Most Underrated Comic Superheroes

[WilliamWeird1313]

My favorite unrated superhero or in this case, superheroine is Power Girl.  I'm not showing a picture, but as soon as you see her, you'll laugh and think my reason for picking her is something else.  It's not.  Just read her current run and you'll see why she is awesome.

Good pick! Power Girl is great, but, yo're right, people do tend to look at her costume and, um, physical attributes... and often dismiss the character in short order. I know a few writers have tackled it as a topic for a discussion a few times in the comics, to varying degrees of success. One instance I remember, and quite liked, involved it coming up in coming up in a conversation between her and Superman, with Supes commenting on her, ahem, "cleavage window," and Power Girl responded with a somewhat touching story about how, when she was designing her costume, she originally wanted to have a symbol of some kind there, like Superman's S logo, but she could never think of anything, so the costume remains, essentially, unfinished, the gap basically representing a gap in Power Girl's own identity.

There was another, more amusing instance, in, I think either a JLA or JSA book, where Power Girl is elected to be a distraction for some teenage boy for some reason I can't remember, and when she confusedly asks why any teenage boy would be distracted by her, they all look at her without saying anything and, it clicks, and she just goes "Oh."

[Hammock Rider]

My favorite unrated superhero or in this case, superheroine is Power Girl.  I'm not showing a picture, but as soon as you see her, you'll laugh and think my reason for picking her is something else.  It's not.  Just read her current run and you'll see why she is awesome.

Good pick! Power Girl is great, but, yo're right, people do tend to look at her costume and, um, physical attributes... and often dismiss the character in short order. I know a few writers have tackled it as a topic for a discussion a few times in the comics, to varying degrees of success. One instance I remember, and quite liked, involved it coming up in coming up in a conversation between her and Superman, with Supes commenting on her, ahem, "cleavage window," and Power Girl responded with a somewhat touching story about how, when she was designing her costume, she originally wanted to have a symbol of some kind there, like Superman's S logo, but she could never think of anything, so the costume remains, essentially, unfinished, the gap basically representing a gap in Power Girl's own identity.

There was another, more amusing instance, in, I think either a JLA or JSA book, where Power Girl is elected to be a distraction for some teenage boy for some reason I can't remember, and when she confusedly asks why any teenage boy would be distracted by her, they all look at her without saying anything and, it clicks, and she just goes "Oh."

   I don't think the distraction would be limited to just teen age boys. I'd think her costume would give her at least a very brief advantage over most male villains.

   Depending on how he's written I like Wildcat. A lot of the time he's used as a poor man's Wolverine, what with his gruff, scrappy personality and "9 lives" that seem to come and go. But he's been written really well occassionally and when he is he's one of my favorites. In issue 9 of the first JSA reboot series, he was sitting in a hot tub with a broken arm, chatting up Cat Woman when the Injustice Gang attacked. He was all alone with abroekn arm and wearing a towel, and he mananged to whup the whole Gang, using only his fighting spirit, skills and vast experience. It was a pretty great issue. There have also been some story arcs in JSA classiifed that I really liked. When he's written to his full potential he's a lot of fun.

[Vik]

Preacher  My favourite comic series ever.

[JaseSF]

Darkhawk, Wildcat and Dr. Strange are all great picks. 

Speaking of Darkhawk, some more arguably underrated team comics...

The New Warriors



Guardians of the Galaxy



L.E.G.I.O.N.

[Mofo Rising]

Sorry to disagree with you guys, and no offense meant, but Darkhawk was a terrible comic. Might as well celebrate Wild Dog while we're at it.



(If you think I'm being too harsh, I loved both of those comics when they first came out. I thought they were really cool.)

I will second or third Grant Morrison's run on Doom Patrol, my favorite superhero series ever, and I would one-up with it with his run on Animal Man.

But I'm going to nominate Ambush Bug.



Originally introduced as a semi-serious villain for Superman, Ambush Bug very quickly became a vehicle for Keith Giffen and Robert Loren Fleming to mock everything about comics. They are still to this day some of the funniest comics ever written.

But don't take my word for it, buy the trade.

[Hammock Rider]

Hank Pym : Certified Loon and Scientific Adventurer!






Do you think Cap would be thwarted by a twisted ankle? Would Jarvis?






