@@adamfrey4920 Many atheists would argue (quite rightly) that the thing in the Bible (especially the Old Testament) is a monster, not something be worshipped. And given the Spectre's actions taken in its name and with its tacit approval, they'd be correct.
I would love to have seen a story where Dolores’ daughter became a hero in her own right, but instead of stealing a body, she got a robot body of her own, denouncing her mother and Ultra-Humanite’s body-stealing legacy.
So she would be a spirit possessing a mechanical body? That would be really interesting particularly if one leans into the otherworldly nature of her vessel being just as much spiritual as it is mechanical. A vessel made with interdimensional construction, you don't see that too often.
I love how someone REALLY wanted to revisit the story of a not very prominent character, to was screwed over by a villain who isn't even associated with the hero anymore. That's dedication.
Endless Winter reminds me of the Victim Syndicate, normal civilians who got so screwed over by villains they became villains. The problem is she's so evil here that she doesn't come off as tragic or damaged. Hell, she's proud of killing her daughter. Where do you go from that?
@@phantom_blade555 They're Batman villains who came out at the start of ReBirth. Each were regular people who were utterly ruined by Gotham's villains. Great story.
Its interesting how the Ultra-Humanite predated the brain- swap sub-genre of the 1940s. In 1940, there was "Black Friday" with Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi, about a gangster's brain being transplanted into a meek bookworm. In 1941, "The Monster & the Girl" featured a murder victim having his brain transferred into a Gorilla to take revenge. In 1942 was "the Ghost of Frankenstein" where Igor ( Bela Lugosi) has his brain transferred into the Frankenstein Monster, (Lon Chaney.) "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" in 1948 was about Dracula (Lugosi) wanting to transplant Lou's brain into the Monster. Ultra Humanite was there first. Good on him.
Goes much farther back than the 1940s. Frankenstein (1818) kind of loosely inspired the idea in the first place, and there's a number of bad and mostly-forgotten Victorian scifi stories that include brain swaps, with the idea recurring on and off ever since. Lot of it in the pulp mags of the 1920s and '30s, which is part of why you got all those films a bit later on.
Brain swapping is pretty gruesome. Kind of reminds me of Dr. Cyber, a Wonder Woman villain who kept trying to steal Diana's FACE. That's kind of creepy when you're a little kid at the time.
I remember how creepy Dr. Poison was in the 90s, when she was drawn with a permenant rictus grin like a female Joker, only laser focused on toxins of course (not deadly pranks).
I would of liked to have had Delores to encounter the Ultra-Humanite. To either get revenge on him for not only stealing her body, but also discarding it for a gorilla body, maybe involve a Superhero like Green Arrow or someone to stop both. Or we can go for a twistier choice and have her team up with Ultra instead, saying that she being with him makes her feel more complete, because he was in her body, he would know what made her tick, or at least that's what she'll think.
When did they officially stop doing the "Batman is an urban legend" thing? Not only because it feels goofy for people to not believe the JLA member with no actual powers is real, but Batman has sidekicks? Archenemies? Just every day Gotham citizens have to feel gaslit as Hell.
Her tracking down her abandoned baby as an adult and taking her body was so unexpectedly dark. I kinda loved it and would be interested to see her make a return
The ice villain default thing got me thinking of Ultra leveraging his body-swapping techniques over Mr. Freeze, both for himself and Nora. That had me wondering what kind of deals Ultra could make with other villains that dislike their bodies, particularly those metas who are deformed as part of their origin. Easy to imagine Ultra giving them the attractive normal body of their choice in exchange for their super-powered body.
I feel like All For One is similar only his power deals with taking quirks who were being discriminated by non-quirk user and giving quirks to those who were feeling powerless against those with criminal with powers. I mean that how he rose to prominence in MY HERO ACADEMIA.
To quote someone else, "That's a hell of a mystery no one thought was a mystery and didn't even really need solving, but damn if it didn't just get solved so nice work." Oh hey, it's Argus. I know him from when I read through the Mark Waid Flash run. I like his design, it's 90s as hell but not in a bad way, and most importantly, it's very purple.
