Appearance Spotlight: Negasonic Teenage Warhead

This is going to be a quick one.

Negasonic Teenage Warhead is a Genoshan mutant who first appeared in New X-Men #115 (June 2001). She was a telepath who also had some precognition powers:

Surprisingly, she appeared in Deadpool (2016), although with a different look, backstory, and power set. Her role in the film was originally meant for Cannonball, but they couldn't use him, so they picked Negasonic based solely on her name. Frankly, her name makes more sense for someone with explosive powers like she has in the film:

She has since started appearing in Deadpool and the Mercs for Money (July 2016, et al.) with a look clearly inspired by the movie. Her association with Deadpool at all derives from the movie, in fact.

Appearance Spotlight: Vixen (post-Rebirth)

DC's Rebirth initiative has two goals, which at first seem at odds with each other, but seem to be working so far. The first is to shake up the majority of their line, taking their books in new directions that feel fresh. The other is to make it feel more like the pre-New 52 DC Universe by bringing back fan favorite characters, iconic outfits, and popular backstories. I guess there's also a third category that falls in between these two, which is adjusting their books to better match popular adaptations. This falls under that third category.

Vixen has been featured on this site before for her wardrobe changes. You can read about that here. That post will bring you up to the New 52, but shortly after that, Vixen got an animated series on CW Seed (August 2015). So while in the comics she looked like this:

On the show she looked like this:

The series turned out to be fairly popular, to the point that the character made a live action appearance on Arrow, played by her voice actor. Another Vixen, the first Vixen's grandmother, appeared this season on Legends of Tomorrow as a member of the Justice Society. With all that exposure, it makes sense to update her costume again (especially to get rid of that plunging neckline), so in DC Rebirth #1 (May 2016), we got this:

Which was modified a little into this in Justice League of America: Vixen #1 (January 2017):

The Origins of the Maximoff Twins

This is a bit of a controversial one, folks, so strap in.

The Maximoff twins, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch, are the children of Magneto. They didn't know this when they joined his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants in Uncanny X-Men #4 (January 1964), but it eventually came out, and it's been the source of many storylines since then, including House of M (2005).

At least...that used to be the case.

See, back when Marvel was selling off the movie rights for all of its characters to whoever would take them, things got a little muddled. There were certain instances where it wasn't clear which rights package characters should belong to. Take Kingpin, for instance; he debuted as a Spider-Man villain and appeared as the primary antagonist in his animated series, but he's also a major Daredevil villain. Where does he go? (Daredevil, it turns out.)

The twins are in a similar situation. They're mutants who debuted in X-Men and Magneto is their father, but they've spent most of their time as Avengers characters. But unlike the Kingpin situation, Marvel and Fox decided to just share them. Which is odd, frankly. So in the same year, we had Quicksilver show up in X-Men: Days of Future Past, where he hinted Magneto was his father (this would be confirmed in X-Men: Apocalypse):

And Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch debuted in Captain America: Winter Soldier, where they're not mutants and Magneto doesn't exist (they would make a larger appearance in Avengers: Age of Ultron):

The problem was solved even further by killing Quicksilver in Age of Ultron (2015), so now Fox has Quicksilver and Marvel has Scarlet Witch.

But what happens if people who are only familiar with the movies stumble upon the comics? won't they be confused? Well, Marvel fixed that too. In Avengers and X-Men: Axis #7 (December 2014), Scarlet Witch puts a curse of sorts on Magneto's family...but she and Quicksilver aren't affected! Later, Uncanny Avengers #4 (May 2015), we get the whole story:

Basically, the twins' parents are the people who raised them, and instead of mutants, they're experiments of the High Evolutionary. People blew a gasket over this, but here's the thing: it makes sense.

For one thing, this isn't the first time their parents have been retconned. Magneto himself was a retcon! I won't get into the nitty-gritty - you can read more in-depth analyses here and here - but the gist is that this is actually the simplest origin story they've had. The Maximoffs and the High Evolutionary have been part of their story from day one, this just cuts out the middle men, whether those middle men are The Whizzer and Miss America or Magneto and Magda.

I also doubt this will be the last time their history changes, but at this point, that's just par for the course.

