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| - The Nineties Anti-Hero is a specific version of the Anti-Hero. Not all such characters were created during the 1990s, but that was the time when they were most common and most popular. The Nineties Anti-Hero is the polar opposite of your typical Silver Age Superhero. Not only are they flawed, they may lack any heroic attributes. However, they're rarely ineffectual or pathetic (in the eyes of the writer, anyway), generally instead being totally committed to whatever they're doing at the moment. They have no compunction about killing villains, and indeed, this may extend to anyone who gets in their way; facing The Cape or any hero who does mind, they sneer at them as outdated. Their super-powers (if they have superpowers -- many are Badass Normals) tend towards the lethal as well, and may in
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| abstract
| - The Nineties Anti-Hero is a specific version of the Anti-Hero. Not all such characters were created during the 1990s, but that was the time when they were most common and most popular. The Nineties Anti-Hero is the polar opposite of your typical Silver Age Superhero. Not only are they flawed, they may lack any heroic attributes. However, they're rarely ineffectual or pathetic (in the eyes of the writer, anyway), generally instead being totally committed to whatever they're doing at the moment. They have no compunction about killing villains, and indeed, this may extend to anyone who gets in their way; facing The Cape or any hero who does mind, they sneer at them as outdated. Their super-powers (if they have superpowers -- many are Badass Normals) tend towards the lethal as well, and may include growing spikes out of one's body, the power to psychically boil blood, or turning any item into a gun. They are usually either demonic or technological in origin. Male Nineties Anti-Heroes are ridiculously muscled, and often wear lots of pouches or bandoliers. There's a good chance he's either young and "hip", or middle aged with lots of long, grey hair, beard stubble, and scars. He also probably has at least one eye that looks fake, injured, or diseased and he carries a ludicrously oversized gun or sword that no human being could possible carry. Female Nineties Anti-Heroes, like most female superheroes, have large breasts and small waists, but unlike most female superheroes, this is often taken to disfiguring extremes courtesy of the ineptitude of the trope's pioneering artists. They don't tend to wear very much clothing (or if they do, it'll be typical superheroic barely-there "spandex" which showcases their exaggerated/inaccurate anatomy). But they still usually wear tights in some form. The ultimate extreme of the female version was the "bad girl" subgenre, featuring ludicrously buxom, near-naked Dark Action Girls, generally with some kind of supernatural nature or origin, hacking and pouting their way through plots designed solely to offer as much Gorn and Fan Service as possible. Usually they'll have gritty, one-word names that used to be reserved for villains, often creatively misspelled ("Shade" becomes "Shayde", etc) to appear more dramatic or, because poor literacy is kewl, to make the character look radical. Never, of course, for trademark purposes. In terms of characterization, they have four modes: brooding, sarcastic, Badass, or just plain psychotic. How much of any one side they show over the others is the main thing that sets them apart from each other. Artist/writer Rob Liefeld is most prominently associated with Nineties Anti-Heroes (and pouches). Todd McFarlane and Jim Lee are also prominent artists from the period. The origins of this trope extend at least to the mid-'80s; two critically praised comics, Watchmen and Batman: The Dark Knight Returns were both published in 1986. Both comics were influential in that they "deconstructed" traditional Superheroic tropes, employing them for more sophisticated ends; Watchmen, after all, is considered by some to be the greatest comic of all time. The Nineties Anti-Hero was born when other writers connected the success of these series with their dark mood and overt violence, mixed their limited understanding of these works with tropes from the action movies of the time, and went from "heroes with flaws" to "characters constructed entirely of flaws". Speaking of action movies, an argument can also be made that the Nineties Anti-Hero came about more from the influence of the Action Hero archetype that was popular at around the same time than anything seen in Watchmen. Indeed, many Nineties Anti-Heroes would spout One-Liners that would not at all be out of place in an Arnold Schwarzenegger or Steven Seagal movie. Note that, in spite of the cynical-sounding write-up, this is not a bad trope, it's just very difficult to describe without making the whole premise sound inherently ridiculous. Much Darker and Edgier fiction tends to suffer from this problem. This can make sorting out the parodies a little tricky. If one is replacing an older more optimistic hero, you have an example of an Anti-Hero Substitute. Commonly paired with Superhero Packing Heat. Generally these prominent figures are a type IV or V in the Sliding Scale of Anti-Heroes (though some might qualify as Anti Villains) and True Neutral or Chaotic Neutral in the Character Alignment. See also: Designated Hero and Byronic Hero. Should not be confused with the Sociopathic Hero, who is blatantly evil and often Played for Laughs. Many, but certainly not all, Nineties Anti-Heroes are Nominal Heroes. Examples of Nineties Anti-Hero include:
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