So while having a FANTASTIC time reading new new Wonder Twins mini it got me thinking; can DC salvage the other Super Friends characters? The media won't shut up about diversity, so why not reinvent Apache Chief, Samurai, and El Dorado with new names and costumes? The DCAU already did this with The Ultimen, and it wasn't half bad.
Do you have any ideas on what to do with these forgotten characters?
I've been toying with this idea for some time, mainly making them in their 60's either remembering crime fighting in the '70's in a Denny's or having to ride again against some low level crooks.
The Young Justice version of them are fine, except maybe diablo who is just boring compared to the others.
You mean those lame street orphans in regular clothes? Hard pass.
They’ve done it a few times.
JLU’s Ultimen.
YJ season 2’s runnaway metas. Though they cheated by making subbing static for a black vulcan stand in. Ty Longshadow was pretty cool though.
About the only thing you could do with Black Vulcan is maybe make him Black Lightning's predecessor.
Yeah, OP already mentioned that, thanks for reading. We're talking about bringing them back in comics
Well I said they were just fine, nothing too special. Especially considering that their origin was for 70s diversity points, who the fuck would've cared back then?
OH but there is also the Justice League Unlimited version of them where they along with the wonder twins are government created heroes.
I kinda like the idea that YJ had with Samurai being a woman, but I guess that may to be too similar to Katanna like how Black Lightning and Vulcan are very similar.
Apache Cheif would have the best chance coming back in to relevancy since he is remembered to this day by normies.
Yes Apache Chief is the most salvageable of the group, you'd just have to change his name and costume. Long Shadow was a better name in hindsight, probably could say the same for Samurai's stand in "Wind Dragon".
Same names and costumes, dragged into modern comics from their own timeline through shenanigans. Deal with being from a different time and change to be slightly less stereotypical.
This makes me think, why not just turn them into the Outsiders?
Instead of creating Black Vulcan and Samurai, have Black Lightening and Katana as their stand-ins. Then it's a matter of just introducing Apache Chief and El Dorado.
El Dorado's thing is teleporting right? Why not make his thing that he was a thief using his powers to make jobs easier. Yes like Jumper because his powers aren't really offensive. He then gets caught by The Outsiders and after being caught he saves someone from the team, getting him a lighter sentence, and his sentence is working for the team. Where he then works for the team and learns different ways to use his powers until his sentence is up.
But we already have a south of the border teleporter
GOD FUCKING DAMNIT THAT SERIES WAS CANNED TOO. Okay so
Black Vulcan- Black Lightning
Samurai- Katanna
El Diablo- Sideways
Fuck Apache Cheif is the only one left who hasn't been replaced by a more modern version.
He's puerto rican raised by whites in Gotham
Well on the Sideways issue, there's a good chance he'll return given that he's one of Didio's babies. Doesn't hurt that the book wasn't too bad either, but it sadly wasn't enough.
As for the Apache Chief stand in, Giganta? I'm not exactly sure which side of the law she's on these days.
He did just meet his birth mom.
Perfect.
Just introduce Long Shadow.
Bring them back as a group like they did in JLU, working for Maxwell Lord and everything.
Evil Max or Fun Max, although I find its a shame that he wasn't a fun straight man after his shitty face heel.
Maxwell will forever be a villain after what Johns done to him.
Both, like in Generation Lost. He's the guy you love to hate.
That was pretty fun and he wasn't that bad in OMAC.
Black Vulcan is already Black Lightning. I would like to see a new version of the others though.
El Dorado should be Colombian at least. That's where El Dorado comes from.
Wind Dragon was so much cooler than YJ Asami
>El Dorado should be Colombian
I dunno if most comic readers can handle a guy desperately trying to handle Columbia's bullshit.
He should be venezuelan dealing with the fresh hot shit happening in his shit country, wishing to teleport away.
El Dorado had a bunch of powers in Super Friends.
Samurai was a stand-in for Red Tornado, and the name is El Dorado, not El Diablo. Apache Chief had a stand-in with Manitou Raven.
Black Vulcan is just Black Lightning with the serial numbers filed off.
Apache Chief was reimagined as the superb character Manitou Raven - a mystic "Native American" hero from waaaaaaaaaaay back in time brought to the present, where he got to grapple with culture shock but also practically got a blank cheque from his deity of choice since there were no more true shamans left. Turned giant a few times.
Samurai and El Dorado were in Superfriends far less than Apache Chief, so honestly I don't feel any particular need to try and redeem them instead of focusing on more memorable modern characters.
