Character Spotlight: Crescent and Io

Last month, as a lead-in to a new event called "War of Realms", Marvel released a book called New Agents of Atlas that featured a team of all-Asian superheroes. Several of those superheroes were canon immigrants, and there just so happened to be four of them. So June is going to be Agents of Atlas month!

This week: Crescent (and Io)!

Marvel Future Fight is a mobile fighting game that pits Marvel characters from different dimensions against each other. Occasionally, that means creating original characters from the multiverse we've never seen before. The first example of this was a new version of Captain America (Steve's daughter from a world where he was never frozen), and the second example we saw last week: Luna Snow.

Crescent's story is that she's a kid from Korea whose antique dealer father disappears one night. She finds a red bear mask in his room, and when she puts it on, it summons Io, a moon bear spirit. Together, they track down her father and rescue him from the clutches of Morgan le Fey. Crescent and Io joined Marvel Future Fight in November 2018.

In New Agents of Atlas #1 (May 2019), Crescent and Io debut fighting alongside Luna Snow and White Fox to protect Korea from an invasion by Fire Demons.

Character Spotlight: Luna Snow

Last month, as a lead-in to a new event called "War of Realms", Marvel released a book called New Agents of Atlas that featured a team of all-Asian superheroes. Several of those superheroes were canon immigrants, and there just so happened to be four of them. So June is going to be Agents of Atlas month!

This week: Luna Snow!

Marvel Future Fight is a mobile fighting game that pits Marvel characters from different dimensions against each other. Occasionally, that means creating original characters from the multiverse we've never seen before. The first example of this was a new version of Captain America (Steve's daughter from a world where he was never frozen), and another example we'll see next week: Crescent.

Luna Snow was added to Marvel Future Fight in January 2018. What's interesting is that, since she's a K-pop idol, she's also had a few singles: "Tonight" (July 2018) and "I Really Wanna (feat. Krysta Youngs)" (December 2018).

Luna Snow's story is a little wild. She was a K-pop singer who was performing at a Stark Industries event when AIM attacked and locked her in an experimental cold storage container, where the exposure to new cold fusion technology gave her ice powers. Notably, as you'll see again next week, all of Marvel Future Fight's original characters are Korean; this even includes the first - Captain America, aka Sharon Rogers - who was born in South Korean while Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter were stationed there. This is because the creators of Future Fight, NetMarble Games, is a Korean company.

In New Agents of ATLAS #1 (May 2019), Luna Snow debuts fighting alongside Crescent and Io and White Fox to protect Korea against an invasion of Dark Elves.

Character Spotlight: Arkham Knight

Way back in 2009, Rocksteady Studios released a game called Batman: Arkham Asylum that redefined what a Batman game could be. Set in Arkham Asylum, it featured a creepy atmosphere, a wide variety of Batman villains used in clever ways, a dynamic fighting system, good storytelling, and most important of all, a focus on stealth that really put you in the mindset of Batman and feel what it's like to use his tricks to fight bad guys. There are few things more exhilarating than sneaking up behind a henchman, stringing him up from a gargoyle before he can alert the others, than lying in wait for another henchman to spot him so you can incapacitate him as well while he's distracted.

Needless to say, it was a hit.

This led to sequels, with Arkham City coming out in 2011 and Arkham Knight in 2015. (There was also Arkham Origins in 2013, but that was by a different studios, and a few mobile games, but none of those really count.)

In Batman: Arkham Knight, the Scarecrow has decided to unleash a series of attacks on Gotham and enlisted the help of the Arkham Knight to help him. The Arkham Knight is a more militarized take on Batman who wears the Arkham Asylum logo on his chest. By the end of the game, you learn that the Arkham Knight is Jason Todd, looking for revenge after Batman supposedly let him die. After the events of the main game, Jason takes on his standard mantle of the Red Hood for some DLC (downloadable content).

In Detective Comics #1000 (March 2019), which comes out today!, the Arkham Knight makes his comics debut. In a suit that looks very similar to his digital counterpart. This version believes that Batman is a cancer on Gotham and plans to eradicate him. He is almost certainly NOT Jason Todd, so who could he be? Time will tell.

Character Spotlight: Copperhead

In case anyone's not aware, I often find inspiration for new posts from TVTropes's Canon Immigrant and RetCanon pages. (But I'm pretty sure a lot of the entries for comics on those pages come from this blog, so it evens out.) And for years now, one of the entries on those lists was a female Copperhead. But I looked and looked and never found any evidence of a female Copperhead appearing in comics.

