The A-12 "kite" was a disaster as far as trying to land a flying wing on the deck of a carrier-it was designed for lo-observable, not to be a Navy craft.
The F-111 "McNamras Folly" never made it performance goals, was a flying dog.
The F-14 was a brilliant effort/design by Grumman to satisfy the Navy's fleet air defence req't. Also, the A-6 Intruder was also a brilliant design to accomplish its task, fly far with many bombs.
In contrast, the fuel hog that is the F-18 (either version ), is being trumped up to relace the A-6. They just started putting on composite wings on the A-6s when klintoons DOD wanted them mothballed.