Maxwell Lord IV (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
takeittothemax) wrote2023-06-13 09:58 pm
takeittothemax) wrote2023-06-13 09:58 pm
Entry tags:
OOC: application for Tu Shanshu
Player Information:
Name: Box
Age: 24
Contact: email: boxofgrenades@gmail.com, aim: bardwithnoname, plurk: likeabox
Game Cast: n/a
Character Information:
Name: Maxwell Lord IV
Canon: DC Comics | Justice League
Canon Point: The Superbuddies Era. This takes place before Identity Crisis and Countdown to Infinite Crisis, even if issue release dates say otherwise. Among other things, this means that Ted Kord and Sue Dibny are still alive.
Age: The usual ‘comic book time makes no sense’ disclaimer applies here. He’s got a canon birthday (April 1st, 1951), but as that’d make him way too old, it doesn’t really work anymore. He seems to be in his late thirties, for the most part. Although I dunno if he can age anymore because cyborg.
Reference: character and 'verse and bonus wiki. As a minor note, his parental history as presented in the third link is based on retcons that I won't be using. His father, Maxwell Lord III, is a professor at Yale, most importantly.
Setting:
In this world, superheroes aren’t just things you see on TV or in the movies. Well, they might appear on TV, but as news coverage and not cartoons. Usually. There’s a wide variety of superheroes, from aliens powered by the sun to normal people with rage issues and a costume. A large amount of these heroes end up being metahumans. Basically, metahumans (or metas) have a genetic structure that supports the development of powers, and the second a convenient lab accident or some such happens, bam, there you go. The vast majority of superheroes are accepted and even greatly praised for their heroic efforts, with museums popping up by the dozens and every city (even the fictional ones) having their own personal hero of choice.
And that’s just on Earth. There’s space cops out there called the Green Lanterns, and to them Earth’s just another quadrant. There’s New Gods, replacements to the old ones who died long ago, locked in a perpetual stalemate between the evil and poorly spelt Apokalips and the good and far removed New Genesis. Throw in numerous alternate dimensions, and it’s a wonder anyone can put their shoes on in the morning without some calamity occurring in the great wide DC world, which actually goes by New Earth.
Maxwell Lord doesn’t fit into any of those categories. At first, anyway. He’s your typical 80s businessman, complete with owning a company whose actual business is totally undefined. He rose to power by plotting to murder his boss via cave related accident, only for an actual accident to happen before he could get to the murdery bit. On the way down after said boss, he runs into an alien supercomputer that convinces him that maybe the world needs saving, and maybe he’s the one who needs to help it along. Which is where his history dovetails with the greater DC universe.
New Earth has so many heroes in it that team ups are not only common but expected. One such group, one of the biggest and most prestigious, is called the Justice League. Usually an 'of America' is tagged onto it, too. After a big time disaster where continuity went fuzzy and all the universes merged into one, the group went defunct, which is where Max stepped in to restore it. Instead of focusing on just America, though, he went through UN channels and expanded it to be an International force. And, once the previously mentioned evil computer got the boot via rebar and a change of heart on Max’s part, Max’s leadership of the League was completely genuine.
The membership changed over time, and eventually ballooned to the point of opening two branches, the first and original one in New York City, and the second in Paris and later London. For the most part, the core members consisted of various second stringers. The most notable of these are as follows: The second Blue Beetle, Ted Kord, who has the powers of being unable to resist cheese steaks and coming up with zany schemes; Booster Gold, who has the powers of self promotion, being from the future, and a shiny suit and flight ring; Guy Gardner, a Green Lantern with a chip on his shoulder the size of Hal Jordan’s face; Tora, a.k.a. Ice, who’s the only quiet person on this team of wackos; her best friend Bea, who goes by Fire and uses Portuguese obscenities and green flame; Ralph Dibny, who’d get called Elongated Man more often if he didn’t insist on introducing himself by name first; Sue, Ralph Dibny’s wife and master of google-fu; Scott Free, an escape artist from Apokalips aka planet New Jersey; Big Barda, who has the powers of sheer badassery and desire to live in the suburbs; and lastly, Captain Atom, who’s a nuclear reactor waiting to blow, if only he could lead the team first. Other notable members of the group are Power Girl, Black Canary, Wally West’s Flash, J’onn J'onzz, and even Batman hung out with them fairly often.
