Designing superheroes is a tough gig. Even more so these days when all the good gimmicks are taking used to be that Stan Lee could spend an idle afternoon staring around his office, notice a creepy-crawly making its way up the wall, and have Steve Ditko putting together a web-covered costume for Spider-Man that same afternoon. Then you factor in The Incredibles convincing everyone that capes are a bad idea... For the most part, all the classic heroes have iconic costumes that have become part of their character, and have stayed that way for decades. Besides some little tweaks here and there, Superman and Batman look basically the same now as they did in the thirties, and their movie outfits tend to follow a similar vein. Here's the thing, though: how about the creators didn't luck out first time? What about the heroes with terrible costumes? Even if they're good, you'd think the characters in question would fancy a change of clothes every once in a while. They're only human. Most of them are. Some of them are the lost sons of alien worlds whose costume is organic armour, or something. You can't trust comics companies themselves to handle these makeovers well, which might be why it's fallen to fans to get creative in their own time. The internet is awash with stylish, elegant, radical takes on familiar comic book characters and their often terrible, other times tired costumes. Here are twenty-five of the coolest superhero redesigns.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
