Lex Sedet In Vertice: A Supervillain in the DCU CK2 quest

What sort of tone should I shoot for with this Quest?

  • Go as crack fueled as you can we want Ambush Bug, Snowflame and Duckseid

    Votes: 30 7.7%
  • Go for something silly but keep a little bit of reason

    Votes: 31 7.9%
  • Adam West Camp

    Votes: 27 6.9%
  • Balanced as all things should be

    Votes: 195 50.0%
  • Mostly serious but not self-involvedly so

    Votes: 73 18.7%
  • Dark and brooding but with light at the end of the tunnel

    Votes: 12 3.1%
  • We're evil and we don't want anyone to be happy

    Votes: 22 5.6%

  • Total voters
    390
  • Poll closed .
[X] [Lex] Upgrade the box opening robot
[X] [Mercy] Speak with Felicity about cybersecurity
[X] [Roxy] Go check out the Royal Flush kids
[X] [Cass] Discover online leaderboards for video games
[X] [Mari] Look into the situation in Zambesi
[X] [Felicity] Get a coffee with Mari and Caitlin
[X] [Nygma] Offer Cassandra a copy of Riddle of the Minotaur and challenge her to beat it
[X] [Lana] Try to join the poker games hosted by Leonard Snart
[X] [Cub] Play more with Packmate (Play with Cassandra)
[X] [Monkey] Watch the many-animals person (Watch Mari McCabe use practice with her powers)
 
So question why are we not making friend with Oliver Queen he seems like the kind of guy who would be ok with killing people and be a good agent for us.
 
So question why are we not making friend with Oliver Queen he seems like the kind of guy who would be ok with killing people and be a good agent for us.
keep forgetting green arrow is in this we haven't really interacted with them prob been more focused on other things, also does anyone know what version of oliver we have in this
 
keep forgetting green arrow is in this we haven't really interacted with them prob been more focused on other things, also does anyone know what version of oliver we have in this
Pretty much every version is ok with killing people so pragmatic Lex Luther would be his best friend. Hey we even have felicity so they can work together in this universe too.
 
So question why are we not making friend with Oliver Queen he seems like the kind of guy who would be ok with killing people and be a good agent for us.
Because:

1) Oliver Queen has enough resources that he wouldn't be an agent for us. In this continuity, King Crimson is being inspired by the immediately post-Crisis Green Arrow, the one who bankrolled his version of the Justice League, as in not Batman doing it, but Green Arrow. Oliver Queen is on roughly our level of wealth. As such, he'd have the financial leverage to expect a more or less equitable arrangement of power. He's a fellow player, not a piece on the board, even if he's a player who doesn't play for quite the same level of stakes that we do.

2) Oliver Queen may be pragmatic but he still has superhero principles on some level. We have a lot of things we would strongly prefer to keep secret from the outside world, and keeping a bit of separation between us and random people with do-gooder instincts strong enough to drive them out into the streets to fight armed criminals and supervillains is usually a good move all around.

Pretty much every version is ok with killing people so pragmatic Lex Luther would be his best friend. Hey we even have felicity so they can work together in this universe too.
We do a lot of things that are much worse than merely "is willing to kill people, ever."
 
A little bit of information on important players in the Sinestro Corps War
So since the Sinestro Corps war has started to begin in space I thought it would be neat to give you a rundown of the main characters and strategies/political relationships on both sides. Some of this will likely come into play in a few turns but I think it's neat to see what's going on outside of the fishbowl that is earth.

