Top Ten Most Embarrassing Characters in the DC Universe

(Disclaimer the first: my research was confined exclusively to The DC Comics Encyclopedia: The Definitive Guide to the Characters of the DC Universe, a book which is not as definitive as it would like to claim. Since not every DC character ever got an entry, it stands to reason there may be even lamer DC characters out there. Given how goddamn lame some of these guys are, though, we’re talking a pretty tall order.)

(Disclaimer the second: I haven’t actually read a comic book since about 1992, and don’t actually know who most of these characters are. It’s entirely possible one or more of these guys is, in actuality, totally kickass. I’m not holding my breath.)

(Disclaimer the third: DC characters have a disadvantage that Marvel characters don’t, in that they share a universe with Batman. Since this so unfairly skews the data by dropping every character into one of two categories — “lamest character ever” and “Batman” — I have temporarily ignored Batman’s existence for the purposes of this exercise.)

#10: Stompa

Stompa has a lot going for her. She’s probably pretty strong and she totally has a skull and crossbones on her helmet. She’s part of a supervillain team from outer space called the Female Furies which, among other things, includes members who can control fiery knives with their minds, command the loyalty of robo-wolves or rollerblade really, really fast. Having that kind of backup sure is helpful if you’re going to be engaging in any supervillainry. This team was in turn trained by an evil sorceress with magic laser gauntlets and a zest for irony named Granny Goodness, whose image I won’t be putting on my website because I’m afraid she’ll try to overthrow it.

However, we have to face facts; Stompa is huge. To her credit it does look like it’s all muscle, but we all know how worthless that actually is in a comic book environment. It’s a well-known fact that being sexy is the number one most important superpower for any female comic book character to have. Every single non-Stompa lady in this book is wearing a thong at best. I’m surprised comic book pages don’t refuse to accept the ink it takes to print an image of Stompa. I’m not saying it’s desireable or even that it’s fair. I don’t make the rules. Stompa, you weigh 330 lbs. That’s at least 240 lbs. too heavy to be taken seriously in your line of work.

Outside of that, she has a really embarrassing name and her superpower is “having big boots”. I’m sure 330 lbs. of woman stepping on you is enough to make you quit trying to stop her friends from robbing a bank, or whatever it is the Female Furies do, but again, when you’re standing next to a teammate who has (and I’m quoting here) “hands that can cut through anything” I think you really have to bring something else to the table.

#9: Chemo

First of all, doing a Google image search for Chemo turned up a lot of really sad images of sick kids. I resented Chemo for that at first, but then decided it wasn’t really his fault. But then I decided that, at some point, a comic book writer figured it would be a good idea to name his villain after a cancer treatment, and then the resentment came back tenfold. I bet there are plans for an evil Penicillin Man somewhere in the dark annals of DC’s archives.

As villains go, Chemo is pretty rad; he is a giant walking vat of chemicals that can vomit acid and grow up to 100 feet tall. He is apparently just barely sentient, too, which means it’s essentially just a giant mindless juggernaut of spewing death that kills people for no reason at all. That’s pretty hardcore.

What is really embarrassing is Chemo’s origin story. Apparently you have this humanitarian scientist who is doing all kinds of research on dangerous chemicals and toxins. However, instead of doing the smart thing and, oh I don’t know, safely disposing of the tons of radioactive goo he produces, he just threw it all into an enormous vat. Which, because this humanitarian scientist was a total dick, was shaped like a huge man.

Now, depending of the legality of Mr. Scientist’s research I can understand wanting to cut some corners on storing hazardous waste. But he had to know that his glowing green barrel of fun was going to come to life at some point, so why not make it shaped like something less dangerous? Say, a butterfly? Or an actual barrel?

#8: Odd Man

Let’s get one thing straight: Odd Man’s real name is Clay Stoner. This might be the first step in understanding his ridiculous outfit.

From what I can tell, Odd Man doesn’t have any powers. His Encyclopedia entry pretty much just falls all over itself talking about how badly dressed he is and how he uses gag props to fight the criminal underworld. Curiously, even though he is described as a superhero, his bio lists him as a villain. I started to do a little research on the character to find out precisely what the haps was, but then thought it would probably just be more fun to blindly speculate about what that means. So let’s get to it!

