Yay for Superhero trivia!
Now, I'm sure everyone's already seen these links, but I think they're pretty awesome and thus I'm promoting them:
If you ever wondered what your favorite hero's birthday is, someone's compiled a list: The DC Universe Calendar
(My mind will never stop boggling at the thought that Bruce Wayne is apparently an *Aquarius*.)
If you ever wanted to know the religious affiliations of comic book heroes: Adherent.com's got a list here ripe with related creator quotes and other tidbits.
(I'm not sure why I find it amusing that Johnny Thunder is a Mormon. But I do.)
And a DCU Atlas!
As a disclaimer, I don't know how accurate these sites are, how well they've done their homework or anything like that. But they're very very cool nonetheless. :-)
If you ever wondered what your favorite hero's birthday is, someone's compiled a list: The DC Universe Calendar
(My mind will never stop boggling at the thought that Bruce Wayne is apparently an *Aquarius*.)
If you ever wanted to know the religious affiliations of comic book heroes: Adherent.com's got a list here ripe with related creator quotes and other tidbits.
(I'm not sure why I find it amusing that Johnny Thunder is a Mormon. But I do.)
And a DCU Atlas!
As a disclaimer, I don't know how accurate these sites are, how well they've done their homework or anything like that. But they're very very cool nonetheless. :-)
posted by kalinara @ 2:03 AM
10 Comments:
At February 05, 2006 5:17 AM,
Diamondrock said…
I find the idea that Hal Jordan is Catholic mind-boggling...
At February 05, 2006 7:06 AM,
Diamondrock said…
Also: if I had been born one day earlier, my birthday would have been the same as LEX LUTHOR's. That would've been awesome.
At least my birthday is the same as Red Tornado's...
At February 05, 2006 9:31 AM,
Anonymous said…
Morman makes sense.
He's the seventh son of a seventh son, which means he comes from people who encourage big families. And bow ties.
At February 05, 2006 10:48 AM,
ShellyS said…
Very cool links. Thanks for posting them.
At February 05, 2006 1:07 PM,
CalvinPitt said…
Apparently nothing happened on my birthday. That's ok, I still share it with Clint Eastwood, freaking awesome.
At February 05, 2006 2:22 PM,
kalinara said…
diamondrock: Oddly, I can see it. Especially given his family's socio-economic status, the size of his family, and the way he's seemed to quietly dwell on guilt.
Heh, you were born the day after Lex Luthor! That's pretty cool! I was born the day after Sue Dibny and the day before Matter-Eater Lad. That's pretty funny.
Steven: Oh, I agree. That's part of why I'm giggling over it. It just makes so much sense. Mormons are funny. (I mean that in the best way possible though. :-))
Shelly: They're a blast, I think.
Calvin: Aww, nothing happens directly on mine either. :-)
At February 05, 2006 5:12 PM,
Anonymous said…
There seem to be a lot of atheist supervillains out there.
I suppose it makes sense that people who are very open about their evilness wouldn't believe in any kind of punishment or reward after death. I mean, some guy named Damian Diablo, who uses his mechanical, extensible, prehensile horns to slaughter people for money (to use a hackneyed supervillain I just made up as an example) probably isn't very worried about answering for his actions when he dies.
Still, as an atheist myself, I don't like the implication that atheism rises out of arrogance, (rather than, say, a personal philosophy that rejects ideas that lack empirical evidence) or the idea that disbelieving in God will drive a person to be evil.
At February 05, 2006 5:32 PM,
kalinara said…
I can see how that would be irritating. (Personally I'm lapsed Catholic-agnostic myself)
Though I suppose, and I'm not sure if this is reassuring, that since unlike the real world, the DCU definitely has gods that directly interfere with the world via Spectres, Earth Angels, Zauriel, Wonder Woman, and others...it's a lot harder to be an atheist with direct evidence that Gods exist. That *would* imply more arrogance or delusion or something than an atheist in our world, considering the lack of any evidence one way or another would be.
Again, I'm not sure that's really reassuring though. Still, the first Starman and Booster Gold are also atheists, so they're not totally unrepresented on the hero side.
At February 05, 2006 5:57 PM,
Anonymous said…
...since unlike the real world, the DCU definitely has gods that directly interfere with the world via Spectres, Earth Angels, Zauriel, Wonder Woman, and others...
That's true, but it also raises some other interesting questions.
Why would people be part of a monotheistic religion like Christianity in a world where the gods of every other religion seem to exist as well? One explanation I can see would be that the Christians in the DCU see Zeus et al as cosmic beings rather than real gods (I've seen this explanation used before). But then, what would stop people in the DCU from viewing the being that controls the Spectre in the same light?
I think the confusing nature of the various pantheons in DC and Marvel is why the subject of religion is so seldom dealt with in comics.
I'm going off on a tangent here, but I was just thinking about how few evil people in the real world actually see themselves as evil. The Nazis, KKK, etc. all saw themselves as forces for good, but most supervillains seem to know they're evil/immoral/insane. I'd like to see a few more villains like Ra's Al Ghul and Magneto, who think of themselves as heroes.
At February 05, 2006 6:12 PM,
kalinara said…
It *is* a bit strange, I think. DCU seems to work on the "it's all true, from a certain point of view" thing. I've read something or other that explained the Greek Gods as humans somehow elevated into beings with tremendous powers, thus allowing the major Judeo-Christian inspired God of the Spectre and Supergirl to be plausibly their equivalent of a monotheistic figure.
Really if you look at religion, monotheism and polytheism aren't really as seperate as all that. Catholicism and Judaism have a number of pseudo-deific figures in Angels, Demons and Saints (in Catholicism at least).
Most polytheistic religions have one originating force from whence the other came...Hindu's Brahma, Chaos in Greco-Roman, that sort of thing. The reasons the Jesuits were the most successful missionaries in Asia and Africa was that they were able to associate the lesser figures in monotheistic Catholicism to the natives' polytheistic deities.
As for if the gods are just "cosmic beings" why isn't the Christian God...I guess that's some things that a person still has to take on faith. :-)
There was a few Wonder Woman issues early on where Hermes started taking an active role in the world that dealt a little with religion. David's run on Supergirl dealt with religion, as does the Spectre. DC I think is actually pretty good about not forgetting religion is an important part of their characters' lives, even if they rarely address it directly.
I would like to see more misguided villains. Though occasionally the over the top, "I've fallen so far into the mire, I'm going to bask in it" evil like say Johnny Sorrow, can be fun too. :-) But a few more deluded think-they're-good characters would be a blast to play with.
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