if you really want to get into the weeds it all goes back to patriarchy. there was a high price placed on a woman's virginity. but that might all be a little too much for a comic book forum.
Uh. I don't feel think it works like that. Literally, if I found out the Joker was a rapist I'd have the same opinion of him. Now 10 or 20 years ago it probably would have really changed how I viewed him but not today. Unless the character is fighting aliens or demons or some oppressive regime. I really can't square with him being a mass murderer.
Red Skull wasn't an A-List villain because he was a caricature. And let's be frank Captain America wasn't really A list in the 40s. Captain Marvel (Shazam) was king. Then you had Superman was others. You could rank him as A list of you want because there were fewer heroes and the landscape was different but he didn't crack the top 5. Even by modern comics he wasn't A-list till the 2000s.
Red Skull could probably be A-list if they just wrote him in a more interesting way and put him in more stories.
The J-man
I don't really get the people wanting Absorbing Man to "come back" from anything. The guy's a monster and always has been. He's not redeemable, at any rate. Titania isn't much better. That's why they work.
f/k/a The Black Guardian
COEXIST | NOEXIST
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Not necessarily. Sutekh didn't mention it, but the other source of mystical power is the well-spring of magical energy that pervades everything. In theory, whenever you encounter someone who is not properly trained in the mystic arts, and who isn't a mystical being and source of their own powers like gods and beings like the Faltine, the magic is usually drawn unknowingly from the environment. In that respect, magic functions like any other source of energy. Just like a person doesn't have to be physically healthy to absorb and channel ambient cosmic energy, they don't have to be particularly fit to do that with magical energy.
That said, mysticism is both a force and a discipline with many forms, some of which heavily rely on a sound mind, body and soul for greatest effect. If you are not "strong" enough to wield the power that you are invoking, or control the paranormal entities that you are summoning, you will likely suffer tragically for it.