deal with NBCUniversal to use the dormant nostalgia property of Casper the Friendly in their new TV spots. The campaign would also hearken back to the old school full-page comic book advertisements of the 1950s, '60s and '70s which would use product placement to tell kitsch, simple stories that featured Casper characters in various child-friendly scenarios. The character of Toby, who met Casper "in-person" during the 2023 Wendy's Super Bowl ad, would often be on-hand for the stars of the comic ads to provide Wendy's-approved products. While the TV ads found more success (including the return of Hilary Duff as Wendy the Good Witch), the comic pages were the subject of derision from many readers of the time, and the campaign was quietly dropped. After a nine-month targeted TV campaign as well, the Casper cast would also disappear from the ads, which would turn their attention to an intersection between college football and Wendy's chili at tailgate parties.

Thoughts:
Almost equally as difficult to position as Red comes Toby, a rather insipid, uninspired meathead advertisement character with about as much brains as Wendy's has quality sandwiches. While product integration is a scourge of comics that has seen everything from drug PSAs in the Teen Titans to power drills shilled by Wonder Woman, the issue here is the integration of a decidedly TV-envisioned character into a nine-panel spectacle. The translation of the joke (which is a pretty bad one) gets lost in the transition from screen to page; and ultimately, there's no future for Toby outside of a functional Hostess snack cakes pitch. And let's be honest - Ed knew that. But also, Ed was looking for a fourth nomination. So he looked up from his typing and saw motherfucking Toby hawking B-tier burgers on ABC and decided to throw quantity over quality - much like Wendy's.

Let's not pretend there's potential beyond the pages from comics you could rip out to wipe your ass without losing context of whatever Mary Jane's lame husband is complaining about today, huh?

v_charon posted...

Yeah, I feel like that was a flawed nomination. Why was Ash Ketchum just not nominated instead? Certainly he could have done better, with all that content and an actual personality.

Yeah, and even still battling the 'Pokemon trainer' aspect of the character, there's simply much more room to maneuver with Ash, even with something as simple as pushing him towards a Titans Academy title or something similar.

Snake5555555555 posted...

Oh this is already awesome, love the blurb and comic cover.

Lopen posted...

I love the format. Clever way to compartmentalize thoughts a bit.

pokemonandrew posted...

Oh wow going the extra mile on these. Almost wish I put in some of my earlier nominations from last topic!

Thanks for the kind words! Much appreciated. Hopefully these controversial low rankings won't scare people off.

ScareChan posted...

I wonder if you got all the Deaths from all these worlds if there would be one that would come out on top

If you mean in a fight, the answer is likely always Death of the Endless - at least in how Neil Gaiman presented the concept.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/0/4/6/AAUHRBAAE02W.jpg
#99 - Red (Pokemon) (Anagram Nom. #1/4)
From CBR.com's "Ten Worst X-Men Members", published on Earth-4:

"...which brings us to #3. Clocking in right here, just about Adam-X is the bizarre marketing ploy from the bankrupt Marvel Comics in the '90s, Red. Yes. You read that right - the X-Men debuted a surname-devoid ball-waggling mute who collected... animals? Debuting in 1999, the so-called "trainer" was a desperate cashgrab from Marvel to capitalize on the craze of pocket monster collect-a-thons such as the popular Digimon, right down to the elaborate setup for catching and teaching these creatures. However, it quickly became apparent that there was large scale mistreatment of animals being lauded as training under the rooftop of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters.

Nothing about this concept made sense, of course. The X-Men had always been about evolution, mutation meeting the changing times. Inserting this entirely unrelated silent enslaver rang hollow and contradicted the traditional philosophies that had long served as the underpinnings for the team. It certainly didn't help that the dry, personality-less Red mostly spent his time staring at others in conversations and refusing to ever offer anything other than ellipses after ellipses.