Green Lantern Corps
  • Hal Jordan: An important Green Lantern, albeit one without much official rank in the corps, and one of the most important symbols in the new generation of the corps. As both the successor of Abin Sur and the person who defeated Sinestro in his first attempt at overthrowing the Guardians of the Universe, Hal is considered to be one of the most powerful fighters in the Green Lantern Corps and a rallying point for the Corps. Hal often struggles with going along with orders from superiors when he thinks he knows better and is often in contention with the Guardians. That being said he is highly opposed to Sinestro and seeks to stop his former mentor. Hal has been kept primarily on Oa as the Guardians want to use him to resolve the most dangerous and climactic battle and defeat Sinestro. However with Sinestro waging his war somewhat cautiously Hal grows more and more frustrated the longer he is unable to help.
  • Ch'p: Ch'p is one of the major followers of Hal Jordan and is a skilled Green Lantern in his own right. He has engaged in a few skirmishes and served as one of the advanced scouts who warned of where the Yellow Lanterns were attacking and attempting to preemptively fight them off to figure out where they are coming from. Ch'p has since gone missing and the last time he was heard was right before he spotted multiple Yellow Lanterns including but not limited to Boodika, Tekik and Kiriazis. As of now he is assumed to be dead but his friends are still holding out hope that he is fine
  • Arisia Rrab: Arisia Rrab is one of Hal Jordan's staunchest supporters and is a popular young new Lantern with a lot of potential. Initially the Guardians kept her in reserve so they could have someone Hal trusts defend Earth if necessary while also potentially serving as support for Hal in the final battle with Sinestro. However following Karu-Sil's attempts at annihilating her homeworld, Arisia Rrab has since gone AWOL to try and hunt down Karu-Sil to bring her to justice. However in doing so she has left the path to Earth fairly clear for Sinestro and his corps to attack and has left the Green Lantern Corps unbalanced and stretched even more thin in a war they are struggling to win.
  • Mogo: Mogo is arguably the most powerful Green Lantern in existence due to being a living planet. Mogo is so powerful that virtually every Yellow Lantern has fled from him on sight and done their level best to avoid ever confronting him. However despite this immense power Mogo cannot be everywhere at once and as such he is unable to turn the tide of the war singlehandedly. The Guardians of the Universe plan on sending in Mogo to an area controlled by the Yellow Lantern which has been cut off from their control and which has the Yellow Lantern Ranx as well as Arkillo operating on the edges of this territory.
  • Leezle Pon: Leezle Pon is a Green Lantern who is being sent in with Mogo, specifically to counter Despotellis and neutralize him before he decides to go from offense to defense. Leezle Pon finds it amusing that the biggest and smallest Green Lanterns are being called in for this offensive.
  • Kilowog: Kilowog was the primary trainer for the Green Lantern Corps and ran the boot camp that trained newbies into real ringslingers. Kilowog is generally greatly liked and respected despite his somewhat brusque nature. However following the defection of Boodika Kilowog has felt like a failure of a teacher and has since transitioned to fighting on the front lines. He has made if clear that he desires to confront his former student and take her to task. As such when Ch'p located Boodika, Kilowog set off to find her and finally face her one on one.
  • Tomar-Re: Tomar-Re is a brilliant Green Lantern who is highly experienced and compassionate. He operates within the Corps as one of the most respected members not in Hal Jordan's camp to still disagree with how the Guardians are conducting the war effort. Tomar-Re has done his level best to assist as many Green Lanterns who were pulled away from the initial plans by attacks from the Yellow Lanterns on their homeworlds and is being run utterly ragged due to constantly having to help elsewhere.
  • Salakk: Salakk is the Green Lantern who operates according to the book and follows all of the Guardians' orders and rules. He is not fond at all of the more maverick younger generation and often sees their attempts to help as shortsighted and foolish. He runs most of the logistics of the Green Lantern Corps and keeps communication channels flowing freely and effectively. Salakk remains on OA due to his critical role in directing the war effort and in managing the administrative aspects of the Corps.
  • Hannu: Hannu is a Green Lantern who is a formidable fighter and was tasked with capturing Gleen and containing the Kroloteans. So far Hannu has proven quite capable at dealing with the Kroloteans but has yet to fight Gleen directly. Hannu desires to fight Sinestro when the time comes but won't move away from his orders.
  • Jack T. Chance: Jack T. Chance is a Green Lantern who has more or less gone rogue and is now only focused on protecting his space sector and making sure things don't get worse. He's been cut off from most of the corps due to how out of control things have gotten but promises to slug Sinestro once he deals with the situation.
  • Ke'Haan: Ke'Haan was Kilowog's second in command who has since taken over his position. Ke'Haan is unyielding and strict and highly dislikes Hal Jordan, viewing him as sloppy and undisciplined and an inspiration to every other sloppy halfcocked arrogant recruit in the corps. Ke'Haan has remained on Oa to teach the newer Green Lanterns and hopefully train them to a standard where they can make an impact in the coming fight.
  • Ganthet: Ganthet is one of the Guardians of the Universe and is often the voice of the minority in how to prosecute the war. Due to being one of the few Maltusians how Hal Jordan can speak civilly with as well as the one who best understands him, he has been given some leeway and more power due to Hal being valuable enough in the war effort due to his defeating of Sinestro prior to this event. Ganthet is a proponent that the Green Lantern Corps should temporarily deputize another earthling as a Green Lantern so as to protect Earth in order to prevent Sinestro luring out Hal Jordan in order to strike elsewhere or even potentially bait him into a trap.
  • Appa Ali Apsa: Appa Ali Apsa is a Guardian of the Universe and is often the voice of the majority in how to prosecute the war. He has favored a defensive strategy focused on protecting Oa while replacing any Green Lantern lost and focusing on eliminating Sinestro Corps members with concentrated strikes and not engaging in chasing after them at all. He also sees the Green Lantern's victory in the coming war as inevitable and seeks to also use it as an opportunity to punish the more maverick younger generation and hopefully get them more willing to follow orders.
  • The Scarred Guardian: The Scarred Guardian is a female Guardian who was injured in Boodika's escape from Oa. Her true motives are unknown but she largely sides with Appa Ali Apsa while also constantly attempting to push for a final conclusion with a unified army of Green Lanterns attacking Sinestro all at once.
Sinestro Corps
  • Sinestro: Leader of the Yellow Lantern/Sinestro Corps. Sinestro has begun to wage war upon the Green Lanterns as a whole and depose the Guardians of the Universe. Sinestro is still immensely feared by many of the newer recruits to the corps and is currently considered their greatest enemy. While it is known that Sinestro is directing the war effort against the Green Lantern corps, his location and grand strategy are utterly unknown. The Guardians of the Universe however are confident that if they can flush him out and defeat him then his side will crumble. Sinestro seems to have a similar outlook as for now he is content to show no signs of where he is and never engage in any fighting and instead is directing his underlings to open up as many fronts as possible while never committing to fights they can't win in order to break the Green Lantern corps through attrition.
