Super-powers of EVIL

[whitefire]

Okay, so I recently read "Soon I Will Be Invincible" by Austin Grossman (GREAT book) which is one of only about 3 books I can find relating to super-hero's and super-villains that isn't about one of the major comic series like Batman or X-men.

Anyway, while reading this book I reached a strange realization: Once you get past the basic super-powers (flight, strength, speed etc.) and into the more outlandish ones there seems to be a distinct polarization into "good" powers and "evil" powers.

Evil powers are abilities that are specifically designed to do damage and be rampage-worthy and anybody with those powers is almost certainly evil. Now there are exceptions to this rule, such as Wolverine (with his slice-o-mattic hands of death) or Gambit (with his I TOUCH IT, IT EXPLODES power), but overall if you see a guy with the ability to melt solid objects or dominate the minds of others, they're usually going to be evil or turn evil at some point.

This brings me to the crux of my point... I've realized Shield has a bad-guy's power :S it's all but designed to be used in a rampage. It's the kind of power that lends itself to destruction/property damage, and the only way to really take him down would be to out-think his power. This is a traditionally 'villain' scenario, where the hero must stop using his strength and instead use his brain to stop his opponent.

I am interested in the opinions of others on this. Are some powers inherently evil or good?
And if so, does Shield have a villainous ability or not?

[coriolis]

One thing I notice is that (EDIT: here at least...) device-oriented/invention powers seem relegated to bad guys (Mad Scientists! Robots!), and that heroic powers are innate -- or maybe obtained via magical artifact? Not much in the way of ExtraterrestrialTech, and the only tech hero we've seen was the cameo by sidekick Remix. Who's OK because his tech is beatdown and crappy.

Tech items like phaser rifles are disposable, single-mission items, not something to build a character around.

I would not characterize Shield's power as evil-oriented. His ability is very defensive, and plays into the notion that a hero has to get beaten on for a while before s/he can turn the tables.

In fact, I haven't seen any powers in this strip I would really characterize as evil, even from the villains! No excessively lethal attacks (physical or energy), no blood/soul/power draining, no razor-sharp claws, no toxins, no PainTouch, no Disintegration Rays, no Mind Control, no indiscriminate area attacks...well, Esper *may* have Mind Control, but she used purely mundane means to ensnare Coldfire. Lana (of "Spying With Lana" fame) could have done exactly the same thing. If she were a villain.

The Villains. Hmmmm. The robot-building child is still in the background (see Inventor, above). Steam-bot butler (again with the tech=evil). The semi-known vigilante (long yellow hair, blue energy blast, Darkness Control) may be two or more metahumans cooperating, and may not be evil -- may be a frustrated sidekick or disillusioned hero. The world is a Union Shop, and this guy's the Scab!

The Chia plant in the closet is just Chaotic Hungry.

Who sent the ferret to spy on Mac & Val? I'm guessing Inventor-boy.

[joe]

I would say that powers cannot be inherently good or evil, but it would be a kind of strange story if a main villain only had the power to heal people, or if the main hero had a death factor like Omega Red. So in the comic book world I would say that you have to align powers somewhat to make a good story. Now what I have always wondered is why is it when a hero changes to a villian he seems to be more of a tough guy and when a villain switches to a good guy he gets weaker.

As far as Shield goes, he has only used his power for good purposes, and lives up to his name well as a protector. Therefore, no I don't think Shield has evil powers.

[nefariousdro]

This is interesting, you have a valid point about how the characters seem to end being good or evil based on their powers in so many comics out there. I suppose part of what I like about this one is that the powers don't seem to define if someone is good or bad as such, but what they do with them. The funniest part by far though is how superficial the hero-agency seems to be in deciding who's a hero and who's a sidekick. Oh, and the idea of a bureaucracy that runs the heros and (apparently) another that runs the villains is fantastic, as well. Perhaps these (or possibly this?) agency is the basis of this pattern because they use an equally superficial system for deciding who's good and who's bad? Interesting idea.

[gamebook]

Thinking over the powers used in superhero comics I think in general it is really more how they are used than the powers themselves. After all there are plenty of heroes who have powers that are purely destructive. Energy beams are used by many, many heroes to destroy stuff.

Even those powers that you would think are 'evil' or come from an evil source are sometimes used by heroes. Deadman possesses people to do good, despite taking control of someone's body normally being portrayed as a really evil thing to do (Ultra-Humanite, Puppet Master et al). There are loads of 'dark' heroes such as Ghost Rider, Spawn, heck even Batman.

It's in personality that the difference between heroes and villains really shows up. Most supervillains are written as really rather stupid and pathetic people. The evil geniuses have ludicrously inflated egos and/or a pathological inability to understand other people, which trips them up time and again. Villains who have a bit of intelligence and are not highly maladjusted sociopaths tend to edge into being antiheroes or even heroes over time as writers and readers sympathise with the character.

On reflection there is another area of consistent difference between heroes and villains. Only villains tend to be ugly, often horrendously so. An 'ugly' hero usually just has disfiguring scars which he conceals behind a mask, and before he was scarred he was handsome. This only applies to the men and monsters of course. Nearly all women heroes or villains in comics are gorgeous

[davidj]

Aug 31, 2010 11:29:11 GMT -5 joe said:

I would say that powers cannot be inherently good or evil, but it would be a kind of strange story if a main villain only had the power to heal people, or if the main hero had a death factor like Omega Red. So in the comic book world I would say that you have to align powers somewhat to make a good story. Now what I have always wondered is why is it when a hero changes to a villian he seems to be more of a tough guy and when a villain switches to a good guy he gets weaker.
.

Because, generally, when a villain turns face, he also joins a team. When a hero turns heel, he faces a team as a foe. That being said, there are exceptions. Rocket Racer was another joke Spider-Man villain but got a hero upgrade when he turned face, and Scarlet Witch was...just useless as a villain, but got pretty good as a hero. The original Thunderbolts also got hero upgrades and I think the Riddler is cooler as a hero. I can't think of a lot of heroic examples, apart from the mind control excuse, where the hero's reduced effectiveness is blamed on fighting the mind control.

There are powers that are easier to use as a villain. The Ghost Riders had powers that let them mentally torture people. They were heroic...but not very. The Hulk's power of rage fueled strength enhancement is easier to use as a villain, and sure enough, he's been a rampaging monster for most of his career, even if it was usually the fault of whoever provoked him. The Purple Man and his daughter had chemical mind control. He definitely worked better as a villain than she did as a hero, if only because it was boring to have the hero say "surrender" and they do so she kept running into immune characters and was totally useless.