New Warriors
PURPOSE: Preserve Security of Earth against Super-Human Threats.
AFFILIATIONS: Avengers
ENEMIES: Various
BASE OF OPERATIONS: Rented Firehouse in Manhattan, New York
FIRST APPEARENCE: Thor #411 (1989(
HISTORY :
The New Warriors are the new generation of costumed, super-powered adventurers
in their teens and early twenties. The Warriors were founded by wealthy young
adventurer Dwayne Taylor, who devoted his life to fighting crime after the murder
of his parents. Mentored by his legal guardians - retired mercenary Andrew Chord
and enigmatic housekeeper Tai - Dwayne fought crime as Night Thrasher, forging a
vigilante partnership with the superhuman brother-and-sister duo Midnight's Fire
and Silhouette, and romancing the latter; however, their alliance ended badly
when Silhouette was shot by a gangster. Blaming Night Thrasher for the tragedy,
Fire disappeared with his fallen sister, swearing vengeance.
Despite this setback, Chord encouraged Dwayne to continue his work, and to keep
seeking allies in his war on crime. Inspired by and envious of the family dynamic
of the Fantastic Four, Dwayne decided to form his own super-hero quartet: he restored
Richard Rider's lost superpowers (casually risking Rider's life in the process),
persuading veteran adventurer Rider to join him as Nova; he recruited eager young
telekinetic hero Vance Astrovik, then known as Marvel Boy; and he pressured
reluctant heroine Firestar into joining the group after uncovering her secret
identity. No sooner had the four met than they found themselves in battle with
the alien menace Terrax, whom they defeated with the aid of Namorita and the
clownish kinetic-energy charged Speedball. The six heroes decided to remain
together as a team, dubbed the "New Warriors" by Speedball using a television
reporter's description of them. The new group, based in Dwayne's Ambrose Building
penthouse, was funded by the Taylor Foundation, a conglomerate of financial
institutions established by Dwayne's late father and overseen by Chord and Tai,
who also acted as Warriors support staff.
After aiding Thor against the Juggernaut, the Warriors crushed an AIM equipped
street gang run by the embittered Midnight's Fire, who was disowned by his sister
Silhouette. By this time, the superhuman genetic research firm Genetech had hired
the Mad Thinker to investigate the Warriors, gathering information on the team's
powers; however, the Thinker seemed to take a fond personal interest in them.
He concealed the details of their personal lives from Genetech and tried to offer
the young heroes guidance over the course of several encounters.
Meanwhile, Genetech used the Thinker's data to create their own team of super-youths,
Psionex: Asylum, Coronary, Impulse, Mathemanic and Pretty Persuasions. This unstable
new team would encounter the Warriors repeatedly as both enemies and allies. Similarly,
Genetech itself would either cause or help defuse a variety of exotic threats over
the years, often working with the Warriors.
The Warriors went on to face foes such as the astro-saboteur Star Thief (Ditmil
Pirvat); corrupt corporation Stane International; environmental extremists Project:
Earth and their super-agents, the Force of Nature; the White Queen and her Hellions;
a new female Sphinx whose self-made alternate reality was unmade by the Warriors;
the reality-warping mutant Proteus; cosmic custodian Edifice Rex; the Puppet Master;
unscrupulous armored marine salvage specialist Sea Urchin; the Hate-Monger and
his pawns, the Sons of the Serpent; and a reborn Terrax. Silhouette joined the
team, amulet-empowered adventurer Darkhawk and super-strong man-child Rage became
recurring associates, romance blossomed between Vance and Firestar, and the group
adopted a Taylor-owned factory building as its new "Crash Pad" headquarters.
The Warriors eventually discovered that the Taylor Foundation was corrupt, that
Chord had murdered Dwayne's parents, and that Tai was an evil sorceress bent on
world domination, a member of the ancient Dragon's Breadth cult whose hidden temple
in Kampuchea housed a mystical energy nexus known as the Well of All Things. Decades
ago, a unit of American soldiers - including Chord - had made a pact with Tai through
which they would marry the cult's selectively-bred daughters and produce offspring
fated to control the Well's power, all in accordance with a prophecy that said a
merging of East and West was required to access the power; in fact, Tai planned
to sacrifice the children to the Well to gain its power.
All of the soldiers participated in the pact except for Daryl Taylor (who refused
since he was already married), each of them returning home to start families with
their new brides. Tai's daughter Miyami married Chord and bore him twins; but to
save the children from Tai, she faked her own death and that of the twins, whom
she gave up before she went into hiding. To replace these children in the pact,
Tai mystically forced Chord to kill his friends, the Taylors, and take custody
of their boy, Dwayne. When the truth about Tai finally came out, Tai found and
killed Miyami and learned that the lost twins were Silhouette and Midnight's Fire.