  • Boodika: Boodika has emerged as one of Sinestro's most important followers. Boodika has become the unofficial head general of the Sinestro Corps and is the one often leading the actual combat as the war wages on. Boodika is generally well-regarded in the corps due to being less cruel than Arkillo and less cryptic and confusing than Lyssa Drak. That's not to say Boodika is any less capable of incredible amounts of cruelty and brutality but she's notably one of the most controlled members. Boodika is loyal to Sinestro above all else and her presence in the current war is often to both lead the charge and conduct war where Sinestro is unavailable.
  • Arkillo: Arkillo is another one of the key lieutenants under Sinestro. Arkillo holds a technically high position and while he is an excellent combatant the role he actually plays within the Corps is mostly administrative. Arkillo is the head of all training programs within the Sinestro Corps and is also in charge of all punishment details within the Corps. His brutal personality and fondness for eating sentient creatures have made him a figure of terror even within the Sinestro Corps. Arkillo is not personally loyal to Sinestro but likes and appreciates his system enough to be willing to fully submit to it and has found something akin to comradery with other Yellow Lanterns. If Boodika is often the first into battle leading the charge then Arkillo is often the one sitting in the rear motivating the other Yellow Lanterns not to break from the plan for fear that they'll have to endure his punishment. His location is known to the Green Lantern Corps as he and many neophyte Yellow Lanterns that he is training are all operating out of Ranx.
  • Lyssa Drak: Lyssa Drak is the head of the informational network of the Yellow Lanterns and reports directly to Sinestro himself on top of assisting with the administrative aspects of the corps. Lyssa keeps all records within the Sinestro Corps and is critical to their ability to operate cohesively together. As such she is considered the second most important Yellow Lantern to remove from the war since after Sinestro her removal would do the most damage. Lyssa does not directly dictate any strategy for the war and she is utterly loyal to Sinestro but she has been pushing for a final decapitating strike at Oa. Many of the more fanatical and impatient Yellow Lanterns support her argument and so even without much overt power she is pressuring the Sinestro Corps to eventually make a dramatic move or potentially face discontent.
  • Karu-Sil: Karu-Sil is one of the most deranged members of the Sinestro Corps and generally serves under Arkillo. For the war however Karu-Sil has been transferred over to Lyssa Drak's command for a while. Karu-Sil has been acting as bait, attacking Arisia Rrab's homeworld to earn her ire and then leading her on a constant chase to further cut off Hal Jordan from his friends and potentially remove an additional defender for a later assault.
  • Bedovian: Bedovian is a cold calculating individual and is the leader of what has been informally termed the "Disruption Squad" under the command of Boodika. Bedovian's incredible senses and unique sniping ability have made him a uniquely talented individual suited for his current mission. Bedovian and his squad have essentially cut off an entire swathe of space sectors for the Green Lantern Corps, attacking anyone who enters that area. Furthermore Ranx often lingers at the edges of this dead zone and Bedovian and his squad serve to discourage and destroy any spaceships not aligned with the Sinestro Corps that get to close to Ranx. Bedovian's main role in the squad is to mark out and deal with threats while picking off stragglers and assisting his comrades from a distance.
  • Flayt: Flayt is one of the three members of the "Disruption Squad" and takes his orders from Bedovian. Flayt's role within the squad is to effectively strand any ships that enter the dead zone and then kill everyone he can or leave them for his teammates to destroy. Flayt is sadistic in almost a playful sense and has made a game of pushing ships he's drained of all power towards nearby stars to that the momentum eventually results in a slow painful incineration for all the people suck onboard.
  • Despotellis: Despotellis is the Yellow Lantern with the highest body count and is the third member of the "Disruption Squad". Despotellis serves as the greatest deterrent for any planetary, galactic or intergalactic governments to move military forces through the dead zone as he can wipe out entire planets if people give him the opportunity. So far Despotellis hasn't acted a lot, mostly restricting himself to killing Green Lanterns that wander into the zone but people are still immensely wary of provoking him. The Guardians have theorized that Sinestro is either hiding in the dead zone the Disruption Squad is cutting off or is between the two points due to how conspicuous it seems to be to have a Yellow Lantern like Despotellis acting defensively
  • Ranx: Ranx is a sentient city and self-professed moon (despite not orbiting around a planet). Ranx is a powerful Yellow Lantern and serves as a mobile base for the Sinestro Corps, being where Arkillo and the Yellow Lantern trainees are operating out of as well as serving as a resupply point for Yellow Lanterns that need it. Ranx has been keeping to the edge of the zone the "Disruption Squad" is controlling and retreats into it every time it is faced with a fight it can't win. That being said Ranx has engaged in a few battles and is a known quantity to the Guardians
  • Horku: Horku is an experienced Yellow Lanterns and is one of the first to be recruited for the Sinestro Corps. He is one of the two individuals who have been sent to Earth under Sinestro's orders. Horku desires to use the Earth as a way to prove himself
  • Setag Retss: Setag Retss is a member of the Sinestro Corps and is the other one of the two individuals sent to Earth under Sinestro's orders. Unlike Horku, Setag significantly more wary and is likely to flee if sufficiently pressed in battle as an Earthling defeated Sinestro and Setag knows he is less powerful than Sinestro. That being said his species has been looking for a new breeding ground and a world with a lot of water like Earth would be ideal for that.
  • Gleen: Gleen is a Krolotean member of the Sinestro Corps and has acted as the ambassador between the two factions. Gleen has successfully convinced the Kroloteans to begin mobilizing and causing more chaos in the universe. As such Gleen is not often involved in military pursuits but he has assisted them in the fight against the Green Lanterns by opening up yet another front to fight them with.
  • Seer Ruggle: Seer Ruggle is a Yellow Lantern bomb maker who has armed the Children of the White Lobe with her creations as part of the alliance with them.
Third Parties and Wildcards
  • Atrocitus: The leader of the Five Inversions and the individual who killed Abin Sur. Atrocitus has remained locked up in the Oan Science Cells and has continued to taunt anyone who visits him all the while spouting off vague prophecies. He and Hal Jordan have spoken multiple times although Hal utterly despises Atrocitus as a person. A yellow ring came to recruit Atrocitus to the Sinestro Corps but the ring was summarily rejected and forced to head elsewhere. Atrocitus remains safely locked up but many Green Lanterns are concerned by how calm and knowledgeable he seems to be about the current situation
  • Children of the White Lobe: The Children of the White Lobe are an intergalactic terrorist organization who have struck a deal with the Sinestro Corps. In exchange for the assassination of Green Lantern Mogo, the Children of the White Lobe will be given a supply of Seer Rundle's bombs to use to achieve their own aims.
  • Kroloteans: Kroloteans are generally despised the galaxy over and have used the current war to buck against the Green Lanterns and conduct more immoral genetic tests on hapless individuals. Thanks to the efforts of Gleen they've proven effective at stretching the Green Lanterns even further and properly taking advantage of all this chaos.
 
