Saturday, March 13, 2010

Escalation Never Solves Anything

Satanna didn't think this whole "revenge on Power Girl" thing through very well, did she?

She's angry that Power Girl defeated Ultra-Humanite and carted him off to the authorities. So she hires Sivana to whip up some gizmos for her, and sets out to kill Power Girl.

OK, let's say she succeeds. She won't, but say she does. Either Terra didn't show up, or Satanna outmaneuvered her, or something. Power Girl is dead. What's that earned Satanna? Some dap from other villains? That and five bucks will get you a coffee.

Now she's going to have all the heroes breathing down her neck, out for revenge, and at least some of them will be willing to kill her right back. Certainly Terra seemed willing (or is an excellent bluffer), there's Magog to consider (I know it's painful to do so, but we don't have to consider him for long), Ray Palmer jumping on people's brains (not lethal, but unpleasant), Green Arrow killing people for JUSTICE!* and so on. What's she going to do about them? Claim Jean Loring paid her to do it?

This is the thing about evildoers, they never think. If they beat up the hero, maybe make them look bad, sure, the hero is still alive and after them, but said hero is only annoyed. That's less hazardous to a villain's health than a hero out for blood. This is why, if I were a villain**, I'd stick to using my powers for robbing banks, and jewelry stores and stuff. The heroes would probably be pretty nice, since I'm not endangering the lives of civilians or their loved ones. Yes, they're still going to punch me and throw me in jail, but it'll be a relatively gentle punching.

* Misspelled "justice'" there for a second. Considered leaving it, making joke Ollie was committed to a concept he can't even spell, which might explain why he was going about things in such a stupid manner. Decided it was funny enough to mention in a footnote, not funny enough for the main post.

** I'd probably start as a hero, but wind up saving Marvel Universe*** style citizenry, who would berate me for not also saving their car/hat/fruit cart, at which point I'd turn to evil. I'd rob banks, and make sure to smash fruit carts as I escaped (while being careful not to harm the fruit cart vendor, naturally).

** I know the solicits say that in the Heroic Age, the majority of the citizens will finally appreciate the heroes, but I'll believe that when I see it.

2 comments:

SallyP said...

You raise a very valid point. This is one of the reasons that I like the Flash Rogues so much. They KNOW that Wally or Barry will be on them if they do anything REALLY outrageous, and they police themselves to a certain extent. So they "just" rob banks, they don't kill anyone.

Criminals alas, ARE stupid. That's why they are criminals.

CalvinPitt said...

sallyp: You're right, the Rogues understand the score. There was the whole "killing Bart Allen" thing, but we'll chalk that up to lapse of judgment.

I wish more of Spider-Man's enemies went that route. Expect Spider-Man to show up, but don't go after him directly. That was a nice thing about Slott's Mysterio story, the guy was trying to make some bank and get gone before the webs-linger could catch him, and maybe drive Spidey a little nuts for fun.