Who's got the right stuff for League of Extraordinary Gentlemen 1990s?

>>Stephen King characters are absolutely in the running. Who else wrote memorable novels in the 80's and 90's?<<

Only literary characters and only for 80's literature...

Ok, I'll make a 10 person league. Make it the "10 who were Taken" from Glen Cook's Black Company novels.

If they can avoid fighting each other long enough to fight the bad guys, the bad guys won't stand a chance. Unless you make them real tough.

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com
http://www.1483online.com
http://www.thermopylae-online.com
 

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Celebrim said:
Yes. But consider the snears that Stephen King still recieves from establishment critics.
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Establishment critics have no bearing on wether works will endure or not. Many authors and painters have been lampooned and insulted in their day, and 100 years later, venerated as the greatest creative geniuses of their time. Others have been venerated in their time, and then forgotten.

I think Stephen King's works stand side by side literature of other eras touted as being great, but will people in 100 years feel that way? I would be lying to claim I have a crystal ball able to provide that information.
 

Seeten said:
Establishment critics have no bearing on wether works will endure or not.
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I think that that was my point. Stephen King has a greater chance of enduring than whatever it is that the establishment critics are praising. But I concur, and did say, that we had very little clue what would endure. I think we are just beginning to know what is enduring about the literature of say the 1950's, and its going to be decades before we know what people will be able to identify with and enjoy when looking back at what was written in the 90's.
 

But, Celebrim, if I were picking classic literary characters, I'd definitely pick some of his. He is certainly a giant currently. And, if we're picking characters from the 90's, I guess they really only have to have generated some cross-genre marketing. So if we're looking at books only, then we ought to look at books that have been made into movies, tv shows, video games, or all of the above.
 

If we confine ourselves to literature taking place in the near-present, only 2 names come to mind:

- Vaughn from Crash
- Oedipa Maas from The Crying of Lot 49

I would still prefer opening up the field to TV and movie characters. Speaking of which, I thought of another reason to have Steve Austin in the League: he was an astronaut, which is as iconic for the 20th century as the gentleman-adventurer was in the 19th.
 

Contrarian said:
Except that when Alan Moore talks about the 1950s League (like here), he doesn't talk about characters from TV, radio, or film. He talks about characters from Keruoac and Burroughs. The core characters of the League series are always from literature.
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Fair enough. I don't keep up with Alan Moore at all, so I'm playing catch-up right now in regards to LoXG.

I'm not sure -who- will be the "defining generational authors" of the 90's, though I'm terrified it'll include Bret Easton Ellis. I went to the same college shortly after his books came out, and they were all the rage. I found them unbearable. I have to refresh my knowledge of "literary fiction".

Piscine Patel from Life of Pi would be interesting.

Susie Salmon also remains in the running. (Though I get the impression I may be the only person in this discussion to have read that book. ;) )
 

I don't know what "establishment critics" are offending y'all. If anything, critical discourse has shifted to the other extreme, where the popularity of a novel has often become the sole criterion for examining media and a lot of good. lesser-known works are getting the shaft.

Anyway, if you want adventure novel characters, you need Dirk Pitt. Cussler's Pitt novels are pretty much prime successors to the stylized thriller/pulp genre. After that you want Mack Bolan, who was the model for the Punisher, and Remo Williams.

The main problem is that for the most part, adventurers did turn into primarily comics and cinema characters. The men's adventure genre was the last of the pulps, and it died in the 60s, largely due to the Vietnam War and the rise of hardcore pornography (men's adventure was packages with girlie pics).

Now more classic literary characters would certainly be something. Atticus Finch and Holden Caulfield team up!
 

You could add some conspiratorial groups/stuff as enemies as well...

More opponents.
1) Orbital Mind Control Lasers (and tinfoil hats)
2) Animal mutilations
3) Crop circles, and other patterns (some burned on your lawn)
4) Art Bell
5) Shadow People
6) Templars, Free Masons, Rosicrucian, Trumpeter of the Apocalypse (see google), and [Deleted]
7) New World Order, (Bilderberg, Trilateral Commission, Council On Foreign Relations)
8) UFO cults, and other cults
9) Elvis
10) Antarctic Nazis (probably operate the Orbital Mind Control Lasers)
11) Chupacabera, Mothman, Bigfoot.
12) Mind control, sensory deprivation, sleep modifications.
13) Annunaki
14) Alphans
15) UFO abductions
16) Post Office, IRS, Office of Homeland Security, and Skull and Bones Society
17) Shadow government FEMA.
18) Coke or Pepsi (or a
19) Somebody that leaves Tarot cards at the scene of the crime.
20) International Monetary Fund, Federal Reserve, which of course is run be the [deleted]
21) Chemtrails, drug smuggling, fluoridaters, and other fun chemicals.
22) Law enforcement inter-operational group 17.
 

iwatt said:
Someone mentioned that the 6 million dollar man wasn't gray enough. Well Quatermain, isn't either in the original books. The comic book starts him off as addicted to Opium from what someone mentioned. Something similar could have happened to Steve Austin.

Say he was replaced by newer Tech: (Jake 2.0 for example). I could see an Alcoholic Steve Austin forced to retire from the CIA (post OSS). Bu of course, nothing compares to the original, and he has to be brought back.
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This is especially appropriate given Lee Majors' appearance on Jake 2.0 as an agent who hinted at the existance of previous enhancement programs.

I agree that Lamont Cranston is a good choice.
 


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