Source: henchmen4hire.com
8. Samaritan
(Astro City, Wildstorm/Vertigo)
Born in the 35th century, Samaritan was faced with the troubling reality that Earth was going to die out within one generation.
Scientists tracked this horrible environmental catastrophe to one specific historic event. So to save the world, Samaritan was sent back in time. But on his chronal journey, he became enveloped in a strange time stream energy called Empyrean Fire . He gained amazing powers, popped up in 1985, stopped the explosion of the Challenger Space Shuttle, and saved the future.
But, as he was now trapped in the past, Samaritan figured he’d just start up a career superheroing. But he also needed to do something to make money, so he got a job as a fact-checker for a major metropolitan newspaper. Admittedly, he just used future technology to check facts while he flew around saving people, but a paycheck’s a paycheck.
Astro City is one of the greatest long-running comics of all time, and Samaritan is an extended riff on Superman that says new things about the character and the world he inhabits.