Until now.

But first, let's go over the Copperhead legacy. The first - and, most would argue, "main" - Copperhead debuted in The Brave and the Bold #78 (April 1968). John Doe was a master contortionist and super-assassin who strangled his victims to death, but he later got snake powers when he sold his soul to Neron during Underworld Unleashed. He was killed by Manhunter in 2004.

The second Copperhead was Nathan Prince, who debuted in Teen Titans #56 (February 2008) as a member of the Terror Titans. Considering the New 52 happened only a couple years later, Nathan didn't have much time to shine.

The New 52 introduced us to Sameer Park in Justice League #18 (March 2013). Unlike the previous two, this Copperhead is actually a human/snake hybrid. He was killed during Forever Evil (2013).

Another Copperhead who looks almost exactly the same as Sameer appears in Batgirl and the Birds of Prey issues #2-4 (September-November 2016). And a Copperhead with a still inhuman but less snake-like appearance showed up in Batman issues #14 and #19 (January and March 2017. Whether these are meant to be the same Copperhead, and whether either or both of these are meant to be Sameer Park, remains to be seen. Wikipedia calls this version "Nora Park", but I have no idea where it's getting that information. This version or versions doesn't even appear to be a woman.

But you know who is a woman? The Copperhead who appeared in Batman: Arkham Origins (October 2013). She's a boss fight in the game and she seems to have all the same abilities as the original Copperhead. There also seems to be some evidence that points to "Copperhead" being a role in drug cartels rather than a specific person. Regardless, I've used an image of her action figure because all the screenshots I could find of her in the game are really dark and don't give a good impression of her.

Three years later, a female Copperhead with a very similar appearance premiered in All-Star Batman #2 (September 2016). Why yes, that IS the same month as the mysterious Copperhead above. It's almost like comic book companies are terrible at getting their facts coordinated these days. But I digress. She is formally a mercenary like previous Copperheads, but is currently a crime boss in Gotham.

After all this time, I'm glad I can finally cross her off the list!

Wolverine's Heat Claws

I don't know what to make of this one, I really don't. It may very well be the strangest entry on this blog, and may I remind you we've had characters imported before they debuted, characters imported as different characters, characters that technically immigrated but never appeared in the thing they immigrated from, whatever oddness was going on with Venom's Spawn, and more. But first, some backstory.

As you may know, Wolverine died back in 2014 in the aptly named miniseries Death of Wolverine. Everyone knew at the time that his death was a stunt, but what people didn't realize was how long it would take for him to come back. Four years gone for a character of his magnitude is a lifetime, especially since there was a reality reboot in the middle there. Marvel had the perfect opportunity to erase Wolverine's death during the Secret Wars event and they chose not to use it. That's huge.

But now Wolverine has returned, in the equally aptly titled miniseries Return of Wolverine (September 2018), except there's something different about him. His claws, specifically. There's something different about his claws. They're "heat claws".

At San Diego Comic-Con in July, the writer, Charles Soule, stated in a video message that the heat claws are based on Wolverine's appearance in the fighting game Marvel vs. Capcom. But here's where it gets weird: nobody knows what he's talking about.

Basically, Wolverine doesn't have heat claws in Marvel vs. Capcom (1997). He doesn't have special claws of any kind. The closest thing people can figure is that he's actually talking about Marvel vs. Capcom 3 (2011).  In that game, Wolverine's special moves are depicted as a series of flashing slashes. This could've given Soule the idea for Wolverine to have energy claws.

Some other fans have suggested that Soule is mistaken about the video game that influenced him, and that he was actually talking about the X-Men arcade game from 1992. Although Wolverine didn't have heat claws in that, either, his swipes were often illustrated with an energetic effect.

No matter how you slice it, everyone agrees they're a canon immigrant but no one is sure where from. And that's nuts.

Costume Spotlight: Spider-Man's Advanced Suit

Of the thousands of comic book characters out there, I'm pretty sure none has had as many video games as Spider-Man has. Wikipedia lists 35, stretching all the way back to the Atari 2600, and the newest one - simply called Spider-Man - debuted earlier this month (September 7) on PS4.

The game was first announced at E3 in 2016, which is also where they showcased a new suit that would appear in the game and took focus in most of the marketing.

