Continuing my very analytical conception of a Black Manta mini series.
I think we already covered what we already know about Black Manta in
Dark Water, which could also mean it's more to Manta than meets the eye
and definitely more than what's been written.
His mini series should focus on blood soaked revenge against Xebel, his relationship with his son kaldur'ahm aka Aqualad (Devil Ray). Were forgetting Aquaman altogether
and since Manta and Mera is not a factor Black Manta needs a love interest.
So who's out there that would be compatible and useful to the scourge of the 7 seas?
Why did I pick these three?
In this book David Ray is still a villain / anti hero
so we'll still see villain. He'll try to sugar coat and justify some of it
when Kaldur is around, and balance it out when he does heroic things (anti hero)
but with a fatal unforgiving style that only this idealist vigilante can bring.
Remembering Manta is an unforgiving, scheming, me first killer
we have to know that's how he'll deal with his women.
Clea: angry, vengeful and wrapped to tight
for some wrong done to her by a man.
Maybe she just dislikes the fact that men
rule the world and wants to hurt every
man she comes in contact with.
Manta will crush her physically, financially,
sexually, mentally and emotionally
take everything she ever had and have.
Leave her broken on all levels.
Then build her back up giving her the power she needs and forever denying her the power she had. Making sure she can't even exist without him PERIOD!
Fatality: mercilessly manipulate her back into an unrepentant killing machine. Taking the honor and pride of a warrior from her, turning her into his own personal attack dog. Give her the true love from a man that she needs and the true love of a family that was taken away from her. Manta and Kaldur becomes her family. Giving Manta the love, loyalty and companionship of a woman he needs and another tool to turn Aqualad into his killing murdering prodigy.
Giganta: Manta takes full advantage of their secret unknown relationship. Feed her desires and natural tendency for violence to the point of overflow. Champion and protect her in battle, in the bed, in life outside of crime, until every hope and thought of rehabilitation is gone. Put a grip on her so hard that every thought she has is his. Every action, every dream belongs to Black Manta. Her devotion and obedience is so geared that she would kill every padawan on coruscant if Manta told her to.
No padawans were hurt during the making of this post.
Killing padawans is not my Black Manta's style, At All!
D.Ray love the kids, old people and innocents. But if he told her to she'd do it.
I'm not big on rendering other heroes' villainesses subordinate to Black Manta... especially ones that would kick his ass. Better to create a Black Mera to go with Manta.
ReplyDeleteI'm disappointed at your lack of vision Frankie, Fighting and winning is so much more than strength. Everybody knows brains beats brawn. Black Mera....Frank, your colors are showing. Get it together.
Deleteall i can say is that is one helluva splash page! i also love the name Fatality. she was part of that major throw down between the JLA and Luther's Legion of Doom in Justice League of America #15 (2008) which i just found last week for just a measly quarter.
ReplyDeleteThanks. And yeah, she was there. I enjoyed that little run for the most part, even though it had some major gaps and inconsistencies.
DeleteDale said to make Manta an anti hero would make him soft and boring like it did Venom, Magneto, Sandman ect.Do you think I kept him as the villain you love to hate?
mmmmmm i dunno the juries out on that one for me. from what little i know of him in from the comic book he seems to be quite obsessed and also doesn't appear to have many redeeming qualities as a person. as for the Young Justice version i would have to see how the story unfolds. it'll be interesting to see how he reacts to the eventual revelation that his son is a double agent. i'm kinda envisioning some kind of scenario like at the end of Return of the Jedi with Vader, Luke and The Emperor.
DeleteThis is good conversation. A hung jury is why the Black Manta should go more into the direction of this post. Because Geoff and most past writers hasn't written him as person, a character with substance.
DeleteIs he some hacked twist of Ahab, with a dash of sociopath? "I only die for Aquaman" what kind of dumb shit is that? Whatever the case, the ideas come from a sewer of unbelievable none since with no understanding of the character their trying to write.
Young Justice on the other hand is the polar opposite (so far). A strong super villain. laid back with a since of purpose and plan. A skilled tactician prone to explosive anger. Something that a viewer/reader can identify with, can relate to in way of connecting the dots.
The only thing that's left for YJ to do is show us that Black Manta kicks ass. His popularity on the show is going to depend on it. He's going to have to do more than beat Kahina.
