[OOC] CLOSED - Ultimate One Universe: Season One

[Byrd Man]

<Snipped quote by Sep>

Dr. Thomas Elliot aka Hush.

I feel as though more than any of Batman's rogues, Hush has the explicit opportunity to be Batman's Mirror Universe Counterpart. Bruce's parents were murdered, Thomas murdered his parents. Thomas was jealous of Bruce's seemingly carefree life while forced to go to school after school to pursue a medical degree while Bruce was free to travel the world. I just feel that beyond his introductory arc, Hush has never been made a legitimate threat again despite this being a man who was able to cut out Selina's heart and keep her alive or perform open heart surgery on himself. Not to mention making his face look identical to that of Bruce's.

Elliot is able to physically go toe to toe with Bruce and given his knowledge of the human body should be able to target vulnerabilities with surgical precision. He's a master strategist and during the pair's childhood, Thomas always beat Bruce at their 'friendly' games of chess.

I would just love to see Hush rise to the same notoriety as Joker, Two-Face, Riddler etc especially because I think Hush is far more of a threat than a lot of Batman's 'A-List Rogues'.

@Lord Wraith

Boo this man!

[Lord Wraith]

@Byrd Man Not a fan of Hush?

[Sep]

@Master Bruce for all of us wanting to finish arcs, can we get a rough guestimate on when MME2 will take place?

[Byrd Man]

@Byrd Man Not a fan of Hush?

@Lord Wraith

He's watertrash with a face wrapped in garbage.

[AndyC]

To start my own discussion, who is your favourtie underrated villain? Someone that never really grows (but has the potential to do so), or someone that just gets isnta-knocked out. Why are they you're favourite?

@Sep

MB and I were talking about Killer Croc last night, and I think the guy definitely gets a bad rep. Guy used to be a genuine threat, but now he's treated as either a side-arc or a lackey for more important villains. It doesn't help that nobody can agree on whether he's supposed to be just a buff guy with a skin condition or a full-on kaiju. For that matter, pretty much all of Batman's "monster" villains get treated like total jobbers these days.

Also, I've said it before, but I think the Atomic Skull should be a much more prominent villain in Superman's lineup, purely on how great his name is. If it were up to me, he'd have replaced Metallo a long time ago. "Metallo" sounds like a brand of aluminum siding for your house. "Superman Versus The Atomic Skull," on the other hand, that sounds like the main event of Wrestlemania.

[Master Bruce]

Too start my own discussion, who is your favourtie underrated villain? Someone that never really grows (but has the potential to do so), or someone that just gets isnta-knocked out. Why are they you're favourite?

@Sep

Poison Ivy actually ranks pretty highly with me, despite the notion that she's just a crazy plant lady who kisses people to death. I like the fact that she has her own distict thing and seems to have a genuine psychosis, where she's genuinely in favor of plants over people and doesn't see the inherent irony that she was born human. I do love the villains that reflect Batman's own fractured psyche, the 'This is what Bruce would be like if one part of him were turned evil' type of villains like Joker, Scarecrow, Riddler, and Bane. But compared to all those, Pamela seems the most genuinely sick and deserving of care in Arkham.

To pick a non-Batman villain, I've always really loved Mysterio. He gets kinda labelled as a joke villain, but I like the idea of a self-made illusionist and glory hound wanting to steal Spider-Man's spotlight because he never personally made it in show business. That's more of a motivation than "I'm made of sand/electrity/water/bees and must take it out on the world!" I'm excited to see what they do with Mysterio in the new film, because he's tailor made to be a movie villain.

Honorable mentions go out to Parasite, Hugo Strange, Chameleon, Black Hand, Baron Helmut Zemo, Madame Masque, and the Silver Surfer's master in-game, The Condiment King.

[Master Bruce]

@Master Bruce for all of us wanting to finish arcs, can we get a rough guestimate on when MME2 will take place?

@Sep

In about roughly 30 posts. Give or take, really. We want people to be on their toes when it happens, so giving an exact date or post count would be foolish.

I see what you did there.

@Lord Wraith

Twenty-seven and the year 1939 have been pretty prominent throughout my run. Gordon is Captain of the 27th Precinct in Gotham, The Roman's Holiday Massacre took place in 1939, and I'm sure some other examples are in there that I'm forgetting. Let it never be said that I don't lay it on thick.