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  • Horku: Horku is an experienced Yellow Lanterns and is one of the first to be recruited for the Sinestro Corps. He is one of the two individuals who have been sent to Earth under Sinestro's orders. Horku desires to use the Earth as a way to prove himself
  • Setag Retss: Setag Retss is a member of the Sinestro Corps and is the other one of the two individuals sent to Earth under Sinestro's orders. Unlike Horku, Setag significantly more wary and is likely to flee if sufficiently pressed in battle as an Earthling defeated Sinestro and Setag knows he is less powerful than Sinestro. That being said his species has been looking for a new breeding ground and a world with a lot of water like Earth would be ideal for that.

Well. That's... interesting.

The fact that Hal is slowly going crazy while confined to Oa as a defensive piece is also interesting.

If Carol can somehow apply appropriate levels of beat-down to the incoming Yellow Lanterns, that becomes even more interesting.

If the Yellow Lanterns show up before Superman can get back, it gets downright hilarious.

Hal rushes home after Earth gets attacked (possibly abandoning OA to do it) and arrives to the general consensus that he's a complete flake who's never around when you need him, and Ultraviolet is much better anyway. Among other things, she's not just leaving for no good reason and without warning while the Earth is under extraterrestrial threat.
 
Well. That's... interesting.

The fact that Hal is slowly going crazy while confined to Oa as a defensive piece is also interesting.

If Carol can somehow apply appropriate levels of beat-down to the incoming Yellow Lanterns, that becomes even more interesting.

If the Yellow Lanterns show up before Superman can get back, it gets downright hilarious.

Hal rushes home after Earth gets attacked (possibly abandoning OA to do it) and arrives to the general consensus that he's a complete flake who's never around when you need him, and Ultraviolet is much better anyway. Among other things, she's not just leaving for no good reason and without warning while the Earth is under extraterrestrial threat.
There is also the fact that Carol's actions are likely to draw the Zamarons into the war, either as a third side fighting against both the yellow and green Lanterns, or allied with the green lanterns due to the yellows engaging in conflict with one of their members (Carol).
 
So I'm going to get to closing the vote sometime tomorrow. The vast majority of the options are still surprisingly close. The winning option and the runner up option are win vote away on the Lex, Roxy, Cass, Mari and Nygma personal actions. A single vote is enough to potentially shift the direction things are headed in so get them in before time runs out if you feel strongly about personal actions.

I would also like to remind people that a creative writing contest is in the works. It's open for quite a bit longer but it's only fair to warn you that if I do not receive enough entries to even have a contest I'm going to just shut it down and not bother trying to do such things in the future again for quite a while. I encourage people to try their hands at this because the rewards can gain you tangible things.

If the Yellow Lanterns show up before Superman can get back, it gets downright hilarious.
It's not really super possible for that to happen.
For them to get past Earth they need to get past Brainiac who is following Superman. That means that they'd have to sneak past Brainiac and then arrive on the planet they also know he is heading towards. Brainiac has a bad enough reputation that they'd have to either be supremely confident or stupid to be willing to potentially engage with him, the locals and the Green Lantern Corps, potentially all at once. It's much simpler for them to arrive after Brainiac does his stuff and worthwhile for them to wait in the grand scheme of things.
There is also the fact that Carol's actions are likely to draw the Zamarons into the war, either as a third side fighting against both the yellow and green Lanterns, or allied with the green lanterns due to the yellows engaging in conflict with one of their members (Carol).
I've mentioned this earlier in an informational post but the Star Sapphires, and by extension the Zamarons, aren't really organized enough to be capable of posing as a third side in this conflict or even really as allies of the Green Lanterns.
 
