Broken Frontier

By 1993, there hadn’t been a title called The Defenders (or, indeed, The New Defenders) published by Marvel, or anyone else, for seven years. The original team had briefly reunited in 1990 in Incredible Hulk #370 and later in a crossover story (‘The Return of the Defenders’) in Hulk Annual #18, Namor Annual #2, Silver Surfer Annual #5 and Dr. Strange: Sorcerer Supreme Annual #2, but that had not led to a revival of the book. So some Defenders fans were quite excited at the launch, in March ’93, of a new series - The Secret Defenders, spinning out of a Defenders reunion in Dr. Strange (vol:3) #50.

Unfortunately, as soon became clear, this was not a revival so much as a new spin on the non-team concept, with Dr. Strange (the only regular link to the original series) assembling more or less random groups of characters each month for specific missions. While it started out solidly enough (hardly surprising with old pro and Defenders creator Roy Thomas writing it), without a regular membership or continuing subplots there was no real hook for the readers. Thomas himself was gone before the end of the first year. Dr. Strange was gone too by issue #15 (replaced by the rather inferior Dr. Druid, hardly a fan favorite) and by March 1995 it was all over, #25 being the final issue of the book.

This would not, however, be the end of the Defenders. By 2001 it was fairly obvious that something was afoot regarding Marvel’s premiere non-team - the formerly late Nighthawk and the since equally deceased Hellcat had been resurrected (even the mysterious Elf with a gun had resurfaced in an issue of Spider-Man Team-Up by his creator, Steve Gerber) and rumors had been flying around for awhile. In March 2001 the fans’ patience was rewarded, when The Defenders (vol:2) #1 hit the stands!

The new series got off to a rollicking start with not only Dr. Strange, Sub-Mariner, the Hulk and the Silver Surfer reunited, but also Nighthawk, Hellcat and a new version of the Valkyrie (the former Defenders mainstay having since left Earth) who turned out to actually be the original Valkyrie (Samantha Parrington) from way back in Incredible Hulk #142!

Kurt Busiek and Erik Larsen, clearly Defenders fans themselves, brought energy and humor to the book, and over the course of the next twelve issues took the group on a wild ride through some of the most obscure corners of the Marvel Universe. The team were brought up against terrorist techno-geeks A.I.M., the Red Raven and his bird people on their floating Sky Island, Atlantean warlord Attuma and (rather predictably) old foe Yandroth, amongst others. Even the Headmen got a rematch! It was fast-paced, bright and colorful, witty and imaginative, a breath of fresh air at a time when many Marvel titles still seemed to feel that their mission was to drive as many readers as possible to the brink of suicide every month. In short, it was fun.

It didn’t sell.

In fact, the revived Defenders did more than just not sell. It united much of fandom, people who hadn’t agreed on anything at all in years, in absolute, total and utter hatred of it. It was described by at least one critic, rather unfairly, as "the worst comic book ever published". It was, in fact, a total failure. Which is a shame; because it wasn’t actually a bad book. It simply wasn’t the kind of book the fanboys wanted at that time. In 2001, it seemed, angst was still in.

From their earliest days, Marvel has always adopted an attitude of ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em’. Martin Goodman founded the company on a policy of finding out what the other guys were selling a lot of and copying it, and that policy has stood them in good stead ever since. So, it is perhaps not surprising that The Defenders #12, the final issue of the ill-fated second series, led directly into a follow-up book with a decidedly darker tone.

The Order (April-September 2002) was a six-issue limited series which picked up on the trailing plot threads of The Defenders and took them somewhere totally unexpected. Kurt Busiek had established in Defenders vol:2 #1 that the maniacal Yandroth had cursed his old foes the founding Defenders (and the Silver Surfer) to be forcibly yanked together by magic every time the Earth was threatened, a singular revenge motivated by his knowing that Strange, the Hulk, Sub-Mariner and the Surfer really, really couldn’t stand each other’s company much of the time. The curse had dogged their footsteps throughout the twelve issues of the book’s run, and the more observant readers had already noticed that something was slightly amiss with their characters as a result. This had come to a head in issue #12, in which the perhaps understandably irritated heroes had rather unexpectedly ditched a shivering Nighthawk in the Himalayas and decided to take over the world! They called themselves ‘The Order’.

The Order, then, was essentially the story of Earth versus the original Defenders, with Nighthawk, Hellcat and Valkyrie leading the fight against their former team-mates. The Order’s collective shift in personality was reflected in their appearance, as Dr. Strange readopted his short-lived masked mystic vigilante look from 1969, the Sub-Mariner donned his almost equally short-lived black leather look from the mid 1970s, and the childlike green Hulk was replaced by his devious grey skinned alter ego, Joe Fixit. They were not a group who inspired confidence that Earth was going to prosper under its new masters, and Busiek seemed to delight in making them as evil and twisted as possible.

Naturally, there was a reason for this - Yandroth’s curse had had a second phase to it, slowly bringing the four heroes’ dark sides out while their nobler, better selves languished on a kind of astral plane. Ultimately of course, The Order were defeated when, with the assistance of Nighthawk’s mystical advisor Papa Hagg, the Defenders brought together four female counterparts of the addled would-be conquerors to somehow restore the guys to their real selves. In a nice final scene, the released founding members go their separate ways but Nighthawk (described here as "the heart of the Defenders") is left by the Earth goddess Gaea with a magic ring which will enable him to summon the team together if ever they are needed again.

The four founders teamed up again in Jim Starlin’s 2003 limited series The End, in which they faced the mad Titan Thanos (the three ‘junior’ members appeared in only one scene, at the very end), and more recently in a five part The Defenders limited series in 2005, by the team of Keith Giffen, J.M. DeMatteis and Kevin Maguire -better known collectively as the team who reinvented DC’s Justice League of America in the mid ‘80s. Predictably, given the tone of their Justice League books, this latter series was much more comedic than any version so far, as the founding members faced the Dread Dormammu in his Dark Dimension and the tyrant’s sister Umar seduced the Hulk, while the Silver Surfer spent the entire series on a beach hanging out with surfer dudes!

Asked why only the ‘big four’ appeared in the 2005 series, editor Andy Schmidt voiced the opinion that "if you’re not using the most powerful characters, then you’re not doing a Defenders book", and added that he was "relieved when it wasn’t about Hellcat, Nighthawk, Valkyrie, Devil Slayer and Cloud". Luckily, for Nighthawk at least, others seem to disagree, and 2008 saw the return of Marvel’s most mismatched super team in The Last Defenders. Will this be a last hurrah or a glorious new beginning for the Defenders? Only time will tell…

Also included here for your enjoyment are cover scans of Marvel Treasury #12, the story that saw Howard the Duck team up with the Defenders and the first issue of The Gargoyle limited series from 1985.