Depowering Cisgender Males in the DC and Marvel Universes

[Tami]

This is a little different from the usual Rumbles thread, so bare with me.

You are writing for an 11 issue comic book series for either Marvel or DC (not limited to any one character) with the only instruction being that every cisgender male with powers would be de-powered during that time (they can get their powers back at the end of the series, if you want).

The goal is to have as many fights and as much action as possible, but with the fewest causalities.

How would you go about doing that? Who would fight who? And how would the usual cast of characters react to it?

[Ptrvc]

I'd show the remaining powered characters doing their best to belittle, humiliate, maim and kill the depowered characters with the depowered characters doing their best to survive.

Last issue the Cis Gendered men get their powers back and the series ends on a note of disunity and disillusionment that anyone was ever a hero to begin with.

Right now that's the story in my heart and that's my view of humanity.

[Sharkerbob]

This is a little different from the usual Rumbles thread, so bare with me.

You are writing for an 11 issue comic book series for either Marvel or DC (not limited to any one character) with the only instruction being that every cisgender male with powers would be de-powered during that time (they can get their powers back at the end of the series, if you want).

The goal is to have as many fights and as much action as possible, but with the fewest causalities.

How would you go about doing that? Who would fight who? And how would the usual cast of characters react to it?

Mainly I would treat it like one of the Elseworlds that also does huge shake ups, like Act of God and Created Equal.

In this case, all the non-cismales step up to fill the gaps in power to cover now open spots on teams, while the existing cismales find themselves relegated to support for the most part. The thing about DC Marvel is the sheer abundance of heroes by now means there's going to be plenty of non-cismales that can fill those roles, now, so you can still have full line-ups of X-Men, Avengers, Justice League, etc. Meanwhile, however, the depowered males, depending on how severe the drop in ability, would either go into tech support, rely on power suits and gadgets and guns, operate on the street level, or provide other support functions for the bigger teams.

At the same time, one can't deny the the massive drop in power on both sides means that while hero/villain match ups might still roughly even out, when the alien and demon invasions come knocking, every lost Superman, Thor, Green Lantern, Flash, Sentry, etc, is going to be a strain on protecting the planet. So, we get to what actually caused this:

I would have the plot revolve around an alien species that fires a "depowering ray" on the Earth, but because they are aliens who don't have the full grasp of their target's biology, and the ray functions by targeting "identity frequencies" which will be a new psuedo-science thing related to psychic energies, the astral plane, and dream-self projection. Everyone's got their own psychic signature, and you could cluster people together along certain "frequencies" based on how they perceive themselves. The aliens, not actually having the full range of the Identity Frequency of humanity as a whole, probably because they based their data on a kidnapped group of cismale astronauts, they calculated based on the most common attribute of the ID signatures, which was being cismen. The aliens didn't intend to only target cismen, they intended to depower all metahumans on Earth, but whoops, they fucked up by making the ID Frequency range too narrow, and after the first successful firing, it's gunna take [arbitrary number of plot-necessary days] to fully recharge the device for another planet-wide shot. It did manage to cover cismen of other humanoid species like Asgardians and Kryptonians at least, so there's that.

It would take some time for the heroes to suss out exactly what happened, and the earlier parts of the story would be largely dealing with the fall-out, while Batman or Reed Richards solve the mystery in the background. Finally, though, the aliens would be discovered. The big arc here would be trying to stop the aliens before they fire the corrected beam at the Earth and depower everyone and then kick off their invasion in full force. As a bonus, capturing the technology and reversing the bizarrolarities to restore the cismale's powers, which of course happens by the end. This would probably require a big hero/villain team-up, so of course you'd have Lex Luthor or Dr. Doom trying to pull some shenanigans, only for non-powered Superman and Mr. Fantastic to step in and stop them.

Throughout the story, everyone would be heroic and care foremost about making sure the planet was safe (the heroes) or slimily trying to take advantage of the situation (the villains). You'd probably get some commentary from the men feeling frustrated at their powerlessness, but they're still in the game doing what they can. Everyone would see this and not give them **** about it, unless they were already one of the shithead villain characters who would do that anyway. The big thing I would do would be to go out of my way to not focus on the obvious Culture War Bait themes a premise like this would be ripe for, and just treat this like any other "crisis event of the month" deal the characters roll with and fix. This will give all the pundits on YouTube and the online Magazines nothing solid to complain about or cheer about (though I'm sure they'll try for a day), and thus no one would be able to mine any juicy clickbait out of it, and it will be memory holed like all the boring mega-events we get five times a year now.

And thus I will have once again saved Halloween. You guys don't even know how many times I've done that. Not that I'm keeping track or anything, I'm just saying, you could maybe give me the Tootsie-Pops that actually have the Tootsie inside it this year. It'd be nice, y'know? It's not like I do this for my health, candy's bad for you after all.

[T51R]

I'd pull a Doomsday Clock, just, worse.

Turns out that TOAA/Presence isn't actually real, its the guy who owns Marvel/DC at that point in time. Well, due to some screw-up, the owner of Marvel, DC and Disney is...KOGARASHI from Kamen no Maid Guy. Who is confronted by Dr. Manhattan at the beginning. Well, Kogarashi reveals another of his Maid Guy powers and tells Dr Manhattan that "unless you can be manly while wearing a dress, YOU AREN'T A REAL MAN! Now all of you, go and discover the true essence of MANHOOD!"

Welcome to Hell.

[Beadle]

Just make toxic masculinity genuinely toxic.