Thankfully, the newcomer darkening both the doorstep of Xavier's Mansion and the covers of the X-Men franchise leading into 2000 disappeared as soon as sales and criticism came in. For many, Red was such a far veering from what made the X-Men work that the lost, wayward franchise was in dire need of resuscitation - or a mercy killing. Thankfully, it would be the latter, on its way courtesy of Grant Morrison, who ensured Red was killed off by Cassandra Nova in his first issue of New X-Men.

Thoughts:

Nearly as untenable as the Santa Claus Rule is what I will call the "Universe in a Bag" rule. How do you finesse a character who possesses no unique character traits, a mute personality and a decidedly un-comic book costume into a preestablished universe? The answer is, like a square peg into a round hole. The problem with a Pokemon Trainer in any other comic universe is simply the Pokemon part of the name. And given that Red has nothing, nothing, N-O-T-H-I-N-G else to hang his proverbial (and literal) hat on, we're forced to try and explain what training is, how it works, why something that everyone else in the universe would consider to be functional slavery and animal cruelty plays a role in a universe that simply eschews all of the functions necessary for this to hold water.

Bad enough that Red is, and you can admit this, Anagram, a nobody. Nothing about the character allows him to stand out when you try to extract the Pokemon out of the name of Pokemon Trainer Red. But to then try and reinsert that concept without the Pokemon culture that exists both in game and out makes the entire idea ludicrous. And Pokemon is, largely, a ludicrous idea that only survives straining credulity thanks to an otherwise well-constructed, simplistic, child-friendly product. An entire world had to be built around trainers in order for trainers to hold water. There are few other remotely similar examples I can provide. Maybe Max Mercury from the Flash - here's a character whose only purpose is to be the Zen Master of the Speed Force. Except no other universe has a Speed Force, so what purpose is Max Mercury? Even there, I could use a personality, a costume, a history, to bolster the character's worth in the eyes of readers. But Red is a player character, a silent protagonist. He's exactly the wrong sort of nomination for this contest. We asked for comics potential. You didn't read the assignment. (But your next nomination will much better...)

We kick off this ranking with...
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/9/9/0/AAUHRBAAE01e.jpg
#100 - Death (Discworld)(VeryInsane Nom. #1/4)
From Wikipedia on Earth-4, on the page for "Discworld", sub-heading "Comics":

Despite the precipitous rise in success of the titles of Discworld throughout the mid-to-late '80s, Terry Pratchett's light-hearted fantasy series could not reduplicate its efforts through comic adaptations. IPC Press, known for their countercultural juggernaut weekly called 2000 AD, refused to take a stab at the title after dozens of their top talent was poached by DC Comics and Marvel in the 1980s. The so-called British Invasion left the UK starved for pop talent, and the paltry offerings available failed to demonstrate the sort of headline power necessary for an adaptation of this magnitude.

After failing to find a strong publishing house on the British Isles, Pratchett met with DC Comics publisher Karen Berger, hoping to borrow luminaries such as Grant Morrison, Alan Moore or Neil Gaiman for the adaptation of The Colour of Magic. Unfortunately, with each writer booked into longterm commitments for such titles as Animal Man, Swamp Thing and Sandman (the future foundational books of Vertigo), Pratchett was forced to accept a different, more American writer - Dan Jurgens, creator of Booster Gold, who at the time was preparing to launch the Flash Gordon adaptation for DC.

While attempting to balance multiple alternate media adaptations at once, Jurgens (ever a prolific writer) ultimately would admit that the efforts to juggle four or more titles simultaneously left him overworked and "forced to pick and choose priorities." Because Discworld as a source of revenue seemed to be the thinnest trickle of his various properties, DC editors constantly demanded it sit at the bottom of the pile.

Within three years, after adapting the first five books of the series through over 30 issues and 2 annuals, the title was cancelled, with Discworld to never appear on comic shelves again.