A similar suit debuted in Peter Parker: The Spectacular Spider-Man #305 (June 2018), which came out the same week as E3. There are several differences between the two outfits (especially at the wrists and ankles), but it's clearly supposed to evoke the Advanced Suit of the game.

But in case that's not close enough to count for you, never fear. The character himself appears in Spider-Geddon #0, out today!

Spider-Geddon is a sequel to the recent Spider-Verse event, which famously included "every Spider-Man ever". They did a pretty good job with that, so will this be the only new addition? Surely there are a couple they weren't able to include before - I don't ever recall seeing MTV's Spider-Man, for instance, and Atari's Spider-Man almost certainly never showed up. Anyway, I'm excited to find out!

Character Spotlight: Captain America (Peggy Carter)

Recently, Marvel has brought back Exiles, a series about a team of superheroes from across the multiverse whose goal is to save the multiverse. This month (May 2018), an alternate Captain America joins the team - Peggy Carter!

This version of Captain America first debuted in Marvel Puzzle Quest in June 2016. Presuming the two characters have the same backstory, this Peggy was friends with Steve Rogers before he became Captain America and took his place in the Super-Soldier Program when he died prematurely.

And this might actually be a double immigrant, because her costume seems to be based on a mixture of the outfits in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) and Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), albeit with a dapper tie that Steve didn't have:

Character(s) Spotlight: Coldmoon and Dragonfire

In November 2011, Marvel released Point One #1, a comic that touted "The Future Begins Here!" It set up stories across the Marvel Universe, including major ones like Original Sin, Avengers VS X-Men, and Age of Ultron, but right there in the middle was the first appearance of two brand new characters: Coldmoon and Dragonfire, two yin yang-themed Chinese teenagers with fire and ice powers.

These characters were never seen again. According to Fred Van Lente in his Reddit AMA, they were created for the Marvel Heroes video game, by Gazillion Entertainment, to help the game appeal to the Chinese market and included in Point One to help promote that. Normally this is where I'd show you the video game versions of them as proof, but they never appeared in the game. This issue is literally the only time Coldmoon and Dragonfire appeared anywhere.

It's a shame; with such a high profile introduction, you'd think someone would've seized the opportunity to use them somewhere. Oh well. For all we know, someone will dust them off twenty years from now and they'll be the surprise character find of 2040. Worked for Squirrel Girl!

Character Spotlight: Sin Tzu

This is one I never expected to see, and I have to give another shout-out to austinpopdan for (inadvertently) pointing me in the direction of it!

Batman: Rise of Sin Tzu was a video game that was released for all consoles in 2003. Set in the DC Animated Universe, the game introduced - who else? - Sin Tzu, a yellow peril villain that basically followed the plot of every event villain: he comes to Gotham to challenge Batman and recruits a bunch of Batman villains to soften him up first.

Sin Tzu was a big deal at the time. To my knowledge, an original character had never been created for a video game adaptation before, so DC got Jim Lee to design him and hyped him up to be the next Harley Quinn. That...didn't happen.

In fact, he didn't appear in comics at all (a pretty major step if you want a character to be the next Harley Quinn) until almost fifteen years later in Suicide Squad Most Wanted: El Diablo and Killer Croc #3 (October 2016).

I don't know why this second-rate Ra's al-Ghul, himself a second-rate Fu Manchu, exists. But he does, and he finally achieved his goal of becoming a canon immigrant. Join us next week for the final immigrant from Suicide Squad Most Wanted!

Character Spotlight: Guillotine

There's not much to say about this one, as she's brand new. I've mentioned in previous posts that Marvel currently has a series called Contest of Champions, which ties into a video game of the same name, even though the series is in continuity and the game is not. Despite that, the company behind the video game has a lot of input into the series.

While the video game mainly uses well-known Marvel characters, the series tends to go for a more international flavor, using such characters as the South Korean White Fox, a British version of the the Punisher named Outlaw, the Greek Ares, and more. To that end, the company created a French character named Guillotine, who is the latest in a long line of vigilantes armed with a bloodthirsty, sentient sword named Le Fleur du Mal.

She appears in Contest of Champions #1 (October 2015).

Despite her very 90s backstory, I like her look and hope she appears outside of Contest of Champions in the future.

Item Spotlight: ISO-8

Iso-8 began as a collectible power-up resource in Marvel: Avengers Alliance (2012) and then spread as a connecting factor in other Marvel video games, including Thor: The Dark World - The Official Game (2013) and Spider-Man Unlimited (2014).

