What do you get when you cross a boxer, a convict, and a man endowed with powers by the Norse god of mishief? Carl “Crusher” Creel. That’s what.

While no one can ever accuse the Absorbing Man of being one of the top dog villains in any Universe, (With the exception of an attempt at a story arc by Bruce Jones, he’s usually a done in one type villain.) (Actually, that’s not fair. I liked what Jones did with the Hulk..mostly. I didn’t even have a problem with the “evolved” absorbing power of Creel.) I have always liked him and found his power visually interesting. He always puts up a good fight against Thor, the Hulk, and in one instance Quasar, and he’s apparently impossible to kill.

Crusher Creel was a washed up boxer with no future when Loki approached him and gave him a magical , unbeknownst to Creel, but knownst to us gave him the power to absorb the properties of anything he touches. And by anything I mean ANYTHING.

I was first introduced to the Absorbing Man in the pages of the Incredible Hulk, and though his origins are that of a Thor villain, he’ll always be in the Hulk’s rogues gallery to me. In the story, he was beaten by touching the Hulk and absorbing all his strength, however, when he calmed down, he became as weak as Banner and the Hulk readily defeated him.

One of the reasons I’ve always like The Absorbing Man was because of a story I read with him early in my comic collecting years. He was pulling himself out of a river having willed himself back together after a battle with The Hulk. Later on in life, Alex Ross was working on Universe X, and one of the subplots of the story was that some Absorbing Man worshipers were finding pieces of him that had been scattered to put him back together and bring him back…basically from the dead. That’s a pretty formidable foe. No matter what you do to him…he can come back.

With his power, The Aborbing Man can put up a fight with practically any super hero. If nothing worthwhile is around, he’ll start by absorbing the metal from his ball and chain.  From there, he may absorb water, brick, other metals, and even energy.   In one particular battle with the Hulk, Creel absorbed the power of an electrical station and the Hulk used water to short him out and defeat him.  (I mention that to make my point about Creel absorbing energy.)

In one interesting absorbtion, Creel found himself facing off with Quasar.   This was in an earlier issue of the series from the late eighties/early nineties.In fact, this is the first appearance of the Absorbing Man after his fight with Hulk in which he aborbed the electricity. In this fight, he absorbed the properties of Quasar’s power bracelets. In a throwback to the first issue, Creel couldn’t contain the power and it “detroyed” him. He’d return later.

From the cover, hopefully you can see one of my other favorite things about The Absorbing Man. He’s visually interesting. The Absorbing Man is one of those characters that can be given a different look depending on his environment or what he has absorbed. It makes for some very neat looks to the character and he turns out being quite visually interesting.

I’d love to see a story (and this may have happened) where Creel absorbs the properties of Captain America’s shield.  He’d be indestructable, and he’d probably look pretty cool too.  (Get on that Marvel.)

Whether it’s steal, rock, water, sand, electricity, or Quasars power bands, The Absorbing Man has the potential of a different look everytime he’s on the page.   It makes for a great challenge to the artist, and also a great freedom.

While I know that The Absorbing Man may not be the most complex or interesting villain in comics, the truth is he provides good times and good fights.   I think it would be possible to see him join the Thunderbolts at some point, because we know from his relationship with Titania that he has some kind of heart underneath that absorbing exterior.

I suppose that’s where I differ, though, from a lot of comics readers.  Depth of character, as it pertains to a villain, isn’t a prerequisite for me to invest in a villain.  I like a villain that can give our hero a good fight, whether it’s over a thwarted bank robbery, a matter of vengeance, or an attempt to take over the world.

I have always enjoyed a good Absorbing Man story and always will.  That’s what puts him in my top ten.

Greatest Muppet video ever?  You be the judge:

Not me.  That’s for Sure.

Back in the mid-eighties it seemed that whatever animations companies threw against the wall stuck. It didn’t matter what these guys did, kids seemed to eat it up. Of course, from a business standpoint at the time it was all to promote toy lines.

The most popular properties among kids (after Star Wars) were GI Joe, Transformers, He-Man, and Thundercats. I really think that’s true and I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the order of popularity by sells and ratings.

In an effort to capitalize on the success of those most popular properties and products, other lines were launched that were in someway comparable. The answer to Transformers? Go Bots. The answer to GI Joe? Maybe M.A.S.K. The answer to He-Man? I’m not really sure there was a proper answer to He-Man unless it was the Thundercats, but they became so successful that they demanded an answer to their success. Enter The Silverhawks.

The Silverhawks had a lot of similarities to the Tundercats. Instead of organic cat/human amalgams, the Silverhawks seemed to be bionic in nature.

There was the tried and true team line up including a nearly perfect leader of the team, a female counterpart, a strong guy, a kid, and a rocker..uhm…country singer…uhm…he had a guitar.

The villains were the classic big scary guys that tended to screw up a lot with a super scary and vastly superior boss. In this case, the boss actually went through a transformation just like Mum-Ra in Thundercats. I guess that’s what makes them seem so similar.

The Silverhawks were like space police. They took assignments from a leader with a bionic arm and everything.

Of course, at the end of every episode was a lesson of some sort usually featuring the child of the team (who only talked in beeps and whistles) and the cowboy guitar playing guy. These would teach a moral or safety lesson a la GI Joe or He-Man or even a science lesson.

While the Silverhawks never rose to the popularity of He-Man or the Thundercats, they were there and as a kid I enjoyed them and thought they had a great theme song. I don’t know why I thought so then, but it seemed to rock out more to me than any other. Looking at it all through the eyes of an adult though? I’m not so sure…I still love it…just not sure it rocks as hard as I once thought it did.

