Villains Endgame - Expendables and Survivors

[Mel Dyer]

I didn't want to hi-jack or muddle the 'redeemable villains' thread, with a similar or opposite premise; ..so,here we are.

Imagine that some COSMIC event has Wonder Woman's better and lesser known super-villains gathered into one place, at the edge of our universe, ..and that place is about to be destroyed! There will be a galaxy-razing, cosmic explosion, and you must select the TEN wonder-rogues, ..who will survive.

Start Wonder Woman's rogues gallery over, with TEN super-villains! WHO will they be?

Important: This is INSTANT DEATH. The expendables you eliminate, ..die, as they are presently shown in the comic! The survivors you save, ..emerge, exactly as they are portrayed in the WW comic! That means your selection of WHO LIVES should be based whatever powers, motivations, origins and backstories, these villains ..already have. Please do NOT enhance, reboot, re-imagine or re-characterize any of your ten survivors. Please do NOT start or encourage discussion of re-imagining Wonder Woman's super-villains.

Example: My version of Queen Clea is First Born's daughter, who is indestructible and can't be killed! I envision Cheetah, as an Amazon and Diana's childhood BFF, so...can't kill her off! Whatever villains you eliminate, you leave on the cutting room floor, exactly as they are, in the WW comic.

Do NOT trivialize, dismiss or ridicule any postors' selections, even in jest, ..as stupid or crazy or anything else negative, for any reason. We just don't do that to each other, here.

WELCOME for discussion? Feel free to post your list and go ..or join the rousing, nuanced, provocative discussions, so typical on the CBR Wonder-boards. Edit and resubmit your survivors list or...

Submit a NEW list, if you like! Discuss your reasons for selecting your ten survivors, why you picked them ..or why you think your ten are essential and can't be done, without.

Here's my ten! You don't have to, ..but, I've marked superheroes 'GA' to mean Golden Age.

Warmaster (GA)
First Born
Doctor Cyber
Queen of Fables
The Adjudicator
Atomia (GA)
Doctor Psycho (GA)
Super Woman
Cheetah (GA)
Queen Clea (GA)

[Gaius]

Hmm

Cheetah (Rebirth)
Circe (Rebirth)
Ares (Post-Crisis)
Veronica Cale
Dr. Poison
Dr. Psycho
Dr. Cyber (Rebirth)
Giganta
Paula Von Gunther
Queen Clea

[Nyssane]

1. Cheetah
2. Circe
3. Giganta
4. Doctor Psycho
5. Queen Clea
6. Silver Swan
7. Doctor Poison
8. Blue Snowman
9. Zara
10. Doctor Cyber

[Koriand'r]

Circe
Veronica Cale and Godwatch (Dr. Cyber, Cheetah and Team Poison)
Silver Swan
Dr. Psycho
Queen Clea and Villainy Incorporated (Giganta, Gundra, Cheetah, Hypnota, Blue Snowman and Dr. Poison)
Superwoman
Grail
Warmaster
Devastation
Astarte

[Mel Dyer]

Great lists, amigos! Clever selections, ..but, please resist listing villain teams, as single units.

Remember ..this is basically starting the rogues gallery over, with ten, individual super-villains! That's all who will survive. What super-villains are ready for a new WW era, ..as is? Considering WHO you picked, ..is there a worthy archenemy in your list?

[WonderScott]

Ooooooo fun!

1. Cheetah
2. Eviless
3. Circe
4. Doctor Psycho
5. Giganta
6. Doctor Cyber
7. Superwoman
8. Queen Clea
9. Angle Man
10. Queen of Fables

[SiegePerilous02]

1. Cheetah
2. Veronica Cale
3. Circe
4. Dr. Psycho
5. Giganta
6. Dr. Cyber
7. Dr. Poison
8. Silver Swan
9. Queen Clea
10. Eviless

Ideally, I'd add the rest of the classic Villainy Inc members as well as Gundra, Angle Man, and Medusa.