Initially, Scott’s manager Oberon filled the role of lackey, but he was later replaced in this function by L-Ron, a robotic assistant. How the group managed to not kill each other is a minor miracle, being perfectly honest. Still, they saved the world a lot, from an alternate dimension’s post-apocalyptic Extremists to the petty crimes and incompetence of the Injustice League. Max even ended up with mild persuasive powers as a result of that metahuman angle mentioned above. He only used them a handful of times: accidentally to get Ted to rescue him, to get Huntress to join the team, to get a girl named Wanda to talk to him, and to change his chauffeur's name to something that fit better. The powers didn’t last for long, however, due to getting burnt out when an evil psychic from another world named Dreamslayer hijacked him. Other notable members of the rogues gallery include a robotic home shopping network invasion force called The Cluster, run by Manga Khan and where L-Ron came from, and a rivalry with a corporate sponsored superteam called the Conglomerate, which was run by Claire Montgomery. She also happened to be Max’s ex-wife twice over. Good times. Eventually, those times changed, and people moved on. After everything went nineties to the extent that half the team may have been cyborgs at one point, and that’s including Max, the League disbanded for good.
Well, until Max decided everyone should go on a reunion tour, anyway. His latest scheme was called the Superbuddies, and it was based out of a strip mall in Queens. Not his finest hour, here. For one thing, the advertisements were terrible. But he saw a gap in the superhero group market caused by the big guns being inaccessible by everyday people, so he formed up his own. L-Ron got nabbed first, and the rest of the team fell into place. This group kept Ted, Booster, Fire, the Dibnys, and Captain Atom around, substituted Mary Marvel for her brother, Billy, who quit the old JLI early, and everyone else either didn’t get invited, didn’t show up, or didn’t live at the time (sorry, Ice). Not like it helped in Guy’s case, since he ended up crashing the group anyway, but still, the intentions were good.
Continuity was always a bit of a slippery slope in the DC universe. Way too many alternate realities to keep track of. In the run up to a cataclysmic event where time got reshuffled and various characters came back to life, Max was revealed to be evil all along and killed Ted. Also ran a creepy satellite network initially started by Batman. Also got killed by Wonder Woman because he was mind controlling Superman and wouldn’t let him go. And it goes on like this. This will probably come up with various other characters in the DC universe because, you know, big deal. However, I’m ignoring this part because frankly it makes no sense.
Of course, then DC rebooted the entire world so who knows if any of this stuff even really happened anymore. So let’s also ignore the reboot here.
Personality:
Maxwell Lord loves only two things: money and himself. Mostly money. He’ll do anything to make and keep a buck, from poorly thought out superventures to get rich quick schemes. He passes ulcers on the way to a rage black out when his money gets swindled to fund the even more poorly thought out KooeyKooeyKooey casino. Forget poorly explained turns to evil, dickery, and mind control; this is probably the closest he gets to straight up homicide. As for the narcissism, his ego’s roughly the size of Neptune and getting bigger by the acquisition. He prefers a certain amount of bootlicking in his lackeys, preferably subtle but ‘O Beloved Leader’ works in a pinch. He’s confident in himself to the point of arrogance, assumes he knows what’s best for everyone, and tends to steamroll disagreements.
Of course, when you’re a manipulative little shit, such confidence comes with the territory. Granted, his scheming is more on the level of used car salesman than world domination, but the point is that he’s got a tendency to smarm and scheme his way to the top. Max only apologizes when he wants something, pushes people around on strings, and seems to know the vaguely right buttons to press to get people to go along with him. For example, when he tries to reunite the Justice League, he tells Ted that Booster’s in before even talking to the walking billboard himself. Back when he formed it in the first place, he appeared more like a shadowy, shady puppet master than an actual boss. Max has ambition by the truckload, and doesn’t let pesky things like morality and the right thing stop him. The only reason he won’t sell you for a dollar is because he probably thinks he can get a better deal.
Well, and the fact that he’s kind. Not much of a perk when you’re an amoral 80s businessman, but the fact remains valid, much to his dismay and confusion. He claims to have always been an idealist at heart, but if you’re gonna swim with the sharks, you’ve gotta get a pair of fins to match, so he made himself ruthless to fit in. It’s notable that even in the bad old days, he had some variety of standards. What’s haunting about how his boss died isn’t the death so much as Max never truly knowing if he’d have been able to go through with it. He also shows a slight tendency to balk when faced with Uppercase Evil, like when the computer system activates a death ray satellite without him knowing it, but it’s very subtle and downplayed. Still, his ruthlessness at this time can’t be denied. This streak’s best demonstrated by him setting up a terrorist’s death to set up the league. What prompts his turn away from the dark side is the knowledge that he’s sending the League into a trap, and he just can’t do that anymore.