Odd Man’s gimmick is using wacky practical jokes. That’s kind of unfair right out of the gate, since the Joker causes the same problems for villains in the DC universe as Batman causes for heroes, and a villain who is pretty much just trying to be an uglier and more badly dressed version of the Joker simply doesn’t have a chance. But is Odd Man a villain? If we believe his bio he is a villain even though he makes a living throwing cream pies at mobsters. I wonder, then, exactly how hero/villain status is decided in the DC universe. Unquestioningly there are many characters who play both sides of the field. Does the Justice League get together every few months and hold a vote? Do Superman and Lex Luthor just meet up every so often for a schoolyard pick? Because I can totally see why none of the good guys would want Odd Man on their team.

In addition to battling the mob in River City and apparently having stolen his outfit from a load of Two-Face’s laundry that had too much bleach in it, Odd Man is credited as solving a murder of a reincarnated Pharaoh. Sources say he took the job because no meddling kids were around to handle it.

#7: Green Arrow

Green Arrow makes the DC list for all the exact same reasons Hawkeye made the Marvel one: he’s hilariously underequipped. It’s one thing to bring your bow and arrow to a gunfight. It’s another thing entirely to bring your bow and arrow to a heat-vision-and-I-can-throw-buildings fight.

Maybe this doesn’t seem fair. It’s not like Green Arrow is the only comic book hero without any real superpowers. Heck, Odd Man dresses like a clown and he’s rated as less embarrassing as Green Arrow. What gives? Well, Odd Man has a paragraph and a half down in the corner of a page he shares with a Spawn wannabe and an Aquaman villain. Nobody’s ever heard of him. The only image of him on the internet is that grainy scan I used above, and his image in the Encyclopedia is just a cleaned-up version of that exact same grainy scan.

Green Arrow has a two-page spread, complete with summaries of important Green Arrow storylines, a dozen pictures, and bios of some of his closest allies. You know who else gets that kind of treatment? Martian Manhunter. The Flash. The entirety of the Teen Titans. Real superheroes. Odd Man is just happy he made the book at all. He’s a small-timer. Green Arrow? He’s trying to play in the big leagues. That means he has to stand up alongside the best in the business.

Wonder Woman’s mother is a goddess. She can fly and talk to animals and smash brick walls with her bare hands. She deserves a two-page spread. Green Arrow dresses in his best Ren Faire duds and shoots arrows at people. I’m not saying that I could take Green Arrow in an even fight, I’m just saying the types of people he can take in an even fight wouldn’t stand a ghost of a chance against the likes of Wonder Woman.

#6: Shaggy Man

The Shaggy Man (that’s right; the Shaggy Man) is possibly the hairiest evil robot that ever went on a rampage and had to be drowned by Aquaman. Wait, what? Let’s back up.

First off, why did someone make a Bigfoot robot to begin with? That’s not something that happens by accident; we’re not looking at another Chemo here. Someone decided he absolutely had to have a Bigfoot. This is a comic book; if you want a Bigfoot, go out and capture you a Bigfoot. You don’t need to build one, especially not one that regerates body parts and, oh yeah, can’t be destroyed.

At least the guy didn’t build a giant Bigfoot; the Shaggy Man is only five and a half feet tall. This means that even though the creature could totally knock most of our heads off with a single punch, he would at least have to look up at us while he did it.

So we have this kinda-short hairy beast terrorizing the universe. That’s not enough to get someone on this list. What really made the Shaggy Man sparkle was the various ways superheroes decided he ought to be dealt with. The Flash figured the only thing that could beat a Shaggy Man is another Shaggy Man, so they whipped up another one and dropped them both on an asteroid somewhere hoping their fantastic eternal duel to the death might be viewed through telescopes. When that didn’t work, Aquaman got hold of him and just dropped him into an ocean trench somewhere, hoping the creature wouldn’t draw even more power from geothermal vents. Then, just because that wasn’t ridiculous enough, Lex Luthor decided he absolutely had to have a Shaggy Man on his supervillain team, the Injustice Gang. Whatever the hell a Shaggy Man is, it’s apparently a very hot commodity.