[Lord Wraith]

Twenty-seven and the year 1939 have been pretty prominent throughout my run. Gordon is Captain of the 27th Precinct in Gotham, The Roman's Holiday Massacre took place in 1939, and I'm sure some other examples are in there that I'm forgetting. Let it never be said that I don't lay it on thick.

@Master Bruce

I've caught most of the references but since this one was pretty spelled out I had to make a comment.

Honestly, of everyone's posts, yours tend to be the most fun to hunt for Easter Eggs.

[Eddie Brock]

HOT TAKE ALERT: Moving sucks. Don't ever do it.

I'm surrounded by boxes, but at least my computer is set up. Thus, I will try to find time between unpacking to chip away at my next post.

We're talking best costumes, eh? Well, I suppose my opinionated ass can chime in.

Spider-Man

Weren't expecting that, eh? I mean, sure, the red-and-blues (or red-and-blacks, depending on who you ask) are "iconic" and "timeless" and "a benchmark by which all Spider-Man costumes must be measured," but this is the work of Jack freakin' Kirby! Dude's a legend! How could I not give his vision the nod?

But seriously...

Romita Sr. Accept no imitators.

Superman

Jim Lee is great at three things: Square jaws, outrageous muscles, and flowing capes. Sound like anyone you know?

Batman

I love this suit, you guys. Something about the contrast of the black cape and the grey bodysuit, the cowl shape is nice, it looks armored without being "in-your-face" about it. It's just a really great Batsuit. And then they ditched it for that overdesigned, ugly, segmented crap for the other two movies... one of a few reasons I still consider Batman Begins the best of the series. Don't @ me.

Captain America

I'll be honest: I don't have much of a connection to comics Cap. (Although, a major "Fuck yeah!" to any artists who find a way to incorporate the scale mail.) But this costume -- though a touch overdesigned -- is just such a great modernization of the classic Star-Spangled Man with a Plan.

Iron Man

Marvel Studios had the task of making Iron Man a reality. They looked at Adi Granov's covers and said, "That one. That's the one we want." And they were right on the money.

Flash

Francis Manapul is bae. I'm not going to include them in the discussion, but go ahead and throw his Captain Marvel and Superboy down as "best depictions," too, k?

Supergirl

I'm gonna get raked over the coals for this one, but I don't even care. Look, I'm not going to defend the midriff costume: It's silly, it's pandering, it's cheesecake. But fuck it, it's the Supergirl I was introduced to, and I just love Ian Churchill's pencils. @ me if you want, idgaf.

MORE TO COME... if I feel like it.

[Lord Wraith]

One more costume from me...

Thor

Thor's costume in Age of Ultron and Dark World I think is far superior to the one he wore in his solo outing and in the original Avengers.

But I also really like...



If I could get the first costume from the waist down including the bottom of the cuirass combined with the waist up of the latter costume, that'd be perfect. I like the longer hair too, but I hate how fake the blonde has always looked.

[Retired]

My laptop died early yesterday. It has been running disk repair for over 24 hours in a cycle with no signs of actually working. I'm using my brother's right now to right this, so until I am able to get it looked at and/or it chooses to actually reboot I am unable to post in this. I'm not sure how often/if I'll be able to give an update prior to this season ending. I'm going to assume I will likely miss the post deadline, and I may even be unable to continue this season due to this. I'll let you know if/once I get it running again.

@Retired

Updating on this situation if anyone cares. Tl;dr at the bottom.

I was able to cancel the disk repair loop the laptop was caught in - literally given a one second window every three to five hours so was easy to miss - then stayed up until nearly 7am that night transferring all of the files from the laptop to various external hard drives. Who knew that it took a long time to move hundreds of gigabytes worth of comics. Once that was done I did a complete factory reset of the computer, wiping the entire hard drive, and hoping that would fix whatever error there had been without me needing to take it to a tech shop. Which seems to have worked, it's been a day and I've noticed no signs or issues. I had to reinstall nearly four years worth of updates and all of my programs and settings again, but I think for the most part I am back to having a fully operational computer.

I need to still take care of some work and sort out a few things on the business front today, but the post I was working on when this happened is still half complete and I mostly remember the direction I was taking it in. I might shorten it further now given I've missed another week of posting and have less time to finish my intended story, but I should be able to get it posted sometime tomorrow, with any luck. I'm not sure at this moment when my last post was and if I'm over the deadline as of today, but I think I might still have time.