Those examples are interesting because they show that Iso-8 isn't just a feature of some "Marvel Video Game Universe". Thor: The Dark World is technically part of the MCU and Spider-Man Unlimited is a multiversal game that ties into Spider-Verse, showing that Iso-8 exists across realities. This makes it easy, then, to have it show up in the OG Earth-616 Marvel Universe...which it did.

Blue Marvel was seen studying Iso-8 in The Ultimates #1 (November 2015), where he put forth an interesting theory: Iso-8 is a "cosmic counter", meaning that it's in its eighth iteration because the Marvel multiverse is in ITS eighth iteration.

I will say that it's POSSIBLE Iso-8's first in-continuity appearance was in Contest of Champions, a video game tie-in series that is itself in continuity. That would make sense but I can't confirm it. I can confirm, however, that Iso-8 will appear for sure in Contest of Champions #5 (February 2016).

If someone can confirm an appearance of Iso-8 in Contest of Champions before showing up in The Ultimates, please let me know.

Convergence: "Injustice: Gods Among Us"

This week saw the release of Convergence #0, the official kick-off to DC's summer event where remnants of destroyed alternate realities find themselves stuck together on one planet and fight it out (but please don't get that confused with Marvel's upcoming summer event where remnants of destroyed alternate realities find themselves stuck together on one planet and fight it out, Secret Wars). The last ten or so pages of the issue clarify who will be involved by giving a list of 41 worlds. Most of them are ones you'd guess: past versions of DC (Flashpoint, pre-Flashpoint, pre-Zero Hour, etc), possible futures (various version of the Legion of Super-Heroes, Kamandi, Hex, etc), older versions of alternate earths (Earth-4, Earth-S, Earth-X), and popular Elseworlds (Kingdom Come, Superman: Red Son, etc). Some are more surprising, like Sugar and Spike. And then, at the very end, is Injustice: Gods Among Us.

Injustice: Gods Among Us is a 2013 fighting game pitting heroes against villains and other heroes, and I hate it. The storyline is atrocious (it starts off with Superman killing The Joker after The Joker kills Lois Lane, and then Superman establishing a new world order with him as the high chancellor) and somehow the costumes are even busier than the New 52 versions, which is quite a feat.

I have no idea how Injustice made it as one of the 41 worlds when things like The Nail didn't, or why it's the only non-comics media world to be included, instead of something like Super Friends or the DC Animated Universe. But here we are.

And here's a page from the upcoming Convergence #1 that shows just how dire this stupid reality is.

"Ultimate Spider-Man" and Ultimate Beetle

In 2005, ActiVision released an Ultimate Spider-Man video game. It was written by Brian Michael Bendis, the author of the Ultimate Spider-Man series at the time, and it was promoted as being in continuity with the comic. And then it got released and...it wasn't. And it was. Some stories ignored events that happened in the game, yet others referred to them.

Three years later, it was finally accepted that the game didn't count, so it was adapted into a storyline near the end of the series's run called "War of the Symbiotes"...with some details changed, because they just can't make it easy, can they?

As part of the storyline, a character who first appeared in the game - Ultimate Beetle - was also introduced in the second part (Ultimate Spider-Man #124, August 2008), with the same power suit.

Spider-Verse: Marvel Vs Capcom

Spider-Verse is a currently running event in the Spider-Man comics that will involve every* Spider-Man we've ever met, including several Spider-Women and Spider-Girls (not to mention Scarlet Spiders and Spider-Hams and whatnot), and several brand-new versions. The premise is simple: there's a group of people trying to wipe out every Spider character across the multiverse, so all the Spider characters will team up to stop them. This is, of course, a massive event - multimedia even, since it will also feature in the Spider-Man Unlimited video game and the animated series Ultimate Spider-Man - and given the premise, it's only natural that it will add a few entries to this catalog.

*I say "every" because Marvel says "every", but there are a few that won't be showing up, such as Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield. (Although see here for more information on that.)

Today's entry is Marvel vs. Capcom Spider-Man!