The effect his friendship with the League has on him cannot be overstated, either. His character development can be traced entirely by how he reacts to and thinks of them. He goes from coldly manipulating the league as if they’re tools to a man who stands around panicking and useless when the group gets kidnapped. His ruthless streak also fades over time, as by the end of the series he goes from a guy who can manipulate a man to his death to one who shows tremendous guilt over people he killed while possessed. While his moneygrubbing continues unabated, he does show less actual enjoyment of Rich People Things over time, to the point of getting bored at a cocktail party. Even the psychic power related moral quandaries tend to resolve themselves with positive developments. After using them to get a girl to talk to him, he has a morality/alcohol induced nightmare about him slipping up on his good behavior and into stupid evil territory. The pink costume didn’t help, either. He seems to think of the Justice League as his family, and consistently not only cares *about* them but also what they think of him. After a funeral, he goes so far to say he’d rather disband the League than watch another one of them die. Which, for him? Yeah, kind of a big deal.
Granted, this doesn’t change the fact that his moral fiber’s got more holes than swiss cheese. He’s got his temptations, oh boy does he ever. Numero uno is money, but right behind that is making him human again. He’s got some computer related issues, to say the least. For a guy who once had mindpushing powers, he has a bad habit for getting mind controlled himself or otherwise falling under evil influences. He can be cowardly at times, too, because he’d rather save his own skin than the alternatives. He may be kind and ultimately good hearted, but he’s never met an ethics class he didn’t sleep through. He’s prone to doing morally sketchy things and then spending a good issue or so monologuing about what the right thing to do is. He’s got trouble telling what those right things to do are, so he almost never figures it out in advance. At his worst, he’s capable of sliding down a rabbit hole of no morality and manipulation straight into ‘I planned everything’ mode. It’s also worth noting that in both his approach to Superbuddies and his approach to taking over the world, the first person he tries to convince to join him is Ted. It’s the rationality, methods, and lengths he’s willing to go to that make the difference, here. Still, when he really crosses the line, he’s capable of at least trying to fix it. He even genuinely apologizes once or twice. Shocking, I know.
How he’s capable of managing this group of misfits is a complete mystery. He tends to be somewhat hands off, in that he very seldom bosses them around directly and instead just gives broad orders. His real skills lie in promotion (typically self-) and public relations, as well as recruiting. His solution to 90% of all problems is to form a superteam, or else find new members for the current one. Overall, he projects an aura of relative calm, money related issues aside. Make no mistake, he’s not above it all even remotely, because when your makeshift family’s as messed up and sprawling as this one it’s impossible, but he does tend to put his game face on and deal with things. He’s close friends with J’onn J'onzz and Sue Dibny in particular, as befitting his difficult to flap nature. He also tends to be close to the resident Justice League lackey, or to be more specific, Oberon and later L-Ron. Particularly L-Ron. As for the rest of the League, he’s referred to them a couple times as ‘the kids’, so there you go.
As for finding out he’s in a world in between, there’s a few different directions he’d take. Firstly, as mentioned above, his first response to most crises is to form some sort of group or team. Seriously, it’s like that’s his super power. So, at some point, he’d most likely form one such group to help out around the turtle. I’m also working off the assumption that someone in the DCU Cast will probably inform him of the turn to evil and/or killing Ted issue at some point, possibly with their fists. He’d probably spend half his time trying to rebuild his image and half his time moral crisising about it at the drapes, should he find out. These two factors, the team building and the What He Did, will probably combine to make the inevitable group he forms some kind of public relations/outreach group. Fixing stuff, like if a building gets busted they’d repair it, or dealing with low level threats, that kinda thing. As for the world itself, he’d probably just try to deal with it. Not very well, but the deeper implications will probably get lost in a more practical desire to not die. He’s not really given to existential crises, but material concerns always catch him. This is the guy who pauses in the middle of a ‘the team got sent to hell’ freak out to wonder how Bea’s phone gets reception from there, after all.
He’s not above a good batch of odd quirks, either. He’s got a sarcastic sense of humor to him, and can get quippy if pushed. It doesn’t take much pushing, either. He also tends to speak as if he’s a constantly second away from “What is it this time?” When it comes to actually doing work, he tends to pawn it off to the above mentioned lackeys. He owns a coffee mug with ‘Take it to the Max’ on it. He’s got a weakness for ladies, especially co-eds, and even with the mindpushing he’s awful at talking to them. Speaking of which, he seems to hover somewhere between ‘civil’ and ‘not entirely over it’ with regards to his ex-wife, Claire. Much to his dismay and constant denial, he does, in fact, punch like a sissy. He’s near constantly seen smoking cigars, and has a habit for brooding at the drapes near the window. Maxwell Lord is a lot of things, but dignified isn’t often one of them. Mostly, though, he’s a master of well intentioned dickery.
