Celebrating the 10th Anniversary of the Hot Squad! The woman who inspired Venom. A six-armed villain. The real Puck. An industrial spy. Marvel’s Justice League of America. Stark’s rival company. Which are Hot? Which are Not? Find out, as the Hot Squad continues its coverage of OHOTMU’s 12th issue and reveals how datable its characters are.
Featuring permanent panelists Isabel, Nathalie, Josée, Shotgun, and Amelie.
Listen to Episode 105 below (the usual mature language warnings apply), or subscribe to oHOTmu OR NOT? on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
Relevant images and further credits at: oHOTmu or NOT ep.105 Supplemental
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As always, the show is just a joy and I smile non-stop. Congrats to Amelie!
I’ll start by saying that I have not been pranked in a long time. Because people learned the revenge prank was always 10x worse. So it wasn’t worth it.
Characters:
Spider-Woman: I have a fondness for all Spider-Women although Drew,Jessica is my fave and has my fave costume. But this one is certainly lovely. Love that Venom based his look on hers. And somehow like the lack of web-slinging as a differentiating aspect. I think she became part of WCA at one point?
Spiral: Anything Arthur Adams draws is going to look scrumptious and this is no exception. Somehow I think I could look past the evilness for a brief fling.
Two arms good for canoodling. Six arms better.
Spymaster: I honestly have always thought it was a plane circling the globe, like he knew everything from a birdseye view. So I am in the camp of whoever said that. The pockets are ridiculous. Given the time this came out my guess is he had AA batteries in all of them for his Walkman.
Squadron Supreme: never read the original stuff but did like the JMS/Gary Frank reboot. Some DC nods not mentioned (or at least what I think are nods). For some reason, I thought Tom Thumb was an Atom riff. Ape-X I think is Ultra-Humanite? Lamprey is Parasite? Quagmire is Major Force? Shape is Plastic Man (former criminal turned gov agent).
I also don’t know if in the 10 years prior there was as much use of the word ‘pube’ as there was in the brief discussion of Haywire.
Love the show and congrats on 10yrs! My con season is creeping up so hoping to get some sigs for the Squad!
Good ideas for the analogs, but Major Force is impossible in 1985. Shape is the Elongated Man who was in the JLD, which I think is as far as the series might have gone (JLI premiered later).
Wow! Maybe Major Force is an analog for Quagmire instead!!
It’s just as likely that the sort of trendy punk look is meant to be a swipe at Vibe. I think it all falls apart once the villains are integrated, even if I like to think of Redstone as Rocket Red, Moonglow as Dr. Light, and Thermite as Fire & Ice. It just can’t be!
Happy Anniversary to everyone’s favorite “Girlfriends in Canada”! 😀
Spider-Woman – This version of the character I got to know during her time on the West Coast Avengers roster. I’ve always enjoyed her balancing her superhero duties with being a parent (much like Roy Harper).
Spiral – I’ve run across Spiral in various tie-in media (90’s cartoon, video games, etc.) but I can’t remember actually reading a comic with her in it. I guess I was out of my “X-Men Phase” at the point where she was introduced.
Sprite – I like how he’s dressed like the Lemon/Lime of the soft drink. 🙂 (I’m not big on Eternals if they haven’t been in another book, so someone way down the bench like him is well out of my experience.) I’m predisposed to not like pranksters, being that Loki was one (before turning evil), and nothing here makes me change that opinion.
Spymaster – To paraphrase Gandalf, “I have no memory of this character.”
Squadron Supreme – My knowledge of this team comes from their appearances in Quasar (I know, you’re shocked), but I MIGHT be doing something on Back to the Bins involving them in the near future. 😉
Stane International – I’ve always had a huge problem with Obadiah Stane, and that stems from Iron Man #198 where we get his backstory. When he was a kid, Stane wanted to win a chess competition, but couldn’t because Bernie Devlin was better than him. He found a way to make sure that Devlin was off his game, though, and that way not only made me sick to my stomach as a kid, but still does now. (I’ll send an image to Siskoid and he can decide whether he wants to share the method with the group.)
#TeamToes
P.S. Yes, I do have hair, although I keep it short to be more manageable.
No JLA equivalent for Tom Thumb?!! A certain Ray Palmer is gonna jump down your phone line and bop you on the ear drum!
And – with absolutely no background knowledge whatsoever – I wondered if Firefox was the reverse-Firestorm; he can’t affect anything organic, but with her Rot Power, she can *only* affect organic matter. But what do I know?
Happy anniversary, Hot or Not Squad!
I’m sure I’m in the minority on this opinion, but I’ve always felt the black and white costume looks better on Spider-Woman than it does on Spider-Man or Venom. Both Julia and Jessica have some of my all-time favorite female costumes.
