4. The Rawhide Kid
Well, racism was always going to be a sensitive issue when it comes to...anything, really. But that was in the late 1980s, surely Marvel would have learned to treat the barely walked paths of superhero traits where taboo is still existent some twenty years later, right? Nope. Not even a little. Step forward, The Rawhide Kid. What was originally a typical rough and tumble cowboy comic of the 1970s got an unexpected reboot in the 21st century. What was once a gun-slinging, bully thwarting western man of noble morals inexplicably became a weirdly homosexual slapstick act. Of course, I'm not saying there's anything immoral or weird about being homosexual, but the Rawhide Kid was transformed into what can best be described as a Carry On film crossed with anyone who was ever affiliated with Frankie Goes To Hollywood. His homosexuality became a reference point in pretty much every frame of every comic he appeared in. We're not talking about just a cheap gap (as above) all the time either, but punctuating sentences with typically camp expressions as "honey" and making remarks about how fabulously dressed he was. Disturbingly, the latter trait led to a female character stating how she believed such a thing was a "terrible waste of MAN-flesh", almost throwing a lovely piece of hateful bigotry our way right there. Oh, and his name was the RAWHIDE Kid...RAW...HIDE. Good god. Get it? It's a suggestion that...oh, nevermind.