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I had not realized that we had a confirmation that the Space Thing was "Braniac, chasing Superman". That's... almost even better. I mean, he's literally leading an alien menace back to us., and everyone in the government who matters will know it.
I don't recall anything about the identity of the unknown object been confirmed either. So unintentional spoilers maybe?
 
I don't recall anything about the identity of the unknown object been confirmed either. So unintentional spoilers maybe?
Someone guessed it after the last Lobo interlude in the sidestories and I lowkey confirmed it. I'm bit surprised that it's a surprise but I suppose that this is just people not communicating stuff for a while and information being buried under a ton of other information. If you just read the threadmarked posts you wouldn't know as I've tried to avoid indicating it since a lot of that is from Lex's POV. I also think you would have figured it out this turn regardless so I'm not super worried about it being a spoiler. That being said I have put it in a spoiler box now to prevent people not in the know from unintentionally being spoiled.

If it was a legitimate spoiler I'd never confirmed one way or the other then I apologize for my little lip up but the jig was up probably next week. Still if I did screw up that's some egg on my face for making an easily avoidable mistake.
 
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You know, Superman's biggest problem is that he really doesn't think these things through. He waited until things personally escalated before becoming Superman, willingly operates as a vigilante (that's illegal because nobody wants some vigilante going judge, jury and executioner), and now led a threat back to Earth that he seemed aware of. Plus, from a PR standpoint, it looks really bad he wants to pick a fight with LexCorp. Though overall, he could of saved himself so much trouble just by caring more about his PR. People are gonna be mad he's been around for decades doing nothing, and shows little concern for (in)directly causing damage.
 
[X] [Lex] Upgrade the box opening robot
[X] [Lana] Try to join the poker games hosted by Leonard Snart
[X] [Cass] Discover online leaderboards for video games
[X] [Felicity] Help Lana Lang get a better understanding of technology and how to make full use of modern phones
[X] [Nygma] Look into bigfoot sightings to determine what is the truth of the matter regarding these creatures
[X] [Roxy] Go check out the Royal Flush kids
[X] [Mari] Experiment with superhero costume designs
[X] [Mercy] Observe Rose practice using the Ravager suit
 
You know, Superman's biggest problem is that he really doesn't think these things through. He waited until things personally escalated before becoming Superman, willingly operates as a vigilante (that's illegal because nobody wants some vigilante going judge, jury and executioner), and now led a threat back to Earth that he seemed aware of. Plus, from a PR standpoint, it looks really bad he wants to pick a fight with LexCorp. Though overall, he could of saved himself so much trouble just by caring more about his PR. People are gonna be mad he's been around for decades doing nothing, and shows little concern for (in)directly causing damage.
Uh... His PR was actually excellent, and he's shown no sign of making any special effort to pick a fight with us so far. I don't think he's even really aware of how much Lex hates him.

One of the advantages of his secret identity is that no one actually knows how long he's been on Earth, or when his powers awoke, so no one can blame him for holding back. Besides which, the world wasn't actually doing that badly without him; he could revolutionize the whole world with massive efforts but then the "why didn't he do that" thing just wraps back to "why doesn't he do more right now?"

Depending on how the Brainiac thing goes down, it's entirely possible that Earth as a whole won't even know that Brainiac was looking for him.

Someone guessed it after the last Lobo interlude in the sidestories and I lowkey confirmed it. I'm bit surprised that it's a surprise but I suppose that this is just people not communicating stuff for a while and information being buried under a ton of other information. If you just read the threadmarked posts you wouldn't know as I've tried to avoid indicating it since a lot of that is from Lex's POV. I also think you would have figured it out this turn regardless so I'm not super worried about it being a spoiler. That being said I have put it in a spoiler box now to prevent people not in the know from unintentionally being spoiled.

If it was a legitimate spoiler I'd never confirmed one way or the other then I apologize for my little lip up but the jig was up probably next week. Still if I did screw up that's some egg on my face for making an easily avoidable mistake.
I think a lot of us were strongly suspecting it was Brainiac.

I know I did.
 
I still think most superheroes are oddly selfish, like seriously- using random cars as weapons? Plenty of heroes kind of act like that they can do whatever they want because they're "heroes" and really don't seem to care why being a vigilante is illegal. At most they're all "I'm not like that". Superman is probably one of the worst in that regard, as he refuses to legalize his actions and the Justice League is often considered an NGO Superpower because they barely care about acknowledging the world government. At most they're clearly unhappy about people trying to limit them. Like if it doesn't seem alive, they're often willing to kill "just because" and high-tier ones like Superman have no need for a secret identity. Sure, he shouldn't be forced to Superman 24/7, but when he isn't on the "clock" he tends to ignore problems. People like Superman are heroes with undeserved respect, who aren't violent- just careless and indifferent when not dealing with something that is their "immediate problem". I think that's the reason Lex tends to get fed up with Superman- dude is ridiculously powerful, but never worked for any of it. Dude saves a cat from a tree and suddenly gets a ton of rep for being "a real superhero". Even Superman doesn't see a problem with his behavior, even though he should feel guilty for all the inaction he did. It is really only ever just Superman Lex tends to be offended by, and the only real distinction is that Superman is someone powerful who wastes his own potential to play reporter.
 
