BOOYAH!! Cyborg Appreciation Thread '19

[Decoy]

I like how Cyborg has gone from Titan Orbit to becoming a League Founder......kinda awesome he was given more of a prominent role in the DCU.....

[Vampire Savior]

Is Wolverine really a good example? He wasn't really made to be an anything character, he was just a cool design and cool power. I mean, he didn't even have an origin in his early years (iirc for a long time he couldn't remember anything) until it was created and developed and expanded over years.

Still, I don't think that's really a valid point considering 1) these are fictional characters, anything is possible and 2) how do you explain people like Dick Grayson/Nightwing who was literally created to be support to Batman? Characters change and evolve all the time because they are imaginary, they can be whatever you make them out to be. With all due respect, I HATE that reason that "oh x character can't do x because they weren't designed that way" or anything like that that treats these characters like they are arbitrarily stuck as one thing because they are inherently one thing. If I wrote for DC and go "oh yeah, Parallax didn't make Hal Jordan slaughter all the Lanterns in Emerald Twilight, he chose to" you can say whatever you want but he's a mass murderer now, that's canon and is the truth if that character now, ya dig? It just comes off like an easy out for lazy writing, lack of commitment to their characters and implies that it's impossible for characters progress (which is patently untrue).

You have to be practical and take into consideration the way the business works. Cyborg has no real foundation. Over the decades he has been around, no one has given him one like they did for Spider-Man and plenty of other characters. There's nothing there for writers to work with. Or, very, VERY little.

Now that people see how much potential money can be made from these comic book ideas, most writers are not going to spend the effort and energy building a worthwhile foundation for Cyborg, because they do not have enough of an incentive to. Why should they do that for Cyborg when they can do that for their own property? I sure as heck wouldn't do that. If I'm going to toil to come up with a mythology as interesting as the major DC heroes', why am I going to give that away so DC and WB can get the great majority of the money from it? This is one of the major reasons why you don't see nearly as much new stuff coming from Marvel and DC as was done in the past. Not enough incentives.

Ergo, Cyborg is up a creek because most creators aren't going to give the character the commitment he will require because they don't own him. When doing work for hire, most creators would rather work from what is there, but with Cyborg, there is hardly anything there to work with. A creative team would need to construct a whole mythology near from the ground up...with not enough incentives.

[Killerbee911]

Creating stuff is what writers do. The biggest problem with Cyborg two solo runs is that Cyborg was operating without a large chunk of his back history. I think the statement about Cyborg being big work to made a solo property doesn't apply anymore. A creative team doesn't have to creative whole mythology anymore David Walker did that already, John Semper Jr., Kevin Grevioux and Marv Wolfman already did that. Cyborg also has Titans history,Cyborg has his justice league history, Cyborg has his JLO history now,He has all of other media history. Maybe in the past that has been true but it is not true anymore.

I am going disagree they have done a lot building for Cyborg over last couple since he has been semi pushed hard. Cyborg has one of the best origin stories which has been told Young Justice, Justice League movie, Justice League comics,etc. Cyborg gets mad at dad,There is an accident. To save him his dad in Star Labs use Apoklips tech to save him. He become part machine with amazing abilities. It is part tragedy and part wish fulfillment of now he has the power to be hero. He has supporting cast from Star Labs which can be strictly his own and he has supporting cast from the Semper run,He has supporting cast from Justice League and Titans.He can pull villians from his solo runs and justice league/titan runs.Cyborg even has candidate for ArchNemesis is in Grid. I am failing to see "the hard work".Good Origin, Support cast and couple villains that is excellent start. The only thing missing is what does solo civilian Cyborg do. Literally all writer has do is figure out what is Cyborg "job" or mission statement".

Just for fun how hard is it to put together a rogue gallery Grid, Red Lion, The Techinis ,The H.I.V.E , Variant, Gimzo AND Amazo, Brainiac, Toy Man,(Superman villians tend to be good fits for Cyborg) Professor Ivo ,T. O. Morrow.

[Vampire Savior]

I am failing to see "the hard work".