Appearance: He kinda looks like Sam Neil.
Abilities:
Persuasion: Max no longer has this power, but since it was very important in past arcs (and in a future one), it’s worth defining here just to be safe. Max had the power to push people into obeying him. This was usually portrayed on a level akin to a jedi mind trick: not super powerful, but hard to resist. It also came complete with a tell: every time he used this power, he’d get a nosebleed. When Dreamslayer snatched his body, he increased his power level to the point of being able to control thousands at once and straight up treating other people like puppets. It was usually nowhere near that powerful, however. The power’s gone twice over: once by Dreamslayer burning it out, and twice by being a cyborg now and no longer human.
Cyborg: So Max is a cyborg, and has been since the mid-nineties. He’s got a metal skeleton and that’s about it. No, really. He doesn’t even get super strength out of it, since he can’t throw a punch to save his life. He probably can’t age anymore, either, but still: not going Terminator any time soon. Basically, all he does is set metal detectors off now.
Management: While not a super power per se, Max does possess very, very good management skills. He’s able to direct, let’s face it, a ragtag bunch of misfits to work together for ten minutes without murdering each other. Much, anyway. What this means is that in a place like this, he’s more likely to be employing others than be employed by others.
Inventory: One (1) business suit + tie + shoes, one (1) mickey mouse watch, one (1) pen, one (1) cell phone, and one (1) wallet (contains money, credit cards, some pictures, ID.).
Suite: ME-3B
In-Character Samples:
Third Person:
As the great philosopher Mel Brooks once said, it’s good to be king. And, as most of the big shots got deposed in the last couple centuries, executive would just have to do. Max had to admit, it came with an awful lot of perks. You know, besides the money and power, which? Given. For one, he never had to fight for a parking spot. Or worry about parking tickets, for that matter. Somebody else would handle it. He knew a guy. He knew several thousand guys. Sometimes they even got paid. Mostly, they just took care of things while he was off being an executive, which wouldn’t you know it, involved very little actual work. Funny, that.
Sooner or later, though, it came back to the money and the power. Which, he had to admit? Pretty big fan of those. He didn’t know very many people who weren’t. Oh, sure, people talk about how there’s more things to life than money and money doesn’t buy happiness and all that, but given half a chance, he’s pretty sure they’d all take the money. He sure would. And, really, the thing of it is, you really couldn’t have much power without the money to back it up. Or maybe it was the other way around. He’s not really sure how it works exactly, philosophy’s not really his thing. But you had to run before you could walk, and it was much, much easier to get a good pair of running shoes that way.
Money and power were nice enough on their own. Extremely nice, actually. But the important bit was what you did with them. Which, yes, most of it ended up being buying things or ordering things to be bought. That’s just common sense. But, and some part of him long buried rages at the very idea, sometimes it wasn’t so bad to share it. Spread it around a little. Use the power and the money for something else. Something bigger... bigger than his wallet, anyway. Give back a little. Maybe in the small ways, like spare change to the panhandlers outside Starbucks. Maybe in bigger ways, like buildings in Queens and advertising campaigns no one wanted. They’d saved him from an empty, cruel, hollow sort of life, so it was only fair to return the favor now and then, to save them from lives of mediocrity and boredom and jolly meals.
Plus, the chicks were great.
Network:
[Audio]
[There’s still some hustling and bustling going on in the background as he gets himself settled. Moving in days. Always a classic. The audio wavers in and out, as if he’s moving around as he speaks into the computer.]
Usually my dreams have more blondes in them. [Some muttering that peters out. More distinctly:] Serves me right, trying to catch a nap on the job. [Sigh x2. He brightens up eventually, though. ] Ah, well. There’s no use weeping about it just yet. [If he says things could be worse, they immediately will. So he cuts himself off and moves on.]
Does anyone know if a Dr. Fate’s here? This seems right up his alley. Although I think he stopped taking my calls... can’t imagine why. [yes he can.]
[More focused on the computer now. From here on out, the audio is much clearer. Finally took a seat, apparently.]
Right, introductions. I’m Maxwell Lord, but most people go with Max. If anyone’s in need of work, I think I can provide.
