Can we solve the Martian Manhunter problem?

[Trey Strain]

That's the idea. Make it so that the MM is no longer a second stringer. Apply a different attitude to him.

People like to still talk about John Ostrander's work on The Martian Manhunter and The Spectre, but believe me, DC Comics has NO interest in those runs. It made its money off them 20 years ago.

[BatmanJones]

In a way I've come full circle. I set out to write plays and I did write plays and that led to the formation of my first theatre company, Infernal Bridegroom Productions, where I was artistic director and Jim Parsons was a founding member. He was just finishing college then and we did 16 plays together in about three years and he's still a dear friend and the largest donor to my current company, The Catastrophic Theatre.

Over the years I learned that I'm good at ideas but I'm not great at being the actual playwright so I've become a director: theatre's answer to an editor.

I come to my opinion here -- that it takes great creators and not just great editorial decisions -- through nearly 30 years of professional experience as a storyteller.

I know how easy it is to have an idea for a character or a play or a comic book and how hard it is to make it live. It takes a great playwright and great actors and designers in theatre; in comics it takes great writers and artists.

Editorial (and directors) are there to guide the creators. When they do that too much the creation is inhibited and the story is bad.

This is a thread about making a character better through editorial. My point is it doesn't matter unless you have great creators. And they typically have been ideas than editors and directors do.

[BatmanJones]

My most recent post doesn't make sense without reading the last post I made on the prior page, in which I explain how I sort of did what OP is suggesting on the phone with Andy Helfer in the 80s.

[FanboyStranger]

That's the idea. Make it so that the MM is no longer a second stringer. Apply a different attitude to him.

People like to still talk about John Ostrander's work on The Martian Manhunter and The Spectre, but believe me, DC Comics has NO interest in those runs. It made its money off them 20 years ago.

And last year when they released tpbs of the Ostrander series.

[Jim Kelly]

It's been a long time since the MILLENNIUM crossover event--and most of it is probably not in continuity anymore--but I remember they bent over backwards to make virtually every character called Manhunter connected in some way to the Manhunters. I forget how that involved the Manhunter from Mars, but I'm pretty sure he was utilized in some way.

If some fashion of the Manhunters still exists in the current DC books, then it would make sense if J'Onn is a Manhunter (many Manhunters operated in secret, some not even themselves aware of their true purpose). That would explain why he's called the Martian Manhunter, as a way of distinguishing him from all the other Manhunters.

As far as the powers go--I like the fact that J'Onn has so many. Mark Waid made it a thing. No one knows how many powers he has--so when he reveals another it's a surprise. It could be that the Martian Manhunter himself doesn't know--and he's always discovering new powers. I remember that the Composite Superman had a lot of powers (all of Superman's, Batman's and the Legion of Super-Heroes) and he had green skin. They're both like the Super-Skrull.

Martian Manhunter would keep most of his powers hidden--this works with how he was handled in his initiial DETECTIVE run, where he mainly operated as John Jones, using his powers covertly. As an alien in a strange land, he would keep his powers in reserve, as a kind of prime directive, in order not to disturb the balance in Earth's development.

Of course, the more human super-heroes on Earth would find J'Onn's dispassion frustrating and would always be wanting him to do more. Yet another reason for the Manhunter to hide the full range of his powers and use them judiciously.

This is how I want super-super-powered heroes to be handled--using philosophical and psychological limitations on their powers rather than physical limitations. It's been suggested in the past that the vulnerability to fire is not a physical limit but a psychological one--which means the greatest limitation to the Martian Manhunter's power is the Manhunter himself.

[JackDaw]

There's a real problem with any thread of this type: no one really knows what makes one character sell better than another. ( I agree with Batman Jones as to prime importance of writer and artist in determining quality of story..but similar quality stories can, and do, sell vastly different numbers.)

Yes..you, or I, might think that concentrating on selected powers and costume design might increase sales. But there's no real empirical evidence to support such a belief.

If Batman sold at MM levels, and MM sold at Batman levels...we'd all be saying that it's "obvious" that a lead character in a super hero comics needed a substantial power set. Imagine you don't know which character sells the big numbers...and you might well conclude that MM without "improvements" is the more interesting character by some margin.

[Agent Z]

I think there are only two ways to look at this:

1) You think the Martian Manhunter is perfectly fine as is, and has already established both his ceiling and floor as a viable character ... and it is not as an "alpha" who can anchor a franchise around himself. He's a valuable "beta" who is extremely useful as a big-time team player or in "quirky" one-off stories. And that's it.

2) You think the Martian Manhunter is NOT fine as is, and needs significant change to his character to reach his true potential as a viable "alpha" who can anchor a franchise around himself. He's in need of establishing his own niche within the DCU, where he doesn't mimic his more popular colleagues. His own mythos need major upgrading.

These are the only two Full Measures with regard to the MM's future.

Anything in between these two are merely half measures that won't have any lasting effect, IMHO.

Still think the transgender allegory might be the way to go with J'onn.

I appreciate your passion, but I think this has the most potential to backfire. Allegories tend to end up insulting the issues they're trying to represent due to massive false equivalencies.