I feel that is a good point superman is very willing to play judge, jury and executioner like darkseid in comics (something about singing him to death) darkseid in the cartoon by throwing him to his slaves saying u deal with him, zod (in the orginal movies and man of steel issue #22 of Superman vol 2) granted these guys are dangerous but their is a reason supes is the one who seems to snap first
 
I still think most superheroes are oddly selfish, like seriously- using random cars as weapons? Plenty of heroes kind of act like that they can do whatever they want because they're "heroes" and really don't seem to care why being a vigilante is illegal. At most they're all "I'm not like that". Superman is probably one of the worst in that regard, as he refuses to legalize his actions and the Justice League is often considered an NGO Superpower because they barely care about acknowledging the world government. At most they're clearly unhappy about people trying to limit them. Like if it doesn't seem alive, they're often willing to kill "just because" and high-tier ones like Superman have no need for a secret identity. Sure, he shouldn't be forced to Superman 24/7, but when he isn't on the "clock" he tends to ignore problems. People like Superman are heroes with undeserved respect, who aren't violent- just careless and indifferent when not dealing with something that is their "immediate problem". I think that's the reason Lex tends to get fed up with Superman- dude is ridiculously powerful, but never worked for any of it. Dude saves a cat from a tree and suddenly gets a ton of rep for being "a real superhero". Even Superman doesn't see a problem with his behavior, even though he should feel guilty for all the inaction he did. It is really only ever just Superman Lex tends to be offended by, and the only real distinction is that Superman is someone powerful who wastes his own potential to play reporter.
This is like the least charitable interpretation of information possible. In comics people don't constantly use random cars to a ridiculous degree. I like to use it in writing because it lets me demonstrate superstrength in a way that's more interesting to read about than "he punched really hard", lets me change up the flow of a fight and allows me to demonstrate some intelligence on the part of the combatants (if someone got pushed back far by another powerful opponent and they hurl a car at the person who pushed them back it lets them demonstrate some more lateral thinking beyond "run at the other guy and hit them" which makes the fight more interesting and engaging as a result).

Your second point is straight up wrong. Superheroes do care about why vigilantism is illegal. Batman for example has straight up said on multiple occasions (including in the DCAU) that he's working specifically so that there shouldn't be any more vigilantes in the future and that in his ideal world there would be no need for Batman in the first place. The problem is that most superheroes see the existing power structures as fundamentally incapable of achieving what they want to get done. With regards to the Justice League not caring about being an NGO superpower, there have been multiple Justice League and Society teams directly under US supervision (generally whenever they stick "of America" in their title), there are entire storylines about Justice League interaction with the UN, the Justice League has disbanded over concerns that they have too much power and don't have government oversight and much, much more.

The heroes who do choose to destroy things that don't seem alive aren't usually doing it "just because" so much as a philosophical reason regarding the sanctity of all life. Whether you agree with that philosophy or not is a different matter or not but it's not often something super pithy. Furthermore plenty of superheroes (Green Lantern, Huntress, Captain Atom, Wonder Woman, the Doom Patrol etc.) will kill even if they're not murderhobos for justice.

As for Superman's inaction, part of that is because Superman doesn't want to be someone swooping in to save the day on every little thing and he can't actually fix everything. Sure Superman could conceivably stop a war from brewing in say the middle east, but he can't fix the underlying tensions and reasons for the war in the first place so much as engage in delaying action. He can't stop people from being put into conditions that make them want to commit crimes, and its not his responsibility to do so and fix everything. Sometimes you have to let people solve things on their own.

Furthermore the idea that Superman just pulls cats out of trees and gets praised as a real hero is an exaggeration at absolute best. He generally takes down very powerful supervillains who threaten cities, if not countries or the entire world. What he does doesn't fix more long term problems like wealth distribution the world over but it is also significantly flashier than say a stimulus package designed to help people get on their feet in ten years time to hopefully reduce crime. Yes Lex can resent him for being praised as a real hero when he is not and he does have something of a point (even if it requires ignoring the fact that Superman is not trying to fix everything ever so much as deal with things he feels he is uniquely capable of dealing with that the normal systems would struggle with) but what you argued for is a ridiculous exaggeration.