[Dr. Poison]

1. Cheetah(Alex Ross' Justice version)
2. Giganta(Jimenez version)
3. Dr. Poison II(Luke version)
4. Queen Clea
5. Angle Man
6. Osira
7. Kung
8. Dr. Psycho
9. Warmaster(Orlando version)
10. Aegeus

[WonderScott]

1. Cheetah(Alex Ross' Justice version)
2. Giganta(Jimenez version)
3. Dr. Poison II(Luke version)
4. Queen Clea
5. Angle Man
6. Osira
7. Kung
8. Dr. Psycho
9. Warmaster(Orlando version)
10. Aegeus

Interesting choices... it killed me not to include Doctor Poison in my list.

[WonderScott]

Ooooooo fun!

1. Cheetah
2. Eviless
3. Circe
4. Doctor Psycho
5. Giganta
6. Doctor Cyber
7. Superwoman
8. Queen Clea
9. Angle Man
10. Queen of Fables

So here’s my reasoning, behind my choices...

1. The brilliant Barbara Minerva is a powerful and classic foe of Diana’s and formidable as a woman and a werewoman. A predator to one aspect of Diana’s namesake, the hunter.

2. An alien adversary and organizer and schemer for the downfall of Earth. Gives Diana the opportunity for sci-fi and space opera storylines.

3. The witch versus the warrior, as Jimenez put it. Another divine lady who undertook a very different path to power than Hippolyta and the Amazons. Magic versus might and completely terrifying with her Beastiamorphs.

4. One of the most terrifying villains in the DCU. A malevolent misogynist and master manipulator who subtly brings all your fears to life and makes you question reality.

5. A splendid spectacle of a monster woman and brilliant mad doctor in her own right. Doris never shrinks from wanting revenge on Diana.

6. The ghost in the gynoid and the tyrant of technology and the cruel commander of a clandestine cabal. One part a creature daring to reclaim their lost humanity and one part a despotic dame desiring technological world domination.

7. Diabolical doppelgänger double from another Earth. It’s harrowing to see the absolute worst parts of yourself dominating your personality and messing with your life.

8. A queen and queendom that turns Hippolyta and Themyscira on its ear.

9. Gentleman thief and collector of alien artifacts, enchanted accoutrements, mythical machines, and wondrous weapons.

10. A fairytale fatale, with a princess complex, out to destroy everyone’s happy ending.

[SiegePerilous02]

This is a fun idea for a thread, but narrowing it down to just 10 is a bit difficult. Since Batman's rogues gallery is often considered the gold standard, and his core group is a little bigger. Can we select Wonder Woman villains roughly in number to the below?

1. Joker
2. Catwoman
3. the Penguin
4. Two-Face
5. Riddler
6. Poison Ivy
7. Mr. Freeze
8. Scarecrow
9. Mad Hatter
10. Harley Quinn
11. Bane
12. Ra's al Ghul
13. Talia
14. Hugo Strange
15. Killer Croc
16. Clayface

[Mel Dyer]

This is a fun idea for a thread, but narrowing it down to just 10 is a bit difficult. Since Batman's rogues gallery is often considered the gold standard, and his core group is a little bigger. Can we select Wonder Woman villains roughly in number to the below?

1. Joker
2. Catwoman
3. the Penguin
4. Two-Face
5. Riddler
6. Poison Ivy
7. Mr. Freeze
8. Scarecrow
9. Mad Hatter
10. Harley Quinn
11. Bane
12. Ra's al Ghul
13. Talia
14. Hugo Strange
15. Killer Croc
16. Clayface

TEN was so-ooo hard...seriously!

Eliminating Circe, when it came down to Circe or Clea, was almost ..paralytic. The real contest for me, I suppose, was deciding that I had to choose which sorceress enemy was more interesting to me: Circe, as brilliantly and chillingly revised by the JLD comic, ..or Queen of Fables. I chose the Queen, pretty early on, leaving a final contest between Circe and Clea ..for one spot. At the end, I decided Diana needed a Per Degaton or Vandal Savage conqueror type to threaten her Amazon love of championing freedom...