My Thoughts:
Instead of offering a long, dull explanation of how my rankings were determined on this list, I decided that, through these little blurbs beneath each pitch, I would explain my thought processes in drips and drabs. Along with some Wikipedia entries for each title that was happily provided by the Scarletspeed7 of Earth-4, we'll have an opportunity to take a gander through the window of what might have been to see just where each characters' potential lies.

Now, Death in the Discworld series is a phenomenally entertaining character. There's a strange, macabre charm to the character and versatility of usage in the dozens of Discworld volumes that makes his presence a mainstay in what is likely both one of the best and the most prolific fantasy franchises in history. But Death suffers a lot of drawbacks that preclude him from ever entering into a major comics universe, and that is this:

There are already a dozen deaths across a dozen universes.

Now, I decided to institute a very peculiar rule during the production of this list just to keep me a little more honest - each character could not debut in comics before their debut in other media. In this case, that meant no Death before 1983, the year the first Discworld book was published. I felt that it would be almost too easy to pretend these characters - many of whom are derivative of other tropes that debuted within comics themselves - were originals. They should suffer the same weight of the times they were created. And that does Death in, in particular, because the damnable truth is this: Marvel had a Death. DC had a Death (and they would retool that character again in 1989). All of the major companies that would come along afterwards would have a Death. Judge Death in 2000AD, the system of Hell in Image comics through Spawn (Which would connect to Wildstorm), etc., etc. Even the most minor universes had their own interpretations of Death. And despite the wonderufl personality and even unique form of speech presented in the texts of Discworld that set Death apart from other Deaths, the facts are these: Death is still just Death. There's not enough separation and individuality from other Deaths to say that any of these companies would risk introducing a character they already had. Hell, the Death of DC comics WAS a straight-up Grim Reaper until Neil Gaiman decided to make Death the bubbly, effusively cheery young lady that now is an icon of Vertigo Comics.

Thus, the only way to insert Death into comics, I'm afraid, is to publish a Discworld adaptation. That's happened before. Didn't you realize that? No. You didn't. And that tells you exactly how successful it was. For my purposes, I think the greatest potential would be marketing the adaptation to the largest audience - but the only way to manage that would be to make strides in publishing it as early as would have been reasonable. Yet, without a bankable built-in audience (these sorts of adaptations rarely do well), I think it would go extinct rather quickly. A victim of circumstances, VI's first nomination dies a quick death.

Death is, in fact, the only nomination that fell victim to the Santa Claus Rule from the original post. RIP, mon frre.

All right, the ranking is prepped. The list is ready. And today, it begins!

Here are the contenders:

