50 Greatest Super Heroes In Comic Book History

31. Martian Manhunter

(Write-up by Nick Tylwalk, Bam Smack Pow Editor)

One of the real shames of the New 52 relaunch of the Justice League was the removal of the Martian Manhunter as one of its founders. It’s cool that DC wanted to get Cyborg onto the team, but a League without J’onn J’onzz? That’s bordering on blasphemy.

In both comics and animation, J’onn had established himself as the tactical link that enabled the League to perform at its best. Thanks to his telepathic gifts, his fellow heroes never needed to rely on technology to stay in contact with one another, and with Martian Manhunter delivering orders right into their brains, it was easy to see what an important cog he had become.

I almost wrote that J’onzz served as their backup muscle too, but that would be selling him short. Thanks to a ludicrously deep pool of super powers, he was like Superman, the Vision, Mr. Fantastic and Professor X rolled into one. That made it extra silly that his one weakness, fire, was such a common one, but without that he probably wouldn’t even be fun to write.

And sure, the Martian Manhunter is still around, and he’s even got a Justice League of his own now, in a sense. It simply shouldn’t have come to that, as except for Marvel’s Hawkeye with the Avengers, it’s hard to think of any hero as devoted to a team as J’onn was to the pre-New 52 League. He deserved better.

Next: No. 30: A hero even before he became a man