And, for my money, Clea was that foe. It also helped that Clea could punch Diana through a mountain, at will, with her bare hands...really mess her up.

At the risk of having a very short thread, I'm going to carry on with the ten survivor premise and see how it goes. The point of this elimination game is to determine, once and for all, who, without revision or embellishment, ..is the baddest of the bad, among the Wonder-rogues? Who, driven by their sheer hatred of Wonder Woman, will still be standing, after the worst thing ever kills the rest?

We spend so much time re-imagining the Wonder-bads, I would really like to see who, among them, are perceived as Diana's natural and essential enemies...the not-to-be-missed ones. Who, among them, best defines who Wonder Woman, in the way that Luthor and the Joker define their arch-enemies?

If we broaden the list so that all of the well-known rogues survive, we basically have the status quo. I want to raise the stakes and throw off a few, ..just to see who sicks. Enjoy (I hope) and good luck!

[Mel Dyer]

TEN was so-ooo hard...seriously!

Eliminating Circe, when it came down to Circe or Clea, was almost ..paralytic. The real contest for me, I suppose, was deciding that I had to choose which sorceress enemy was more interesting to me: Circe, as brilliantly and chillingly revised by the JLD comic, ..or Queen of Fables. I chose the Queen, pretty early on, leaving a final contest between Circe and Clea ..for one spot. At the end, I decided Diana needed a Per Degaton or Vandal Savage conqueror type to threaten her Amazon love of championing freedom...

And, for my money, Clea was that foe. It also helped that Clea could punch Diana through a mountain, at will, with her bare hands...really mess her up.

At the risk of having a very short thread, I'm going to carry on with the ten survivor premise and see how it goes. The point of this elimination game is to determine, once and for all, who, without revision or embellishment, ..is the baddest of the bad, among the Wonder-rogues? Who, driven by their sheer hatred of Wonder Woman, will still be standing, after the worst thing ever kills the rest?

We spend so much time re-imagining the Wonder-bads, I would really like to see who, among them, are perceived as Diana's natural and essential enemies...the not-to-be-missed ones. Who, among them, best defines who Wonder Woman, in the way that Luthor and the Joker define their arch-enemies?

If we broaden the list so that all of the well-known rogues survive, we basically have the status quo. I want to raise the stakes and throw off a few, ..just to see who sicks. Enjoy (I hope) and good luck!

The 'instant death' feature of the challenge was to force us to deal with the present rogues gallery. I was hoping to avoid players submitting lists of villains, accompanied by a rationale for each, explaining how they had re-imagined their selections, ..justifying their places on the list. We do a lot of that, here. As there are so few players participating, it seems...

There are practically no WW villains, who are good picks, ..as is. We don't have ten super-villains, as presently written in the WW comic, worth listing, as THE official rogues gallery. That is pretty sad.

That is infuriating.

I want to put the new JLD Circe on my ten, so badly. She really is much improved, over the Perez version, but, it came between listing her or another sorceress enemy, we all know and love. Can't switch out the Queen of Fables, though, because She is just so much weirder, than like...everybody else!

[Perseus]

Dang, this really is a lot harder than I originally thought.... Ok... uh....

1. Ares
2. Circe
3. Cheetah
4. Atomica
5. Dr. Cyber
6. First Born
7. Aegeus
8. Alkolyne (and her 3 sisters, if they count as one)
9. Dr. Psycho
10. Silver Swan

[Mel Dyer]

Dang, this really is a lot harder than I originally thought.... Ok... uh....

1. Ares
2. Circe
3. Cheetah
4. Atomica
5. Dr. Cyber
6. First Born
7. Aegeus
8. Alkolyne (and her 3 sisters, if they count as one)
9. Dr. Psycho
10. Silver Swan

The 'instant death' thing makes this, so hard. Aegeus, Circe and Atomia - as they are - were picks I really struggled with.