[Nik Hasta]

To make something readable? Choose my cast of characters and have them dropped into a sword and sorcery parallel world that causes them to lose their powers.

You get a fun miniseries wherein they have to learn new abilities and skills and the story ends with them escaping back to their normal reality.

[Cleric of Hell’s Brigade]

To make something readable? Choose my cast of characters and have them dropped into a sword and sorcery parallel world that causes them to lose their powers.

You get a fun miniseries wherein they have to learn new abilities and skills and the story ends with them escaping back to their normal reality.

This.

I would love to see a group of DC heroes dropped into a D&D type world, initially powerless, and have to learn new skills/powers to survive.

[Dr Will Hatch]

I suppose that I'd lean into the potential(And let's be honest, extremely likely) controversy that a premise like this would receive by a lot of toxic comic book fans and make it a political shitshow. Controversy usually drums up sales.

A sympathetic magical character who is either a woman(I'm thinking either Scarlet Witch or Nico Minoru from the Runaways) or a trans/nonbinary person grows resentful over the patriarchy and the disproportionate number of cismen in the superhero community over a period of time, and in their anger they cast a worldwide spell which removes the powers of cismen everywhere.

This person has some sort of scheme which causes the depowered men to fight amongst each other, I suppose in an attempt by the sorcerer/ess to prove that toxic masculinity exists or something, while the heroes who weren't depowered try and figure out what the hell is going on.

These heroes eventually discover that this entire scheme was actually being orchestrated by HYDRA/The Red Skull/A.I.M/take your pick in an attempt to sow discord, and the magical person who created this spell was just an unwitting pawn.

The douchebags are defeated in a grand battle, maybe some of the depowered heroes are manipulated into fighting the powered heroes for some reason by said douchebags, but the magical character who started all this in the first place is still resentful and angry and refuses to lift the spell.

That is, until a threat from outer space or Dormammu or whoever threatens to destroy the Earth. The magical character realizes that they got played, has a breakdown, and helps The Avengers/whoever defeat this bigger threat. The sorcerer/ess now has to live with the fact that life sometimes isn't so black and white. The end.

[Morning]

Batman takes the throne as most powerful cis-dude in the justice league like

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[T51R]

Just make toxic masculinity genuinely toxic.

Toxic Crusader already did it, and in style.

Also, there is no such thing as "toxic masculinity." Only "the feeble, impotent mewlings of those who wish they were Hanma Yujiro." ~Anon.

[Sharpandpointies]

I'd go with the idea that the cis males try to use technology and their wits/skill/cunning to make up for the loss of their powers. This goes perfectly well until five seconds into the first fight with some very powerful villain who retains their powers, and a bunch of the cis male heroes get absolutely crippled, potentially with someone who still has their powers getting killed or almost killed trying to protect them.

This leads to a discussion between the cis males and Everyone Else™, where Everyone Else™ convinces the cis males they are basically a LIABILITY in these big fights (except for the ones completely without superpowers, who are mostly backup anyway in this kind of huge situation), and should keep their noses out of them. The cis males finally get a clue on this and turn to support roles while Everyone Else™ does the heavy lifting.

Maybe occasionally a depowered cis male with gear bumps into an old enemy - also depowered, with gear - and we get a weird fight that's completely different from their norm, possibly ending with them rolling on the ground, pummeling one another. ^_^

Everyone Else™ gathers information in the field, does 80% of the legwork, etc. The cis males contribute where they can. Finally everything gets sussed out, leading to a long, desperate battle where Everyone Else™ manages to do the important work that results in the cis males getting their powers back. Already exhausted and beaten down, Everyone Else™ faces off with the cis male villains and fight another desperate battle. The cis male heroes turn up to equal the odds, and find it remarkably easy because Everyone Else™ - despite being all tuckered out - has done a decent job of wearing down the cis male villains already. Also, it's possible a couple of the Everyone Else™ villains join in to help the Everyone Else™ heroes.

Much celebration.

End, possibly with some shifts in the status quo.

[Dark Soul # 7]

The Champion of the Universe returns to challenge the heroes of earth to another contest. But this time it will not be a battle of strength and supernatural powers, but one of skill and teamwork.

Que 11 issues of the CIS-male heroes playing earth based team sports against the Champion and his newly gathered crew of cooky cosmic athletes... FOR THE FATE OF THE EARTH!!!

[StupidMoniker]

The Champion of the Universe returns to challenge the heroes of earth to another contest. But this time it will not be a battle of strength and supernatural powers, but one of skill and teamwork.

Que 11 issues of the CIS-male heroes playing earth based team sports against the Champion and his newly gathered crew of cooky cosmic athletes... FOR THE FATE OF THE EARTH!!!

Also known as, "Space Jam".

[Nik Hasta]

The Champion of the Universe returns to challenge the heroes of earth to another contest. But this time it will not be a battle of strength and supernatural powers, but one of skill and teamwork.

Que 11 issues of the CIS-male heroes playing earth based team sports against the Champion and his newly gathered crew of cooky cosmic athletes... FOR THE FATE OF THE EARTH!!!

Captain America's mastery of shuffleboard finally comes to the fore.

[Dark Soul # 7]

Also known as, "Space Jam".

The Champion: ...what?

Spider-man: Space Jam. It's a movie from our planet. It's pretty dumb but oddly charming. While this situation isn't exactly identical to premise in that movie there are a lot of similarities. So I'm going to make a lot of references to it which will probably fly over your head, which is pretty impressive given how tall you are and how big your hairdo is.

The Champion: ...mention it one more time and I'll murder all of you.