Superpowers
The superpowers of Johnny B, Gloria, and El are exciting, fun, and infinitely memorable. Of course, fans each have their own favorite of the three powers — powers they probably secretly wish they had.
Electrical Manipulation
Johnny B
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Telekinesis
Gloria
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Shrinking
El
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This is a wonderful short essay about the superpowers of the Misfits sent to me by Tiziano Caliendo, an MoS fan from Italy. Thanks, Tiz, this is very cool!
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BILLY - Billy is the classic "normal hero" who helps the superheroes to get the mission accomplished and the job done. This is a very important stereotype in the comic book world, to the point that there are several characters in history to have issued such mentorship quality for "freaks". Half Michael J. Fox (with his happy-go-lucky charm), half Nikola Tesla (with his genius), half Professor Xavier (of X-Men fame), all eighties guy!
JOHNNY B - Johnny is a mishmash of several personas pretty popular in either the real world or the comic book world. He looks like the lovechild of Val Kilmer's character in the 1984 comedy movie 'Top Secret' (Nick Rivers) and real world famed Duran Duran eighties guitarist Andy Taylor: handsome face, sunglasses, Elvis-like hairdo, bravado and much rebel attitude.
I bet singer Rick Springfield even played a major role in the "shaping" of Johnny.
Powers-wise, the first character to come to mind is infamous villain 'Electro', arch-enemy of Spider-Man, but even Elle Bishop from Tim Kring's fantastic show 'Heroes' (yes, THAT Tim Kring who also wrote a Misfits episode). His speed is borrowed from 'the Flash' (Barry Allen being the most popular man to take that mantle) and 'Quicksilver' (a mutant in the Marvel universe).
His weakness (water) is a very refreshing take on the electric man fictional cliché; I don't remember any energy-powered character to display such a commonly spread Achilles' heel. Even Elle Bishop suffered some problems related to water, but not so extreme and severe as our beloved Mr. B.
Finally, I doubt American audiences spotted a (slight) estethical similarity with the highly-successful Italian comedian Jerry Calà.
EL - Unmistakenly, he is the second shrinking black superhero in history! Yes, there's another black character to perform miniaturization like 'Ant-Man' (Henry "Hank" Pym; also known as 'Yellowjacket', 'Giant-Man', 'Goliath' and now 'Wasp') or 'the Atom' (Ray Palmer) used to do... I'm talking about the forgotten 'Microwoman' from the 1979 short-lived Filmation cartoon segment "Superstretch and Microwoman". Her true identity was Christy Cross, and she could shrink down to microscopical size by using some obscure neural process (she appears to need to concentrate when doing this). Sounds familiar? Anyway, her power seems to be energy-field induced and not originated by any chemical medium.
GLORIA - Telekinesis is the most common female superpower in (duh) fictional worlds. Stephen King's Carrie, Jean Grey/Marvel Girl from X-Men, just to name some chicks. Anyway, the fact that Gloria's power is depicted on-screen by a "negative photography" effect is quite a subtle and original touch, since she is actually "negating" the force of gravity's efforts on bodies.
Nobody ever noticed this before, but there's a "Gloria" in the popular 1985 cartoon 'M.A.S.K.', and she looks like Courteney Cox a lot!
I will also consider Beef to be a part of the team with his powers of freezing.
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