#5: Angle Man

I’m not really all that interested in Angle Man, real name Angelo Bend, Italian gentleman thief, because he’s a complete nonentity. What interests me is the sole source of his super powers: his set square.

Now, comic book characters get their powers from some pretty ridiculous places. This guy has a magic ring, that guy has a magic cape, that other guy has a magic sword… the list is endless. What I want to know is how far down on the list of magical somethings you have to go before you start hitting school supplies. A magic set square? Really? That has got to be the product of an artist with a hangover and a looming deadline who frantically has to decide which of the things on his desk is the best thing to base a supervillain around.

I’m not even completely convinced the magic powers are worthwhile. The set square can apparently bend someone’s perceptions of space and gravity, which is kind of vague. Does this mean it has actual control over space and time? Or does it mean that after you kick him off a building Angle Man can point his thingie at you and make it look like he’s falling a lot slower than he actually is? It does say the set square grants the power of teleportation, which is probably really useful for a thief, but I think if I were Mr. Bend I’d just content myself with robbing the occassional bank completely unnoticed, and not dress up like a lunatic and start attracting the ire of superheroes. I have no idea whose spaceship he stole or who he’s talking to in that panel, but I bet by the end of the issue his little speech earned him a sound beating and a valuable lesson.

Angle Man’s biggest weakness, of course, is that the one and only source of his magical powers isn’t hot-glued to his hand. You know who could shoot the damn thing out of Angle Man’s grasp, thereby rendering him completely powerless? Green Arrow. And you already know how I feel about him.

#4: Torque

In this picture, Torque is not looking over his shoulder. No, no, no. He just has a backwards head.

See, Torque used to be a crooked cop, until someone caught wise and broke his neck. And not in the “hanging at a funny angle” way, either; I mean in the way the bad guy might spin your head completely around if you happen to be a teenager in a slasher movie. Drugs and physical therapy enabled Torque to not die, which is pretty miraculous in and of itself, so he got into the mobster game and kept right on committing crimes.

Torque doesn’t have any special powers. The only thing noted in his bio are mirrored glasses which allow him to see straight forward. Hell, if seeing what’s in front of you is a super power, I guess I qualify! Come on, that’s not so much a power as it is overcoming a handicap. Professor X is classified as a superhero, but it isn’t because he’s in a wheelchair.

I want to say Torque is just the product of an earlier era of comic books where having a pretty distinct and goofy visual cue is enough to stake your claim in the industry… but no, his first appearance was in 1996, a time when honestly I thought even the comic book people would know better. Tsk tsk.

#3: Fisherman

I started out somewhat discouraged that I couldn’t find a decent image of Fisherman to include in my list, but after I remembered what his superpower is I figured that any picture of any fisherman ever would be just as good. No fooling, the extent of this guy’s villainous evil abilities is wearing SCUBA gear and carrying a fishing pole.

That is apparently enough to go up against Aquaman, who honestly I feel gets a bad rap. Yeah, he’s got this reputation as a loser superhero and pretty much just exists for people to make Aquaman jokes about, but sometimes he has a pretty kickass beard and a hook for a hand. The beard alone would be enough to subdue a guy whose idea of being evil is going fishing.

Maybe I’m looking at this the wrong way. Maybe it’s not Aquaman who has the bum rap, but Fisherman. I mean, okay, Aquaman isn’t as tough as Superman or any of his other friends, but he’s at least tough enough to beat up a regular dude. Regular dudes often enjoy fishing, and out of the hundreds and hundreds of superheroes in the entire world there is only one who would take offense to that. I’d be pretty irritated if there were a superhero whose sole job is to make sure I couldn’t enjoy myself while playing video games or making snarky websites.

Then again, maybe I had it right to begin with. Fisherman’s pole is the most super fishing pole imaginable, described as being made of titanium steel and having an unbreakable polymer line. Which isn’t that impressive by supervillain standards, but is pretty bad ass for a fishing pole. The question is, just what is the guy fishing for? The only thing in the ocean I can think of you’d need that kind of hardware to catch would be, uh, Aquaman. So I guess the idiot was asking for it all along.