Tl;dr: Laptop's fine now, will post tomorrow hopefully.

[AndyC]

Supergirl

I'm gonna get raked over the coals for this one, but I don't even care. Look, I'm not going to defend the midriff costume: It's silly, it's pandering, it's cheesecake. But fuck it, it's the Supergirl I was introduced to, and I just love Ian Churchill's pencils. @ me if you want, idgaf.

@Eddie Brock

That's honestly a very close second-place for me. I'm honestly getting pretty tired of this weirdly Puritanical attitude when it comes to costume design-- I can see her belly-button and her limbs, oh Heavens to Betsy! I don't particularly want to see Kara flying around dressed like Vampirella, but I don't think it's out of character for an attractive young woman to wear a costume that accentuates the fact that she's an attractive young woman.

[Lord Wraith]

<Snipped quote by Eddie Brock>

That's honestly a very close second-place for me. I'm honestly getting pretty tired of this weirdly Puritanical attitude when it comes to costume design-- I can see her belly-button and her limbs, oh Heavens to Betsy! I don't particularly want to see Kara flying around dressed like Vampirella, but I don't think it's out of character for an attractive young woman to wear a costume that accentuates the fact that she's an attractive young woman.

@AndyC

And she's bulletproof. It's not like Batgirl is running around with her navel poking out.

Huntress on the other hand...

[AndyC]

<Snipped quote by AndyC>

And she's bulletproof. It's not like Batgirl is running around with her navel poking out.

Huntress on the other hand...

@Lord Wraith

Yeah. As much as I'll advocate for cheesecake (like I've said, I think comics need to get back to their pulpy roots, and that includes sex appeal), Huntress's costume is just awkward. With Kara's midriff and mini-skirt, it's at least somewhat familiar looking since the traditional Supergirl costume is basically a cheerleader outfit with an 'S' logo, so it's similar to something we see actual people wearing. I've never seen anyone cut out a rectangle in their shirt just to show off their belly-button. All arguments about practicality aside, it's just goofy.

Plus, I don't like any mask that has big pointy Wolverine ears on anyone who isn't Wolverine.

[Eddie Brock]

<Snipped quote by Eddie Brock>

That's honestly a very close second-place for me. I'm honestly getting pretty tired of this weirdly Puritanical attitude when it comes to costume design-- I can see her belly-button and her limbs, oh Heavens to Betsy! I don't particularly want to see Kara flying around dressed like Vampirella, but I don't think it's out of character for an attractive young woman to wear a costume that accentuates the fact that she's an attractive young woman.

@AndyC

My only issue with it is when artists -- including Churchill, whom I'm praising here -- exaggerate the proportions such that the crop top begins one nanometer below the breasts and the skirt is literally only wide enough to cover a bikini bottom. There is a difference between attractive young woman shows off toit abs and something that looks like an outfit from the sort of media that Greg Land likes to trace.

[Lord Wraith]

<Snipped quote by AndyC>

My only issue with it is when artists -- including Churchill, whom I'm praising here -- exaggerate the proportions such that the crop top begins one nanometer below the breasts and the skirt is literally only wide enough to cover a bikini bottom. There is a difference between attractive young woman shows off toit abs and something that looks like an outfit from the sort of media that Greg Land likes to trace.

@Eddie Brock

Even in the image that you shared if anyone is behind Kara and there are not some boyshorts under that skirt, the lucky viewer is going to have a great image for their spank bank.

[AndyC]

<Snipped quote by AndyC>

My only issue with it is when artists -- including Churchill, whom I'm praising here -- exaggerate the proportions such that the crop top begins one nanometer below the breasts and the skirt is literally only wide enough to cover a bikini bottom. There is a difference between attractive young woman shows off toit abs and something that looks like an outfit from the sort of media that Greg Land likes to trace.

@Eddie Brock

I can see that, yeah. As much as I like the old-school one-piece on Wonder Woman, I do find it a little ridiculous when it's drawn so that her shorts are practically a thong. There's titilation, and then there's borderline porn.

Even then, though, I don't find it all that galling, especially when you compare the relatively tame cheesecake in comics to the outright shamelessness in your average anime. If it's a live-action thing and there's an actual person who might not be all that comfortable with nerds drooling over their bodies, then yeah, the costume should be as modest or as risque as the actress is okay with wearing. But if it's just a drawing of a fictional character, then meh, at the very worst I just find it amusing what some writers think will be hot.