Appearance Spotlight: Tempest (post-Rebirth)

DC's Rebirth initiative has two goals, which at first seem at odds with each other, but seem to be working so far. The first is to shake up the majority of their line, taking their books in new directions that feel fresh. The other is to make it feel more like the pre-New 52 DC Universe by bringing back fan favorite characters, iconic outfits, and popular backstories. I guess there's also a third category that falls in between these two, which is adjusting their books to better match popular adaptations. This falls under that third category.

When Aquaman's sidekick, Aqualad, first appeared in the 60s, he looked like this:

As the Teen Titans grew up, they took on new superhero identities and changed their appearances. Aqualad became Tempest in a miniseries of the same name (1996), and he adopted a costume that was similar to a blue one Aquaman had started wearing, but keeping the red color scheme that was associated with him.

In 2003, the Teen Titans got their own animated series. Although Aqualad was not a member of the team, he did appear in the first season and made several appearances after that. However, his look was much different from anything seen in the comics at that time.

Tempest did not appear in the New 52 for several years, not until Aquaman #42 (July 2015). This version wears a blue version of his classic Tempest outfit, which makes sense as it contrasts Aquaman's warmly colored outfit, just like Tempest's red contrasted Aquaman's blue.

But then Rebirth happened. Tempest is still wearing blue, but as you can see, his new outfit his clearly inspired by his animated one. It debuted in Titans: Rebirth #1 (June 2016).

Character Spotlight: Katya Belyakov

This one isn't as cut-and-dried as I'd like it to be, but I think there's enough circumstantial evidence for it to count.

In 2013, Marvel debuted Agents of SHIELD, a show that followed a small team of SHIELD agents led by Agent Coulson. Like Agent Coulson, the rest of the team were original to the MCU. They consisted of Melinda May, Grant Ward, Liam Fitz, Jemma Simmons, and Skye. Skye turned out to be a pre-existing character later on, and the rest made their way into the comics eventually. You can read more about all of that and some other canon immigrants from the show here.

Over the course of the first season, we learn that May is nicknamed The Cavalry, but stories differ on where the name comes from. We know it happened in Bahrain, and we get hints here and there about what went down, but we don't learn the full story until the season 2 episode "Melinda" (April 2015), where we discover she had to kill a child Inhuman named Katya Belyakov to save the people Katya was mind controlling.

2015 was SHIELD's 50th anniversary, and Marvel commemorated that by releasing a series of SHIELD one-shots as well as a new SHIELD ongoing series. To be honest, this was all pretty much an excuse to introduce MCU elements into the comics. The series uses the tv characters, and the one-shots are based on SHIELD members that are prominent in the MCU, as you can see below. But we're here to talk about May.

In The Cavalry: SHIELD 50th Anniversary Special #1 (September 2015), we see May training some new cadets. We also get flashes of her backstory, particularly this one:

Now here's the thing. The issue never says this is Katya Belyakov. It never says she's an Inhuman. It never says it happens in Bahrain. But I think "Cavalry + little girl + similar positioning" is enough to say that's what they were going for. There are other shout-outs to the show as well (an aircraft is named the Tancharoen Hawk after the showrunners, and a character sings a song from Mulan, who was voiced by Ming-Na Wen, who plays May), so I don't think they're trying to shy away from the inspiration for this issue.

Independent Month Appearance/Backstory Spotlight: Salem the Cat

It's Independent Month here at Jor-Ellis Island! As I stated back in the Thirty Days of Turtles, I want to start branching out this blog beyond Marvel and DC. It won't happen often because I'm not as familiar with other comics companies and I'm not sure they take to immigrants as well as Marvel and DC do, but I will be on the lookout for them in the future. They won't always be in a theme month like this, I don't think, but we'll see how it goes. Let's get to it!

Sabrina the Teenage Witch first debuted in Archie's Madhouse #22 (August 1962) in a story that was meant to be a one-off. The character was very popular, however, and gained multiple series of her own over time, not to mention several tv shows. Since the beginning, she's had a pet cat named Salem.

If you're mainly familiar with Sabrina through her ABC series, that picture was probably surprising to you. It will also surprise you to learn that Salem was just a regular cat. He couldn't even talk. For those of you who aren't familiar with that show, Salem was a black cat. And more than that, he was a former wizard named Salem Saberhagan who was cursed to be a cat for making moves on the wrong witch.

Until the live-action series, Sabrina had not had a comic series in over ten years. But a new one started because of the show, and - wisely - it instituted some changes to make it better match the television series.