There is some critique to be made of superheroes (perfect paragons are often uninteresting to read about which necessarily means that superheroes must be flawed) but at a certain point the critique of superheroes shifts away from a critique of the characters and more to the nature of the genre itself. You can argue that some superheroes are selfish and shouldn't be praised as heroes but the argument you presented above kind of doesn't work.
I feel that is a good point superman is very willing to play judge, jury and executioner like darkseid in comics (something about singing him to death) darkseid in the cartoon by throwing him to his slaves saying u deal with him, zod (in the orginal movies and man of steel issue #22 of Superman vol 2) granted these guys are dangerous but their is a reason supes is the one who seems to snap first
Not really. You have maybe two incidents of him actually doing this in the four examples you listed. Darkseid is a quite literal god of evil and is immortal so Superman fundamentally cannot kill him. Ignoring that when he was singing him to death it was literally a crisis scenario where the options were "let Darkseid conquer the entire multiverse forever" or "kill him" and Darkseid had killed Batman beforehand (or at least it seemed so at the time) which I imagine is kind of a unique instance that is not a normal circumstance for Darkseid, and in the DCAU he very pointedly did not kill Darkseid when he threw him to his slaves and he knew that this was the case. It was supposed to be a "you reap what you sow" moment from Superman after he had beaten Darkseid to near death after Darkseid had brainwashed him to make him attack earth, beat his cousin to near death and fundamentally destroy most of the goodwill he had built up. The slaves then carry Darkseid as he pithily tells Superman that he is many things but on Apokalips he is god and Superman then flies off leaving Darkseid. So both situations are extreme outliers and he straight up didn't kill Darkseid in one of them.

Now I'm not familiar with Man of Steel issue # 22 so I can't talk about it there so I'll assume it's salient (though if it's anything like the movie Man of Steel where he also killed Zod there was huge fan backlash over Superman acting out of character and an attempt to force Superman into a trolley problem to justify the decision to kill Zod). In the 1980 Superman 2 movie he does kill Zod after Zod overthrows the American government, this is true. However it's a one off thing from a movie 40 years ago. Batman brands people in the old WW2 era specials and he straight up carries a gun in the early comics. Yes the movie came out significantly later but even if we take the most extreme angle and argue that this was relevant to his character in the 80's (it wasn't) we can still make the case that Superman's character has sufficiently diverged from where it was 40 years ago. Furthermore Batman also killed even more people in the Tim Burton movie that came out almost a decade later, but no one is seriously attempting to argue it as evidence of "Batman is totally willing to kill people" because it's excused as being part of the movie adaptation.

Now to add all of this up you've got maybe one example that holds ground. You could bring in other examples of when Superman killed villains (like Doomsday or Parasite in the Man of Tomorrow movie) but it requires you completely ignore the circumstances behind what happened (in the fight with Doomsday it was a mutual kill and Superman literally died fighting him and in the movie he accidentally killed Parasite by overloading him if I remember correctly for example). By and large there are almost no good examples of Superman playing judge, jury and executioner and for the most part it's about as relevant as saying that Batman uses guns (Batman has used guns in his earliest comics, he shot Devil Ray with a gun when possessed by Deadman in the DCAU and in the same crisis where Superman supposedly killed Darkseid Batman picked up and used a gun to try and take down Darkseid first), reliant on ignoring circumstance and piecing together disparate occasions to make a bad faith argument.

The perception of Superman being willing to murder people is probably an unintended consequence of people being terrible uncreative writers and constantly throwing evil superman into a bunch of stuff because they're hack writers who can't come up with anything interesting or original and have been steadily writing worse and worse evil Supermans than Frank Miller did back in the 90s. Superman's not really a murderous individual and considering that in the 70+ years he's existed you can still count the times he's overtly killed a character across multiple forms of media on your hands, I think it's safe to say that Superman killing people is by far the exception to the norm.
 
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I still stand by the idea Lex wouldn't care, and honestly he's a lot better when he's more of a ruthless businessman- of course he'd take offense at Superman, what businessman wouldn't feel insulted by some rando appearing out of nowhere and stealing away "their" fame? Anything else are really just justifications for why they're "totally not unreasonable".
 
I feel that is a good point superman is very willing to play judge, jury and executioner like darkseid in comics (something about singing him to death) darkseid in the cartoon by throwing him to his slaves saying u deal with him, zod (in the orginal movies and man of steel issue #22 of Superman vol 2) granted these guys are dangerous but their is a reason supes is the one who seems to snap first
Superman generally snaps and escalates to deadly violence only after the following conditions are met:

1) The opponent is as strong or stronger than Superman.
2) The opponent is themselves already VERY willing to resort to deadly violence in their own right.
3) The opponent has already killed people on a scale that would enrage or terrify any reasonably normal person.

Darkseid and Zod both qualify on all three counts.

Superman does not, importantly, snap and kill mere mortal criminals, no matter what they do, even though it would be incredibly easy for him to kill them without a trace. No matter how serious their crimes are, no matter how easily he could get away with it, no matter how they mock his code of, y'know, not killing anyone.

Superman is not "very willing to play judge, jury, and executioner" in the mainstream continuities. In fact, he is almost inhumanly restrained about never doing so, with only a handful of exceptions in the most extreme conditions.

So I don't know what source material gives you the idea that Superman is "very willing" to act as an executioner. He "always seems to snap first" only if you ignore all the source material in which he, y'know, doesn't snap despite considerable provocation.
 
I still stand by the idea Lex wouldn't care, and honestly he's a lot better when he's more of a ruthless businessman- of course he'd take offense at Superman, what businessman wouldn't feel insulted by some rando appearing out of nowhere and stealing away "their" fame? Anything else are really just justifications for why they're "totally not unreasonable".
I'm not attempting to argue whether or not Lex would hate Superman so much as I'm trying to point out that the argument is biased and not really a critique of the actual character. Lex has plenty he finds wrong with Superman but not all of Lex's issues are things a normal person who can objectively understand the situation would necessarily agree with.

