Throg is a frog with Thor's superpowers.
Fantastic Four comes out this week, just the latest in the seemingly endless line of comic book movies from the past few years. The group (made of Mister Fantastic, The Thing, Human Torch and the Invisible Woman) were some of the original Marvel superheroes, first appearing in 1961 and predating many big name characters like Hulk and Iron Man.
Following their success, dozens more superhero teams began to sprout up (the original Avengers line-up first came two years later in 1963), many of whom have seen success on television and the big screen. X:Men and Guardians of the Galaxy have both found great success on the big screen, while The Defenders is coming within the next two years on Netflix.
However, amongst the dozens of teams Marvel has put out over the decades, there are plenty that don't have the cinematic selling power of their comic book colleagues. In honour of the latest team to hit the big screen (again), here are four not-so-fantastic teams you won't see in cinemas any time soon.
Comics can be a bit ridiculous at times: with people being gifted extraordinary abilities by radioactive spiders and exploding gamma bombs, there is a large element of absurdity to these stories. Yet few heroes are quite as ridiculous as the GLA, undoubtedly Marvel's silliest ever time.
Founded via a newspaper ad placed by Mister Immortal, whose ability is to die constantly and get reborn, this team is notable as being the stupidest, silliest, most moronic bunch of heroes ever assembled. Fighting in the USA's Midwest, the GLA includes such cinema-toxic heroes as Big Bertha, a model who can gain 285 pounds in an instant (but, rather offensively, has to throw it up to slim down); Doorman, who can turn into a door into the room, and Flatman, who is frankly self-explanatory.
This group is usually brought out as a bit of comic relief during darker periods in the company's storylines, but enjoy a bit of cult-infamy for just how terrible they are. Though it is never going to happen, putting them on screen would make The Avengers look as serious as Schindler's List.
It's no secret that there is a bit of rivalry between Marvel and DC: the two biggest comic-book companies have been competing against each other for years, and their race to the top has moved off the pages and onto the screen. But before they threatened to bury us all under an avalanche of reboots and CGI explosions, they had to fight it out on the page.
Enter the Squadron Sinister: the foursome, who originally appeared in 1969, is a group of supervillains who are basically DC rip offs. The team originally included Nighthawk, a former rich kid with no powers and an arsenal of weaponry; Doctor Spectrum, who creates objects out of light from a crystal on his finger; The Whizzer, who runs really fast; and finally Hyperion, a god-like alien that flies, shoots beams from his eyes, has a cape and was even a journalist in one reality - any guesses who he might be impersonating?
This team is very much on the nose, even by comic standards (I mean, The Whizzer? Seriously???), so much so the creators didn't bother denying it's Justice League inspirations.. Marvel could bring these guys out as a giant middle finger to DC, but if there was a time when they became that desperate, most likely no one would be paying attention anyway.
Marvel has done some risky things at the box office: most people doubted Guardians of the Galaxy would be a success before it came out, but its combination of an alien tree and a genetically modified raccoon captured the hearts of moviegoers everywhere. However, I think even Marvel wouldn't find much luck if they betted on this lot for their next big franchise.
Essentially the comic book version of Universal's classic monsters, this recurring team brings together a group of archetypal fantasy monsters whose only point of difference is that they are in a world alongside Thor and Iron Man. Original members included Morbius the Vampire, Werewolf by Night, Living Mummy, and, for the hell of it, Frankenstein's Monster, because I'm sure a comic book is just what Mary Shelley had in mind. A few Marvel creations are scattered in there, including Man-Thing, a man-turned-plant monster, and Manphibian, a mysterious alien/pun that was taken waaaay too seriously.
While the Legion only existed for a short while, versions of the group have lingered throughout the universe. The name 'Howling Commandos', i.e. the group Captain America fought alongside in WW2, has been reused to keep this alien/monster/whatever team around for modern audiences, and now includes the Abominable Snowman and someone literally called Zombie. Marvel may be trying to tackle different genres with their movies (space opera, spy thriller, heist flick), but a monster-movie with mostly rip-off characters probably won't bring in the big bucks at the box office.
No, you didn't misread that - Pet Avengers is a thing that actually happened and we should never let Marvel forget it. This team, as you can probably imagine, is made up of several of the powered animals from around the Marvel universe. Some of them make sense being on a team together, like Zabu the sabretooth lion and Lockheed the dragon, but any legitimacy those two might bring is lost in their colleagues. They must fight alongside Ms Lion, the faithful, powerless dog belonging to Spider-Man's ever-troubled Aunt May, and Throg, a human-turned-frog with the powers of Thor, which is a sentence no one should ever have had to have written.
The group only appeared 16 times in total, according to the Marvel Wikia, which was probably after the executives sobered up and realised they'd let a six year old pick their next comic book. Marvel did try and distance themselves from this group, saying it was set in an alternate universe, but that's still no excuse for wasting trees.
To be fair to Marvel, DC did a similar thing with the Legion of Super Pets, which saw a super powered cat, dog, monkey and horse fight alongside each other. However, that group first appeared in 1962: the Pet Avengers debuted in 2009, barely a year after Iron Man hit the big screens. Make of that what you will.
- nzherald.co.nz
Film distributor A24 used this to promote Celine Song's 'Materialists'.