Here are a couple of my weirdest memories about various appearances of the squadron (I haven’t reached the series so those are the previous incarnations)
Nighthawk led the Defenders for a long time but was completely useless. He even had his brain removed and put in a jar for an arc.
Golden Archer was used as a costume by Hawkeye to convince Cap to pick back the shield when he quit. The costume was complete with a human rubber mask that Hawkeye wore over his own costume mask.
Aw, congrats to Amelie on her happy belly, and the entire Hot Squad – past and present – on ten great years.
I know it went on awhile but I loved the section on the Squadron Supreme, Mark Gruenwald’s 12-issue series is one of the best Marvel stories ever, far superior to later derivatives.
As regards Amphibian’s civvie name, Kingsley Rice may be a nod to Water-Babies author Charles Kingsley. I can’t see an obvious link to Edgar Rice Burroughs, mind!
I agree with my chums above, Tom Thumb was likely meant to be a play on the Atom, sized between the Golden and Silver Age versions.
Arcanna’s Drusilla was long pre-Buffy.
Apologies for still not being able to tell who’s talking, but the Hottie who made the connection between Golden Archer and McDonald’s is blooming brilliant.
Congrats on the anniversary, and Ameile’s impending bundle of joy!
I always liked this Spider-Woman entry. Not sure if I dug that they had Spidey base his new costume on a new hero he just met, but I like the look on her. Mike Zeck always draws tiny feet!
But Art Adams outdid him with Spiral!
Sprite looks like Loki’s annoying kid-sidekick here.
I always saw a dagger on Spymaster’s chest. Costume is pretty loud for a guy in his line of work, though, don’t you think? Even in the Marvel Universe?
Squadron Supreme did Kingdom Come before DC. Justice League animated did a similar take with the Justice Lords as well. But Mark Gruenwald got there first!
Alan Moore pitched a story with a similar plot called “Twilight of the Super-Heroes”, but I don’t know if that was before or after the Squadron Supreme mini.
Ah, “Twilight of the Super-Heroes” or as I like to call it “Incest of the Marvel Family”. YUCK.
Thermite refers to a compound consisting of a powdered metal and a metallic oxide (usually aluminum and ferrous oxide) that burns at extremely high temperatures and exudes molten metal.
I’m not sure what that has to do with the character, but as none of you seemed familiar with the term, I felt obligated to mention it.
Happy Tenthiversary!!
re: Squadron Supreme – Foxfire is a kind of bioluminescence given off by certain fungi that grow on rotting plants. It’s a kind of eerie greenish glow visible at night. The name is probably a mispronunciation of “faux fire”. You might also be onto something with the Vixen connection, though.
Yeah, everyone after the Big Thirteen are probably a mix-&-match. Before giving up, I’d tried Nighthawk and the Outsiders (a later story shows Redstone’s powers depend on his contact with the Earth, a sort of geo-force) or the Institute of Evil as the X-Men, which has me seeing Lamprey’s design and personality as an evil Wolverine.
The Hot Squadron may be delighted to know that Arcana cast an illusion that she was Moonglow in order to go on an important mission. (Immediately postpartum, the rest of the team was still treating her like she was made of glass.) Through incidents and accidents she wound up keeping the costume.
It’s a strange coincidence for the 2 new members of Freedom Force to have adjacent solo entries. That’s gotta break some odds. Boy, the artwork is stunning for both. And what about Spider-Woman having 4 limbs, while Spiral has 8 limbs … like a spider?
Maybe this was mentioned, but Julia’s first mission with Freedom Force was to capture the X-Men while the heroes were in San Francisco staying in the home of Jessica Drew. If ever there was an example of Chris Claremont melodrama, there you have it.
For the rookie/infiltrator members of Squadron Supreme, I will absolutely call Redstone an analog of the Outsiders’ Geo-Force, but in his first appearance which was in silhouette and no costume, it implied he was Hulk-like from his build and scruff of unkempt hair.
Continuing the Outsiders connections, Inertia could be Halo if you squint a lot. And then there’s Moonglow. On the surface she seems more like a Halo analog, but when it’s revealed that Moonie is actually a frumpy woman, she could absolutely be Looker whose own origin included transforming a “plain Jane” into “glamor girl”. The timing is a bit tricky, with Looker’s origin completing in December 1985, and Moonglow popping up in the June 1986. Not impossible, but quick for 1980s standards.
I noticed Siskoid did not spoil later developments in the Squadron regarding Moonglow, so I won’t either, but I would like to hear the Hot Squad’s reaction if they get revisited in the “later looks” episode.
Whew. 10 years for the Hot Squad (Supreme). At somewhere around 40 characters per year, (not counting the members in team entries), that’s 400 characters. You’re wonderful sports and always bring a smile and a laugh. Congratulations! (and to Amelie!)