Fictional Characters

"When he first appeared in March 1941, Captain America was the alter ego of Steve Rogers, a skinny art student from New York who had been transformed into a super-soldier by the U.S. army. Trying to enlist, but rejected because of his scrawny physique, Rogers agrees to be used as a subject in a secret project. Injected with a special serum and exposed to a course of radiation with “Vita-Rays,” the scrawny young man acquires astonishing strength, resourcefulness and courage. Captain America isn’t a superman; he is an average human being whose powers have been enhanced to the nth degree. It may be the fact that he is so recognizably human that makes him the most modern of the comic superheroes."

"In a story from the early 1980s, Captain America uses his amazing powers to destroy a renegade American intelligence agency that is plotting an attack on the Soviet Union in order to make the United States the last remaining superpower. Confronting the plotters, the comic-book hero makes one of many declarations of faith that resound throughout his more than 70-year-long career as a fighter against evil: “I represent the American dream! A dream that has precious little to do with borders, boundaries, and the kind of blind hatred your ilk espouses!”"

"On Olympus, we measure Wisdom against Athena, Speed against Hermes, Power against Zeus. But we measure Courage ... against Captain America."

"Your name's Zero? Hope you don't fight like one. (when up against Zero in Marvel vs. Capcom 3)"

"You think I'm going down to some pampered punk like you? (when up against Iron Man in Marvel vs. Capcom 3)"

"We Avengers will always fight the good fight! (When winning with the Avengers team in Marvel vs. Capcom 3)"

"The day I fall to the likes of you is the day I hang up my shield. (After defeating M.O.D.O.K. in Marvel vs. Capcom 3)"

"Your kind's got no shot--not while I'm around."

"Final Justice! (when performing his "Final Justice" super move)"

"Charging Star!!! (when performing his "Charging Star" special attack)"

"Stars and Stripes!!! (when performing his "Stars and Stripes" special attack)"

"Believe in your country, but believe in yourself!"

"For Truth, Justice, and the American way!"

"Good Work, Soldier!"

"Thumbs up, Soldier!"

"Freedom Prevails!"

"When Captain America throws his mighty shield, All those who chose to oppose his shield must yield! If he's led to a fight and a duel is due, Then the red and the white and the blue will come through, When Captain America throws his mighty shield!""

"What are you ladies waiting for, Christmas?!"

"Yeah, I'm gonna fight you. You know why? Because I fought besides Russians during World War 2. They were good and decent men, and they made terrible painful sacrifices to save their country. And to their country then turn around and put monsters in prisons with nuclear landmines... to see people like you, proudly complicit in this nightmare... Yeah, I'll fight you. You've waited forty years for me in this hellhole, I feel it'd be impolite not to kick your head in."

"Surrender??!! You think this letter on my head stands for France?"

"...so we worked our way up from the south and met with leaders from the Maquis to help plan the attack. I've seen a lot of combat...and I'd seen a lot before I got to France...but the savagery inflicted on these people. I never saw anything like it until we got to Buchenwald. That's why it galls me when I hear my own people dismissing the French as cowards. We're talking about a people who never gave up fighting the Nazi occupation. Their country may have surrendered, but they didn't..."

"These are dark and desperate times. I know that some of you are afraid. It's alright. It's perfectly natural. But I want you to know that I am not. I am not afraid to die this day because what we do here is necessary. It may seem impossible, our enemies may appear to be endless, but that doesn't matter. Because there is no one else. Look at me. I believe in an idea, an idea that a single individual who has the right heart and the right mind that is consumed with a single purpose, that one man can win a war. Give that one man a group of soldiers with the same conviction, and you can change the world."

"Courage, Honor, Loyalty, Sacrifice. You're braver than you think."

"Listen to me -- all of you out there! You were told by this man -- your hero -- that America is the greatest country in the world!"

"Captain America is not here to lead the country. I'm here to serve it. If I'm a captain, then I'm a soldier. Not of any military branch, but of the American people. Years ago, in simpler times, this suit and this shield were created as a symbol to help make America the land it's supposed to be... to help it realize its destiny. Ricocheting from super-villain duel to super-villain duel doesn't always serve that purpose. There's a difference between fighting against evil and fighting for the common good. I'm not always able to choose my battles... but effective immediately, I'm going to make an effort to choose the battles that matter. Battles against injustice, against cynicism, against intolerance. I will still serve with the Avengers. I will continue to defend this nation from any and all threats it may face. But as of today, I am not a "super hero." Now and forevermore, I am a man of the people. Together, you and I will identify and confront America's problems. Together, we will figure out what we are and what we can be. Together, we will define the American Dream and make it an American reality."

"Do you actually think the fact that you know how to program a computer makes you more of a human being than me? That I'm out of touch because I don't know what you know? I know what freedom is. I know what it feels like to fight for it and I know what it costs to have it. You know compromise."

"Doesn't matter what the press says. Doesn't matter what the politicians or the mobs say. Doesn't matter if the whole country decides that something wrong is something right. This nation was founded on one principle above all else: the requirement that we stand up for what we believe, no matter the odds or the consequences. When the mob and the press and the whole world tell you to move, your job is to plant yourself like a tree beside the river of truth, and tell the whole world — "No, you move.""

"Avengers assemble!"

"I fought your kind every day of that war, Zemo! You mocked democracy and said that free men were weak! Well feel this grip, Zemo — it's the grip of a man who loves liberty! Look into the eyes of your foe, and know that he will die for his freedom! The world must never again mistake compassion for weakness! And while I live — it had better not!"