I, too, found Dr. Midnight’s assessment of Dolores/Delores Winters’ career at 06:20- “a merely moderately famous Hollywood starlet”- rather harsh. In the “Stargirl” (TV show) version of her backstory, Delores even won an Oscar! (Though the implication that Ms. Winters needed a literal brain transplant to give an award-worthy performance doesn’t say much for her acting skills, pre-body swap.)
The question of what happened to Delores' brain isn't one I had but it's nice to have an answer. With that said if there's anything that'll make me squirm it's skin stealing and skinsuits. It just doesn't sit right with me but I guess it's kinda interesting that a skin transplant can lead to powers, you'd think there would be some sort of ice generating organ. As for Delores' villainous turn I can totally see how what she went through would cause one to snap but stealing your own child's body is cold.
"...you'd think there would be some sort of ice generating organ." Your skin is an organ. Largest one in (or on) your body, and very complex. With ice powers it would have to interact with them somehow anyway or you'd be giving yourself frostbite from your own powers all the time. She says she can't control them as well as she'd like followed by freezing the tissues of her own arm solid enough to shatter the brittle flesh and bone. That suggests that while the skin might generate the effect, the original owner Ice Maiden had further biological adaptations that prevented subcutaneous freezing from happening - in other words, her powers were more than skin deep, unlike Endless Winter's pirated version.
The only thing superhero comic writers love more than resurrecting under preposterous circumstances characters they've brutally killed off is torturing/mutilating them. And the cherry on top for poor Icemaiden is that while someone's ripping their fellow metas apart, the JLA/JSA are like, "Meh, let third-generation Dr. Midnite look into it, he's a detective like Batman, right?"
I confess, it never occurred to me for a moment to think that the brain of Dolores (or Delores) Winter might have survived the hijacking of her body, but I find I do like the idea.
@@nicknevco215 Arguably worse, since the victims in *_Get Out_* were at least still trapped inside, and had some small hope of regaining their own bodies, while a victim of the Ultra-Humanite had none at all.
It was mentioned that that Dolores still had both arms in Cry Justice, but remember, She dealt in the organ and limb trade, so whos to say that she didn't just get a new arm at sometime. To get back to the Ultra Humanite; I would love a review of the Elsworld story JSA The Golden Age.
I actually don't think she ever really lost that arm. I think she was acting when she said she couldn't control the powers, and that was just an ice statue arm. That's my headcanon anyway lol
The psychology of the body swap is an interesting one, even if the story didn't do much with her. Another one that could have been touched upon before modern incarnations would be Giganta, who one version had Doris swap minds with a circus strong woman who had the growing powers apparently.
14:10 Much as I really hate to suggest anything about Cry For Justice wasn't phenomenally stupid, her having both arms doesn't seem like a stretch. She's already wearing someone else's skin at that point, has body-hopped and taken other organs as well. Getting a new forearm grafted on is just a matter of finding a good fit - which, knowing her, probably took several tries and resulted in a number of involuntary southpaws wandering around. You could probably explain away her not being permanently dead if you really wanted to bring her back. She was getting weird power interactions from Ice Maiden's skin already, maybe she also harvested parts from someone with serious regeneration abilities that could resurrect her after her apparent death, maybe in conjunction with some kind of reflexive cryogenic self-freeze preserving her vital organs until the rest of the damage was patched up.
I actually liked the idea of Endless Winter and her motives behind it all. Her possible hatred for Ultra would've been great to see. As to my seasonal hero/villain how about Summer Love? A hippie woman who uses her powers to create psychedelic hallucinations?
I think she has potential, maybe tweak the story so she’s trying to get revenge against the Ultra-Humanite and will do whatever it takes to get it, a sort of body hopping Andrea Beaumont, that could be interesting
It seems like Endless Winter was a writers attempt at a deep cut stab at creating a new villain. During this time period, there were plenty of digs in Bro Comics Golden Age for new material. Starman was particularly well known for this.