Agent Smith (Matrix)
ALF (Alf)
Amaterasu (Okami)
Atticus Finch (To Kill a Mockingbird)
Big Bad John (Jimmy Dean)
Borg Queen (Star Trek)
Cat (Stray)
Catastrophe (Bad Blood)
Chouchou (One Piece)
Clive Rosfield (Final Fantasy)
Cocaine Bear (Cocaine Bear)
Cody Rhodes (WWE)
Cranky Kong (Donkey Kong Country)
Data (Star Trek)
Death (Discworld)
Denarys Targaryen (Game of Thrones)
Doctor Facilier (Princess and the Frog)
Ed Mercer (Orville)
Edgar Figaro (Final Fantasy)
Elaine Parks (Love Witch)
Emperor Palpatine (Star Wars)
Ernst Stavro Blofeld (007)
Flynn Carsen (Librarian)
Frank Drebin (Police Squad)
Freddy Krueger (Nightmare on Elm Street)
Fuches (Barry)
Garp (One Piece)
George Costanza (Seinfeld)
Glacier (Wrestling)
Globglogabgalab (Strawinsky and the Mysterious House)
Gordon Ramsay (Kitchen Nightmares)
Goro Akechi (Persona)
Gustav (Braindead)
Hannibal Lecter (Silence of the Lambs)
Harry Ambrose (The Sinner)
Harry DuBois (Disco Elysium)
Heavy (Team Fortress)
Heidegger (Final Fantasy)
Homura Akemi (Madoka Magica)
I-No (Guilty Gear)
Illyria (Angel)
Jak (Jak and Daxter)
Jedah Dohma (Darkstalkers)
John Cena (Wrestling)
John Wick (John Wick)
John Wilson (How To)
Johnny Cage (Mortal Kombat)
Kat (Gravity Rush)
Kirby (Kirby)
Kiryu Kazama (Yakuza)
Kratos (God of War)
Lady Dimitrescu (Resident Evil)
Ladybug (Bullet Train)
Laura Roslin (Battlestar Galactica)
Liz Lemon (30 Rock)
Lord Zedd (Mighty Morphin Power Rangers)
Louis Litt (Suits)
Luke fon Fabre (Tales of the Abyss)
Luz Nocedo (Owl House)
Michael Jackson (Michael Jackson: Moonwalker)
MidKnight (Eternal Champions)
Missile (Ghost Trick)
Mister 2/Bon Clay (One Piece)
Monkey D. Luffy (One Piece)
Mordin Solus (Mass Effect)
Nadja Doll (What We Do in the Shadows)
Nathan Fielder (Nathan For You)
Nimona (Nimona)
Nina Struthers (Devolver Digital)
Odysseus (Greek Mythology)
Orange Cassidy (Wrestling)
Parappa (Parappa the Rapper)
Parker (Leverage)
Phoenix Wright (Ace Attorney)
Princess Peach (Mario)
Princess Zelda (Legend of Zelda)
Proto Man (Mega Man)
Quark (Star Trek)
Rafael Nadal (Real World)
Raymond Holt (Brooklyn Nine-Nine)
Red (Pokemon)
Rintaro Okabe (Steins;Gate)
Rocky Balboa (Rocky)
Ronald McDonald (McDonalds)
Rudolf Ushiromiya (Umineko)
Sam Seaborn (West Wing)
Samus Aran (Metroid)
Saul Goodman (Breaking Bad)
Seymour Guado (Final Fantasy)
Shang Tsung (Mortal Kombat)
Sing (Kung Fu Hustle)
Solid Snake (Metal Gear)
Star Dragon Sword (Suikoden)
Sydney Bristow (Alias)
Thomas the Tank Engine (Thomas the Tank Engine)
Toby (Wendy's)
Usada Pekora (Hololive)
Vampiro (Wrestling)
Vita (Vigor Mortis)
Willy Wonka (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory)

First ranking this afternoon!

Robazoid posted...

Even though it's one of my favorites, I'd be interested in hearing your comments! I certainly didn't hold back against The National Anthem, and there are a few in the future that I dislike nearly as much.

For me there's a bizarre push-me pull-you of pacing; I constantly found myself looking at my watch and yet, at the same time, I thought the male lead spiraled far too fast in his paranoia. This reached the point that the technology was the most realistic thing about the episode. I honestly thought the human beings were really just in service to a point, to preach a moral that felt end written first, premise over personhood. When you write to an idea, sometimes the characters just seem like their arms are being broken in the getting there, and I found that it just didn't feel organic. It's really a problem with the Black Mirror/Twilight Zone concept as a whole.

Oh, and I have to reiterate - I was watching the clock a lot during this particular episode. The tension was so manufactured, I just wanted Brooker to post the moral of the story so I could move on to catching up on binging Spartacus (it was a different time, 2014).

That's a lot of complaining to explain an above-average score, I guess, but I realize that this is a beloved episode so you go in on the defensive, right?

I'm a little afraid to make any comments on this one, but 5.4/10 for me. I know, it's supposed to be an amazing episode, I know.

Didn't Triple H have animosity with HTM? You know, the guy who books the show?

I got through about half the list today, so hopefully I'll finish it up tomorrow.

mcflubbin posted...

I was going to nominate some characters, but when I first entered the topic I forgot every character from every media I've ever consumed lol

I will still follow along with great interest!