Well. Soon enough, anyway. I’ll keep you posted.
Now, how do I turn this thing off...
[Oh, there’s the button. Click.]
Name: Box
Age: 24
Contact: email: boxofgrenades@gmail.com, aim: bardwithnoname, plurk: likeabox
Game Cast: n/a
Character Information:
Name: Maxwell Lord IV
Canon: DC Comics | Justice League
Canon Point: The Superbuddies Era. This takes place before Identity Crisis and Countdown to Infinite Crisis, even if issue release dates say otherwise. Among other things, this means that Ted Kord and Sue Dibny are still alive.
Age: The usual ‘comic book time makes no sense’ disclaimer applies here. He’s got a canon birthday (April 1st, 1951), but as that’d make him way too old, it doesn’t really work anymore. He seems to be in his late thirties, for the most part. Although I dunno if he can age anymore because cyborg.
Reference: character and 'verse and bonus wiki. As a minor note, his parental history as presented in the third link is based on retcons that I won't be using. His father, Maxwell Lord III, is a professor at Yale, most importantly.
Setting:
In this world, superheroes aren’t just things you see on TV or in the movies. Well, they might appear on TV, but as news coverage and not cartoons. Usually. There’s a wide variety of superheroes, from aliens powered by the sun to normal people with rage issues and a costume. A large amount of these heroes end up being metahumans. Basically, metahumans (or metas) have a genetic structure that supports the development of powers, and the second a convenient lab accident or some such happens, bam, there you go. The vast majority of superheroes are accepted and even greatly praised for their heroic efforts, with museums popping up by the dozens and every city (even the fictional ones) having their own personal hero of choice.
And that’s just on Earth. There’s space cops out there called the Green Lanterns, and to them Earth’s just another quadrant. There’s New Gods, replacements to the old ones who died long ago, locked in a perpetual stalemate between the evil and poorly spelt Apokalips and the good and far removed New Genesis. Throw in numerous alternate dimensions, and it’s a wonder anyone can put their shoes on in the morning without some calamity occurring in the great wide DC world, which actually goes by New Earth.
Maxwell Lord doesn’t fit into any of those categories. At first, anyway. He’s your typical 80s businessman, complete with owning a company whose actual business is totally undefined. He rose to power by plotting to murder his boss via cave related accident, only for an actual accident to happen before he could get to the murdery bit. On the way down after said boss, he runs into an alien supercomputer that convinces him that maybe the world needs saving, and maybe he’s the one who needs to help it along. Which is where his history dovetails with the greater DC universe.
New Earth has so many heroes in it that team ups are not only common but expected. One such group, one of the biggest and most prestigious, is called the Justice League. Usually an 'of America' is tagged onto it, too. After a big time disaster where continuity went fuzzy and all the universes merged into one, the group went defunct, which is where Max stepped in to restore it. Instead of focusing on just America, though, he went through UN channels and expanded it to be an International force. And, once the previously mentioned evil computer got the boot via rebar and a change of heart on Max’s part, Max’s leadership of the League was completely genuine.
The membership changed over time, and eventually ballooned to the point of opening two branches, the first and original one in New York City, and the second in Paris and later London. For the most part, the core members consisted of various second stringers. The most notable of these are as follows: The second Blue Beetle, Ted Kord, who has the powers of being unable to resist cheese steaks and coming up with zany schemes; Booster Gold, who has the powers of self promotion, being from the future, and a shiny suit and flight ring; Guy Gardner, a Green Lantern with a chip on his shoulder the size of Hal Jordan’s face; Tora, a.k.a. Ice, who’s the only quiet person on this team of wackos; her best friend Bea, who goes by Fire and uses Portuguese obscenities and green flame; Ralph Dibny, who’d get called Elongated Man more often if he didn’t insist on introducing himself by name first; Sue, Ralph Dibny’s wife and master of google-fu; Scott Free, an escape artist from Apokalips aka planet New Jersey; Big Barda, who has the powers of sheer badassery and desire to live in the suburbs; and lastly, Captain Atom, who’s a nuclear reactor waiting to blow, if only he could lead the team first. Other notable members of the group are Power Girl, Black Canary, Wally West’s Flash, J’onn J'onzz, and even Batman hung out with them fairly often.