That reminds me of a thing that never happened in a movie called Face/off by john woo. Where nobody woke up with Travolta's face, and the only person close to that was awake for the procedure, having woken with no face.
I remember reading this story simply because it acknowledged the existence of Ice Maiden. With that era of the Justice League, references like that are few and far between.
I remember being really pissed off with all the mutilations to other superheroes, especially Icemaiden since I enjoyed all of the Global Guardians characters a lot, going back to the days of the Superfriends comic when they were just the "international heroes" and had not yet formed into a group. These heroes were so significant that they (and Dr. Mist who went on to lead the Global Guardians, though he had been sort of an antagonist to the Superfriends in an unrelated story) were the ONLY things from the Superfriends comic that really became canon. Things like Sinestro reforming and becoming a good guy happened in the Superfriends comic but was never referenced in main continuity. I think the character of "Kitten" is one of the few other things that have escaped the Superfriends comic to have a life beyond the comic, if only as a character on the Teen Titans Go show.
TY for this Background story Sasha, voices great, lol, I think the transfer as depicted in All Star Squadron is “Cannon” to me, JSA Classified is just a “Elseworlds” story. Lol, BTW The Daily Star was cannon through COIE and the original destruction of E2.
Geoff Johns-era DC is oft-criticized for being so retro and so grimdark at the same time, but this shows that this approach does fit Golden Age revivalism, because yeah, Golden Age superhero comics got pretty messed up.
I quite like the idea of Dolores Winters here tho I don't particularly like the "ah i just decided to have an organ business, considering I'm already doing it" thing. It's pretty interesting to have a villain going after heroes bc they want their bodies in order to live forever/take revenge on the villain who did it to them in the first place. I really like when villains have beef with each other tho haha
Forget ghosts and aliens: the DCU is full of cyborgs living without massive parts of their bodies. Cyborg, Cyborg Superman, Robotman 1, Robotman 2, Metallo, The Brain, the cyborgs that worked for the terrorist organization Cerberus...
Forgotten storyline: that time Alpha Flight's Sasquatch died, and Snowbird gave him her body. He could still become a Sasquatch, but he was otherwise now a woman. Oddly, nobody talks about this one anymore.
I think about that story a lot, especially now that I recently finished the Immortal Hulk trade paperbacks. Langkowski pulls the same stunt wth Samson's body and is a green Sasquatch. And it was interesting that when in Narya's body, who was a natural shapeshifter, that she (Wanda Langkowski) could only transform into the white Sasquatch.
@@TitularHeroine if I remember right, his original body was possessed by one of the great beasts snowbird was to kill. When Walter was reanimated in her body, his spirit inhabitant it as it was. Still his becoming a female had a lot of potential, but marvel didn't seem to care about alpha flight at that point. Plus snowbird could only turn into animals native to the canadan teratory. With Walter it could be because of his sasquatch persona. Being that was what he was used to being.
I forgot which one, but there's a DC animated movie, or tv show, in which they showed a prison for Meta Humans, and they had a whole wing, a whole cell block, just for frost powered villains. A whole cell block! That's how many ice villains there are on DC, enough to fill their own cell block, plus the ones that were still at large. That's a lot indeed.
I always love seeing side characters come back, it makes the world feel more alive. Anyone hit by a stray bolt or kidnapped could become a new hero or villain in and of themselves.
As I recall at one point Vandal Savage had to get new body parts because he would out live them. It was hinted he either got them off a black market or the person was kidnapped.
@@Hanmerhack I think so, yeah. Which should be basically every human on the planet if it isn't a matter of direct descent. He's Genghis Khan on steroids when it comes to being everyone's ancestor. In fact, I think he might canonically be Genghis Khan. Guy's had a lot of identities.
Athena is a notable example. One of the least awful of Greek gods, although even she fell for that golden apple BS. Darn you, Eris, why do you have to be such a troublemaker? Oh right, literally your whole divine portfolio. Well, go ahead then. Okay, now you're overdoing it, lady.
