Animal Man

Bernard "Buddy" Baker first appeared in Strange Adventures #180 (1965) as a film stuntman who, after exposure to an exploding extraterrestrial spaceship, acquired the ability to temporarily borrow the abilities of animals. Across publication history the character has been revised: the Silver Age depiction presents episodic, borrowed animal powers for crimefighting, Grant Morrison's 1980s run emphasized domestic life and animal-rights themes, and later Vertigo-era writers (notably Jamie Delano) killed and resurrected Buddy, creating the concept of the 'Red' and recasting him as an animal avatar or a non-human animal god.

Early depictions present Buddy Baker as a costumed superhero (specific costume details are not supplied in the provided sources). In Vertigo-era stories his superhero costume is largely abandoned after narrative events that render him legally deceased and reborn as an animal elemental; thereafter his physical form and conventional heroic iconography become less central to his portrayal.

Core ability: the capacity to temporarily "borrow" animal abilities (examples cited include a bird's flight and the proportionate strength of an ant). Original origin attributes these powers to proximity to an exploding extraterrestrial spaceship. Later Vertigo-era narratives and Jamie Delano's run reframe Buddy as linked to a metaphysical animal life force called the 'Red,' leading to portrayals of resurrection and an ontological union with animal life that move beyond episodic borrowing. Behaviorally, he functions as a crimefighter in earlier stories and as an agent advocating animal-rights and ecological concerns in later runs; some stories depict morally fraught actions tied to defending animals.