Initially, Scott’s manager Oberon filled the role of lackey, but he was later replaced in this function by L-Ron, a robotic assistant. How the group managed to not kill each other is a minor miracle, being perfectly honest. Still, they saved the world a lot, from an alternate dimension’s post-apocalyptic Extremists to the petty crimes and incompetence of the Injustice League. Max even ended up with mild persuasive powers as a result of that metahuman angle mentioned above. He only used them a handful of times: accidentally to get Ted to rescue him, to get Huntress to join the team, to get a girl named Wanda to talk to him, and to change his chauffeur's name to something that fit better. The powers didn’t last for long, however, due to getting burnt out when an evil psychic from another world named Dreamslayer hijacked him. Other notable members of the rogues gallery include a robotic home shopping network invasion force called The Cluster, run by Manga Khan and where L-Ron came from, and a rivalry with a corporate sponsored superteam called the Conglomerate, which was run by Claire Montgomery. She also happened to be Max’s ex-wife twice over. Good times. Eventually, those times changed, and people moved on. After everything went nineties to the extent that half the team may have been cyborgs at one point, and that’s including Max, the League disbanded for good.
Well, until Max decided everyone should go on a reunion tour, anyway. His latest scheme was called the Superbuddies, and it was based out of a strip mall in Queens. Not his finest hour, here. For one thing, the advertisements were terrible. But he saw a gap in the superhero group market caused by the big guns being inaccessible by everyday people, so he formed up his own. L-Ron got nabbed first, and the rest of the team fell into place. This group kept Ted, Booster, Fire, the Dibnys, and Captain Atom around, substituted Mary Marvel for her brother, Billy, who quit the old JLI early, and everyone else either didn’t get invited, didn’t show up, or didn’t live at the time (sorry, Ice). Not like it helped in Guy’s case, since he ended up crashing the group anyway, but still, the intentions were good.
Continuity was always a bit of a slippery slope in the DC universe. Way too many alternate realities to keep track of. In the run up to a cataclysmic event where time got reshuffled and various characters came back to life, Max was revealed to be evil all along and killed Ted. Also ran a creepy satellite network initially started by Batman. Also got killed by Wonder Woman because he was mind controlling Superman and wouldn’t let him go. And it goes on like this. This will probably come up with various other characters in the DC universe because, you know, big deal. However, I’m ignoring this part because frankly it makes no sense.
Of course, then DC rebooted the entire world so who knows if any of this stuff even really happened anymore. So let’s also ignore the reboot here.
Personality:
Maxwell Lord loves only two things: money and himself. Mostly money. He’ll do anything to make and keep a buck, from poorly thought out superventures to get rich quick schemes. He passes ulcers on the way to a rage black out when his money gets swindled to fund the even more poorly thought out KooeyKooeyKooey casino. Forget poorly explained turns to evil, dickery, and mind control; this is probably the closest he gets to straight up homicide. As for the narcissism, his ego’s roughly the size of Neptune and getting bigger by the acquisition. He prefers a certain amount of bootlicking in his lackeys, preferably subtle but ‘O Beloved Leader’ works in a pinch. He’s confident in himself to the point of arrogance, assumes he knows what’s best for everyone, and tends to steamroll disagreements.
Of course, when you’re a manipulative little shit, such confidence comes with the territory. Granted, his scheming is more on the level of used car salesman than world domination, but the point is that he’s got a tendency to smarm and scheme his way to the top. Max only apologizes when he wants something, pushes people around on strings, and seems to know the vaguely right buttons to press to get people to go along with him. For example, when he tries to reunite the Justice League, he tells Ted that Booster’s in before even talking to the walking billboard himself. Back when he formed it in the first place, he appeared more like a shadowy, shady puppet master than an actual boss. Max has ambition by the truckload, and doesn’t let pesky things like morality and the right thing stop him. The only reason he won’t sell you for a dollar is because he probably thinks he can get a better deal.
Well, and the fact that he’s kind. Not much of a perk when you’re an amoral 80s businessman, but the fact remains valid, much to his dismay and confusion. He claims to have always been an idealist at heart, but if you’re gonna swim with the sharks, you’ve gotta get a pair of fins to match, so he made himself ruthless to fit in. It’s notable that even in the bad old days, he had some variety of standards. What’s haunting about how his boss died isn’t the death so much as Max never truly knowing if he’d have been able to go through with it. He also shows a slight tendency to balk when faced with Uppercase Evil, like when the computer system activates a death ray satellite without him knowing it, but it’s very subtle and downplayed. Still, his ruthlessness at this time can’t be denied. This streak’s best demonstrated by him setting up a terrorist’s death to set up the league. What prompts his turn away from the dark side is the knowledge that he’s sending the League into a trap, and he just can’t do that anymore.
