Tuesday, March 07, 2023

If Hasbro had any stones, I'd have a Nightwatch action figure already.

Extra points if he comes with a board-with-nail-in-it accessory. We're coming in pretty cold to this, his second-to-last issue: from 1995, Nightwatch #11, "Down to Earth" Written by Terry Kavanagh, pencils by Roy Burdine, inks by Abraham Madison
I knew about two things about this character going in: Nightwatch really, really looks like Spawn, minus a logo and some chains; and there may have been a much later story with him retconning a lot of the character, possibly a scorched-earth approach to keep him from returning. This issue, the hero considers time-travelling to help his younger self, but is forced to save Manhattan from a falling satellite, with the aid of what I'm assuming was usually his bad guy, Deathbringer. Who might be an older version of a younger supporting character here? Together they save the city, but Nightwatch is seemingly no more...
I'm not sure if I remembered Nightwatch was Black; which also feels like it's from Spawn. Cardiac also guest-stars--which means both heroes were Black but wore completely concealing costumes--but the supporting cast mostly was as well; which I don't think Marvel was always great about. And I should appreciate McFarlane figures for making a go of it for so long: obviously somebody likes them, even if they leave me cold--but sometimes his characters feel a little knock-offy. I don't think Marvel or Hasbro has felt the urge to knock back; but Nightwatch would be the way to do it.
Posted by googum at 5:00 AM
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5 comments:

Mr. Morbid said...

Apparently he’s a villain now or always has been according to an issue of She-Hulk. Don’t know why. It was either Slott or Parker that did that. I’ll find out & let you know.
Yes, he was very much a CLEAR & blatant rip-off of Spawn, both in overall look & choice of Black protagonist. Not really sure why Marvel decided to do that to Todd but it really was a very childish & dickish move on their end.
I’m good on a Nightwatch figure, although there is an appeal of making a skit with the two addressing the elephant in the room. Do want a Cardiac figure though. It must be because I’m a 90’s guy but I love that design & color scheme. It probably shouldn’t work but for me it does.

11:02 AM
Mr. Morbid said...

It was neither Slott nor Parker who turned him heel; it was Charles Soule during his run on She-Hulk. Vol.3#12

11:06 AM
CalvinPitt said...

Like Mr. Morbid said, Soule dusted Nightwatch off for at least a 2-part story in the middle of his run, the two issues drawn by Ron Wimberly instead of Javier Pulido, and made him a bad guy.

I feel like there was a time travel aspect to Nightwatch's origin I remember from a story in Spider-Man Unlimited, or maybe an Annual. Like he was getting beat up by invisible enemies on an airstrip, and his much older self showed up in the Nightwatch outfit to save him, but couldn't stop the plane his wife was on from blowing up? There was definitely an exploding plane involved.

3:44 PM
googum said...

I think that's briefly a point in this issue: Nightwatch considers, if he goes back in time, he could solve everything, get the girl, and so on, but that would screw over his past self. Ah, what has anybody's past self ever done for them!

They changed his name in that She-Hulk story: apparently, the guy we knew as Nightwatch never really existed, he was a villain named Nighteater that tried to use a spell to make everyone remember him as a hero. Then...I dunno, profit? They might've changed Nightwatch/Nighteater's look there, too.

Would Cardiac's paint apps be a bother, or doable? Hmm.

5:51 PM
Mr. Morbid's House Of Fun said...

Doable and definitely there was time travel involved as he took his costume off his older self and basically hid out for a year.

11:17 AM

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