Theme Week Intro.

Despite what TV, radio, department stores, scratch off lottery tickets, and advertising in all its forms would have you believe, the next big holiday is Thanksgiving. Not Pre-Black Friday Thursday, Thanksgiving. The holiday, that despite how it may or may not have originated, is supposed to be about getting together with family (be they biological and/or chosen family) and stuffing our faces with an oversized bird that could have been our national bird. We sure dodged a bullet with that one.

The whole holiday thing was in my head when I conceived my latest idea for a theme week. See if you can follow my train of thought. While Thanksgiving is supposed to be about seeing and enjoying family, the truth of the matter is that there are some family members that you might not want to see. It’s a sad fact of life that I think everyone knows, or is themselves, someone that has family that you’d rather leave off the guest list. It could be a particularly obnoxious aunt/uncle, mean spirited in-laws, that step-sibling that’s been a complete tool from the first meeting, a sibling that is living an unconventional lifestyle, or a grandparent/parents that is crotchety and/or old timey racist. Those people that just make family gatherings a little uncomfortable.

This thought mixed in with one of my other primary thoughts, superheroes, and got me thinking about who has it worse. Sure, the jerk step-sibling may be a pain, but at least he hasn’t actively tried to kill you like Charles’ Xavier’s step-brother Cain Marko. No matter how bad an in-law can be, they don’t hold a candle to the Hulk’s father-in-law, Thaddeus Thunderbolt Ross, who has spent the last oh forty years trying to get ol’ Bruce on a dissection table. As bad as sibling rivalry and old grudges can get, I doubt any of us have to deal with a brother that is a bigger pain in the butt than Aquaman’s brother, the self-proclaimed Ocean Master. And as weird or unconventional as some family members can be, at least you don’t have to deal with Wolverine’s son, Daken, who is a claw waving lunatic.

If you haven’t guessed it just yet, that’s the end-of-November-start-of-December theme, People you should be glad you don’t have to invite for the holidays. I’ll be using baddies from both major comic book companies. The only criteria I’m really using is that these guys are 1. Villains, and 2. That they have particularly close ties to their superhero nemesis. Typically relation by blood or marriage. I’ll be using the four guys mentioned above, as well as a few others to round out the week. They’ll be your typical villain profiles, but with a few more comments on the familial relationships that the villain of the day shares with their hero. This post kicks off the week, and six villains will follow, hopefully ending the week by November 30^th.

“Why didn’t you start this sooner,” you may be asking. Because I am still working on time management skills and you can’t rush genius. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

Starting off this week will be Talia al’Ghul, daughter of famed Batman villain Raz al’Ghul and on-again-off-again lover of the caped crusader. You don’t get much more complicated than their relationship. I couldn't think of any photos for this one, so here's a picture of a family having Thanksgiving dinner. Enjoy.

Come eat with us, Michael, forever and ever and ever.
(Shudder.)