Who Wants to be a Superhero?
Who Wants to be a Superhero's 11 contestants
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Thursday, 10, May 2007 02:55
"Immortality: Take it; it's yours." So says Brad Pitt's Achilles in 2004 movie Troy. And that's exactly what's on offer to the participants in Who Wants to be a Superhero (WWTBAS).
Hailing from a country where television schedules are saturated with reality shows beyond a level even seen in Britain, WWTBAS still manages to stand out from the crowd of American Idol, Big Brother, Survivor et al.
The 11 contestants selected for the six-episode series, which received its UK premiere on the Sci-Fi Channel last weekend, are largely devoid of the fame-grabbing antics that hinder the aforementioned shows.
Each of the 11 on WWTBAS (with maybe one or two exceptions) are motivated by the slightly unsettling desire to help their fellow citizens and make the world a better place; while dressed in spandex.
To watch the Who Wants to be a Superhero trailer click here.
One such superhero hopeful is Chris Watters, AKA Major Victory, who flew to London last week to promote the show's UK launch.
In many ways he is the typical US reality TV contestant; his native America's broadcast culture breeding an innate brashness rarely found on our shores.
But then some answers Watters gives to questions InTheNews asked him suggest that the line between superhero and alter ego had become blurred, despite his insistences to the contrary. He is also genuinely terse when I fail to correctly repeat his catchphrase 'Be a winner not a wiener'.
What is WWTBAS all about? "It's about a lot of things," Major Victory explains while dressed in his superhero costume.
"It's about 11 superheroes who come to one place to try to be immortalised by Stan Lee - the creator of Spider-Man, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four, all these different guys - just amazing."
Of course even Spider-Man creator and all round comic-book icon Stan Lee cannot supply literal immortality as the show's ultimate prize, but he can offer the winner his or her own Dark Horse comic book and the chance to star in an original Sci-Fi Channel movie.
"For me, being a huge comic book fan, and a huge superhero kind of person, that's big," Major Victory says of the prize that awaits the winner of WWTBAS.
After a selection process that saw applicants making their own costumes and explaining their back story to Stan Lee, the 11 superhero aspirants are whisked away to a secret lair somewhere in Los Angeles.
"It was kind of weird [living in the lair] because we were all in the same room, and every night someone would go home and there would be one less of us, and it got kind of empty in there," Major Victory reveals.
"But it was interesting being with the other superheroes, because these people genuinely cared about others and it wasn't everybody out to get each other. I think in other reality shows they do that," he explained, adding that the lack of heat between the contestants is what sets WWTBAS apart from other reality TV shows.
From this base the superheroes are set a succession of tasks ranging from rescuing blonde twins from a burning building and staving off two attack dogs, to 'connecting' with convicted felons and changing into their superhero costumes in public by the overlord Stan Lee, who in keeping with his role as the person who decides who stays and who goes (no phone-in votes here) appears only on giant TV screens.
"I would say the best challenge was the one involving two attack dogs coming at us," Major Victory says. "And that was interesting because your initial reaction when two things are attacking you like that is to curl into a ball, but I opened up a little bit [stretches arms out]."
So just what are Major Victory's powers?
"Here's the full story: I was involved in a speaker cabinet factory incident; it blew up. Through the years I gained my powers, my powers are I can jump 375 yards in the air, I can manipulate sound and I can levitate. In fact I'm levitating right now because I'm just so happy!
"And my kryptonite is that I'm lactose intolerant. But what I've found is that when I do have a little bit of milk I can jump just a little bit higher.
"And my hair: It's not really a super power; I kind of do that every morning. It's just super. I've always had good hair, that's just genetics."
He jokes that the initial thinking behind his own costume - the original designs of which were the contestants' own work - was "can I get into it".
"I like the shiny pants. [Pings underwear] That has a resonance that is just amazing. Plus now I have a cape and I cut the ends of my gloves off so you can see my phalanges," Major Victory adds.
But as Stan 'the man' Lee tells us, you need more than a tight costume and world beating superpowers to be a hero - it's what inside that matters.
As part of his promotional work on the UK launch of WWTBAS, Major Victory walked the streets of central London (dressed in full costume) to keep an eye out for his fellow world citizens in the UK.
"How do they react to me? 'Who the hell are you?' I'm trying to change that one country at a time. But when I tell them I'm Major Victory they're like 'yeah, Stan Lee, the show. can you help me mow my lawn?' I have to save people though - People need my help."
And what does the future hold for Major Victory post-WWTBAS?
"Well I would like to see this character go forward just a little bit more. Look at Spider-Man, new film coming out soon and it's got two sequels under its belt. That's not too bad," he said.
I ask him whether he has set his eyes on a movie trilogy. "That would be nice, yeah. Why not?" is Major Victory's reply.
Matthew Champion
Who Wants to be a Superhero - contestant roster
Major Victory
Alter ego: Chris Watters, DJ
Powers: Levitation, super jumps
Weakness: Lactose intolerant
Catchphrase: Be a winner, not a wiener
Feedback
Alter ego: Matthew Atherton, software engineer
Powers: Absorbs abilities from video games, disrupts electrical fields
Weakness: Foreign computer games
Catchphrase: OK, lecture's over - time for some Feedback!
Major Victory says: Intense
Fat Momma
Alter ego: Nell Wilson, single mum
Powers: Can grow five times her size when angry
Weakness: Health foods
Catchphrase Saving the world, one doughnut at a time
Major Victory says: Kind
Nitro G
Alter ego: Darren Passarello, student
Powers: Super strength, super speed, flight - the lot
Weakness: When his adrenaline levels fall so do his powers
Catchphrase: None
Major Victory says: Small
Lemuria
Alter ego: Tonatzin Mondragon, sculptor
Powers: Laser beams, fireballs, flight
Weakness: Darkness
Catchphrase: Hello, sunshine!
Major Victory says: Nice
Iron Enforcer
Alter ego: Steel Chambers, bodyguard
Powers: Array of weapons, death punch
Weakness: Has only five years to live
Catchphrase: Always outnumbered; never outgunned
Major Victory says: Stinky
Monkey Woman
Alter ego: Mary Votava, investor
Powers: Banana-shaped weapons
Weakness: Calliope organs
Catchphrase: Ooh ooh ah ohh ah
Major Victory says: Loud
Cell Phone Girl
Alter ego: Chelsea Weld, interior designer
Powers: Free travel through mobile phone networks, learns internet-based information automatically
Weakness: Locations with bad phone reception
Catchphrase: Listen to this!
Major Victory says: Decent person
Ty'veculus
Alter ego: E Quincy Sloan, fireman captain
Powers: Fire resistance, super strength, human lie detector
Weakness: Beauty distracts him
Catchphrase: Good night
Major Victory says: Big
Creature
Alter ego: Tonya Kay, mechanic
Powers: Organic food has healing properties, magical bullwhip
Weakness: Hair is the source of her strength
Catchphrase: Why not?!
Major Victory says: Environmental. naked chick
Levity
Alter ego: Tobias Trost, toy designer
Powers: Air blasts can break concrete
Weaknesses: Needs air to survive
Catchphrase: None
Major Victory says: Gay