How would you mature Character names?

[Kage Kisaragi]

This isn't something that I feel is necessary, but it is something I wondered about. Now I don't know every character with a name that falls under the misleading age catagory, but if you know some that do fall under these catagory by all means, list them and if possible how you might update the name or change it entirely to suit the characters aging self.

Karate Kid, well im sure he isn't a kid and probably wasn't even when he joined the legion. So how about Mister Karate?.. Sure I know Mr Karate is a SNK game character but thats the reason I spelled out Mister instead of using the abbre. version.

Power Girl, I'm not so sure about this one. Infact im a little lost. Just changing the girl part wouldn't help as much as the name would still sound goofy, mostly because power anything sounds kind of dated.

these were the only two that immeditately sprang to mind when I started thinking about this. Any other revisions on names or characters that you guys can think of?

[ultramandingo]

......." matter eater lad" should be called " that freak who eats every thing lad"

[Harlock]

Robin should be called Nightwing.

[Kid Kyoto]

One adult Legion story had him as Karate King, with the Elvis collar I think that's a great name.

I think Power Woman sounds fine, you have a nice symetry of 2 syliblles in each word.

[StoneGold]

Need a slightly less goony replacement for Karate Kid? Karateka.

[Armless Penguin]

Personally, I hope they start calling Karate Kid Daniel-San soon.

[Kage Kisaragi]

Karate King does sound kind of cool. Matter Eatting Lad, would just become Matter Eater. Come to think of it, there are plenty of easy ones I guess. In most of those Lass/Lad cases you could just drop the suffix and have a perfectly usable name. Saturn Girl=Saturn or Ms Saturn, and so on. Oh well this was just a little experiment into the ideas that might start flowing.

[Fatguy]

I would mature Roy Harper from Red Arrow to Arsenal.

[stelok]

Robin (Tim Drake)= Redwing

Wonder Girl= Wonder Babe

Superboy= Superstud

Batman= Bat-Legend

Superman= Super-geezer

Captain Marvel= Shazam

Wonder Woman= Wonder Hag

[Alan2099]

I really don't see the point in maturing them, unless we're talking about some kind of elseworld's thing.

[Kage Kisaragi]

Well like the animated Dick Grayson said, "You can't be a boy wonder forever!"

Personally, if I were a legacy superhero/heroine I'd be change my name the minute I hit 20 years of age, if said name had something like boy, girl, lad, lass or kid in it. Imagine 10 years into the current DCU time line and Wonder Girl is still called Wonder Girl and shes like 26 or 27. O_o Powergirl being called Powergirl when shes probably 30 something? I'm not saying it's a major issue that needs addressing, its more like how more serious naming characters should be, so minor oversights like this could be avoided. Seriously, Clark is gonna live a long time and there is really no reason why he can or will not be superman in the distant future, so to have Superboy in his 30's possibly 40's and still being called Superboy is kind of sad.

I mean its the same thing as coming of age and you're parents not calling you, little boy or young man anymore.

[J. Robb]

Power Girl, I'm not so sure about this one. Infact im a little lost. Just changing the girl part wouldn't help as much as the name would still sound goofy, mostly because power anything sounds kind of dated.
Powerhouse.

[ultramandingo]

Powerhouse.

........or "brick house " as is "shes built like a "

[Alex L]

In the case of the LoSH, I don't see why they can't go by their real names, later on.

I'm not all that informed on the history of the book, but it doesn't seem like they're big on secret identities.

Otherwise, I like the "Robin -> Nightwing" path where they make a new identity for themselves.

If you left Dick in the red and yellow, doesn't matter what you call him -- he's still Robin.

[Kelson]

As far as LoSH goes, they could reuse some of the alternate names from the 1994-2005 Legion

Lightning Lad -> Live Wire
Phantom Girl -> Apparition
Triplicate Girl -> Triad

etc.

[Spiffy]

Is "Power" any inherently sillier than "Super"? I mean objectively, out of context with how established Superman is?

"Powerwoman" would seem to be a natural evolution. Although you could also do a storyarc with her accepting the fact that it doesn't matter what universe she's from and calling herself "Superwoman".

Of course you could just go short. "Power". As the whole name.

Wonder Girl is harder, but maybe not as necessary. She's still shown as pretty young. And we already have the precident of Troia as a kind of silly attempt to create a new identity, since we just wound up calling her "Donna Troy" again eventually.

[kel25]

Otherwise, I like the "Robin -> Nightwing" path where they make a new identity for themselves.

If you left Dick in the red and yellow, doesn't matter what you call him -- he's still Robin.

I disagree with this. I think Dick became Nightwing so he could be his own man and as a way to show he is not Batman's sidekick. He left Robin in the past and I think the idea of anyone else taking up the mantle of Nightwing (especially former Robins) would go against the reasons why Dick chose to be Nightwing.

On the other hand, I have no problem with Robins becoming their own hero and making their own idenity as long as other Robins take the same idenity.

As for the main subject I think any character that has lad, lass, boy, girl, woman, man, or an adjective in their name has a bad name. Yes, I know this covers a very large portion of comic characters. I've always felt these names tend to be very corny. As a previous poster mentioned, many of these names could be fixed by just dropping a single word.

[rick]

As far as LoSH goes, they could reuse some of the alternate names from the 1994-2005 Legion

Lightning Lad -> Live Wire
Phantom Girl -> Apparition
Triplicate Girl -> Triad

etc.


Oh please no.

Those awful, new names did nothing more then point out the basic style, clarity and simplicity of the original monikers.

[Gamiel]

I disagree with this. I think Dick became Nightwing so he could be his own man and as a way to show he is not Batman's sidekick. He left Robin in the past and I think the idea of anyone else taking up the mantle of Nightwing (especially former Robins) would go against the reasons why Dick chose to be Nightwing.


Many things that begins as teenage rebellion and a search for your own identity later became the norm.

[mosdef]

I'd like to see a different name for Catman, especially since he's been re-vamped to a mature character.

[Kage Kisaragi]

As far as LoSH goes, they could reuse some of the alternate names from the 1994-2005 Legion

Lightning Lad -> Live Wire
Phantom Girl -> Apparition
Triplicate Girl -> Triad

etc.

That actually does sound like a good idea.

[Adamantium_Avatar]

That actually does sound like a good idea.

I'd vote for this too.. Or at least some sort of change.

The LSH names are just too corny for words!

[Sizzle]

Beast Boy - Manimal
Karate Kid - Mutai Man

[BoosterBronze]

I think the LOSH is a concept which is basically kinda silly, and if you accept it for what it is and love it for that, those names are fine, and if you don't accept the concept, then no ammount of 'cool' names can change it.

[Zero Hunter]

I think alot of the new names the Legion got in the reboot were great. Some of the boy/girl/lad/lass stuff works still, but alot don't. I hated that Waid brought back alot of them in his reboot.

Alchemist > Element Lad
Triad > Triplicate Girl
Apparition > Phantom Girl
Inferno > Sun Boy
Shrinking Violet > Atom Girl

Some are better as the classics:

Lighting Lad > Live Wire
Lighting Lass/Light Lass > Gossamer
Colossal Boy > Leviathan
Saturn Girl
Cosmic Boy
Karate Kid
Star Boy
Ultra Boy

And some just work best when you drop the end:

Dreamer > Dream Girl
Ferro > Ferro Lad
Chameleon > Chameleon Boy
Projectra > Princess Projectra