The effect his friendship with the League has on him cannot be overstated, either. His character development can be traced entirely by how he reacts to and thinks of them. He goes from coldly manipulating the league as if they’re tools to a man who stands around panicking and useless when the group gets kidnapped. His ruthless streak also fades over time, as by the end of the series he goes from a guy who can manipulate a man to his death to one who shows tremendous guilt over people he killed while possessed. While his moneygrubbing continues unabated, he does show less actual enjoyment of Rich People Things over time, to the point of getting bored at a cocktail party. Even the psychic power related moral quandaries tend to resolve themselves with positive developments. After using them to get a girl to talk to him, he has a morality/alcohol induced nightmare about him slipping up on his good behavior and into stupid evil territory. The pink costume didn’t help, either. He seems to think of the Justice League as his family, and consistently not only cares *about* them but also what they think of him. After a funeral, he goes so far to say he’d rather disband the League than watch another one of them die. Which, for him? Yeah, kind of a big deal.
Granted, this doesn’t change the fact that his moral fiber’s got more holes than swiss cheese. He’s got his temptations, oh boy does he ever. Numero uno is money, but right behind that is making him human again. He’s got some computer related issues, to say the least. For a guy who once had mindpushing powers, he has a bad habit for getting mind controlled himself or otherwise falling under evil influences. He can be cowardly at times, too, because he’d rather save his own skin than the alternatives. He may be kind and ultimately good hearted, but he’s never met an ethics class he didn’t sleep through. He’s prone to doing morally sketchy things and then spending a good issue or so monologuing about what the right thing to do is. He’s got trouble telling what those right things to do are, so he almost never figures it out in advance. At his worst, he’s capable of sliding down a rabbit hole of no morality and manipulation straight into ‘I planned everything’ mode. It’s also worth noting that in both his approach to Superbuddies and his approach to taking over the world, the first person he tries to convince to join him is Ted. It’s the rationality, methods, and lengths he’s willing to go to that make the difference, here. Still, when he really crosses the line, he’s capable of at least trying to fix it. He even genuinely apologizes once or twice. Shocking, I know.
How he’s capable of managing this group of misfits is a complete mystery. He tends to be somewhat hands off, in that he very seldom bosses them around directly and instead just gives broad orders. His real skills lie in promotion (typically self-) and public relations, as well as recruiting. His solution to 90% of all problems is to form a superteam, or else find new members for the current one. Overall, he projects an aura of relative calm, money related issues aside. Make no mistake, he’s not above it all even remotely, because when your makeshift family’s as messed up and sprawling as this one it’s impossible, but he does tend to put his game face on and deal with things. He’s close friends with J’onn J'onzz and Sue Dibny in particular, as befitting his difficult to flap nature. He also tends to be close to the resident Justice League lackey, or to be more specific, Oberon and later L-Ron. Particularly L-Ron. As for the rest of the League, he’s referred to them a couple times as ‘the kids’, so there you go.
As for finding out he’s in a world in between, there’s a few different directions he’d take. Firstly, as mentioned above, his first response to most crises is to form some sort of group or team. Seriously, it’s like that’s his super power. So, at some point, he’d most likely form one such group to help out around the turtle. I’m also working off the assumption that someone in the DCU Cast will probably inform him of the turn to evil and/or killing Ted issue at some point, possibly with their fists. He’d probably spend half his time trying to rebuild his image and half his time moral crisising about it at the drapes, should he find out. These two factors, the team building and the What He Did, will probably combine to make the inevitable group he forms some kind of public relations/outreach group. Fixing stuff, like if a building gets busted they’d repair it, or dealing with low level threats, that kinda thing. As for the world itself, he’d probably just try to deal with it. Not very well, but the deeper implications will probably get lost in a more practical desire to not die. He’s not really given to existential crises, but material concerns always catch him. This is the guy who pauses in the middle of a ‘the team got sent to hell’ freak out to wonder how Bea’s phone gets reception from there, after all.
He’s not above a good batch of odd quirks, either. He’s got a sarcastic sense of humor to him, and can get quippy if pushed. It doesn’t take much pushing, either. He also tends to speak as if he’s a constantly second away from “What is it this time?” When it comes to actually doing work, he tends to pawn it off to the above mentioned lackeys. He owns a coffee mug with ‘Take it to the Max’ on it. He’s got a weakness for ladies, especially co-eds, and even with the mindpushing he’s awful at talking to them. Speaking of which, he seems to hover somewhere between ‘civil’ and ‘not entirely over it’ with regards to his ex-wife, Claire. Much to his dismay and constant denial, he does, in fact, punch like a sissy. He’s near constantly seen smoking cigars, and has a habit for brooding at the drapes near the window. Maxwell Lord is a lot of things, but dignified isn’t often one of them. Mostly, though, he’s a master of well intentioned dickery.
