Favorites – 12 Favorite Black Characters in Comic Books

You know, I really haven’t done much for Black History Month here. I tend not to do much in February anyway. Heck, I’d rather talk about us any other time. Why regulate blackness to one month anyway? Maybe I shouldn’t complain since a lot of history could and does get swept under the rug. It’s also possible that I’m just filling up space with this paragraph. After all, I’m usually a dude with few words.

Since it’s Black History Month and Black Panther is finally coming to theaters, it’s time to get to this post. I’ve wanted to do this for a while but never knew when to do it. While there aren’t many, there are some cool black characters in comics. While some of them aren’t necessarily my favorites, there are some I really like. I especially like when they’re actually well-written. I’d probably say that Marvel uses them better but DC has good ones too. So, here are some of my favorite Black characters from comic books. It’s also not in any order either. First, I have some honorable mentions:

• Bishop (Marvel) – Lucas Bishop’s up here mostly because he may be the second black superhero I ever ran across. For those who don’t know, he’s another X-Man from the future. I first saw him on the 90’s X-Men cartoon. I thought his power set (he can absorb energy and use that energy) was pretty cool. There’s also the fact that was one of the only X-Men who had sense to carry weapons. That being said, I was not a fan of what the writers did with the character around the late 2000’s. How can you turn one of the only black dudes on the X-Men into a villain? At least he’s not like that now.
• Falcon (Marvel) – Sam Wilson isn’t really one of my favorites. Guys who fly and can communicate with birds aren’t my thing. I also haven’t read much of anything with him in it. Still, I did like his turn as Captain America when he was written by Nick Spencer. Yeah, it’s the guy who made Steve Rogers into a fascist. We can’t all be perfect. Also, Anthony Mackie has been killing it in the MCU. Maybe he gets to wield a shield in a later movie?
• Black Lightning (DC) – Then, there’s DC’s first black superhero. As you can tell by the name, Black Lightning has power over electricity. I really didn’t see any of Jefferson Pierce until Infinite Crisis. He was pretty cool in Brad Meltzer’s run on JLA. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen much from him since then. I haven’t even gotten to watch the CW show yet. I’ve heard that it’s good, so here’s hoping I can get some more Lightning goodness there.
• Bronze Tiger (DC) – Ben Turner, aka Bronze Tiger, is pretty much in the antihero side of things. While he has been a villain (especially on CW’s Arrow), he’s sometimes a good guy. I talked about him last month. While I haven’t read a lot on him, I like what I’ve read so far. He’s just a dude who’s awesome at martial arts. That’s cool to me. If you saw what I was posting last month, you’d see that.

Tales From the 50 Cent Bin! - Suicide Squad #38

So, it’s snowing in Tennessee and I’m stuck in Nashville. While being off from work is fine, I wish I got to enjoy the snow in the country. Oh well… on with the show.

Next up for the month is a return to the DC Universe. While most of them are lesser known, there are other fighters in the universe other than the Batman family. One that gets little mention is Ben Turner, aka “The Bronze Tiger,” a man who was brainwashed by the League of Assassins He was introduced along with Richard Dragon in Dragon’s Fists, a novel written by Denny O’Neil in 1975. He then appeared with Richard Dragon in the comic series Richard Dragon: Kung Fu Fighter. He then appeared here and there throughout the DC Universe. He fought Batman a couple of times… and won. Take that, uber-Batfans!!!

Ben then was made a regular member of John Ostrander’s Suicide Squad, which is the subject for today. He even had Rick Flag’s job in leading the team for quite a while. Tonight’s issue is Suicide Squad #38. Even though I haven’t made it here in my read-through (I stopped at "The Janus Directive"), I thought I’d touch on this issue. John Ostrander handles the plot while Robert Greenberger does the script. Luke McDonnell did the layouts while Geof Isherwood is over finishes. So, what happens when Ben is questioned by his superiors?

Suicide Squad #38

Plot: John Ostrander

Script: Robert GreenBerger

Layouts: Luke McDonnell

Finishes: Geof Isherwood

Colors: Todd Klein

Letters: Carl Gafford

Editor:  Dan Raspler

Movie Talk - Suicide Squad and Wonder Woman

Before I get to Justice League, I wanted to make this important pit stop. Here are the other DCEU movies: Suicide Squad and Wonder Woman. I got to see both of these in theaters when they were released. I thought I’d hold off getting to them until now. Since I wanted to see these again, I was able to find them both for pretty decent prices. That definitely came in handy with Suicide Squad since… well, that would be spoiling, wouldn’t it?

Tales From the 50 Cent Bin! - Justice League International #13 and Suicide Squad #13

So, what would you think a fight between the Justice League and the Suicide Squad would look like? If you thought it’d involve Harley Quinn trying to ram Wonder Woman with a motorcycle, you’d be correct. While that recent crossover was actually pretty good, that’s not the subject of today. The League and the Squad did square down before but it was less world-ending. In the late 1980’s, both teams were revamped after the crossover event, Legends. John Ostrander went gritty with the Suicide Squad while the team of Keith Giffen, J.M. DeMatteis, and Kevin Maguire brought the laughs with Justice League International.

The two teams eventually had a little crossover with their books. They are Justice League International #13 and Suicide Squad #13. I first ran across this in the JLI Omnibus years ago before I eventually found the single issues. JLI was written by Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis. Instead of Maguire on the art, Giffen also did the pencils while Al Gordon did the inks. As for Suicide Squad, John Ostrander was the writer. Luke McDonnell handled the pencils while Bob Lewis handled the inks.

Random Pics of the Month - Feburary

Wow, it has been a while since I've done one of these posts. I guess I post enough pics, so I tend to forget about this section. So, here are some pics on things I'll talk about over the coming months.

This is from a forgotten game called Jade Empire. What is it about? I'll let you know... later.

I'm past ready for this. Don't let me down, Snyder!

Yeah, I'll be talking about this event though not in detail. I'll say this, "Civil War" is definitely a talker.

Since Ben Affleck is also appearing in it, we better see something similar to this in the new Suicide Squad movie.

Don't worry Gwen. I didn't forget about Ultimate Spider-Man.

Tales From the 50 Cent Bin! - Suicide Squad #1-#2

Well, after a long break, I'm back into this whole "talking about comics" gig. This time is a little different though. Instead of talking about a certain GN, I will be talking about certain single issues in this segment called " The _______!" I don't know what I want to put in that blank yet, but I'll find a name for it.I'm either going to go with "Singles", "Floppies", or even better, "tales from the 50 cent bin"...nah!

Today's two issues are Suicide Squad #1-#2.  As you can tell by the top images, this is John Ostrander's version, not the new version with Amanda Waller on WeightWatchers. This is old-school, and this is pretty awesome. Now the team was formed (or re-formed if you have never read Secret Origins #14) by Amanda Waller. The goal was to have villains working for the government to do jobs that are too risky. If they survive, they get time served and let go. Some members like Bronze Tiger, Rick Flag, and Enchantress aren't villains, but they have their own reason to be on the team. So let's get to it and see the Suicide Squad take on the Jihad...not kidding.

Suicide Squad #1 and #2
Writer: John Ostrander
Artist: Luke McDonnell
Inker: Karl Kesel