I can't find specific issues for when changes to his backstory took place, but luckily for me, it's still in effect even in alternate realities. In Chilling Adventures of Sabrina #6 (July 2016), we get Salem's backstory and it's pretty much exactly the same, only his name is Samuel and it's told in a more adult way.

Independent Month: Zelda and Hilda's Appearances and Last Name

It's Independent Month here at Jor-Ellis Island! As I stated back in the Thirty Days of Turtles, I want to start branching out this blog beyond Marvel and DC. It won't happen often because I'm not as familiar with other comics companies and I'm not sure they take to immigrants as well as Marvel and DC do, but I will be on the lookout for them in the future. They won't always be in a theme month like this, I don't think, but we'll see how it goes. Let's get to it!

Sabrina the Teenage Witch first debuted in Archie's Madhouse #22 (August 1962) in a story that was meant to be a one-off. The character was very popular, however, and gained multiple series of her own over time, not to mention several tv shows. In her most popular show, she had two aunts named Zelda and Hilda.

They're from the comics, but they're not what you'd expect. Hilda actually premiered before Sabrina, as "Hilda the Witch", the host of Archie's Madhouse, beginning with issue 19 (April 1962).

She didn't become "Aunt Hilda" until Archie's Madhouse #37 (September 1964). Aunt Zelda wouldn't show up until Archie's Madhouse #65 (October 1968), and by that time, Hilda's appearance changed somewhat; she now had red hair.

As you can see, the ones in the show were much more attractive and hip than in the comics. But in 1997, Sabrina got a new comic series to capitalize on the hit show. And it - wisely - decided to make the comics characters a little closer to what the show depicted. In the case of Hilda and Zelda, they got younger and hipper, and gained the last name Spellman, as seen on the cover of Sabrina the Teenage Witch #5 (July 1997):

(Obviously the last name goes for Sabrina too, but I'm not making a whole extra entry just for that.)

Independent Month Character Spotlight: Marcus Williams

It's Independent Month here at Jor-Ellis Island! As I stated back in the Thirty Days of Turtles, I want to start branching out this blog beyond Marvel and DC. It won't happen often because I'm not as familiar with other comics companies and I'm not sure they take to immigrants as well as Marvel and DC do, but I will be on the lookout for them in the future. They won't always be in a theme month like this, I don't think, but we'll see how it goes. Let's get to it!

Kick-Ass, if you don't know, is a series of miniseries about a kid who wants to be a superhero and then becomes one. Mark Millar wrote the comic at the same time Matthew Vaughn wrote the movie, and while they kept in contact, they took the stories different directions.

For example, there's a superhero duo named Big Daddy and Hit-Girl. In the comics, Big Daddy is a former accountant who really loves comics. In the movie, he's a former cop. Therefore, when the movie came out in April 2010, it introduced a character called Marcus Williams, Big Daddy's former partner. He takes in Hit-Girl after Big Daddy is killed.

Mark Millar incorporated some of the movie ideas into the next miniseries, so that is also the status quo when Kick-Ass 2 starts (December 2010). But, while Marcus is still a cop, he's not Big Daddy's former partner.

Independent Month: Jessica Priest

It's Independent Month here at Jor-Ellis Island! As I stated back in the Thirty Days of Turtles, I want to start branching out this blog beyond Marvel and DC. It won't happen often because I'm not as familiar with other comics companies and I'm not sure they take to immigrants as well as Marvel and DC do, but I will be on the lookout for them in the future. They won't always be in a theme month like this, I don't think, but we'll see how it goes. Let's get to it!

Image Comics had noble intentions when it first started: creator-owned superhero comics that were still set in a shared universe like Marvel and DC. Best of both worlds. And at first, they succeeded really well. A great example of this is Spawn.

See, Spawn's backstory was that he was a mercenary that was killed and then we went to Hell and bonded with a demon and became a spirit of vengeance. You know, like you do. The trick was that he didn't remember who killed him. But his subconscious knew, and it kept leading him to a particular church.

As it (cleverly) turns out, the killer was a fellow mercenary named Chapel, who was one of the protagonists of Rob Liefeld's Youngblood. (He's the one with the skull paint.)