I know that drill well. But thanks for following along nonetheless!

I was thinking the game, so thanks for the clarification.

Thanks, Cody! I'm sure it's going to be a controversial list, if nothing else.

Not at this point, sadly. Already in the process of sorting these rankings out.

Probably going to spend today just getting the list sorted out, FYI.

All right, that's 100! I'll get started tomorrow with our bottom rankers. Sorry, Raka. It was your idea, at least, so I hope you'll follow along!

We're at 83 total noms - still a handful of slots. I'll cap at whatever the 100th individual nomination is.

51 nominations so far. Halfway there!

Zigzagoon posted...

Gordon Ramsay from Kitchen Nightmares is as fictional as you get

I'm including Hotel Hell in this from the extended Gordon Ramsay Universe. Top Chef is multiverse Gordon Ramsay.

handsomeboy2012 posted...

fictional characters only or are real life people allowed?

I'll allow real people, but I guarantee you that they will suffer from being real people.

Decided to go with Raka's original idea!

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/80557707

Thanks to the inimitable Raka, I've decided on my ranking topic. Years ago, in the mists of Board 8 history, we ran a similar topic which actually ended up being one of the more well-received rankings I ever did, so here's the RETURN! I'll take suitably non-comics characters as nominated by each of you and drop them into the comic universe of my choice (DC or Marvel, Image, Dark Horse, etc.). Based on how viable I think they would be in those universes as leading ladies and lads or what-have-you, I'll give a brief synopsis not only of how far I think they could climb on the popularity ladder but also why what makes your nominations tick work in the worlds of DC or Marvel. But first some rules:

1) Each user can pick no more than 4 nominations. I'm aiming for 100, but if we come up short, I may expand this to 5.

2) Make sure your nominations do not originate in the DC or Marvel universes, nor are they significant characters in those universes. For example, Santa Claus ain't gonna fly, hombres. He's well-established in both! Otherwise, your nominations can come from any source - but just to be clear, I plan to do no research for this. As a result, any anime is likely going to clock in at or near last place and be judged solely on appearance. Just a fair warning.

3) Feel free to nominate from video games, television, movies, books - whatever you want! Wrestling is fine. Advertisement characters are fine. Really, feel free to go nuts.

4) The winner will get to choose three options for my next ranking topic!

I will say this - last time, Chandler Bing won this contest, so he is the only exclusion. If you think you've got the perfect non-comic character screaming to be part of the grand tapestry of the Dark Knight or woven into the narrative of Spider-Man, lay it on me!

8.9/10

My greatest complaint for this episode is my desire to see more of the nuance of the every day lives of both the haves and have-nots in this particular society. And when that's the complaint, then you've done an extremely good job of drawing me in and engaging me with the basic premise. I think this episode shows how Black Mirror can keep itself from becoming modern Twilight Zone, which was a pitfall it ran aground of many times afterwards.

HanOfTheNekos posted...

Pitch your own Star Trek series

Big potential, but outside of the ranking topic bailiwick.

NFUN posted...

gen viii pokemon

You are NFUN.

MarkS2222222222 posted...

Professional Wrestlers

I've done this a few times already, so I might steer away from this one.

azuarc posted...

I was thinking of doing a ranking topic of games I've played, but I realized that doing favorites is kinda hard to do for me, so I was considering doing instead games that are most important to me. Like, EverQuest is decidedly not my favorite game, but given the time period I played it and how it provided a source of social contact during a period when I had largely shut myself off from the world, it's massively important.

If comics are very central to you, maybe you could try the same thing. The arcs or volumes or whatever that held the most significance for you as a comic fan. I dunno if that works with comics, but I figure it's an idea, at least.

It definitely would work with comics. I think I'm circling either this or Raka's idea at this point, but I'll give this a few more hours for ideas!

Johnbobb posted...