If creating (truly worthwhile) stuff is so easy, why do you want Cyborg to take Superman's foes?

What I'm seeing is you want to use stuff that isn't good (the Semper run, with such great villains as H8 bit) and take things from Superman and New Gods. This isn't really how you successfully build a mythology for a character who you're trying to make truly independent.

When Kirby created New Gods, I'm pretty sure he wasn't thinking, "Hmm. I have nothing here. Well, I guess I could always use Toy Man and the Penguin for villains!" And, "Hmm. My New Gods aren't interesting enough! I know, why I don't I have them get their powers from being Kryptonians!" <= That would be somewhat of an equivalence for Cyborg having to fall back on having a Motherbox, because he himself isn't interesting enough as a solo lead, because he has not much of a foundation or mythology unto himself.

Kirby actually created. He didn't steal. He didn't borrow. He built a fascinating mythology from the ground up. Don't underestimate how challenging that can be. What Semper and Walker put forth did not provide a strong enough foundation to make something that is actually good (especially Semper).

[DragonsChi]

If creating stuff is so easy, why do you want Cyborg to take Superman's foes?

What I'm seeing is you want to use stuff that isn't good (the Semper run, with such great villains as H8 bit) and take things from Superman and New Gods. This isn't really how you successfully build a mythology for a character who is truly independent.

When Kirby created New Gods, I'm pretty sure he wasn't thinking, "Hmm. I have nothing here. Well, I guess I could always use Toy Man and the Penguin for villains!"

[Killerbee911]

If creating (truly worthwhile) stuff is so easy, why do you want Cyborg to take Superman's foes?

What I'm seeing is you want to use stuff that isn't good (the Semper run, with such great villains as H8 bit) and take things from Superman and New Gods. This isn't really how you successfully build a mythology for a character who you're trying to make truly independent.

When Kirby created New Gods, I'm pretty sure he wasn't thinking, "Hmm. I have nothing here. Well, I guess I could always use Toy Man and the Penguin for villains!" And, "Hmm. My New Gods aren't interesting enough! I know, why I don't I have them get their powers from being Kryptonians!" <= That would be somewhat of an equivalence for Cyborg having to fall back on having a Motherbox, because he himself isn't interesting enough as a solo lead, because he has not much of a foundation or mythology unto himself.

Kirby actually created. He didn't steal. He didn't borrow. He built a fascinating mythology from the ground up. Don't underestimate how challenging that can be. What Semper and Walker put forth did not provide a strong enough foundation to make something that is actually good (especially Semper).

Because it is a shared universe.It sucked for Stan and Jack they had to use all the bad villains ideas they made,The characters today don't have to do it that really in their first issues.Heroes today can build on elements around them be strong early in that area. It is not a accident that New Gods, Professor Ivo ,T. O. Morrow are built Cyborg story dna. Jack didn't have the competition for attention that characters do today they could release comics with bad villains. Cyborg or new character has to stand out from early or the book dies. That is why you use Dc or Superman villains as part of your gallery

It is insane that you have villains in shared universe tailor made for interesting conflicts and you don't use them. Especially for heroes who haven't establish themselves yet,Cyborg isn't getting kick out of DC he can use shared villains forever if means interesting stories and they sell. It is no wonder you think that heroes from teams can't have success.You have some weird rule that heroes must be made up completely original villains to be successful.You don't want Cyborg to use successful villains but you are also complain about Semper creating h8 bit a bad villian. It doesn't make any sense. Punisher and Kingpin are Spiderman villians. Kingpin became the fundamental Daredevil villain and Punisher clashes with DD way more than Spiderman. I guess Daredevil was boring that is why he had to take Kingpin. I guess Wolverine is boring that is why he had to take Sabertooth from Iron Fist.