Samurai is just shit. "I'm a Japanese hero with a sword, and I'm called samurai." Fuck man, even by Superfriends standards that wasn't even trying. You may as well make a gunslinger character that's literally named "Cowboy" and has no character beyond being a cowboy. You've got to bring more to the table. Like how Knight and Squire aren't just literally a knight and squire, they're a British pastiche on Batman and Robin.
You can redeem ANY character, sure, but sometimes you have to look at the sheer climb it'd take and ask yourself "why bother?"
Manitou Raven being cucked by Dawn in those later storylines completely ruined the character.
so you're saying that El Dorado's nemesis should be Snowflame correct?
>Apache Chief was reimagined as the superb character Manitou Raven - a mystic "Native American" hero from waaaaaaaaaaay back in time brought to the present, where he got to grapple with culture shock but also practically got a blank cheque from his deity of choice since there were no more true shamans left. Turned giant a few times.
as much as I like Manitou Raven he's a tad too different from Apache Chief to be a good replacement for him, the suggestions others have had about just using the Long Shadow version of Apache Chief is probably the best way to revive him, same with the rest of the Ultimen, though we'd need an analogue for El Dorado since JLU didn't bother with one for some reason
also definitely feels weird how they just dropped the ball completely with the Ultimen after their debut episode(not counting the clone army of them), heck even though Long Shadow ended up going with the League we never see him again
probably why most people are suggesting having Katana be used instead, or at the very least his Ultimen counterpart Wind Dragon
I mean DC also has Katana and Bushido, whose main traits are using a katana and being a bushido respectively
DC isn't great at this
Samurai doesn't use a sword, he has wind and fire powers. Why is everyone is saying use Katana as a stand-in?
Pretty much
And then going along with this guy
Just give Samurai an actual name, update the costume and let the fact that he is "Samurai from SuperFriends" be apparent to those who get the reference.
So,
NEW SUPERFRIENDS
> 'Apache Chief'/ 'Chief' / Ty Longshadow
> [Insert Japanese name here]
> Black Lightning
> Sideways
DC already dug through the bottom of the barrel with Brave and the Bold, the Samurai/Black Vulcan/etc aren't even suds. Let them fade into obscurity as novelties of a simpler time.
He controls wind and fire, there's plenty you could do with that. All he needs is a name change and a better costume.
Wind Dragon
Teleportation, Illusions (that can make sound and seem solid), super-strength, levitation (maybe flight), maybe telepathy -- so, kinda paranormal/psychic (maybe super-strength is "mind-over-matter" tele-or-psycho-kinesis), so he might be magical or psionic in nature.
"El Dorado" is a perfectly ok name, tho.
They've been making noises about him being the villain in 80s Wonder Woman too.
>Normals will now forever know Maxwell Lord as a Wonder Woman villain
>Manitou Raven
Hell yes.
DC and their fans are not interested in making Black Superheroes anymore. they're not even pretending.
I feel sorry for John Stewart fans the most. They keep posting on CBR and he never even had an ongoing.
Man, these dudes show a *lot* of skin.
>Fun Max
YES. Evil Max was a mistake.
>Black Lighting appeared a year before Challenge of the Super Friends
>They use a donut steel instead
For what purpose?
So they wouldn't have to pay Jeff's creator royalties. Marvel wasn't the only shitty comics company.
>Implying the cowboy characters aren’t always the best
A modern Samurai played straight is awesome. Dude is already a historian, just give him the cheeky personality of Toshiro Mifune yojimbo and make his ancestor a kitsune or Abe Seimei.
This isn’t hard
What does any of that have to do with anything?
He can go to USA to take revenge for he’s country, end put Trump in the jail for crimes against humanity
I remember that Alex Ross' Shazam pitch back in the 00's was to also have Black Vulcan be a kid who also got some of the powers from the old wizard Shazam.
That'd work better for Bushido, but we can go further with it. Give him a straight-laced, serious personality a la the classic depiction of a samurai hero in fiction, but he's followed around by the ghost of his samurai ancestor, an irreverent lout who was a low-level bureaucrat in the early 19th century who never got in a fight in his life and mostly just tries to get Ryuku to talk to girls.
Johns need that royalty, mate.
>Johns gets royalties from a character created by Giffen, DeMattis, and Maguire
Based on a story by Geoff Johns.
>WB needs to buy the rights to a story owned by one of their constituent companies and pay one of their employees royalties
That's not even getting into the fact that WW84 in no way resembles OMAC Project or IC.
Are you deaf? Shit works that way. For example Tony S. Daniel got royalty checks and had his name credit for Wonder Woman, all because the movie referenced the God Killer sword.