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** Skateman is interesting because the other two major facets of his life, being a karate blackbelt and a Vietnam vet, are also heavily tied to the early 1970s
* [[The Legion of Super Heroes]]' Karate Kid, who has since moved beyond his fad into a fairly [[Rounded Character]].
** There was a karate fad in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s. He was reworked to fit the kung fu fad of the 1970s. He still predates the movie ''[[The Karate Kid]]'' by decades, so he's not quite as derivative as he sounds. (In fact, if you read the credits on the film carefully, you can find a disclaimer thanking DC for letting them use the title.)
{{quote|'''Beast Boy:''' "Karate Kid"? Ha! "Wax on. Wax off."
'''Apparition:''' Superboy said that, too. What does it mean?
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* Similar to Karate Kid, Marvel's Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu, first appeared in 1972 as part of the '70s kung fu revival. Not only was Shang-Chi meant to invoke [[Bruce Lee]], but his origin came because Marvel owned the comic book rights to both [[Yellow Peril|Fu Manchu]] and ''[[Kung Fu]]'' at the time.
* [[Luke Cage, Hero for Hire|Luke Cage]] and [[Immortal Iron Fist|Iron Fist]] were created to cash-in on the popularity of [[Blaxploitation]] and Kung-Fu genres.
* There were a lot of black superheroes created in the wake of the [[Blaxploitation]] trend. In addition to the aforementioned Cage, there was also [[Black Lightning]], Black Goliath, [[Afro Asskicker|Misty Knight]] (as well as her Kung-Fu master partner, Colleen Wing), and [[Wonder Woman]]'s black "sister" Nubia.
** [[Dwayne McDuffie]] ended up creating the ''[[Icon]]'' character Buck Wild as a parody of this trend.
* '''Adam X the X-Treme,''' from the early, well, [[Dark Age|guess which decade]], who was almost made a ''completely unignorable'' [[Old Shame]] by virtue of being ''the third Summers brother''. Fortunately, he vanished before the writers revealed that, and it ended up being someone completely different about a decade later. He hasn't disappeared completely, considering a few recent appearances - and it's still entirely possible he's the ''fourth'' Summers brother, if only a half-brother.
* Occasionally employed in a self-aware manner by ''[[Astro City]]''
** [[Word of God]] is that the Bouncing Beatnik actually changes identities to match social trends of the time. There's been three known (in-universe) incarnations of the Beatnik, though only two have appeared in stories to date.
** The "Dark Ages" story arc references the kung fu fad of the '70s with the Jade Dragons, and the space race with the Apollo Eleven.
** Older stories have featured brief glimpses of [[The Pioneer|the Frontiersman]], complete with coonskin cap. If you don't get it, there was a popular ''Davy Crockett'' TV show in the 1950s.
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** The Goth subculture's also not even close to dead (though the music's unrecognizably different now, of course) ... its corresponding suerheroes tend to be about ten years behind the current popular "look."
*** Negasonic Teenage [[Monster Magnet|Warhead]], or Why It's A Bad Idea Let A Goth Teen Name Herself.
** [[Neil Gaiman]]'s Death is also now an example. She typically dresses as a
* [[wikipedia:Super-Hip|Super-Hip]], who appeared in DC's ''Adventures of Bob Hope'' comic book, was a parodic example of this trope.
* Video game example: [[The King of Fighters|Hinako Shijo]] was based almost entirely around a very short-lived fad that revolved around petite women and high school girls that wanted to learn how to sumo wrestle. Seriously.
* In the ''[[Global Guardians PBEM Universe]]'', there is Headbanger, a hair-metal themed supervillain (who shows lots of chest hair, has big poofy 80s rock-star hair, and makeup) who uses [[The Power of Rock]] as a weapon. Glitterball was a disco-themed hero active in the late 1970s. Speedway is a Nascar-themed speedster. Yo-Yo uses gimmicked yo-yos as weapons.
* Fire and Ice from the [[Justice League of America|JLI]] used to sport some very...80's looking costumes, complete with big hair and T-shirts over spandex. Ice even lampshaded this by claiming she and Fire looked like they belonged in a rock video. Needless to say, the more recent comic books and cartoon adaptations have chosen to give the heroines different outfits.
* It's hard to tell whether ''Marvel: The Lost Generation'''s Hipster, a skinny, goateed beatnik and total [[Jive Turkey]] operating in late 1950s San Francisco, is intended as a spoof or a completely straight portrayal of this trope. However, he's
* DC's Super Young Team subverts this while trying to play it straight. They aren't tied to any specific trend, but they're obsessed with staying fresh and current. That said, Most Excellent Superbat, the most materialistic of the lot, is adamant that they're also somehow more than all that.
* Video game example: the Koopalings, introduced in ''[[Super Mario Bros 3]]'', were generally given a punk aesthetic to reflect [[The Eighties|Eighties]]-era trends (the most notable exception being [[Ludwig Van Beethoven|Ludwig von Koopa]]). They went on hiatus after ''[[Super Mario World (video game)|Super Mario World]]'', which would seem to reflect on Nintendo abandoning past fads. Luckily for them, they got a comeback in the last dungeon of ''[[Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga]]'', followed by top billing in ''[[New Super Mario Bros Wii]]''; [[Weird Al Effect]] is definitely present, though.
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