If Cyborg adapts some villains from other DC heroes, It means Cyborg is a failure of character okay then if that is how you feel I can't change that. You probably think Team ups,Crossover into events and major characters as supporting cast is "cheating". Flash,Supergirl and Green Arrow must suck or something because the CW use all the "cheesy" marketing techniques to make them work Green Arrow and Supergirl(Batman and Superman Villains) Flash/Green Arrow/Supergirl( major superhero as supporting cast) ,Team ups every year between shows , Big Guess star heroes(Superman and Supergirl), etc . I would call doing everything in power to make sure a character has success using proven assets is supplement avoid using bad characters and concepts, You would say those characters can't survive on their own because they aren't interesting.

[Mr HardKnocks]

Is Wolverine really a good example? He wasn't really made to be an anything character, he was just a cool design and cool power. I mean, he didn't even have an origin in his early years (iirc for a long time he couldn't remember anything) until it was created and developed and expanded over years.

Still, I don't think that's really a valid point considering 1) these are fictional characters, anything is possible and 2) how do you explain people like Dick Grayson/Nightwing who was literally created to be support to Batman? Characters change and evolve all the time because they are imaginary, they can be whatever you make them out to be. With all due respect, I HATE that reason that "oh x character can't do x because they weren't designed that way" or anything like that that treats these characters like they are arbitrarily stuck as one thing because they are inherently one thing. If I wrote for DC and go "oh yeah, Parallax didn't make Hal Jordan slaughter all the Lanterns in Emerald Twilight, he chose to" you can say whatever you want but he's a mass murderer now, that's canon and is the truth if that character now, ya dig? It just comes off like an easy out for lazy writing, lack of commitment to their characters and implies that it's impossible for characters progress (which is patently untrue).

I believe Wolverine is a valid example, he wasn’t given any major backstory or development until Claremont got his hands on him in the Uncanny X Men his popularity then resulted in a Solo. Dick Grayson is rare case and also testament that good creative decisions can make a character successful. He did start as a supporting character as Robin but then transitioned into his own hero as Nightwing which warranted a solo because it was natural development. Daredevil wasn’t anything until Frank Miller did a 180 on the character. All it takes is someone with good creative talent and interest to make a character better. Cyborg has not been given the necessary foundation, development or interest for him to survive as a solo hero.

[DragonsChi]

If you treat characters like their bit players in other characters stories, other characters antagonist, other characters minor or secondary characters, thats all they will be. Bit Players.

Good writers build characters up with unique ideas. They use other peoples characters as "guest" to help already moving in a positive direction/has momentum. Using a Popular villain in a character book with less popularity all you will end up doing is building up the villain in most situations. Since that is really why the people picked up the book in the first place.

[lemonpeace]

I believe Wolverine is a valid example, he wasn’t given any major backstory or development until Claremont got his hands on him in the Uncanny X Men his popularity then resulted in a Solo. Dick Grayson is rare case and also testament that good creative decisions can make a character successful. He did start as a supporting character as Robin but then transitioned into his own hero as Nightwing which warranted a solo because it was natural development. Daredevil wasn’t anything until Frank Miller did a 180 on the character. All it takes is someone with good creative talent and interest to make a character better. Cyborg has not been given the necessary foundation, development or interest for him to survive as a solo hero.

This is the point I'm making, you can't say a character can't be a solo because they weren't meant to be more than supporting because if they are given something to work with any character can work. The key term is PROGRESSION and when was the last time Cyborg had that without it getting rolled back? You wanna talk foundation, there is plenty of material around Cyborg to make him an interesting leading character, we've seen in in other media using different iterations of his origin. By your own admission, Wolverine had no foundation whatsoever until Claremont came along, just a cool design and a cool powerset; Vic's had one (from time to time) and still has the other. You say Nightwing is a rare case, you mean rare in today's comic book landscape? Wally West was support, Deadpool was made to be a one-off villain, Red Hood was support, Winter Soldier = support, Venom = one-off, The Punisher = one-off, Black Adam = one-off,, Captain Marvel = support/d-list. You right, Cyborg hasn't been given the proper development or interest from DC, but my point is that let's stop pretending that these characters (many of whom have fans) are at fault for the incompetence of the creators, editors, and other higher-ups handling them because it doesn't make sense and it gives these creators an easy out for their failure. What's frustrating about Cyborg isn't the fact that he's not a leading man, it's the fact that for a while DC has been trying to half-assedly tell us he is one just so they can say "oh there's a black one with the big boys now. Ain't we woke?" If they want us to buy him as a lead or even just as an important character at all then you can't act surprise if people are frustrated when he's consistently forced to punch below is weight, play unimpressive roles and be portrayed poorly and/or lazily. Especially when we've seen other mediums do a better job.