@@nctpti2073 Heh. Might need scuba gear soon. Then again, they've been saying the Big Quake is overdue for most of my lifetime, and I imagine Poseidon would have something to say about dumping an entire state full of crap in his oceans anyway. Too much pollution already. Mixing my metaphors, let sleeping world serpents lie, right? It's likely going to be human politics that cause the real problems in 2024 anyway.
When the ultra humanite switched with Dolores, I always wondered what happened to her. Did he simply discard her or did they switch bodies? And if so, what machine be going through? Apparently
I remember reading those first few scenes of that story. It made me flash my mind to Grant Morrison’s New Xmen. I did not read on, but after seeing this, maybe I should have given it a try.
A thought: Endless Winter shows up again post-Rebirth, gathering together various people who were screwed over by the Ultra-Humanite, or have other reasons to hate him - because really, it shouldn't be just the heroes who get that kind of treatment.
3:00 I can donate my body parts after I die, I can even donate one of my kidneys while I still live...so why couldn't a supervillain steal them while I am still alive?
I wasn't aware they brought her back, but kinda fascinating--it might be interesting to play her up not just for the attraction angle but the powers angle, sort of like old Marvel's Power Broker, except more monstrous. She could show up empowering villains in the background for a while then lead to her clashing with Ultra-Humanite.
This is fascinating to me. I didn't even think about what happened to Dolores/Delores after watching the previous video, so I think it's pretty cool that someone at DC decided to revisit that so many years later.
6:09 I assume that the writers and editors of JSA: Classified added the ape part for the Ultra-Humanite to show the readers that it is him and not a regular person.
I love being subscribed to both this channel and Comic Pop, it's like the yin and yang of comic book critique on RU-vid. You dive into the interesting themes and concepts an admittedly bad comic might still have and why they interest you, and then I go over and watch Sal, Ethan, Ben, and Tiffany rip it to shreds on Back Issues
The only thing I remember about "Cry for Justice" was the font made the C look like a G and the R look like an A. I can't be the only one who thought it was "Gay for Justice"
I'm pretty sure if I woke up in a different body, I'd be STOKED. Almost guaranteed they have less debt, a working set of lungs, and a knee that doesn't feel like you're being stabbed every step. I'd just sit back and laugh at their misfortune.
Thank you for this video. I only "met" Ultra thru the Justice Leage Animated show. I didn't know his history or why he was an ape. I really appreciate this and yesterday's video.
Young Justice gave Ultrahumanite an interesting backstory, she was originally an old lady scientist who worked with Major Mallah and The Brain in the rain forest experimenting on animals with Venom formula until they all did experiments including on themselves. putting themselves in gorilla bodies and a brain in a jar ody.
I feel like a there’s potential for a team up between Endless Winter and Mr Freeze but I’m not sure what they’d do, just feels like something that could be a thing. Maybe she could offer to help him cure his wife but then it’ll turn out she intended to steal her body once it was cured.
Another interesting "body swap"story was Malibu Comics' "Mantra". The story was a magical apprentice has swapped from one body to another over the last thousand years. Due to circumstances, there is only one swap left, and that needs to be into a body of incredible magical potential. And that body happens to be a woman's and not a man's. Which provided some interesting stories. As well as exploring what it's like for a manly man to inhabit the body and life of a woman with children. Perhaps you can take a look at that series.
Kinda seems closer to a kind of "Quantum Leap" than a typical "body/mind swap" situation. But yeah it could be an interesting premise to revisit if Marvel ever gives a damm about Ultraverse characters...not bloody likely though.
Dolores would be an interesting character study about dysphoria. This idea that your body isnt you but is an accessory you should be able to change however you want with no regard to pain or health effects is super common in the trans community. She doesnt care about her own pain or the people she hurts, as long as she gets to customise without limit. I'm surprised how much her story resonates. I think they could definitely get at least a good miniseries from exploring this concept in a world where souls are real.
I kind-of assume that he just had that body built, same as the gorilla. Ultra is meant to be a super-genius, so building his own perfect body seems like something he can just do.