I’m glad Silverhawks are getting the DVD treatment, now bring on some of those other lesser remembered titles – Turbo Teen, Pac Man, Orbots, and Go Bots.

Use the link below to check it out, and maybe even purchase it from Amazon and support the site.

With a history as confusing as the DC Universe, Brainiac is also one of the more interesting of all of Superman’s Rogues gallery. Brainiac was introduced in Action Comics #242. His plot at the time was to shrink cities on Earth to use on his home planet of Byak, which he ruled. It was in this story that we were first introduced to the bottled city of Kandor.

Later in the Silver age we would find that Brainiac was a creation of the Coluans. This is where things get tricky. There’s a whole Brainiac 2 thing, who long time readers of the Legion of Super Heroes will know is who Brainiac 5 claims to be descended from. It was from the story of Colu creating Brainiac that the accepted history of Brainiac being a super computer came.

From that point on in his history, Brainiac was just that a super computer. In the eighties Brainiac was given a more robot looking body with a metallic brainlike structure adorning the top of his head. It was also during this time that Brainiac’s Skull shaped spaceship was made popular. This form of Brainiac was made even more popular by his appearance in the Saturday Morning super hero spectactula SuperFriends: The Super Powers Show. In a story arc featuring the ever present Darkseid, Brainiac was even given an origin and a reason for his change in appearance from his time doing battle with the Superfriends in Challenge of the Superfriends.

While we all waited with bated breath to see if Y2K would really be the end of the world, DC comics launched a story arc that saw Brainiac 13, a version of Brainiac from the future, travel to the year 2oo in Metropolis and overtake it’s technology replacing it with his own futuristic tech. In the end, Lex Luthor actually saved the day by offering up his daughter in return for the secrets to Brainiac’s tech. Brainiac would return later to cause the Man of Steel trouble yet again. (Honestly though, I don’t think I read that arc. Maybe my good friend Mike Bailey will help clear things up where there are holes in my knowledge.

Brainiac made another appearance recently in the Superman/Batman title, and as that title doesn’t quite take place in the proper continuity of the DC Universe, (Whatever that may be this week.) it’s hard to really tell if that particular story is a proper take on Brainiac.

With such a long and, quite honestly, twisted history, if you had asked me three years ago, Brainiac wouldn’t have been in my list of favorite super villains. Further, if you had asked me six months ago, Brainiac would have only made the honorable mentions list. What happened? How did the crazy emperor of byak/coluan computer/city shrinker/futuristic computer that wants a child come to be on my top ten list?

Two things…or rather two people.

The first person, and the reason Brainiac would have made his way into my honorable mentions 2 or 3 years ago, is James Marsters. Marsters joined the cast of Smallville as a sometimes guest star in Season 5 of the show. He played a shape shifting, humanoid Kryptonian computer known as the Brain InterActive Construct, Brainiac. Marsters brought a certain air to the character that I don’t know that I ever read in any of the comic stories I’d ever seen with Brainiac, and I had certainly never seen the character portrayed that way in any animated version of him I’ve watched over the years.

Masquerading as Professor Milton Fine, Brainiac arrived on Earth in a second meteor shower and sought to release General Zod from the Phantom Zone. During that time, he ran into Clark, befriended him, betrayed him, and was thought defeated by him. That is until he made his return in subsequent seasons. Now, his presence is felt through a connection he made with Chloe, and I am really psyched to see where the take the character in the future.

The second person that brought Brainiac into my favorite super villains and is directly responsible for Brainiac actually making the top ten is Geoff Johns. In the most recent story arc of Action Comics, Johns reintroduced Brainiac as a city bottling, Coluan twelth level intellect. Taking all of the best parts of Brainiac from his long history (including his role in the destruction fo Krypton) and giving us one big, scary baddie for Superman to face. By scary, I mean SCARY. In the story arc, it takes everything Superman’s got to take on Brainiac and defeat him. He basically hangs in a catatonic state absorbing information and controlling his drones until Superman comes face to face with him. Then this drooling, seemingly lifeless mass of Coluan comes alive and kicks all kinds of butt. So he presents Superman with a physical and mental challege. (Kind of like that old show Double Dare only messier and more dangerous.)

I’m looking forward to this villains return in the future whether on Smallville or in the comics. The great characterization of Brainiac in the Justice League and Justice League Unlimited cartoons isn’t lost on me either. However, even on that slice of animated awesomeness, he nowhere near approaches the coolness brought to him by Marsters, and the awesomeness bestowed upon him by Johns.

A challenge for Superman on all fronts. A threat to the Earth and the Universe at large. Brainiac is definitely worthy to be in anyone’s top ten.

On the latest episode of Geek Out Loud, we take a look back at the greatest Summer geeks have ever had. From comic crossovers to the blockbusters that took our money at the box office, it’s all discussed and remembered fondly. All that, plus listener e-mails and a real life super hero.

Head over to www.geekoutpodcast.com to listen, subscribe and comment on the latest episode.

Check out the links mentioned in the show and tell them you heard about it on Geek Out Loud.

Major Spoilers, a great comic blog and podcast – Major Spoilers.

Views From the Longbox is Michael Baileys great podcast that covers a variety of things. Head to Views From the Longbox to hear great geek discussion. I’ll be on there in the next few weeks.

For great talk about all things Clone Wars, check out Michael Cohen’s “Frontlines: A Clone Wars Podcast.” You can find it at www.clonewarspodcast.com.