Just a moment…
I just typed four paragraphs about a supervillain who fishes, and he was only number three on the list. I think I would have to say that, on the whole, the DC universe is way more humiliating than the Marvel universe. I haven’t crunched the numbers, but I’m pretty sure the Marvel list would have topped out sometime around the guy with the backwards head. I just want you to keep that in mind as we go on to the last two entries.

#2: Mr. Mxyzptlk

Mr. Mxyzptlk (which I am pasting rather than typing because, seriously, screw this guy’s name) is the absolute worst comic book villain ever invented. And, again, I want to remind you that this is a group of people that includes an evil fisherman and a guy with a backwards head.

In fourth or fifth grade our classroom library included a series of educational comic books that had to have been printed during the 60s or 70s. They weren’t real comic books, they were watered-down versions of stories that some company obtained DC licenses for. This was in the mid-90s, which was right around the time I went through my own brief comic book phase. My favorites were Spider-Man and Wolverine. Wolverine in particular spent those years pretty much just going around beating up on everyone imaginable, so when I got a hold of these “Superman, but not really” comics during quiet time in school I knew something was up, even then.

One of the stories involved Mr. Mxyzptlk, I don’t know, holding his finger really close to Superman and repeating “not touching, can’t get mad!” over and over again. It went through all the Mxyzptlk folklore; he can only appear once every ninety days, he plays stupid pranks, to get him to leave you have to make him say his own name backwards… you know the drill. At the time, knowing I wasn’t really reading a real comic, I imagined the writers had just invented a stupid one-shot character to star in a Superman story about how it’s not nice to play pranks.

It was years later that I actually learned that Mr. Mxyzptlk was a real comic book character, and that all the insane arbitrary rules from his edutainment appearance were canon. The revelation blew my mind. I’ve never been a fan of Superman, but he punches planet-sized aliens for a living. How could anyone, ever, think it was a good idea to have him match wits with a leprechaun every month-and-a-half?

What’s even more alarming is that Mr. Mxyzptlk’s only weakness is saying his own name backwards. Kltpzyxm. Go ahead, say it. You can’t, can you? That’s because there aren’t any goddamn vowels in that word! Not only is it an impossible word, but Mr. Mxyzptlk is somehow retarded enough into being tricked into saying it every single time Superman has to defeat him. Which is four times a year. My last name is pretty weird, and my last name backwards is even weirder, but I don’t think I’ve ever said it in my life, let alone often enough that someone could trick me into doing it without me being aware of what was going on.

#1: Ch’p

For years I thought Mr. Mxyzptlk was the most insanely unbelievably retarded comic book character anyone had ever drawn, ever. That was my firm belief right up until receiving and thumbing thorugh my copy of the DC Encyclopedia. For behold: the Green Lantern Corps drafted a chipmunk.

He’s big, for a chipmunk; almost two feet tall and 22 lbs. And let’s not wince at his superpowers, either; Green Lantern rings are pretty powerful. But I gotta say, you know what would be the first thing I’d do with a magic ring with limitless power, if I were a chipmunk? I mean, assuming I had enough intelligence to not just shove it my cheek until winter? I’d make myself not be a chipmunk anymore.

The Green Lantern Corps is a pretty diverse superhero team. They have a mushroom guy and a salt crystal with a mohawk and a bug guy and even a woman or two. There are something like four thousand Green Lanterns across the galaxy, putting their combined power level at about infinity times four thousand. I’m simply not convinced they need a cartoon mascot, but even if they did, they could have come up with something better than a chipmunk. If Green Lantern had his own cartoon, Ch’p would get a forty second filler spot at the end where he does something stupid like try to pour himself a bowl of cereal and end up making a mess. And Green Lantern would shrug and say, “Oh, that Ch’p!”

Ch’p is listed as “deceased”. Since he’s technically part of the Green Lantern Corps, I imagined this meant he fell in a spectacular space battle against a monster the size of a solar system. Nope! He got hit by a truck. Know what I’d do if I had a magic ring with limitless power and were about to be hit by a truck? Because Ch’p didn’t.