[Supermaxx]

The only thing I don’t like about the Batman Begins costume is the weird rubber neck. It just looks so goofy and uncomfortable. Even the fight scenes kind of suffer because the dude literally can’t turn his head. The armored look from the later movies is a lot less Batman-y, but I can appreciate that they got rid of that.

[AndyC]

The only thing I don’t like about the Batman Begins costume is the weird rubber neck. It just looks so goofy and uncomfortable. Even the fight scenes kind of suffer because the dude literally can’t turn his head. The armored look from the later movies is a lot less Batman-y, but I can appreciate that they got rid of that.

@Superboy

I go back and forth on the thick neck. On the one hand, it's goofy that he can't turn his head. On the other hand, the smaller neck on the TDK and DKR costumes make his head look weirdly huge.

Also, I think the fight scenes suffer a lot more from all the goddamn shaky-cam and quick cuts so you can't see what the hell is going on.
The Bourne Identity series ruined fight scenes for like a decade.

[Master Bruce]

I have a few runner-up choices for best costume that I'mma post because... well, fuck it. I'mma post 'em, that's why. Consider these a "What look I'd go for if I were playing them in UOU" - or in the case of Batman, what look I'd go for if there were enough pictures of it.

Batman

I used to hate this design and think it were something straight out of the 90's, but I quickly grew to love it. There's something militaristic about it without seeming too much of a departure, and it's one of the few Batsuits to pull off black-on-black in the comics well enough.

Spider-Man

I appreciate any good costume that leans into a character's modis operandi (Batman Beyond, for example), and that's what the first suit that Otto Octavius used as Spidey does for me. It gives the classic look a legitimate run for it's money, making it look a little creepier, a little meaner, and overall more like how a guy with freaky Spider-powers should look. Basically, everything that would make The Bugle have a field day while also playing into Peter's love of sci-fi. Love it.

Superman

Weird belt buckle that I'd photoshop out aside, there's something about this suit I absolutely love. It gives the blue in Clark's outfit a much needed starkness, given one of my pet peeves is a Superman whose blue looks positively flat, while also retaining the bright red elements and eliminating the trunks in a good way. I also didn't mind the boots, as I felt the red ones had been done to death.

Wonder Woman

I know, I know. Blasphemy for including a design that isn't red and blue. But if Diana ever left the island of her own accord and didn't need to appear as a delegate to the US, this is how I imagine she'd look - fiercely armored and unabashedly Greek. The fact that this is Donna and not Diana aside, I love this.

Iron Man

As much as I can't get enough of the sleek red and gold designs to come out of the post-Extremis era, this little number that Rhodey wore during a brief stint as Iron Man really caught my eye. It looks like the greatest "in progress" suit that Tony never had, having all of the trappings of Iron Man while also seeming as though the inner layer is exposed, making it look more science fiction-y. It's like if Iron Man met TRON.

Batgirl

Likely to be my most controversial choice, but I stand by it. I've always been a fan of the classic black and yellow look for Babs, but this armored variation for The New 52 was one of the few positives of making her Batgirl again for me.
It looks functional and doesn't make Barbara look 14 no matter who draws her, which is why I'm one of the few to dislike the Burnside look entirely.

Captain America

Look, I love the stars-and-stripes. But if Cap existed in the real world and I got to pick his suit, this is friggin' perfect. It looks like a standard issue Special Ops uniform combined with a superhero suit, and gives Steve that militaristic edge that he'd need in a world long removed from World War II. This is basically the embodiment of the modern America in the way the original was the embodimemt of the 40's.

The Flash

While I've always liked the CW suit to a degree, it's always needed to look less like a motorcycle number and more like a suit that Barry puts on as one piece. The newest suit tried to do that and fell flat on it's face with a goofy looking mask, so this fan design scratches the itch I've had.

Green Arrow

I didh't originally choose a favorite for Ollie, but far and away this is it. Part Longbow Hunters, part the classic look, this is why I'll never truly appreciate the look that Amell sports on television. This, for me, is Green Arrow: the former survivalist turned the Robin Hood of a town so bent that it needs a guy with boxing glove arrows to save it.