The Marvel/Capcom relationship first began in 1994 when Capcom made The Punisher, a side-scrolling beat 'em up. This was followed by X-Men: Children of the Atom (1994) and Marvel Super Heroes (1995), two fighting games that created the basic format of the Marvel vs. Capcom series using only Marvel characters. Capcom would mix these with their hit Street Fighter series in X-Men vs. Street Fighter (1996) and Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter (1997), and then finally brought other characters into the mix in Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes (1998), which led to Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes (2000), Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds (2011), Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 (2011), and Marvel vs. Capcom Origins (2012). It also led to a slew of other Capcom vs. titles that aren't relevant here. Of these games, Spider-Man appears in all but The Punisher, X-Men: Children of the Atom, and X-Men vs. Street Fighter. Makes sense.

Just like Spider-Verse #1 featured a couple short stories about Spider-Men from other media, Spider-Verse #2 (January 2015) does as well, and this time it's arcade Spider-Man:

"Web Ball", "Spider Sting", and "Maximum Spider" are special moves featured in all of the games he appears in. Morlun, however, has never appeared in the games.

52 Shakeup

The Batman Beyond post from earlier this year made me realize that the New 52 has affected this site more drastically than I originally thought. No longer can I go on just presuming that past stories still "count", however loosely. They do for the purposes of this site, but in terms of the New 52, nothing exists until we see it again. So I think it's important to take note of what makes it through and what doesn't. And let me tell you...not a whole lot has made it through. Below is the list of everything I could find, and most of it is exactly what you would expect. In the future, if anything else shows up, it'll get a brand new spotlight and a "52 Shakeup" tag, because it's essentially a new character

Batman:
Harley Quinn

Batgirl first appeared in Batgirl #1 (September 2011). She's Barbara Gordon again and looks like Batgirl.

Renee Montoya first appeared in one panel of Batwoman #1 (September 2011) and then appeared in one panel of Batwoman #0 (September 2012). That's it so far.

Mr. Freeze's real name, costume, and part of his backstory haven't changed from the Animated Series version. And of course he still calls himself "Mr. Freeze", which is from Batman '66. And, as part of his backstory, Nora Fries is still around..sort of. Her name is Nora Fields, and Mr. Freeze is obsessed with her but they were never actually married. In fact, they never even met. (Batman Annual #1, May 2012)

Clayface is looking more like his animated self than ever in Justice League #30 (May 2014).

The Batmobile's afterburner is still around, but I don't have a first appearance for it.

Presumably this whole page, if the Batman Inc. stuff still counts

Superman:
Perry White and Jimmy Olsen first appeared in Superman #1 (September 2011).
The Daily Planet has definitely appeared in the New 52, but I can't find what issue. I'm sure it came out in September 2011, though.

Mercy Graves first appears in Justice League #31 (June 2014). She's Asian now, supposedly to match Tao Okamoto in Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, but I don't know which one really came first.

Livewire first appears as a member of the Secret Society of Super-Villians in Justice League #30 (May 2014).

Non first appears by name in Action Comics #23.2 (September 2013), although I've read he appeared as early as Action Comics #5 (January 2012). Interestingly, he appears with Faora instead of Ursa; presumably this is to be more like Man of Steel, but then why wouldn't they use Jax-Ur instead of Non?

Sgt. Casey is mentioned in Action Comics #1 (September 2011). As far as I know, he hasn't actually appeared yet, but he's out there somewhere.

Mr. Mxyzptlk first appeared in Action Comics #15 (December 2012) with a new backstory: he's now a court jester for the 5th-dimensional King-Thing Brpxz of Zrff.

Bizarro first appears in Superman #23.1 (September 2013) as a failed Kryptonian/human-hybrid Superman clone called Subject B-0.

Metallo first appears in Action Comics #1 (September 2011) as John Corben, a soldier under Sam Lane. In issue 2 (October 2011), he joins John Henry Irons's Project: Steel Soldier and wears the Metal-0 suit, The Metal-0 suit is then revealed to be sentient - thanks to a Brainiac virus - and through a series of events, Metallo and Corben become one person and they get a Kryptonite heart in issue 8 (April 2012). Later, they upgrade to Metal-2.0, and then by Forever Evil they begin calling themselves Metallo.

This whole page, except for maybe the Phantom Zone appearance

Other:
Giganta's powers, as seen here in her first appearance, Trinity of Sin: Pandora #2 (August 2013):

Green Arrow's costume, as seen here, seems to be a mixture of his Smallville and Arrow outfits. From what I've seen, it tends to lean more toward one or the other based on the artist:

John Stewart's costume, as seen here. John Stewart first appeared in Green Lantern Corps #1 (September 2011).