On Hawkman:

This is probably going to get me in trouble, but I have to say this.

I don't like Carter Hall.

Now I'm going to disclaim this by saying I've yet to read Hawkman, so I'm solely going off of JSA at the moment.

But based on his behavior in JSA: I don't like Carter Hall.

He's arrogant and domineering and a jackass. The spirit of his wife is in his grand-niece, but she doesn't remember it and is justifiably a little freaked. This part of the situation I can sympathize with. That's not an easy situation.

So anyway, he's unintentionally freaking her out and in retaliation, she kisses Sand, hoping to start a relationship with someone who isn't her creepy great-uncle. Carter sees it through the window when he goes to apologize. Fair enough, at this moment, I'm sympathizing with all of them. Carter for seeing the woman he still thinks of as his wife kiss another man, Kendra for her confusion and general freaked-out-ness, and Sand for having to be the mature one and turn down the very attractive woman he has a crush on because he knows she's kissing him for the wrong reason.

Now if Carter had confronted them then, I would have been okay with it. But no, he has to go undermine Sand's authority (authority offered to him) at every move, and make sniping verbal attacks on the guy. The guy who, 50 years as a sand monster not withstanding, is *25* years old. That's around Dick Grayson's age.

And this bothers me. You see, I consider Carter one of the older heroes. And I don't think older heroes should be in direct rivalry with the younger ones. I mean, I was irritated by Ollie's behavior toward Kyle, and Ollie never forgot he was dealing with "a kid". In Carter's case, he's actually treating an ex-sidekick Dick Grayson's age as a full out rival. Not as a kid who happens to have won Kendra's affection, but a full blown rival.

See, that bothers me in some because of my own issues. See when I was growing up most of my friends were younger than me. And my mother would often tell me when we fought that sometimes no matter who's "right", it's the responsibility of the older person to be the grown-up of the situation. In this case, Carter continues acting like a spoiled teenager, leaving the kid to be the grown-up of the situation and try to run damage control/apologize/back down.

So it's not event that Carter has decided to see a *kid* as a full rival (won't ever see Clark or Bruce doing that...), he's also forcing said kid to act like the grownup. Not to mention acting unprofessionally when that kid is ostensibly the group leader.

Then there's the whole thing with Roulette, where she puts Sand and Carter in the event to go save Kendra and the antidote for one. We have Sand visibly affected, on his knees, clearly sweating and probably feverish. It hasn't kicked in for Carter. That's when Carter decides to snipe more at him regarding Kendra. When his "rival" (who is Dick Grayson's age, an ex-side kick I must remind again) is already somewhat incapacitated by the poison.

Not to mention, later taking the antidote. Meh, this part's unfair of me, because as far as they knew Sand's silicon form would have protected him. But you know what, I can't see a situation with say Ollie and Kyle, or Bruce and Kon, where the grown-up would have let the kid give up the antidote on the off chance their powers could protect them. (Especially if they'd already been physically affected).

And to add insult to injury, according to the JSA Secret Files and Origins, Sand's 5'11 and *162* pounds. He's tiny! No wonder the poison hit so hard. I'm not sure why this irritates me. But it just makes Carter into more of a jerk. He's not only maliciously treating a kid Dick Grayson's age as a Rival, verbally attacking when the kid is out of sorts, and making the kid act like the grownup...this kid that's his rival, could probably be carried off by a stiff breeze. He could snap him like a twig! Now he's just a bully!

And he yelled at Courtney for suggesting voting later on and was a jackass in Black Reign.

But mostly, it's the above incident. I'm irrational in my dislike. I'm glad the character exists, and I like the role he plays in JSA, but I really really love disliking him.

Edited to Add: And he looks smelly. :-)