Despite whether a superhero or villain is lame or cool, the code name often makes or breaks a reputation. Here are five code names that rock and make other comic book characters jealous. Eye Scream is probably crying somewhere …
(Supes didn’t make the list, either.)
Setting personal preferences aside and just looking at the names is hard. But for SOME odd reason, heroes and villains with awesome names tend to be, well, awesome. Who’d have guessed? 
1. Scarlet Witch
Not only is Wanda Maximoff’s code name pretty cool by itself, but she’s the friggin’ daughter of one of the most powerful villains in the Marvel Universe (not to mention one of the most dangerous villains): Magneto. If that doesn’t make you keep your distance, her mutant abilities will. Able to warp reality through probability, her powers are, yeah, a little freaky.
And just like Jean Grey (aka Phoenix), her powers are especially deadly when she loses control. Great.
Wanda’s chaos magic, which was revealed to be an uncontrolled aspect of her mutant power, began to wear away at her mental stability. When vague memories of her children resurfaced, she suffered a nervous breakdown and lashed out with her new power, subjecting the Avengers to a series of devastating attacks, apparently killing several team members and ultimately causing the dissolution of the team.
Because making shit go down by manipulating fields of probability is damn attractive.
2. Deadpool
Named after a game called “the Dead Pool”—in which the goal is to predict who will die next—the Merc with a Mouth already has morbidity working on his side. Wade Wilson had cancer—only to have the Weapon X program give him regenerative powers, putting his terminal illness at bay. So really, he should be dead. What’s more, he once survived decapitation: his head didn’t grow back, it had to be sewn back on. How’s that for morbid?
In due course, Wilson formed a semi-romantic relationship with the cosmic entity Death, who regarded him as a kindred spirit.
… I’m sorry, what? You’re a kindred spirit with Death, you say? Huh. Well, best wishes to the two of you, I guess.
He’s also an excellent assassin/mercenary-for-hire, with prowess as a marksman and hand-to-hand and weapons combatant. In other words, don’t piss him off or you might lose your head—and nobody’s going to sew it back on for you.
I like him already.
3. Nightcrawler
BAMF!
Nightcrawler’s pretty bad ass. I mean, he’s a devout Catholic who paradoxically looks like a blue-skinned demon. Not just anybody can pull that off—and with style, too.
If being able to teleport while leaving colored smoke that smells of brimstone isn’t cool enough, Kurt Wagner’s a highly skilled acrobat thanks to his flexible spine. Plus, he can cling to surfaces with his hands and feet.
He’s also the son of Raven Darkholme, aka Mystique, who is a pretty nifty character herself.
And how often is it that you almost become a Pope, then get deemed Satan—all because you were dragged into a church’s scheme to take over the world?
Ultimately it came to light that Kurt had never been fully ordained, rather he had been telepathically coerced into believing so as part of a plan by the Church of Humanity’s Supreme Pontiff to bring down the Catholic Church by installing Kurt as the next Pope then revealing to the world that he was “satan”. The X-Men subsequently defeated the Church of Humanity and prevented their plan for world domination.
Holy crap.
All in a day’s work for the X-men.
4. Nightwing
Two in a row? Evidently the formula for a kick ass code name starts with “Night” and ends with another noun.
Richard Grayson has come a long way since the circus, where he swung through the air from dizzying heights as a member of “The Flying Graysons.” After his parents were murdered, Bruce Wayne (aka Batman) took him as his ward, and the young Dick Grayson spent his nights fighting at the Dark Knight’s side as Robin, the Boy Wonder.
As the years passed, however, Batman and Robin would go their separate ways. They no longer agreed on crime-fighting mythologies, Grayson longed for independence, and other occurrences finally led Dick to leave the Batcave. New costume. New affiliations. New name. Nightwing.
Not only is the name “Nightwing” damn cool, but it’s a major step up from Robin, of all things. And it says a lot about your choice of code names when people are constantly stealing it (and your outfit).
In the 2006 One Year Later storylines, multiple characters join Dick Grayson in using the name “Nightwing”. Bruce Jones’ Nightwing run features Jason Todd prowling the streets of New York City under the guise of Nightwing, copying Grayson’s costume. Additionally, a metahuman fashion designer named Cheyenne Freemont dons a modified Nightwing costume to help Grayson. In Greg Rucka’s Supergirl (Vol. 3) #6, Power Girl and Supergirl assume the identities of Nightwing and Flamebird in a story set in Kandor, just as in the original stories featuring Superman.
They’re just jealous (and so were at least two others, apparently).
I’d be bummed, too, if people kept using my code name.
5. Rorschach
It’s not easy to pull off being a sincere Catholic slash teleporting, blue-colored mutant with a devil’s tail—but who knew ink blots could be so awesome?
“Raw what? Did you say shark? Raw shark? Why should I want to know where to find … raw shark.”
Not exactly how you pronounce Joseph Kovacs’s code name (it’s named after the ink blot test, not fish), but it might as well be. What a great … really screwed up but incredibly astute anti-hero.
It was while he was in high school that he learned of his mother’s death, a force-feeding of Drano from her pimp. His one word reply to the event: “Good.” He was sixteen.
And his mask was made from a woman’s dress—how messed up is that? Of course, the woman never actually wore the dress … but let’s not go there.
Rorschach is my personal favorite character from Watchmen. We’ll be seeing you next year at the movies, Rorschach!
Guy in back: I see in the ink blots … me on fire.
Discuss: Did I miss someone? What comic book characters do you think have the most awesome code names?
August 11th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Weapon X. I love how it has changed it’s meaning over time. First as the project just known as X. Then possibly meaning a project conducted on people with the “X” gene, and ending up meaning that it was the tenth experiment of it’s kind, thus “X” meaning 10.
August 11th, 2008 at 7:18 pm
Ohh, that’s definitely a good one.
August 11th, 2008 at 8:56 pm
good list, wish i had a cool menacing nickname like Deadpool
September 25th, 2009 at 5:02 pm
I have my own little homemade comic strip where the main character’s name is “Richter” which means “judge” in German. I feel very proud of that name.