General Marvel Legends

TheGillMan said:
Soooo...how 'bout that Gene Colan Dracula, eh? The stats on that guy! He's suffered a bit of a slump since his heyday, but I'd put him up against any of these younger, rookie vampires any day! He's the GOAT, for sure, with his wicked claws and pencil-'stache!


(did I do that right?)
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This is the debate we need for today: Dracula: facial hair or no facial hair? The ladies love a good pencil-stache, right?
 
Ru1977 said:
I always appreciate characters who wear masks that can't possibly hide their identity. The best being Batmanuel

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I need an action figure of Batmanuel.
 
docsilence said:
This is the debate we need for today: Dracula: facial hair or no facial hair? The ladies love a good pencil-stache, right?
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Well, for Colan Dracula, he absolutely MUST have his pencil 'stache. If they wanna throw in extra heads with Vlad the Impaler style-'stache, as well as his 80s goatee, I won't complain, but he must AT LEAST have his pencil thin facial hair in closed and fangs-out open mouthed varieties!
 
MagnusPrimal said:
I have to admit, I don’t understand this. One Chinese person is evil, so they all are? I feel the same way about this that I do with RTD changing Davros in Doctor Who, thinking that Davros being in something that looked like a wheelchair meant that people in wheelchairs were evil.
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If your story only has a one or two people of a certain race, and each of them is an offensive caricature, that pretty much does say, "they all are". I'm not saying the Mandarin is like that in a modern context, but during the silver age of American comics, how many ethnically Chinese heroes, or even civilians were there, compared to all the red scare, yellow peril, Fu Manchu type villains?

Anyway, I think the outlandish comic-booky and clearly not oriental design of his green costume with the pink mask & cape undermines the stereotypes and makes him just look like any other goofy silver age villain. And it would give him more articulation than big robes would.

Also, those new claw hands are really ugly. I wish they would paint the nails, as it looks like his fingers just sharpen to fleshy points, like Lady Deathstrike from X-Men TAS.
 
docsilence said:
This is the debate we need for today: Dracula: facial hair or no facial hair? The ladies love a good pencil-stache, right?
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The correct answer is “Bram Stoker says YES” and also “the era in which this particular nobleman was alive also says YES”. This is also why nuOrlok has a mustache in nuNosferatu.
And while Vlad the Impaler is not actually a a *direct* inspiration for the fictional character (Stoker did a last-minute rewrite to drop some of those references in: Drac was originally named “Count Wampyre” and the book was originally titled “The Un-Dead”) and also had a meticulously-curled mustache that kinda sat horizontally on his face, the correct mustache for Dracula is a big giant one that hangs down, at least when he’s an “old man” in Transylvania. When he travels to London and de-ages himself, he also changes facial hair to a pointed goatee/beard.

But Colan Dracula MUST have the pencil-stache, which was inspired by John Carradine’s (and Lon Chaney Jr’s, I suppose) portrayal of the Count in the Universal films of the 40s, and also a way to slip the mustache in without upsetting the general “make him look like Lugosi/Lee” imperative of the time.

Also; Colan based Dracula’s face off of Jack Palance BEFORE Palance played Dracula.
 
I don't see this as racist. I realize it may be a bit naked for some people, but I don't mind it.

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A ML version of this 4" figure would also be rather neat.

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Or Acts of Vengeance
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Or animated
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Any of these in ML would be great. I think a robed version (like the Face-Off 2pk from Toy Biz) is the least appealing, since his robe would just hinder articulation too much.
 
It definitely feels more like a case of baggage at this point. Unquestionably, Mandarin was a racist caricature initially in a very much "it was the style at the time" kind of thing. He probably doesn't necessarily convey that in a modern setting, though he still has that name which basically underlines what they were going for initially. Marvel is obviously sensitive to these things, but it sure seems like he could be done in a more classic sense without that impression. Even if you have to put a different name on the box in a Nemesis/Holocaust thing.
 
TheCaptain said:
If your story only has a one or two people of a certain race, and each of them is an offensive caricature, that pretty much does say, "they all are". I'm not saying the Mandarin is like that in a modern context, but during the silver age of American comics, how many ethnically Chinese heroes, or even civilians were there, compared to all the red scare, yellow peril, Fu Manchu type villains?

Anyway, I think the outlandish comic-booky and clearly not oriental design of his green costume with the pink mask & cape undermines the stereotypes and makes him just look like any other goofy silver age villain. And it would give him more articulation than big robes would.

Also, those new claw hands are really ugly. I wish they would paint the nails, as it looks like his fingers just sharpen to fleshy points, like Lady Deathstrike from X-Men TAS.
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I don’t know. I guess that’s a valid argument, but just speaking for myself, I don’t think I’ve ever thought that just because one example of a group acted a certain way, that every member of that group acted the same.
And the goofiness was part of my point with that costume. Surely that version can be released and not seen as racist? Although there do seem to be other options available as well.
 
AceofKnaves said:
I don’t even think the name is racist, though I am open to correction.
It would be like a western villain calling themselves “the Scholarly Bureaucrat”.
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Do we know his actual name? Or is there an alias he uses a lot? I wonder what they could call him, if they didn’t want to use “Mandarin?”
Also, I personally would like Dracula to be based on Colan’s art/Jack Palance. If they deviated too much from that, I’m not sure I would buy it.
 
MagnusPrimal said:
but just speaking for myself, I don’t think I’ve ever thought that just because one example of a group acted a certain way, that every member of that group acted the same.
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I don't think this is inherently wrong or ignorant or anything, but I do get why someone from that group may feel that way, especially if they're anxious for representation in mainstream media. I remember when Silence of the Lambs came out, there was an uproar about James Gumb representing that group etc. I know if I watch a movie where there is only one Irish person and they're portrayed as a psycho, I might have feelings about that. Except for Stephen on Braveheart. But goofy and hurtful stereotypes, oh yeah, definitely gonna piss me off even while understanding they may not mean everyone from that group is that way.
 
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