I like Cyclops. His attitude and leadership. X-Men rock. Very family like. Bickering. Love them resurrecting Asteroid M. So much greatness and rich meaning.
I have never been big on the DC characters. Especially not Superman. I have always found Marvel to be far more entertaining on many levels. Not just with the storyline, but the artwork as well. For me, it was the artwork that sold me a comic, and I always found the Marvel artwork to be far more appealing than the DC artwork. The DC artwork, while it is impressive, to me was never quite as high a standard as Marvel was. We each have our own opinion and taste there. I also think that a lot of my opinion now, has to do with the fact that my children and partner also enjoy Marvel a lot more.
I've mostly favored the Marvel movie adaptations as opposed to the DC ones (with Nolan's Batman reboot the exception). Spiderman is also a favorite of mine... well, the first two movies, anyway.
DC wins for me, not that I read a lot of either (comics are waaaaay expensive here, so I generally just read graphic novels or those big collections of comics rather than individual issues). The only Marvel IP I really got into was X-Men; Spiderman and the Fantastic Four and Hulk and stuff never really did it for me. I was raised on Frank Miller and Alan Moore and those kinds of darker superheroes, and a lot of the Marvel universe is a little too light for my tastes (but like I said, I haven't really delved too deeply into them, so maybe people can point me to some better stuff). DC has a lot of that kind of stuff too I guess, but Batman and to a certain extent Superman had some really innovative writers working on them, and Batman in particular has a lot of genre-defining books, so I guess he wins. And DC's crossovers are amazing, although a little insane.
Never been a fan of either to be honest, but if I was to pick between underpants-on-the-outside comics then it'd be Marvel purely because of the X-Men. I've always preferred independant type comics such as Footrot Flats, Heavy Metal, MAD magazine and just recently, Flight.
Rent Iron Man Extremis. If you have Netflix, its on demand. It's dark and thought provoking. Marvel is not happy go lucky. Civil War and other arcs prove that much.
While growing up, I tended to favor Marvel from the late 1970s into the mid-1980s. About three years ago I started The Defenders Fansite blog about that non-team. That said, I have a soft spot for many DC characters and a number of tropes that are more common to that company. In the game-adventure writing I do for the Villains & Vigilantes game, I draw inspiration from both Marvel and DC.
Batman was the hero, in my eyes, during all of my childhood. I knew about Superman, of course, I read a couple of Spiderman and Fantastic Four stories, but nothing pleased my baby self like seeing the scene from the old 1960s Batman TV series with Adam West where Batman has to dispose of a bomb with a lit fuse. He goes to throw it off the dock into the water, but stops when he sees a family of ducks swimming down there. Oh Batman, you so moral. So, uh... DC.
DC has movie troubles. The only great character that stood out on film has been Batman. Superman had a moment or two, but Batman is the consistent homerun hitter. Green Lantern needed to be a homerun, and isn't.
If you want happy-go-lucky Marvel, read "Ruins" by Warren Ellis. A parallel Marvel universe where everything goes wrong. Gamma rays turned Bruce Banner into a living mass of tumors, Wolverine's flesh is falling off because his skeleton is toxic, Fantastic Four got murdalized by space rays, etc.
I like Marvel more but Superman is by far my favourite superhero. Marvel is cool because their stories seem alot darker. I feel like DC is meant for a younger audience, but I'm probably wrong.
Marvel has stronger, smarter and better fleshed out female characters. Jean Grey, Emma Frost, Storm, Rogue, Selena, Husk....and the list goes on and on.
