I think it's partly because he mines (and I mean that respectfully) the genres and era's he's referencing with a great deal of love and affection for them.
He looks at other themed heroes and villains who were around in the times he is referencing, and comes up with plausible alternatives.
So Musicman sounds like he could have been a Golden Age hero, and so his sidekick has a name that stresses he's a kid partner, and which would look good on a cover from the 1940's: "Musicman and Bugleboy". Majorette even feels like a later addition somehow, like the original Bat-Girl, perhaps helped by the fact she doesn't seem quite as invested in staying a hero.
Rally's design is Speed Racer writ comnic book so brings that whole vibe with him.
And of course Surfmaster, who feels like another long standing hero, got a sidekick in the 60's he'd be a Beachboy
And then, and this is the REAL genius part, Kurt Busiek gives them stories that it is obvious we are only seeing a fragment of, a slice of their lives, but with the same sort of dialogue as old comics used referencing old stories we'd likely never read anyway, which reassures us that these are established characters in their own stories and on their own journies.
When this sort of story is done right, (Alan Moore's Supreme, the Big Bang comics series, and of course this), without the layers of cynicism that some might feel required to give it, it is indeed magical.
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He looks at other themed heroes and villains who were around in the times he is referencing, and comes up with plausible alternatives.
So Musicman sounds like he could have been a Golden Age hero, and so his sidekick has a name that stresses he's a kid partner, and which would look good on a cover from the 1940's: "Musicman and Bugleboy". Majorette even feels like a later addition somehow, like the original Bat-Girl, perhaps helped by the fact she doesn't seem quite as invested in staying a hero.
Rally's design is Speed Racer writ comnic book so brings that whole vibe with him.
And of course Surfmaster, who feels like another long standing hero, got a sidekick in the 60's he'd be a Beachboy
And then, and this is the REAL genius part, Kurt Busiek gives them stories that it is obvious we are only seeing a fragment of, a slice of their lives, but with the same sort of dialogue as old comics used referencing old stories we'd likely never read anyway, which reassures us that these are established characters in their own stories and on their own journies.
When this sort of story is done right, (Alan Moore's Supreme, the Big Bang comics series, and of course this), without the layers of cynicism that some might feel required to give it, it is indeed magical.