Shlomo, I do like the Darth Vader outlook you have. I just hope it doesn't kill him. But makes the force STRONNNG in him.
you saw YJ from this weekend right? what did you think?
DeleteAnother good one. Tigress is staying one step ahead of danger. I'm a little tired of Lagon, what about you?
Deletenaw i'm cool with him. i like it when he says "Neptune's beard".
DeleteSorry I jumped on this one late. Kinda' agree w/ Frank on having these usually very strong women into Manta's subordinates. I get what you were trying to go for here, but by dominating and domineering these women, it doesn't make Manta more sympathetic here, but rather worse even.
ReplyDeleteAgain Frank had a good point that rather than using these women, although Giganta does seem like the better option out of all the other women(Clea seems to unstable in the long-run, and Fatality's got the hots for John Stewart) Manta needs a created-just-for-him female companion. Much like how Namor had his Lady Dorma, Manta needs a female version of himself as well.
Now the Vader comparison does seem to fit the YJ version of Manta and son. Maybe not here yet, but only because not as much build-up story-wise towards the relationship between Manta and Aqualad has occurred.
Of course all of this is just my opinion; doesn't make me any more right than the next person, but a good discussion is always nice. Now to me, if you were going to make him go the anti-hero route, I'd focus on maybe his own code of honor. The YJ Manta is definitely the best candidate for maybe rehabilitation as a somewhat good guy/anti-hero. That version seems to have a better concept and belief of honor, much like Dr. Doom has his won twisted sense of honor. By building on that, you could keep him bad, but make not as out and out evil, blurring the lines sort of.
But good post, good subject matter, and thoroughly enjoying the analysis and discussion on Manta. It's what helps separate you from other blogs, and from what the rest of us do. Well maybe not Shlomo, since I just make fart jokes and he's more on the same level of character dissection as you;)
Looking forward to what's coming up next as always.
Glad you finally came thru. The idea wasn't for a sympathy vote for David Ray. The idea is to give Black Manta some real goals, issues, missions. Some real story. Your right Dale, Black Manta shouldn't be written as evil. He's very specific, they crossed him, killed, stole, lied and tried him. Now he'll give em what they were asking for; the full fury of Black Manta.
DeleteManta doesn't have any problem doing what's right, it's just his fatal version of it. Geoff just missed it. I read wonder woman 179-183 among other Clea material. Clea is the worst type of terrorist scum you can find. Torture, biological warefare, horrific magical atrocities and any thing else you can think of, all to innocent people. And someone feels sorry for her cause she's a woman.....please. And are you under the same impression that an Omega level power makes you a winner? Lex Luthor might be my next post, to show the reading public how it's done with no powers.
I do agree that Manta needs his own book, complete with his own supporting characters and antagonist. But to think these ladies are exclusively Wonder Woman's villains is funny on so many levels. Clea is not to be thought of as a wife or girl friend, she's a tool. Just something to do. Fatality could give a shit about John Stewart. Her mind was under the influence of the Star Sapphire. Stewart is a plaything, she is out of his league literally. Fatality is the epitome of a strong, independent, smart woman; with Hella drive. She plays no games. Fatality is what you want. A poot butt sidekick like John Stewart would be ridiculous to mate her up with. Giganta is my girl, always will be. Strait forward, no nonsense thick and sexy. What else is it to say?
I can see Manta having his own female companion like Dorma. Hell, Namor needs Dorma back in his life, he's been slipping. I don't want to see Black manta with the wasp stuck to his side though. A love interest doesn't have to be Sue Richards. They can go do their own thing even though their together. Marvel didn't have to split T'Challa and Storm for her to lead a team of X-Men. the whole thing was foul if you ask the Agent.
About the whole Storm/Black Panther thing, I hear ya on that one. Why they were brought together only to be split apart over some really flimsy reasoning must be beyond frustrating to their fans, and further shows as an example of why a good number of today's writers don't really think a lot of these story lines/plots through before changing things up again.
ReplyDeleteIt's that type of ADD writing that makes things harder on fans in the long run.
Other than that, again solid work here on your Black Manta project.
If Luthor's next, I'm very interested in what direction you take that one.
What ever I do next I know that I'll have a little help from my friends. Thanks for being you. One1
DeleteAhhh, you're too kind sir, too kind indeed;)
ReplyDeleteAnd you know this........man!!!!!!:)