With many thanks to Myro for pointing it out, this is most definitely a Thing I Like: Stan Lee is giving each NHL team a super hero!
It's an interesting idea, and though frankly Stan's later career has been a bit hit or miss, I admit to curiosity as to how this will turn out. Given their massive speed, manual dexterity, and seeming imperviousness to pain, NHL players are this close to being super heroes anyway, so this shouldn't be too much of a stretch! Here's the official site if you want to check into it further.
That’s just all kinds of awesome.
In fact… that kind of gives me an idea for a character contest. A superhero that represents a professional sports franchise.
Also, “hit or miss?” Bite your tongue. You can make that claim about other classic writers who have been lost with the times (I’m talking about you, Chris Claremont), but this is Stan freaking Lee. His career has transcended writing. He’s the guardian of all things superhero.
Okay, despite my allegiance to the Minnesota Wild (I’m not from Minnesota, but they are the affiliate of my hometown team, the Houston Aeros of the AHL), my favorites so far would have to be the Sabre and the Hurricane.
Does anyone know who drew these?
Stan Lee is like Thomas Edison: So influential as an early inventor and so self-promoting in his successes that people tend to forget his many failures along the way. Remember Striperella? 7th Portal? Lightspeed? “Hit or miss” is a very appropriate phrase.
If we’re going to incorporate concepts, it’s be great to see something new. As a Pittsburgh man, I have to say “The Penguin” is just a black-and-gold Cyclops rip-off. The Steelers already have Steely McBeam, so he better do something better than a Colossus rip-off to get my support.
CPrime (3): Okay, you piqued my interest, so I went looking. If I read this article correctly, it looks like the NHL Guardians are drawn by Neal Adams.
http://www.hypergeek.ca/2011/01/first-four-characters-of-stan-lees-nhl-guardian-project-revealed.html
Kind of interested to see what he can pull off with the St Louis Blues… The Senator is going to, um, hard to pull off well, unless it’s a Roman senator like the logo.
The whole concept is pretty fantastic. I like how, in the character descriptions, there are hat tips to the cities they’re from–The Shark has technological powers, The Sabre has electrical powers (Buffalo is the birthplace of hydroelectric power), and so on.
Whit (6): Some of the character descriptions are interesting, others, not so much. I’m looking at you, Flame! He can sometimes even create a “fiery stampede?” As in a poor reference to the Calgary Stampede? That’s just…dear God…*facepalm*
Okay, I’ll cop to it. I live In Calgary, the Flames suck this year, and I’m considering following the Red Wings again. And for my money, the most badass-looking of the 21 already unveiled is the Sabre.
Interesting concept. If he’d chosen NFL or college football teams, he might have gotten a bigger response. Hockey has never been a big deal in the South where I live, even though the Carolinas and Atlanta now have their own teams. And that cuuute little skating Pittsburgh Penguin is just a trifle hard to take seriously as the logo on the chest of a badass superhero.
I tried to start a similar thing on the forums, but it didn’t take off. I created a character called Garnet Girl, whose colors were garnet and black like those of my alma mater, the University of South Carolina. I challenged other folks to make supers in their favorite team colors but nobody took me up on it. Funny. I guess I just don’t have the drawing power (or the budget) of Stan Lee. 🙂
TheNate (4): Ok, we’re not counting Striperella. Of course he had failures. Every great thinker does. He’s still Stan Lee.
Hey, Stripperella was great dumb fun. And if you watched it thinking it would be anything but dumb fun…that’s on you.
Be that as it may, X-stacy, it still wasn’t exactly a commercial hit. Quality and success are two different things from a marketing standpoint.