[Chazro]

Lose the stupid 'Monster' look that's supposed to be what he really looks like, hated when they did that to him. Go the opposite direction, make him a stunning Taye Diggs/Idris Elba green sex symbol! Show children loving him for eating oreos. Have him become best friends with other aliens, like Superman, or become a love interest for Supergirl or Starfire. If he's a true manhunter, with telepathy, shape-shifting, and invisibility abilities, he should rival Batman as a detective, he could also work well with Grayson. He could go interplanetary, become a galactic lawman, hell, make him a bounty hunter with Lobo as a sidekick. They're always pitting Superman vs. Batman, a much more believable battle would be to see him go toe to toe with The Martian, on a regular basis, to cement the fact that he's a world-class powerhouse. He could be the new Oracle. Between shape shifting and telepathy, he should be able to instill fear in the heart of anything. There's so much to work with. Throw him into a war. Let him not have issues with killing. Make him the ruler of some imaginary country, that functions perfectly. Have stories set in a future where he's outlived the rest of the league, maybe along with the other aliens.

[stephens2177]

Martians were supposedly peaceful ppl who lived in harmony with not only themselves but the world they lived on,I just don't see the flying brick and Martian vision as abilities that these ppl would have.telepathy makes perfect sense,even shapeshifting does,why don't DC go with a logical powerset for where he came from instead of a superman like one.

Oh and kryptonians were all about science and better than selves through it,their having a ultra weaponized powerhouse power set makes sense,even the fact that they get more powerful over time makes sense when you factor in their history

[Trey Strain]

Things like the way a character looks, what he wears, what his name is, where he's based and so on do matter. No, they don't matter to the choir, but they matter to the uninitiated. And the uninitiated are the ones who a low-selling character needs to win over.

[daBronzeBomma]

I appreciate your passion, but I think this has the most potential to backfire. Allegories tend to end up insulting the issues they're trying to represent due to massive false equivalencies.

Disagree. Look at the X-Men.

Marvel used the mutants as a blatant allegory for racial discrimination (and then eventually LGBTQIA phobia) for decades to swell their popularity. So it can be done.

That said, to even begin to introduce the transgender allegory into the Martian Manhunter mythos would definitely require a deft writing hand, b/c there are admittedly a lot of ways that this move could backfire.

It's a risky move, but with great risk, comes great reward. And with no risk, comes no reward.

[Trey Strain]

The Martian Maneater?

Really?

[byrd156]

The weakness to fire is made necessary by the problem of his being so powerful that it's hard to subject him to credible threats. So you give the writer an easy way out be making it so that someone can just strike a match and then overwhelm him. A better way out is to lose the weakness to fire and take away a lot of those powers.

Ones to keep: Shape shifting, invisibility, telekinesis. And that's plenty. That's powerful as hell. Batman would give anything to have just one of those powers.

Now, should he fly? No, teleportation is better because it even further differentiates him from Superman.

Appearance-wise, put some hair on him, lose the cape, lose the boots and cover up the nakedness.

The last son of Mars? No, because that's yet another similarity to Superman. Come up with something different.

Put him in a comic that focuses on his job as a detective. Show him mostly in his human form, and have him take the Martian form when he needs to.

Any kind of a name that doesn't sound silly or dorky will help him.

There's your reboot.

That's just a completely different character, it sounds like you just don't like MM. You can always read about someone else.

[Timber Wolf-By-Night]

It's been a long time since the MILLENNIUM crossover event--and most of it is probably not in continuity anymore--but I remember they bent over backwards to make virtually every character called Manhunter connected in some way to the Manhunters. I forget how that involved the Manhunter from Mars, but I'm pretty sure he was utilized in some way.

Sorry, but your memory is failing you. J'onn J'onzz was not incorporated into the 'Manhunter' mythology during MILLENNIUM just because his superheroic name/title includes the word 'Manhunter' in it. You might be remembering the Secret Origins issue devoted to the Manhunters' history, in which it was retconned that the Quality Comics Manhunter, Dan Richards, was spied upon by the Manhunters via a robotic dog (the kind of Silver Age storytelling trope Roy Thomas seemed to love, ala "I want to explore the hidden connection between Johnny Thunder & His Thunderbolt, the Old West's cowboy Johnny Thunder, and my creation, Jonni Thunder, Private Eye"), as well as including Mark Shaw, Manhunter, but the only tie-in to the Manhunters J'onn had was appearing in a DC Comic published during the Millennium event (and all that comic did was reveal that he first Rocket Red assigned to JLI was a Manhunter robot in the suit).

Also, got to agree with the previous poster -- the OP wants to change everything about J'onn to the point that he's not recognizable as J'onn at all. He just wants a completely different character altogether. (Seriously, you think slapping hair on a hairless alien will make him a better seller?)

[Trey Strain]

That's just a completely different character, it sounds like you just don't like MM. You can always read about someone else.

Do you want to write a sample issue and prove to you that it's not a "different character?"

Anyway, we all know what doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result from each attempt defines, don't we?