Movies that should've been tv shows instead
Tv shows that should've been movies instead
Fictional masks

I think the first two could be combined, but they would be pretty repetitive in terms of any write-ups. Masks is a little interesting, but it invariably means I'll have to rank horror film masks, which I generally have little interest in.

Dark_Silvergun posted...

Rank the locations in the Resident Evil series.

I think this should be a Snake55555 ranking (hint hint hint)

WazzupGenius00 posted...

ranking all character endings in the Twisted Metal series

Admittedly, the TV show was really enjoyable, but this topic probably won't pull much insight out of me.

v_charon posted...

Time to rank episodes of WWE Legends House.

I'm happy for you to come back into my life but this is the most perverse way to do it. Legends House, my god.

Damn, a team-up topic sounds really enjoyable as well! I'd have to give some serious thought to the matches - I'm nowhere near as encyclopedic as most users, like Jakyl or Iceman or that guy who tells mods to eat shit.

Well, now we're in a chicken-Lopen-egg paradox that we'll never escape from.

I don't think I've ever just done an out-and-out favorite movies list. Hoo boy, would that be a strange list! I like the idea.

It took me so long to find my own niche in writing, and I still don't think I'm necessarily comfortable with that voice entirely, but you have a very unique vision in what you like to read and watch already, so I think that really helps propel someone forward in finding a voice. I was always pretty scattershot.

UltimaterializerX posted...

@Jakyl25

I never got mad at you for refusing to sell me a video game lmao. People in discord love to make these silly charges with no proof. No wonder they all hate me so much.

Seriously be more like foolmo. The GOAT of haters.

I'm in discord and I'll tell them all you said to eat shit. But not in the main channel. In the film discussion chat. Hit 'em where they're most vulnerable.

xenosaga posted...

Sonic Soundtracks... !

Pass, but only because I dislike Sonic's music, and not because I dislike Xenosaga.

Snake5555555555 posted...

I alluded to it sparsely here and there, but yeah, just sell assorted knick-knacks and collectibles on some storefronts online, and things have been steady! I've also been trying to write fiction more, wrote a few short stories last year and I'd really like to hunker down and seriously focus on a horror novel once I'm in a better headspace.

That's awesome to hear! I wish I had been more focused with online retail with my comic shop, but I was so focused on live events at the behest of the owner that I just couldn't pivot during covid at all. And since he didn't nest any of the money we saved well, you can guess what happened.

You've always had such a great grasp of horror! You'd do so well at it.

Anagram posted...

Fictional comic locations (Wakanda, Fortress of Solitude, etc)

I do love the idea, but I'm not sure how much traction I'll get when I've bounced every Marvel location before I get into the mid-tier DC locations.

HanOfTheNekos posted...

Rank the past 15 seasons of football on how likely Michigan would be to beat the Detroit Lions.

I'm generally in the camp of a college team would never beat a pro team. It's more likely than it used to be, and it IS the Lions, but still.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/7/6/4/AAUHRBAAE0DE.jpg

Snake5555555555 posted...

To be honest this year has been a little rough for me mentally and health-wise but my home business is doing better than ever at least! I just try to keep my head up best I can. Hope you've been well!

You've got a home business? I'm not sure I saw anything about that on the board! What are you up to? Probably only cool things.

Lopen posted...

Nah. You dislike me for whatever reason but I think you make some of the best topics here

I edited in that it's a joke reference to the Steiner topic.

Lopen posted...

And I know that's going to seem like a jab but I love your topics and don't care what they are generally-- you have great thoughts to read

But it does legit suck that they all, in your own words, get abandoned after a couple of days

So I really would just like to see one followed through

I think Raka's idea would get some responses, and activity tends to keep me motivated?

Lopen posted...

Follow through and do it.

I hope you aren't allowing me to live rent-free in your headspace

EDIT: For the sake of things, this is just a joke reference to the dead Steiner topic.

Oh, those are fun!

How have you been doing as of late, Snake? What's going on in your world?