What DC Character Has Changed The Most From Their Debut?

[The no face guy]

Vic Sage, The Question. Under Steve Ditko he was pretty much a cold hearted eye for an eye right wing vigilante (Rorschach), and then under Denny O Neil and Greg Rucka he became a self consciousness zen minded liberal. Then he turned into a lovable 31 flavours conspiracy nut in the JLA cartoon, to a weird poetic shaman (in a not so good mini series) and now it's like they've blended Ditko & O Neil together. which is fine by me, I find it more entertaining to have both left and right wing superheroes, so whatever political leaning he takes, he will still be my favourite hero.

[j9ac9k]

Guy Gardner by a country mile.

The funny thing about Guy is that despite all those insane changes throughout the years, he's now almost exactly where he started (post-coma, that is - even in the same outfit) - just a tamer, more likable version.

[Lightning Rider]

That's a funny read on Gardner. Seems like the guy scarcely had a stable status quo. Would be a nightmare for top-tier fan favorites but I can actually see it working for his character.

[bretmaverick2]

Batman

A rich guy on a mission for justice for his parents deaths and keeping his city safe.

NOW? psycho with plan to defeat all his JLA friends unless they go whacko. Mega billionaire with all sorts of crazy tech gadgets

No longer the Darknight Detective.

[Ishmael]

Booster Gold.

From being a bit of a lovable time travelling fraud to tasked with guarding the integrity of the timeline. Pretty big shift.

[CRaymond]

Robin

Dick to Damien.

[bat39]

A good case can be made for Green Arrow.

He was a Batman knock-off...a pretty cookie-cutter masked adventurer with all kinds of 'trick arrows' and miscallaneous arrow-themed gimmicks.

Now, he's changed quiet a bit over the decades, but I think the version that's become predominant, at least as far as the comics are concerned, is the bearded Robin Hood-esq social justice crusader. And the other significant take is Mike Grell's version - a dark vigilante and 'urban hunter', a flawed man and hero who nonetheless does his best to rise to the occassion.

[Adekis]

Robin

Dick to Damien.

I think that's a reasonable take. I don't think Damian is particularly good at being Robin. That's not to say he's a bad character. Just that Dick, Jay, Carrie, Tim, and even Steph, all started out in similar places as characters - Batman's upbeat young partner who serves to contrast Batman's seriousness. Damian has, to the best of my knowledge, never been that.

I want to say, I think the reports of Superman's changes have been greatly exaggerrated. Superman's just as capable of being a hothead, of being socially conscious, or even of being more physically grounded as he ever was. It just depends more on the writers than anything else - which is the way it's always been. The Golden Age Superman isn't too far from the surface though.

[Frontier]

I think that's a reasonable take. I don't think Damian is particularly good at being Robin. That's not to say he's a bad character. Just that Dick, Jay, Carrie, Tim, and even Steph, all started out in similar places as characters - Batman's upbeat young partner who serves to contrast Batman's seriousness. Damian has, to the best of my knowledge, never been that.

He has his moments under Tomasi's pen.

[married guy]

A good case can be made for Green Arrow.

He was a Batman knock-off...a pretty cookie-cutter masked adventurer with all kinds of 'trick arrows' and miscallaneous arrow-themed gimmicks.

Now, he's changed quiet a bit over the decades, but I think the version that's become predominant, at least as far as the comics are concerned, is the bearded Robin Hood-esq social justice crusader. And the other significant take is Mike Grell's version - a dark vigilante and 'urban hunter', a flawed man and hero who nonetheless does his best to rise to the occassion.

HA! I ALMOST added Ollie to my list too.
I didn't as his isn't as a big a change as others I listed.
(For record, I think Ollie is MUCH better now than the one note, Batman ripoff he once was.)

[phantom1592]

I disagree on Harley. She’s no longer the Joker’s sidekick, realizes he’s toxic, and she has a different costume. Not really all that dramatic. More like her story’s moved forward. The character I’m watching in the Harley Quinn animated series still seems like the character from the dcau.

Agreed. I can picture a time travel shenanigan where DCAU Harley meets up with modern Harley and they act, fight, and joke about the same. She always had that kinda sorta sympathetic psychopath thing going on..

The funny thing about Guy is that despite all those insane changes throughout the years, he's now almost exactly where he started (post-coma, that is - even in the same outfit) - just a tamer, more likable version.

Beat me to it. I think Guy may have had the longest road with the MOST changes... but his current status quo isn't that different from where he used to be. If Modern Guy met original Guy it wouldn't be a major shock.



for me it'll be Superman. Mostly because of the powers. Going from strong, fast, and a high jumper... to Flight, breath, heat, magnifying, xray, telescopic etc. visions, hearing, time travel... pushing planets... etc. etc.... The Superman we know today is PRETTY far from the Action comics #1 Superman.

[Lee]

Deadshot. Nobody's said Deadshot.

[DrNewGod]

Deadshot. Nobody's said Deadshot.

Defend Yourself!

[Doctor Bifrost]

In many ways I'd really have to go with the Martian Manhunter. Originally he was a Martian, unwillingly teleported to Earth, who had no way to get back home. So he set himself up as a superhero on Earth, with a secret identity as a seemingly human police detective. And had a touch of melancholy because he yearned for home.

Now, that's fine in self-contained stories. But once he joined the Justice League of America, and was friends with Superman and Green Lantern (who can travel through space), it just didn't hold together too well.

So they kept changing his origin. The White Martians had conquered the Green Martians in a war, and he be killed if he went back. He was teleported through time as well as space, and in this new time the Martians had all left Mars. Or died off. His evil twin bother destroyed the Martian race with a telepathic fire plague, just as J'onn was being pulled away. Or... we could go on at some length, couldn't we? And once he accumulated so many conflicting origins, writers came along and thought, "Hey, I'll just think of a new one!" (In this he somewhat resembles poor Donn Troy.)

And his powers kept shifting, at least in power level. It's one thing to say a humanoid alien can shapeshift into various human forms of roughly the same size and shape. It's another to decide he can shapeshift into anything, from a cat to a huge Lovecraftian monster. (I'm not saying "it's impossible," I'm saying it changes the tone of the character a great deal.) It's one thing to say he has telepathy, so he doesn't have a problem not knowing Earth languages. It's another to use him as the telepathic core of the whole JLA, no matter how far they're separated, and - have I seen this? - having him telepathically influence the whole planet. I mean, power inflation is a thing, but he's got so many powers to start with that it gets a little difficult to describe the core of the character.

Oh, yeah, and it turns out that his true form is this weird Gumby-like creature, and he only took on the form we were familiar with since 1955 to put humans at ease. (Which raises the question of why he went for green and hairless, when he could have just put people at ease by looking like a human being.)

In the past 15 or 20 years he's been given so many backstories that I have little idea, when I see him in the JLA, exactly who he is supposed to be.

[Lee]

Defend Yourself!