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Who are Marvel’s New Warriors?

Marvel is just pushing out as many TV shows and Netflix shows as they can this year and next. Of the new shows, Marvel’s New Warriors will be a live-action half-hour comedy show on Freeform (ABC’s teenager-driven network). But who exactly are the New Warriors? Not many people know who they are, but Marvel does better than DC when taking B-class superheroes and making them extremely popular. So this is an introduction to Marvel’s New Warriors, in the comics, and what we can possibly expect from the show and the changes they made.

New Warriors’ Origins

Marvel doesn’t do sidekicks like DC does (the original duo of Captain American and Bucky aside). Stan Lee actually doesn’t like the concept of sidekicks, which is why he created Spider-Man in the first place, a solo-teenage hero with problems galore. However, this doesn’t mean that Marvel does have teenage or young adult superheroes. On the contrary, there are teams of teenager superheroes and young adults—from X-Force, incarnations of the X-Men, Young Avengers, New Mutants, the Runaways, the Power Pack and now the Champions (with my current favorite three heroes—Miles, Kamala and Sam; i.e. Ultimate Spider-Man, Ms. Marvel, and Nova).

New Warriors was created by Marvel editor Tom DeFalco in 1989 to be a junior counterpart to the Avengers. The first series lasted 75-issues and four annuals, spinning off mini-series featuring original character Night Thrasher, but also Nova. The second series was only 11-issues in 1999. The third series was a six-issue mini-series that was the catalyst for the divisive event of the early 21st for Marvel and I will talk more about that later. The fourth series expanded the team. And the fifth series was part of the All-New Marvel NOW! Relaunch and lasted 12-issues.

Earth-616 (Main Comic Continuity) Civil War

The third series, as I mentioned in the above paragraph, was the catalyst for the divisive event of Civil War. I’m not talking about Captain America: Civil War, because the message is similar, but the events are different. The New Warriors in this series were stars of a reality TV Show with Namorita, Night Thrasher, Nova, and Speedball and Microbe. With Nova off in space, the rest of the team faced a group of supervillains that included the C-list likes of Cobalt Man, Coldheart, Nitro, and Speedfreak.

When Nitro flipping exploded, it killed 612 people in Stamford, CT, including most of the New Warriors and the villains. Did I mention it was at a school? This event was the thing that made people question why superheroes got to run about unchecked by the government. Several other events later, and the Superhuman Registration Act was passed and spearheaded by Iron Man, while Captain America was wholly against it because it was impeding on the rights of the heroes to have their privacy.

Say what you will about Civil War, it does bring superhero accountability to into question.

Team Members (in the Comics): The Original Team

The original team included:

Firestar (yes, like from the Spider-Man cartoon from the 1970s, she is Angelica Jones); Marvel Boy (and people wonder why DC’s Captain Marvel/Shazam can’t use Marvel anymore); Namorita (Namor’s relative); Nova, young adult Richard Ride (not Sam Alexander, the current Nova); Speedball; and Night Thrasher (the founder).

Second Series Team

The Original Team was joined by Turbo, Bolt, and Aegis (who actually is like an expy of Night Thrasher, who’s already on the team).

Fourth Series Team

All of the members of New Warriors, with a few exceptions are depowered mutants including:  Blackwing (Barnell Bohusk) is the depowered mutant known as Beak; Decibel (Jonothon “Jono” Evan Starsmore) is the depowered mutant known as Chamber; Night Thrasher; and Phaser (Christian Cord) is the depowered mutant known as Radian and the brother of Longstrike. In addition, there are Ripcord (Miranda Leevald) is the depowered mutant known as Stacy X; Skybolt (Vincent Stewart) is the depowered mutant known as Redneck; and Tempest (Angel Salvadore) is the depowered mutant known as Angel. And last but not least, Wondra (Jubilation Lee) is the depowered mutant known as Jubilee. Other members joined over time as well.

Fifth Series Team

Justice and Speedball are returning Warriors, while Nova (Sam Alexander), Scarlet Spider (Kaine), Hummingbird (Aracely Penalba), Sun Girl (Selah Burke), an Inhuman named Haechi (Mark Sim), and an Atlantean Water Snake (Faira Sar Namora) are all members.

Changes for the Show

The biggest change of the show is that Squirrel Girl will be a part of it, which makes no sense because she was never a New Warrior. She is an Avenger in the comics, albeit part-time. Anyway, I have conflicted feelings about the character itself (see here). Other members of the team will include New Warrior classics: Night Thrasher, Speedball, Microbe and others likes Mister Immortal (who the hell is that, okay) and Debrii.

The other change or rather what it is going to be is a comedy. A comedy in the MCU. Sure, the MCU does have its funny bits with snarky and sarcastic quips from our favorite heroes, but ultimately the universe is a serious place with high stakes battles. It might be a mistake to have it as a comedy. Perhaps they are going to go with the reality show thing and make it like a mockumentary (oh God, that would be awful, certain shows aside, I don’t really like the concept). But we’ll see. It’s going to be a stark contrast to the other Freeform TV Show Cloak and Dagger, which is a teen drama masking itself as a superhero show.

So there you have it folks, this is your introduction to the New Warriors. It’s one of those groups that you either like or don’t care about, so we’ll see how it does.

What do you think about the New Warriors? Do you think including Squirrel Girl is a mistake or will she carry the show? Is making it a comedy a mistake or not?Sound off in the comments or send us your thoughts on Facebook or Twitter!

About the author

Dara Berkey

Superhero nerd. History nerd. Favorite personal hero--Shazam/The Original Captain Marvel. Favorite female hero--Any of the Batgirls. Favorite male hero, other than Shazam--Any of the Robins.