"I'm loyal to nothing, General.. except the Dream."

"A soldier with a voice that could command a god... and does."

"Ninety percent of the casualties of World War I were soldiers, fraulein. But half the people who died in World War II were civilians... Half of sixty-one million. I know why I'm fighting, fraulein. I don't want to see World War III."

"Weapons down or I will not be responsible for what comes next."

"Keep flying, son. And watch that potty mouth!"

"You do not understand hatred as I understand it. Only hate keeps me alive. Why else should I endure this pain?"

"Nobody could be more devoted to the cause of peace than I! As a commissioner of Earth's Interplanetary Police, I have devoted my life to the cause of law and order; And law and order can only exist in a time of peace."

"I only need two things. Your submission and your obedience to MY WILL!"

"[W]ould a logical creature really behave like the Cybermen do? If not, how would a logical creature really behave? Or, to put it another way, what's the "logical" way to live? That's the question I'll be examining here by contrasting the views of philosophers Thomas Hobbes, John Stuart Mill, and David Hume, asking what they'd thin of Cyberman "logic and how Cybermen might've looked if they'd been designed according to the principles espoused by these philosophers; how they might have designed the Cybermen differently, given a chance. While my examples come from Doctor Who the issue of living logically has real-world importance. After all, we all have to decide if we care about living logically or not, and if we do not want to live logically, we'd better know what "living logically" requires of us."

"The cybermen are said to be logical creatures-and look how they behave. They've become a race of emotionless soldiers devoted to conquering the universe, destroying other species or forcing them to become Cybermen too."

"Rose Tyler: Five million Cybermen? Easy. One Doctor? Now you're scared!"

"SPILSBURY: They're effectively a giant pepper pot, yeah."

"CORNISH: That's Tom Spilsbury. He's the editor at Doctor Who magazine. The Daleks, he says, look like giant metal salt shakers. But they're somehow believable as evil-armored aliens."

"DOCTOR: The floors are metal. All the floors are metal."

"Aren’t we all interested in dominating other people? Total control, a machine-like desire, and the Daleks. It had a neatness that fitted. In the past only human endeavour has overcome this kind of evil. Man is a supreme creation if he is able to work with his fellows. There is nothing he can’t do if he gets down to it. I believe that what people want on television is entertainment, and action stories are what I want to write – there are plenty of other people to write sociological dramas - but if the Daleks have a message this is it. It’s so ‘nonsensically simple. Why do people starve and die in the streets and go on fighting – Vietnam for instance, all in the name of democracy!"

"The Daleks don’t have any personal character, any conscience, or morality. They are totally bad. This has worried some American companies interested in them —Americans seem to think that even the blackest villain must have some redeeming features. They had to have a purpose, and I knew what: they were concerned with total domination."

"Ray Cusick, the designer, took rough notes of my ideas for the Dalek’s behaviour, the electronic eye, mechanical hands, and so on, and although I didn’t have a clear visual image in my mind, when I saw his finished Dalek design it seemed very familiar. In fact the visible part of the Dalek is only a travelling case inside which there is the Dalek itself, a shapeless brain intercommunicating and interacting with all the other Dalek brains – although later there came a need for these to be organised through a Dalek Supreme."

"I went and talked to David Whitaker, the script editor of ‘Doctor Who’, and I came up with a story idea. They liked it, they bought it, and that takes us up to where the Daleks started. I don’t know to this day what the enormous appeal of the Daleks was. I’ve heard all sorts of ideas about it, but they were slightly magical, because you didn’t know what the elements were that made them work. I’d been a cinema-goer all my life, and loved going to what were rated in those days as horror movies. Whatever the creature was, somewhere in your heart of hearts, you know it was a man dressed up, so my first requirement was to take the legs off. Take away the humanoid form, and we were off and running. Further inspiration came from the Georgian State Ballet, the Russian dance trouple which was performing in London at the time. There was a dance that the women did, where they wore floor-brushing skirts, and evidently took tiny steps, so they appeared to glide across the stage. There was no suggestion of what form of locomotion they were using. That’s what I wanted for the Daleks. The rest of it comes easily, you put on an eye, and something else for hands. We made a big mistake with the hands, of course, we should have been smarter, but I had no faith in the show. It was the old writer’s axiom, ‘Take the money and fly like a thief’. I really didn’t think that it could work. After the Daleks, I was for a short time the most famous writer on television. The press interviewed me, there was mail arriving in great van loads. There was stuff coming to my house that said ‘Dalek Man – London’, and I was getting lots of them. Almost all the kids wanted a Dalek, and nobody was quick enough. The BBC, not being the great commercial operator, wasn’t ready, so there was no merchandising, there were no plastic Daleks, there were no buttons, there were no anything. My God, was that to change! Within the year, there were Dalek everythings."

"The Master was dying and begged for his life with one final game, and when he lost, I sealed him for all eternity inside my gold tooth."

"Every star in the universe -- we were going to see them all. But he was too busy burning them. I don't think she ever saw anything."

"And so it came to pass that the players took their final places, making ready the events that were to come. The madman, sat in his empire of dust and ashes, little knowing of the glory he would achieve, while his saviour looked upon the wilderness, in the hope of changing his inevitable fate. Far away, the idiots and fools dreamt of a shining new future … a future now doomed to never happen. As Earth rolled onwards into night, the people of that world did sleep, and shiver, somehow knowing that dawn would bring only one thing …The final day!"