[DragonsChi]

Cyborg hasn't been given the proper development or interest from DC, but my point is that let's stop pretending that these characters (many of whom have fans) are at fault for the incompetence of the creators, editors, and other higher-ups handling them because it doesn't make sense and it gives these creators an easy out for their failure. What's frustrating about Cyborg isn't the fact that he's not a leading man, it's the fact that for a while DC has been trying to half-assedly tell us he is one just so they can say "oh there's a black one with the big boys now. Ain't we woke?" If they want us to buy him as a lead or even just as an important character at all then you can't act surprise if people are frustrated when he's consistently forced to punch below is weight, play unimpressive roles and be portrayed poorly and/or lazily. Especially when we've seen other mediums do a better job.

Bingo. This I can agree with.

DC half a$$ it with Cyborg and that's what they got in return...half a$$ results. Plain and simple.

The character can work in the big leagues. He will never be on the same playing filed in idealism of the the standard Big 7 but that doesn't mean he can't carve out his own unique place that works for him as a character under a creative that truly cares and wants to make him a big deal as him.

[9th.]

Just for fun how hard is it to put together a rogue gallery Grid, Red Lion, The Techinis ,The H.I.V.E , Variant, Gimzo AND Amazo, Brainiac, Toy Man,(Superman villians tend to be good fits for Cyborg) Professor Ivo ,T. O. Morrow.

I’ve been scrolling comic vine for random villains for Vic when I get really bored, it’s a fun little game. I also came up with The Key, Plasmus, White Rabbit, Ultra Humanite, Queen bee, Rampage, Intergang and Mantis.

[J. D. Guy]

John Semper jr.'s Cyborg run has the best and most extensive cast in the modern day run for the character which included Variant, Exxy, Black Narcissus, Fyre Wyre, and Terrance Fisher and his private army stationed in Iraq and of course the introduction of the Digital Universe. But all of his supporting characters and villains are now just being ignored. Cyborg hasn't mentioned his father once in JLO. Right now Cyborg is kind just in limbo in the JLO. His character is definetly not making any progressions while up in space. But it was cool seeing that Cyborg's opening scene in the Doom Patrol tv show was inspired by Cyborg # 1 written by John Semper jr.

While I can't speak firsthand on Cyborg in Justice League: Odyssey, I do know that most other who read it feel he's pretty good in that book, as far as progressive, high-tech Cyborg goes.

But I do know and have read Semper Jr.'s Rebirth run and in spite of its relative short existence, I remember it rather fondly for building up Cyborg's world, including the supporting casts and villains gallery potentials. I miss that supporting cast something fierce, and H8-bit and that one ultra-cool decked-out techsuit-wearing ninja merc who killed Black Narcissus's husband (and who turned out to be a Black man doing all that) were both really cool additions to Cyborg's world, even though they each were in only 2 issues max during Semper Jr.'s run. Walker generally gets his rightful praise, but Semper Jr. and where he took Cyborg and his world, even with all the editorial interference, tends to get glossed over by comparison. It's nice to see someone else acknowledge the good he had done for the character and his world.

One thing I need to point out (not sure if anyone else has, but still) is that Semper Jr.'s build-up was lost well before Odyssey. The Rebirth Cyborg book was cancelled, but then uncancelled, implicitly due to backlash from Cyborg losing his book just as the JL movie came out. And unfortunately, Marv Wolfman was the writer, and he... did something. But it wasn't anything worth anything, in my opinion. Wolfman was the one who ignored everything that came before in Semper Jr.'s run during the brief uncancelled tenure. Also, the Justice League book(s) Cyborg was in never paid heed to most anything that happened in the heroes' solos, so additions were ignored or regressed there, too.

