There are many characters from Marvel Comics which have come and gone, some see a massive heyday for a short period of time and then fall into obscurity while others endure the test of time and keep pumping out more than 700 issues without pause.
The character I’m focusing on today is somewhere in-between — he definitely had a very specific time where he was an absolute A-lister of Marvel content and while he’s far from obscure even today, he’s fallen from his prime to a somewhat minimized role in Marvel’s pantheon of heroes. Today, we’re talking about the Silver Surfer.
Before we get into the Marvel vs. Capcom history as it pertains to Silver Surfer, let’s get to the bottom of the character himself first. Who exactly is the Silver Surfer?
Well, his real name is Norrin Radd and he was originally a normal person from a planet called Zenn-La, not entirely unlike Earth with its inhabitants looking fairly human. His backstory is intricately connected with a famous Marvel character who was also the final boss of Marvel vs. Capcom 3, the planet-consuming entity Galactus.
One day, Galactus appeared with the intent of feasting on the planet of Zenn-La and Norrin Radd offered himself up to work for Galactus in exchange for leaving the planet intact, basically bargaining to save his homeworld and his lover Shalla-Bal.
Galactus accepted this trade and imbued Norrin Radd with the dubiously defined Power Cosmic which turned him into the shiny soldier we know as the Silver Surfer and became the herald of Galactus whose basic role was to fly ahead of Galactus and identify planets which offered adequate sustenance for his master.
Since the Silver Surfer was still Norrin Radd at his core, his conscience was deeply troubled by sacrificing entire civilizations to Galactus’ hunger which led to Galactus altering his mind to repress his memories and entire personality.
Shortly after this is where we are first introduced to the Silver Surfer, way back in Fantastic Four #48 from March 1966, when he arrives on Earth and relays to Galactus that it is fit for consumption.
The Fantastic Four try to figure out how to stave off Galactus’ assault, but it was actually Alicia Masters, long-time girlfriend of The Thing, who pleaded with the Silver Surfer to spare their planet and thereby managed to reawake his dormant feelings and lead to him turning on his master.
With some outside help, the Silver Surfer was able to hold off Galactus long enough for the Fantastic Four to confront him with a weapon which even Galactus could not stand against. Enraged at the betrayal, Galactus erected a barrier attuned specifically to the Silver Surfer and trapped him on Earth, leaving him a homeless nomad on the planet he had chosen to save.
For a long time, the Silver Surfer was more of a cameo character who would show up on occasion across various Marvel titles, though most predominately in the pages of the Fantastic Four as this was a team he had prior relationships with from his debut, but after about two decades things would change massively for our silver-clad superhero.
After a few prior launches that didn’t last too long, in 1987 the Silver Surfer received his own ongoing comic book which lasted for over a decade all the way until 1998. Since then, he’s had several smaller comic book runs though none have reached the length of the massive one he had throughout the late ’80s and almost entire ’90s.
As it stands, the Silver Surfer has a total of over 200 comic book issues to his name and that’s not counting the time he’s spent in crossover events or assisting in other comic books or on teams, so he’s definitely one of the bigger characters in Marvel’s past library as far as standing on his own.
It wouldn’t be fair to call him an obscure character today, but compared to his heyday it’s definitely a big difference. At his peak, the Silver Surfer even got his own NES video game which many cite as one of the hardest games around.
So, given how popular he was during the ’90s, he would’ve been an absolutely perfect candidate for the Marvel vs. Capcom series which spawned around that time, right? After all, other characters who were huge during that time like the X-Men are all over the roster in those titles.
Well… here’s the thing about that. If you’ve kept up with the talk about older Marvel vs. Capcom titles, you’re well aware that Marvel, who were struggling somewhat financially at the time, had basically thrown out their rights to various characters all over the place.
Given Marvel’s interconnected nature with a shared universe for all its characters, some of these restrictions proved to be absolute nightmares. It was to the point where they weren’t allowed to use Iron Man, but Marvel let them recolor him and call it War Machine and there were no issues.
“But really, why were things like The Fantastic Four, like Silver Surfer, like Ghost Rider not allowed? Why is Iron Man not there?” — Kenji Kataoka
In some recently unearthed writing by Marvel vs. Capcom producer Kenji Kataoka he laments the inability to include certain characters including the Silver Surfer himself.
That clearly seems to suggest that Silver Surfer very much was a wanted character at the time but there were simply rights issues which kept him from being included, a fate that plagued many of Marvel’s cast at the time.
So what about Marvel vs. Capcom 3? Much later, there weren’t really any rights issues to the video game usage of Marvel characters (movie rights were a whole other story, though), so the Marvel vs. Capcom 3 developers had much more free reign with who they wanted to include in the game.
Indeed, not even did they have that freedom, they actively used that freedom — Galactus, the character who the Silver Surfer is intricately tied too through his lore was the final boss of Marvel vs. Capcom 3, which actually makes the surfer’s absence a bizarre anomaly.
If Galactus was here to consume Earth, why hadn’t his herald come before him as a sort of mid-boss character, or been included as the traitor he eventually became to stand against Galactus as he threatened his home?
Well, there’s no direct quote but there are some notes from way back in 2010, before the release of the first Marvel vs. Capcom 3 game, where the game’s director Ryota Niitsuma and Capcom USA employee at the time Seth Killian talked to fans about certain decisions they’d made with the game… including a snippet about the Silver Surfer.
When asked about an entirely different character, Ghost Rider, they mentioned that they’d wanted him in the game but couldn’t figure out a way to incorporate his bike in the moveset and didn’t want him included without it.
Notably, Ghost Rider would later be added to the enhanced version with additional content, Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3, where he fights without his bike but uses it in certain super attacks. Not only that, but this version of Ghost Rider would also return in 2017’s Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite.
After talking about Ghost Rider, they said that their rationale for Silver Surfer was similar, except that it pertained to his surfboard — they didn’t figure out how to have him fight without it, but including him without it would be a waste.
It does make a certain amount of sense. Rarely do you ever see a picture of the Silver Surfer without being on his iconic surfboard. It’s even to the point that his name literally includes surfer.
While there was probably some way to make it work the same way they eventually did with Ghost Rider, it appears the development team saw the absence of Silver Surfer’s surfboard as an even bigger hurdle than doing away with Ghost Rider’s motorbike.
The closest we got to seeing Silver Surfer was the Heroes and Heralds mode that was added to Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3, a for-fun mode with various effects added to you where any character could get the same shiny exterior that Norrin Radd once got when he swore his fealty to Galactus.
Obviously, there’s no guarantee we’ll ever see the return of the Marvel vs. Capcom series in the future. But even if we do, are Silver Surfer’s chances completely gone?
Never say never, as they say, but honestly… it’s not looking good.
He may not be an obscure character, but his relevance has certainly faded in a big way since his heights in the ’80s and ’90s.
On top of that, the perfect opportunity to include him would be when you have Galactus as the main threat of the game but since they already did that in Marvel vs. Capcom 3, they’d probably aim for something different next time.
In short, Silver Surfer has missed out on two absolutely golden — er, I mean silver, of course — opportunities to be part of the Marvel vs. Capcom universe but managed to miss them both.
Even if we do get a new game, I just can’t see them prioritizing him over all the other potential picks that are more likely to resonate with current fans… and that’s a real shame.
And so goes the story of Norrin Radd, the silver-clad starfarer who never got to see his chance to shine (in his case literally) on the fighting game stage…
Source: Event Hubs
