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Animal Man is one of my most loved DC heroes. I first saw him in the Who's Who series in the 80's. I managed to track down some of his appearances. Then the Grant Morrison series started up and it became my favorite DC title for it's entire run. Animal Man is Buddy Baker a man who is exposed to a mysterious ray from a UFO. He acquires the ability to absorb the natural abilities of any animal that is with in his range. What makes me love Buddy so much is he is a working class hero. He has a family,wife and two kids. He works as a stunt man ,since heroes don't get paid. And he questions the whole superhero shtick.Then there is Man-Bat a Batman foe who at one time in the 70's managed to get his own title for a short run. He is a scientist who is experimenting with bats to see if it can repair his damaged hearing. Instead he mutates into a half man half bat. More of a tragic hero than a villain he has fought Batman many times,with most stories ending with him being cured. But the cures always last until he is needed again for a story.The Man-bat origin is written by Jan Strnad aka J.Knight and has art by Kevin Nowlen. Where as the Animal Man origin is written by Grant Morrison with art by Tom Grumett. Both of who were the creative team on the Animal Man series that was running at this time. The Animal Man origin is the better of the two art wise and story wise,but the Man-Bat one is still pretty good.8 outta 10