I don't know what Lex being a businessman has anything to do with discussing whether or not superheroes are selfish so that seems like a non-sequitur for me. That being said most businessmen aren't constantly chasing fame and trying to get into the spotlight, most of them are pretty anonymous to the average person on the street. Within just the top ten richest people on the planet many of them (Bernard Arnault, Larry Ellison, Larry Page, Sergey Brin and Mukesh Ambani) are not household names. The people below that are even more unknown. Even CEO's of extremely well known companies are not incredibly famous (the CEO of McDonalds, Chris Kempczinski is unknown despite his position and wealth). So to answer your question "what businessman wouldn't feel insulted by some rando appearing out of nowhere and stealing their fame?" I'd say the vast majority of them because the vast majority of businessmen aren't all that famous to begin with.

Lex having issues with Superman is a unique situation relatively speaking because Superman presses a ton of Lex's buttons in ways few other individuals can. That being said while Lex is (hopefully) understandable I do think it is important to recognize he is incredibly biased and at that some of where he is coming from is less motivated from logic and more from him hating Superman due to emotional/psychological reasons and then retroactively justifying it with semi-convincing logic framed around making his desire to destroy Superman seem understandable and the correct thing to do. You can agree with Lex Luthor to some degree and because a lot of the quest is filtered through Lex's POV he'll seem to be in the right most of the time but at the end of the day I personally am still writing him as the villain who does not hold the moral high ground in the conflict with Superman.
 
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Businessmen don't really like getting showed up, so Superman's mere existence would set him off because Superman is "trying" to "steal" his role of being Metropolis's "hero"- of being the only one they need. Also, Superheroes totally have "what measure is a non-human" going on- they really do care less about anything they don't consider to be a real person. I don't wanna get into a whole thing, I just thought it was really crappy Superman didn't just fight off Brainiac and made him Earth's problem for no reason.
 
Businessmen don't really like getting showed up, so Superman's mere existence would set him off because Superman is "trying" to "steal" his role of being Metropolis's "hero"- of being the only one they need. Also, Superheroes totally have "what measure is a non-human" going on- they really do care less about anything they don't consider to be a real person. I don't wanna get into a whole thing, I just thought it was really crappy Superman didn't just fight off Brainiac and made him Earth's problem for no reason.
Few things to touch on in this comment.

First of all not liking to be shown up is kind of a human thing, not really a businessman thing. Most businessmen wouldn't care about Superman being Metropolis' hero because they don't see themselves as Metropolis' savior, they see themselves as a businessperson trying to make money. Lex's pseudo-messiah complex kicking in and making him hate Superman is understandable but it's not exactly reasonable. Superman is by no means crafting a narrative, much less that he's the only hero people need, and Lex being infuriated that someone showed him up as the greatest, most powerful, most beloved person in Metropolis and then interpreting the events that happened as doing those things in order to justify hating and wanting to destroy Superman is not exactly sane. Lex wants to be Superman but doesn't believe he can be so he constantly reinterprets things so that both Superman isn't as good as he seems and is in some way worse than Lex so Lex is justified in wanting to get rid of this individual. There's a huge difference between disliking someone for arrogantly showing you up, and formulating plans to kill and discredit someone because they looked better than you.

Secondly everyone has "what measure is a non-human" going on. Superheroes aren't an exception just because they put on spandex and give themselves fancy names. There's a spectrum even amongst those characters. Most superheroes don't seem particularly biased against Red Tornado and the Metal Men, or Martian Manhunter or Kilowog and effectively treat them as human. I don't really think this is a legitimate complaint unless you are attempting to argue that it's an unreasonable trait or flaw for a character to have where they are more likely to empathize with things that look broadly human than those that don't and thus be biased in how fast they are willing to resort to lethal force. Generally the things that superheroes are across the board willing to destroy/kill are things which don't have free will (robots, parademons, imperiax drones etc.) or are in a state of full on war. I don't think this is much of a reasonable critique to have when pretty solidly non-human entities like Gorilla Grodd, Metallo, Blackfire, Mongul and Despero, aren't killed any more than the human supervillains. I don't think there's much of a legitimate critique here as it seems to be based on a false impression or two.

As for Superman not fighting off Brainiac and leading him back to earth the actual situation is more complicated than that. The Superman in quest can't breathe in space, was abducted to who knows where in the galaxy, doesn't know who or what Brainiac is and did attempt to avoid him. Did Superman screw up by leading Brainiac back to earth? Arguably yes but the actual situation is a lot more complicated than "Superman ran away from Brainiac and led him back to earth without ever attempting to get rid of him" and his mistake is a lot more reasonable when you realize that Superman is totally unfamiliar with outer space and doesn't even know what Brainiac is (for example he doesn't know that Brainiac is an artificial intelligence that regularly uses drones that look like humanoid aliens but aren't critical in any way). Superman did screw up but I'd like to believe he was reasonable in how he screwed up given what he knew at the time. I won't reveal what exactly happened as that can be purchased in another Lobo omake but you don't have all the information about what occurred. You can still make plans as Lex based off of what you do vaguely know but you ought to keep in mind that there is a distinction between what people know and what is objectively true about the situation.
 
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