Most of the children of the pact formed the Folding Circle, who hoped to claim the
Well's power for themselves. Unwilling to risk the Circle usurping the Well's power,
Tai had long since decided to make the Circle her lieutenants and sacrifice an
alternate group of super-youths to the Well - this was why she and her pawn Chord
had encouraged the formation of the New Warriors. Tai's elaborate plot ended in a
three-way battle at the temple between the Warriors, the Circle and Tai, whom
Night Thrasher killed to save the Warriors.
By this time, Vance had been jailed for accidentally killing his abusive father.
Avengers trainee Rage, fired for helping the Warriors steal an Avengers quinjet
to reach Tai's temple, filled Vance's slot in the team. The group also found new
allies in veteran super hero Spider-Man; college students Mickey Musashi and the
hapless Mike Jeffries, who took turns wearing a suit of jet-powered armor as the
novice adventurer Turbo; the flying mercenary Cardinal; the mercenary Sprocket
(Cardinal's ex-lover), hired as the team's pilot; the cartoonish Slapstick; the
street vigilantes Cloak & Dagger; and obnoxiously brainy teenager Carlton Lafroyge,
who provided research and tech support as Hindsight Lad (later simply Hindsight).
Namorita took over team leadership from an often-absent Night Thrasher, but after
the Poison Memories street gang stole the Warriors' personal information from
Namorita and attacked the team's families, a guilt-stricken Namorita left the team
only to rejoin shortly thereafter as the mutated Kymaera. Meanwhile, released from
jail early for good behavior, Vance rejoined the Warriors in a new guise as Justice.
When Nova's old foe the Sphinx (Anath-Na Mut) scattered the Warriors across the
timestream, Hindsight Lad teamed with Dwayne's estranged half-brother Bandit to
form a new roster alongside Dagger, Darkhawk, Alex Power, and Turbo (Mickey).
These alternate Warriors managed to rescue their time-lost comrades, and the
combined Warriors forces defeated the Sphinx, who merged with his female counterpart
and found enlightenment after the Warriors helped him see the folly of his villainy.
Silhouette broke up with Dwayne and left the team alongside her new lover Bandit,
but the remaining new recruits all stayed on as Warriors reservists, and all but
Dagger and Darkhawk would soon upgrade to fully active status.
When Namorita was enslaved by the Undertow paramilitary group during one of
Dwayne's frequent absences, the team expelled Night Thrasher, who left alongside
Rage; for a time, the two acted as mentors to Psionex. Justice took over as
Warriors leader, and the group was joined by the Scarlet Spider (secretly Spider-Man
clone Ben Reilly), the hyper-adaptive Helix, and the time-manipulating Timeslip,
who helped rescue Speedball from the kinetic energy dimension where he had been
trapped while an alternate-future Speedball impersonated him for months. After
liberating Namorita from Undertow, Night Thrasher and Rage rejoined the Warriors
in time to help destroy the would-be world-killer Volx, alien queen of the Dire
Wraiths, who had slain backup Turbo Mike Jeffries.
The group began to drift apart as its members focused on individual pursuits.
The increasingly part-time team fought foes such as Effex, the Elements of Doom,
and AIM alongside allies such as the young Kree super-mutant Ultra Girl, the T
hunderbolts, and the Avengers (who recruited Firestar and Justice), until Night
Thrasher moved to Seattle on a personal mission and formally disbanded the Warriors.
Unwilling to give up on the team, Speedball reorganized the group alongside Nova,
Namorita, Turbo and new recruits Aegis and Bolt, funded by Namorita's cousin Namor.
When an ongoing conflict with arms dealer Joe Silvermane led to the destruction
of the Crash Pad, Turbo's new boyfriend Dalton Beck helped the team set up shop
in a city firehouse; however, Beck was soon exposed as Silvermane's super-agent
Firestrike, though a repentant Dalton helped cripple Silvermane's operation before
entering the witness protection program. Despite the return of Night Thrasher, the
group has since lapsed into a semi-active state again. Turbo is determined to retire
from heroics, Bolt apparently died, and only a few Warriors such as Night Thrasher,
Nova, Speedball and Namorita are frequent participants in the group. But the team
stands ready for action when needed, whether against minor threats like the
super-delinquent Southpaw or major menaces like the hordes of Hydra. The Warriors
continue to fight for the better future they seek to embody.
Current Members include Namorita (Namorita Prentiss), Night Thrasher (Dwayne Taylor),
Nova (Richard Rider) and Speedball (Robbie Baldwin). Former members include
Aegis (Trey Rollins), Bandit (DonyeIl), Bolt (Chris Bradley), Dagger (Tandy Bowen),
Darkhawk (Chris Powell), Firestar (Angelica Jones), Helix (Rafael Carago),
Hindsight (Carlton LaFroyge), Justice (Vance Astrovik), Powerhouse (Zero G,
Alex Power), Rage, Scarlet Spider (Ben Reilly), Silhouette (Silhouette Chord),
Speedball (Darrion Grobe), Timeslip (Rina Patel), Turbo (Michiko Musashi) and
Turbo (Mike Jeffries)
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