Here's the thing, though: Rob Liefeld owned Chapel, not Todd McFarlane. So what happens when you want to adapt Spawn into another medium...say, a movie? You have to fill that role with a new character. Enter Jessica Priest. (August 1997)

But that worked out for the best, because a year before the movie was released, Liefeld left the company and took his characters with him. Suddenly there was no Chapel around to kill Al Simmons anyway. Enter Jessica Priest again! She was first seeded into the comics in Spawn #61 (March 1997) a few months before the movie was released, and was revealed to be Spawn's true killer.

And since that was pretty much her only role, she didn't show up much after that. A few instances here and there and an origin story in Curse of the Spawn, but only six or seven issues total.

Character Spotlight: Bud and Lou

This is a pretty cut-and-dried one, so it'll be quick.

In the Batman: The Animated Series episode "Harley and Ivy" (1993), we learn that Harley Quin has two pet hyenas named Bud and Lou, after Bud Abbot and Lou Costello.

Not long after Harley Quinn got her own series, Bud and Lou appeared as well, in Harley Quinn #4 (January 2001).

And, although this is a bit surprising, they survived the New 52, appearing here on the cover of her first issue (September 2011), although they didn't actually appear within a New 52 comic until Suicide Squad #15 (December 2012).

Character Spotlight: Condiment King

I've previously included Condiment King in the Batman the Animated Series Super-Post, where I said this:

Condiment King

The Condiment King, aka Mitchell Mayo, is a comic relief villain that first appeared in the Batman: The Animated Series episode "Make 'Em Laugh" (1994).  He first appeared in comics in Birds of Prey #37 (January 2002), also in a comic relief role, although chronologically he first appeared in Batgirl: Year One #8 (September 2003), where his costume and equipment has a much more home-made vibe.


Except for a couple issues of Final Crisis Aftermath: Run! (2009), those were the extent of his comic appearances. He belongs to an important-but-overlooked class of villains that's good for cameos and brief fight scenes but not much else. And there's nothing wrong with that.

It's in that regard that he makes a post-Rebirth appearance, locked up in Arkham in Batman #9 (October 2016):

Character/Team Spotlight: The Awesome Threesome

This is one of those tricky ones, and I never would've known about it without the tip from user shadzane. Thanks!

The Awesome Threesome is a trio of supervillains that first appeared in Aquaman #36 (September 1967). The team is comprised of Torpedoman, Claw, and Magneto.

Torpedoman also appeared in the Aquaman cartoon episode "Treacherous is the Torpedoman", which debuted in October 1967. He returned in the November 1967 episode "The Torp, The Magneto, and The Claw", which featured the debuts of Claw and Magneto (obviously).

So why are these on this site? They clearly showed up in comics before animation. Well, not so fast. First, both of these episodes and the issue were written by Bob Haney. Furthermore, we've seen several times before that the lead time for animation can cause characters created for animation to jump over to comics before the animation airs. And beyond that, check out the cover to Aquaman #36.

It's the only issue to feature that banner at the top, so I'm pretty sure this issue was meant to promote the cartoon by featuring characters created for the cartoon. I think that also holds true for Tusky the Walrus, as seen last week.

Character Spotlight: Tusky the Walrus

This is one of those tricky ones, and I never would've known about it without the tip from user shadzane. Thanks!

Tusky is a very intelligent walrus who is sort of Aquaman's equivalent of Krypto. He debuted in the first episode of the Aquaman cartoon, "Menace of the Black Manta" (September 1967).

He first appeared in comics in Aquaman #36, which was also in September 1967.

And both the episode and the issue were written by Bob Haney. So which came first? Well, we've seen several times before that the lead time for animation can cause characters created for animation to jump over to comics before the animation airs. And beyond that, check out the cover to Aquaman #36.

It's the only issue to feature that banner at the top, so I'm pretty sure this issue was meant to promote the cartoon by featuring characters created for the cartoon. You'll see more of those next week.

Group Spotlight: Peregrinator's Club (Earth-0)

This is not the first time I've featured the Peregrinator's Club, but the other time was on Earth-12 and in the future. This is on Earth-0 and in the present. And this is actually the TRUE first appearance, so it's more important.

The Peregrinator's Club is a men's club where the Gotham Police Department held a party for Commissioner Gordon in the episode "Joker's Favor" (1992), which is also notable for featuring the debut of Harley Quinn.

That episode was written by Paul Dini, and about fifteen years later, Dini started a run on Detective Comics. So in his very first issue - Detective Comics #821 (July 2006) - he featured the Peregrinator's Club as a setting.