 I know Pym isn't much of a real hero compared to other super folks and he's been portrayed as being particularily loathesome in the recent past, but you have to admit he's an entertainning character. He's the hero you love to hate. The guy has betrayed the Avengers on several occasins, created Ultron and made him one of humanities greatest threats by basically being a neglectful father figure to the poor robot, changed identities at least a half dozen times, wore a jumpsuit through most of the 90's, and cooks up some of the most crazy-@$$ therories which are usually laughed at by the scientific community. Half the time, his experiments just end up endangering everyone he knows and he usually makes the worst choices possible when trying to fix his screw ups.



And this is all without mentioning his domestic issues(i.e. he's a spousal abuser, which is an aspect of Pym I don't enjoy and really wish they would do away with). He's a monumental screw-up, a walking Jerry Springer epsisode in tights.
And did I mention his hilarious 90's jumpsuit?

[Doggett]

To this day, the 90's Supergirl comics by Peter David and drawn by Gary Frank still remain my favourites.

[InformationGeek]

To this day, the 90's Supergirl comics by Peter David and drawn by Gary Frank still remain my favourites.

How ironic.  I've been raiding my local comic book store for old issues and I've come across Peter David's run on Supergirl.  I got issues 1-20 for less than 20 bucks!  What a deal!

As for other underrated heroes, why not say Starman by James Robinson.

[JaseSF]

Ambush Bug!  Starman!  Supergirl  (I like but not sure she's really so underrated).

I used to enjoying reading this comic back in the day too. Don't hear much about him now though...



Speaking of the Avengers I used to enjoy this variation...



Finally there's always...

[WingedSerpent]

I need to show some respect to two of my favorites, because while they became great heroes in their own right, they unfortunatley always lived under the shadow of of what came before; I'm of course talking about some replacement heroes.  Pariticulary

Kyle Rayner: Green Lantern


and Danny Ketch: Ghost Rider


I bring this up because these are two characters who don't seem to get respect and in Kyle's case, a great deal of undeserved hate.

Both of them were the stars of the books when I started really reading comics and are the two I ulitmately prefer.

Now, a lot of what people know about Ghost Rider actually originated during Ketch's time. His look, penance stare, the look of the bike comes from one of his enemeis-named Vengence. All this came from that particular run of Ghost Rider. Yet Johnny Blaze is still the better known and loved character.

Kyle, unfortuanately has a lot of bad press.  Comming from both the fall of Hal Jordan and the infamous "Woman in refrigerator" event of his first stories.

But Kyle did grow as a character, and as an artist was able to use the ring to create more imaginative constructs then had been seen before.  And yet a large population of the GL fan base never welcomed him and actually worked at getting him removed as GL.  Despite years as GL in his own book and Morrison's great run on JLA many people still look at him as a bad reminder of mistakes of the past.

[WilliamWeird1313]

I need to show some respect to two of my favorites, because while they became great heroes in their own right, they unfortunatley always lived under the shadow of of what came before; I'm of course talking about some replacement heroes.  Pariticulary

Kyle Rayner: Green Lantern



Kyle, unfortuanately has a lot of bad press.  Comming from both the fall of Hal Jordan and the infamous "Woman in refrigerator" event of his first stories.

But Kyle did grow as a character, and as an artist was able to use the ring to create more imaginative constructs then had been seen before.  And yet a large population of the GL fan base never welcomed him and actually worked at getting him removed as GL.  Despite years as GL in his own book and Morrison's great run on JLA many people still look at him as a bad reminder of mistakes of the past.

I'm actually a member of the minority who not only really likes Kyle Rayner, but actually prefers him to Hal Jordan. The main reason is one you mentioned, that being that he is an artist, which seems to me just such an absolutely perfect choice for a hero whose power is limited only by his creativity. I also liked the "Year One" aspect of Green Lantern. He seemed to feel reeeeally out of his element as a GL, and it was nice to watch him figure out what he was doing with no one to help him out, especially in the wake of the (now undone) destruction of the GL Corps. He made a lot of blunders, more so than Hal (do primarily to the time in which the two characters were first being published), and he felt very much like an average guy in a bizarre situation. The fact that GL stories are so inherently cosmic makes the juxtaposition between his blue collar cluelessness against the superhero identity thrust upon him even more dynamic.

[Leah]

Hush from Batman had a good story, but it got ruined with the sequel, which I've never read.