Ridiculously powerful superpowers

there's a growing trend of "adaptive" superheroes, at least in the X-Men titles. Darwin seems to have worked out, but Lifeguard quietly faded into obscurity... there'll probably eventually be some throwaway line that she lost her powers in M-Day.

I love Layla Miller, her power is she "knows stuff", but doesn't have anything beyond that. she is annoyingly powerful to the people interacting with her, knowing exactly what they're about to do and possibly even orchestrating it, but she's also just a 12-year-old kid.

 

Amazo's ability to duplicate the power of any superhero.

 

for a short time, Rogue could call up any of the powers she'd absorbed over the years.

now, THAT is overpowered.

 

Actually Bobby Drake has been listed as an omega-level mutant.

 

Anyone remember The Quiz, a member of the Brotherhood of Dada from the Doom Patrol? She had every superpower you haven't thought of yet.

 

More basic: Superman

He's been shown crushing and moving planets, then having problems with city-sized tasks.

Must be a control issue....

 

Mogo!

He is a planet with a lantern ring! Holy Christ! It's the death star all over again!

 

If I understand correctly, Superman's planet-sized powers were removed in the original Crisis back in 1985, now he's much less enpowered. Which is why Superboy-Prime was such a threat in Infinite Crisis; he had planet-cracking Silver Age powers.

 

While its true that after Crisis DC wisely choose to lower the insane power levels of its top tier heroes, over the years those levels have increased as writers love just love the dramatic of larger and larger scale feats (something I hate Marvel for doing as it had always had abilities far, far, far more grouding for its characters). And we see Supes who can't move a planet by himself, but add Wonder Women and Martian Manhunter and they can.

 

Why is Storm an Omega-level mutant? Admittedly, it's been a long time since I've read any comics, but her powers don't seem to be eternal or transcendent i the same way that Phoenix, etc. are, or even Iceman. She can control the weather, but she's still limited by her own body, mortal existence, etc.

 

^So are Vulcan and Franklin Richards. The root of Storm's ability to change and control the weather has not been fully explored.

 

I would put Magneto on the Omega list, when he's written properly.

An oft overlooked mutant with near-Omega raw power is Firestar. In the "Starlost" arc of New Warriors, it was said that if she EVER cut loose full strength in a planet's atmosphere she would plasma-burn the entire planet surface to ash.

 

So would Johnny Storm.

 

Earth! Air! Fire! Water! Heart!

Go Planet!

 

I believe so, but Storm's power has been wildly overwritten across the years. At one point, Chris Claremont even had her in outer space, controlling the "Solar wind"--because, I guess, you know, it's wind.

When Marvel published the issue again for its X-Men Classics reprint title, it wisely chose to change that.

 

Jubilee has been becoming alot more powerfull, thier saying she can kill anyone/everyone in a mile radius by litterally makeing fireworks go off in thier brains

 

I've never bought into the idea that, say, Silver Age Superman is "too powerful" to tell interesting stories about. All that tells me is that the writer doesn't have the imagination for it, or the desire to write those kinds of stories. Alan Moore's Supreme series alone is evidence that interesting modern stories can be told about almost infinitely-powered characters. I think what those kind of stories really need in order to work for modern audiences, is for the writer to fully buy into the concept first and foremost.

The other problem faced by writers of these types of characters, is the shared universe. Here is where many of the audience complaints come in--from trying to fit so many disparate characters together. I think DC suffers the most from this, as their characters in general were designed to be a universe unto themselves in the beginning. <RANT> Just because Marvel does it one way DOESN'T MEAN THAT DC HAS TO DO IT THE SAME WAY. <RANT OVER>.

The sky should be the limit for these types of characters--why try to impose the mundane on creatures of wonder?

 

When you're writing a character like Superman, it's actually the people around him that you have to concentrate on making interesting. If you rush into a burning building to save someone, you're a hero; Superman? Can't be hurt. Flying into a burning building doesn't really put him at any risk.

What Superman's vulnerability really is doesn't come in the shape of Kryptonite, but of failure. The risk for him isn't that he'll be hurt, but that he'll fail--to save the kitten, the planet, whatever. Some of the best, most effective and dramatic Superman stories are the ones where he didn't succeed (such as saving the young son of a friend from the Toyman, of all villains).

That's why Superman has such an extensive supporting cast--Lois, Jimmy, Perry White, etc. etc.--because it's the risks that events place those characters in that make Superman into a hero.