Your Top 10 most popular Black Characters in DC Comics

This is a hard one for me. I'm a really big fan of Cyborg and Jason Rusch. I find Static, Aqualad, Black Lightning, and Steel to be cool. But there are a lot of characters that are just awful.

For a while John Stewart was a horribly written character in the Justice League books because no comic book writer really wanted to touch him. DC editorial would force writers to have Stewart simply because Hal Jordan or Kyle Rayner were prohibited to be used. And the first season of the Justice League cartoon put him on the show simply because of his skin color, not because of who he was as a character. As a result, Stewart's history is plagued with being utterly bland and boring. Even Dwayne McDuffie, who made Stewart awesome by the second season of the Justice League cartoon, wanted nothing to do with the comic book version of John Stewart. Thankfully, Stewart has been completely and totally awesome ever since he's been properly integrated in the Green Lantern comics following McDuffie's run on Justice League of America.

Vixen has always been kinda lame to me, especially when you have the far superior Animal Man.

And I ****ing hate Mr. Terrific. As an atheist, the way his atheism is portrayed is utterly horrible. If you're in the DC Universe, you shouldn't be an atheist. And his atheism wasn't even atheism, it was him crying over how much he hates God because his wife died.

 

I have a few that I would put as my top-tier Heroes who happen to be black:

- John Stewart mainly his JLU incarnation
- Icon from the original Milestone run
- Bronze Tiger
- Amanda Waller who is really a standout character being both a powerful woman who is both completely human and very uncomic-ish in terms of a woman's portrayal. i.e. a plus+plus sized black woman.
- Steel who was probably the 1st Black hero who I encountered reading comics as a young kid. I really liked him in Superman books back then.

I probably have a few more characters that I appreciate but can't really remember at the moment. I really liked Hardwire but between Hardwire and Icon, I prefer Icon.

 

I grew up with Static Shock on KidsWB. And I was really mad when they cancelled his New 52 comic.

Somebody needs to put a shock to their system!

 

Love Cyborg. I like Aqualad on Young Justice. I hope he shows up in the New 52. Static is good too.

My only real experience with Black Lightning was when he joined the Justice League and then the Outsiders right before the reboot. I dug him though. His team up with Blue Devil was cool. I like the thunder and lightning DC Nation shorts. I would love to see those 3 characters in a comic

 

um idk

 

I can hardly think of ten

 

Grant Morrison's Superman and Wonder Woman. I wish they gave them an ongoing series.

 

1. Mister Terrific
2. Steel
3. Vixen
4. Black Mantra
5. Amander Waller
6. Black Lightning
7. Bloodsport (Superman Villain from Bryne era)
8. Nubia
9. John Stewart
10. Crispus Allen

honorable mention Morgan Edge because his black now

 

I don't think there are ten popular ones.

 

Here are my top 10:

1. Icon
2. Amanda Waller
3. Rocket
4. Hardware
5. Black Manta
6. Black Lightning
7. Batwing
8. John Stewart
9. Vixen
10. Steel

Honorable Mentions: Static, Tattooed Man/Ink, Natasha Irons, Firestorm, Voodoo, Mr. Terrific, Cyborg, Philippus, Thunder & Lightning, Tobias Whale, Bronze Tiger, Onyx, Azrael, Wise Son, Bumblebee, Mal Duncan, Aqualad, Black Spider, Jezebel Jet, Black Vulcan, Nightshade (Flash TV show), Turbine, Shondra Kinsolving

 

That is a cool idea.

 

Funny that you think the comics' Stewart post-JL/JLU cartoon is awesome. I think he has been largely mishandled or underused. He's nowhere near as awesome as he was on the cartoon. It seems like all the comics can do is have him destroy planets or be reminded and/or agonize about the planets he destroyed.

I haven't read every comic to be fair, but in the ones I've read with him, he's a sideline character. Guy is the much better developed character in the GLC comics. I wish they would do something with Stewart, but it seems like that's not going to happen. To be fair, I haven't really dug into the Third Army storyline so maybe that situation has improved.

 

OHHHHHH YEAHHHHHH I am Game!

1)BLACK LIGHTNING- As if you cant tell!i love dude! loved he was educated but hit the streets talking jive! trust me! you just dont even know how real that is!
2) Cyborg-He's one of the reasons i love the TT and wasnt the token guy they needed. He pretty much was the soul!
3)Firestorm-Stormy is one of my time forever characters and that he turned black! Hell Yeah!! though i like Ronnie the best!
4)Tyroc -the freaking legion of Super Heroes had all flavors but never a brother till dude came on the scene to tell them whats up!
5)Icon-dude's origin of getting found by slaves as " Augustus Freeman! Thats cool!
6) John Stewart-Hal's my boy but total Major League! which really in comics there isnt alot of! everybody was mad cause he made the JLU animated, but dude had been around for along time and he deserved it!
7) Hardware- loved that dude was still working for the jive turkey that was taking his inventions and sabotaging his ass! thats cool and how you take down the man!
8)Mister Terrific- his name is Mister... Terrific! come on!! thats cool and make sure you start off by calling him " Mister!!"
9) Vixen- dig she was DC' 1st major black female and came on the scene in the 70's when firestorm did!
10) Steel- the meteorologist to the gods of Olympus! thats a bad brother right there

Honorable mention: Black racer( a brother "new god and" the lord of death that's cool) Black Manta, Bloodwnyn( though it was the Martian Manhunter with amnesia),Tempest( the bother on the " doom patrol" )static shock, Crispin allen and of course me Black Vulcan! haha

 

who would you cast as them in a movie tbqh?

 

Steel is easily my favorite black character from DC. He's survived the transition to the New 52 relatively unscathed, too. A lot of his history is gone, unfortunately, but his characterization remains relatively consistent.

Cris Allen was a good character fostered to greatness in Gotham Central, but he's basically been pointless since then. They had one good story where his son accidentally kills someone and he's forced to punish him as the Spectre, but other than that he's basically just let the Spectre take over and been an boring "woe is me!" mess since his death.

Mr. Terrific was cool for a while, but he started boring me somewhere around Checkmate.

Jason Rusch was a good Firestorm, but I don't know or care what they're doing with him and Ronnie in the New 52 now because their series' first issue was horrendous.

Amanda Waller's good, but I preferred her when she was fat. Applying the nickname "the Wall" to a skinny person feels weird to me.

Black Lightning was cool, but I don't know what's going on with him now. He doesn't really interest me enough for me to read books specifically for him.

Static could be cool if they stopped putting s***ty creators on his series and/or putting him in s***ty comics like Teen Titans.

Cyborg's fine, I guess, but f*** DC for trying to ram him down my throat as a founding JLA member in place of the Martian Manhunter.

F*** John Stewart. He was boring for a lot of years, and the only way anyone could apparently make him more interesting was to turn him into a f***-up whose actions doom whole planets and eventually a straight-up murderer.

Vixen has cool powers but has always struck me as a boring character who doesn't use them in particularly good ways. It doesn't help that her only starring roles lately have been in terrible comics that I've avoided like the plague.

Those are pretty much the only black characters I care about at DC.