If Odyssey isn't referencing things done in Semper's run, or even Walker's, that's just a symptom of a bigger problem that's been going on for a long time now; and Cyborg being in space makes for the perfect justifications for it in this instance.

[Wakeneuron]

Maybe but contrast Superman in Justice League # 25 with Cyborg in JLO. In Justice League Superman reference back in time with being with his father and this gave a good characterization to the story and why he is able to muster up the strength to get out of his predictament. But with Cyborg in JLO there are no references to his life at all. If JLO had personal touches like Superman had with his family in JL # 25 it would make it a better book.
Imo Dan Didio is probably the person that ordered a wipe out of Cyborg's supporting characters. I think that maybe he's waiting for the right writer to come along and do another Cyborg run so he probably want a clean slate. But it's kind of shocking that Cyborg has yet to mention his Dad or STAR labs. I assumed that they would be permanent members of his supporting cast. Dan Didio's policy is to only put writers on an ongoing or mini-series that have a passion for that character. I wonder if this policy indirectly discriminates if he only meet with writers that are not African Americans?

[lemonpeace]

Maybe but contrast Superman in Justice League # 25 with Cyborg in JLO. In Justice League Superman reference back in time with being with his father and this gave a good characterization to the story and why he is able to muster up the strength to get out of his predictament. But with Cyborg in JLO there are no references to his life at all. If JLO had personal touches like Superman had with his family in JL # 25 it would make it a better book.
Imo Dan Didio is probably the person that ordered a wipe out of Cyborg's supporting characters. I think that maybe he's waiting for the right writer to come along and do another Cyborg run so he probably want a clean slate. But it's kind of shocking that Cyborg has yet to mention his Dad or STAR labs. I assumed that they would be permanent members of his supporting cast. Dan Didio's policy is to only put writers on an ongoing or mini-series that have a passion for that character. I wonder if this policy indirectly discriminates if he only meet with writers that are not African Americans?

The demographics of the creators definitely does affect the characters of color at DC (and comics as a whole), however in regards to Cyborg specifically, writers being passionate about the character isn't always the issue. A creator can be as passionate as can be but if editorial always bottle-necks his progress it doesn't matter. I mean, look at what happen with Walker and him leaving because they didn't see why he was doing what he was doing and rather a "safer" plot point. We complain about Cyborg's appearance being dehumanizing but remember DC higher ups are the ones who decide the references that the artist have to use and they are ones who want him to be 92% metal bits. Tying back to the issue of demographics, it's very possible that because a lot of these people aren't black or people of color, they don't pay too much mind to the concerns of people who see a black face and feel discouraged by the weak characterization because they don't or can't relate.

[Korath]

You can't compare Superman, whose whole morale has been shaped by very caring and present parents, with Victor, whose Mom died when he was very young and an absentee Dad who truly failed to care for his son, because somehow, metahumans meant that Victor would never be good enough. What would CYborg's dad bring to the stories of the Ghost Sectors ? Not much. And that's sadly a problem which happens with a lot of Vic's cast : it doesn't allow him to progress, because they are either used to rehashes the same stories, over and over again (Is he a man ? A machine ? Is he close to his Dad or very distant?) and I think the writers often time try too hard to make him a 'hood hero, with street-level which can be really cool (like Black Narcissus) but aren't developed beyond the basic way for them to work into his tired and beaten up storylines.

That's why even Grid, who could have been his perfect nemesis, the Machine who wants to feel and will go to any length to feel something, anything, hasn't been used quite well since his introduction. He's a one trick pony and not that different from the rest of Cyborg's foes, if all he fights is tech or mechanical enemies. Batman doesn't fight just gangsters or Clown Princes of Crime, he has a very wide and varied rogue gallery. Each and every side-character in Cyborg runs seems to be either "human repeating that he is totally human" or "tech based vilain doing tech based things".

That's not great for the character, and his mostly monstrous body right now doesn't help him move beyond that, like every successful hero moved from his/her roots to become something more.