Appearance: He kinda looks like Sam Neil.
Abilities:
Persuasion: Max no longer has this power, but since it was very important in past arcs (and in a future one), it’s worth defining here just to be safe. Max had the power to push people into obeying him. This was usually portrayed on a level akin to a jedi mind trick: not super powerful, but hard to resist. It also came complete with a tell: every time he used this power, he’d get a nosebleed. When Dreamslayer snatched his body, he increased his power level to the point of being able to control thousands at once and straight up treating other people like puppets. It was usually nowhere near that powerful, however. The power’s gone twice over: once by Dreamslayer burning it out, and twice by being a cyborg now and no longer human.
Cyborg: So Max is a cyborg, and has been since the mid-nineties. He’s got a metal skeleton and that’s about it. No, really. He doesn’t even get super strength out of it, since he can’t throw a punch to save his life. He probably can’t age anymore, either, but still: not going Terminator any time soon. Basically, all he does is set metal detectors off now.
Management: While not a super power per se, Max does possess very, very good management skills. He’s able to direct, let’s face it, a ragtag bunch of misfits to work together for ten minutes without murdering each other. Much, anyway. What this means is that in a place like this, he’s more likely to be employing others than be employed by others.
Inventory: One (1) business suit + tie + shoes, one (1) mickey mouse watch, one (1) pen, one (1) cell phone, and one (1) wallet (contains money, credit cards, some pictures, ID.).
Suite: ME-3B
In-Character Samples:
Third Person:
As the great philosopher Mel Brooks once said, it’s good to be king. And, as most of the big shots got deposed in the last couple centuries, executive would just have to do. Max had to admit, it came with an awful lot of perks. You know, besides the money and power, which? Given. For one, he never had to fight for a parking spot. Or worry about parking tickets, for that matter. Somebody else would handle it. He knew a guy. He knew several thousand guys. Sometimes they even got paid. Mostly, they just took care of things while he was off being an executive, which wouldn’t you know it, involved very little actual work. Funny, that.
Sooner or later, though, it came back to the money and the power. Which, he had to admit? Pretty big fan of those. He didn’t know very many people who weren’t. Oh, sure, people talk about how there’s more things to life than money and money doesn’t buy happiness and all that, but given half a chance, he’s pretty sure they’d all take the money. He sure would. And, really, the thing of it is, you really couldn’t have much power without the money to back it up. Or maybe it was the other way around. He’s not really sure how it works exactly, philosophy’s not really his thing. But you had to run before you could walk, and it was much, much easier to get a good pair of running shoes that way.
Money and power were nice enough on their own. Extremely nice, actually. But the important bit was what you did with them. Which, yes, most of it ended up being buying things or ordering things to be bought. That’s just common sense. But, and some part of him long buried rages at the very idea, sometimes it wasn’t so bad to share it. Spread it around a little. Use the power and the money for something else. Something bigger... bigger than his wallet, anyway. Give back a little. Maybe in the small ways, like spare change to the panhandlers outside Starbucks. Maybe in bigger ways, like buildings in Queens and advertising campaigns no one wanted. They’d saved him from an empty, cruel, hollow sort of life, so it was only fair to return the favor now and then, to save them from lives of mediocrity and boredom and jolly meals.
Plus, the chicks were great.
Network:
[Audio]
[There’s still some hustling and bustling going on in the background as he gets himself settled. Moving in days. Always a classic. The audio wavers in and out, as if he’s moving around as he speaks into the computer.]
Usually my dreams have more blondes in them. [Some muttering that peters out. More distinctly:] Serves me right, trying to catch a nap on the job. [Sigh x2. He brightens up eventually, though. ] Ah, well. There’s no use weeping about it just yet. [If he says things could be worse, they immediately will. So he cuts himself off and moves on.]
Does anyone know if a Dr. Fate’s here? This seems right up his alley. Although I think he stopped taking my calls... can’t imagine why. [yes he can.]
[More focused on the computer now. From here on out, the audio is much clearer. Finally took a seat, apparently.]
Right, introductions. I’m Maxwell Lord, but most people go with Max. If anyone’s in need of work, I think I can provide.
Well. Soon enough, anyway. I’ll keep you posted.
Now, how do I turn this thing off...
[Oh, there’s the button. Click.]