And best of all, so is the talking monkey.
As announced by Marvel at San Diego Comic-Con,
the stars of the acclaimed 2006 mini-series Agents of Atlas are getting
their own ongoing series beginning early next year. Jeff Parker, who
wrote the mini that was collected in a hardcover that's up for an
Eisner Award tonight, will return to the characters.
"The series got an incredible amount of acclaim and buzz when it
debuted and became an office favorite," said series editor Mark
Paniccia. "We've been waiting for the right time to open fire and post-Secret Invasion events gave us just the right ammo we needed."
The Agents of Atlas team were last seen fighting Skrulls in the Secret Invasion: Who Do You Trust
anthology one-shot. Based on characters from the old Atlas imprint from
Timely Comics, the Golden Age precursor to Marvel, the comic featured
Marvel Boy, Venus, Namora, M-11 the Human Robot and of course, the
talking monkey, Gorilla Man.
The mini-series brought the characters up to date, telling the story of
how a covert team from the '50s gets back together in present time to
combat a newly discovered villainous group called the Atlas Foundation.
By the end of the mini-series, the team had taken over the Atlas
Foundation, which sets up this ongoing.
"As strange as it sounds, our cast from the past has found that the way
to really do major good in the present day is to approach this brave
new world-- as villains! The Atlas Foundation was already a vast
criminal organization, and now it's going to be a lot less secret,"
Parker said.
"A few of them would like to be classic, well-known superheroes, but
they keep getting more results with stealth and secrecy. Being below
ground really helped them undermine several Skrull beachheads during
the Secret Invasion," he said.
The new team will be made up of:
- Former FBI-then-SHIELD agent Jimmy Woo, who's in charge of the Atlas
Foundation, which Parker describes as "a global collective of criminal
operations that he's been working to reform with his crime-fighting
team from his FBI days. As an older man, Woo was horribly burned while
trying to infiltrate Atlas, and restored by alien science to himself
circa 1958."
- Bob Grayson, known in the 50's as the Apollo-esque science hero
Marvel Boy. "He's spent 50 years living at the core of the 7th Planet
and isn't as human as he used to be, but he's still brilliant," Parker
said. "He's more often referred to as The Uranian now. His
Eternals-technology headband held the information needed to restore
Jimmy."
- Venus, widely believed to be the actual Roman goddess, but in fact
was a siren who was granted access to a soul by The Ancient One. "Her
voice and presence turn most people to mush, with only amorous thoughts
and the inclination to do whatever she wants of them," Parker
explained. "Though responsible for scores of dead sailors in the past,
she's actually quite sweet now."
- Ken Hale, the Gorilla-Man, whom Parker says is "ironically the member
who knows the modern world the best . Hale was a soldier of fortune who
was forced to kill an ape man and took his curse to be in the form of a
Gorilla for eternity. Also worked for SHIELD's monster ops, but went
renegade to rescue his old friend Jimmy."
- M-11. "A killer robot built by the Atlas Foundation, one of the
Menacer series that came with a Death Ray, Extendo Arms and Voltage
Blasts," Parker explained. "Thanks to a scientist who gave his life,
M-11 is actually sentient, though what he's thinking is generally a
mystery. He appears to be very loyal to Jimmy and the team, thank
goodness."
- Namora. "The only other Atlantean with the same hybrid genetics as
the Submariner, she was left in a block of ice in the deep sea for
years until M-11 calculated that she was likely alive and the Agents
freed her," Parker said. "The powerhouse of the team, she's a bit
haughty (being Atlantean royalty) but fiercely loyal to the team that
remembered her and came back for her. Her daughter died in the events
that created Marvel's Civil War, so she's naturally having a hard time
processing that."
- Mr. Lao, Atlas' royal advisoran ancient, who's also a manipulative --
and very big -- dragon. "Lao wants the lineage of the Khans to stay on
the intended track of eventually conquering the world, and the Agent's
do-gooding doesn't interest him. Yet, he's the definition of crafty,
and somehow as they keep achieving their goals, they also manage to
achieve Lao's as well!" Parker said.
One of the elements that made the characters in the Agents of Atlas
mini-series so charming was that most of them haven't been out living
among the people of earth for decades, so their unique point of view
made for some hilarious reactions. Parker said that will remain part of
the ongoing series as well.
"Most of them have been out of the doings of the world for a while, so
you get to see the modern age fresh through their eyes," Parker said.
"And they tend to see things very clear cut -- if we turn on the TV and
see a network misrepresenting a subject grossly, we just grumble at the
bias of corporations. Jimmy orders M-11 to shoot down the network's
satellite. They're very pure in many ways.
"And yes, they cannot believe what the cost of gas is now!" he said.
While their former nemesis, The Yellow Claw, allegedly died at the end
of the team's mini-series, Parker said they'll have plenty to worry
about without the villain.
"I'm afraid the real nemesis, in the truest sense of that word, will be
the other heroes of the Marvel Universe! The Agents are going to run
afoul of Avengers, mutants, gods... and to do what they have to do,
they can't blow their cover," Parker said.
Although the artist for the series has not been named, Marvel did
confirm that Leonard Kirk, who helped define the characters with Parker
in their mini-series, will not be available because of his work on
Captain Britain & The MI-13.
Parker said he had pitched an Atlas series before, "but there was
always concern about how to bring the characters into the Marvel
Universe at large, working in with what's happening in the mega-story.
Finally it happens that events turned just so and the water is going to
be just right for them to make their splash."
"As always you need to wait for the right moment," editor Paniccia
said. "We've been dying to do a sequel to the mini series but we wanted
to make sure the timing was right and that we had the right hook for it
to play a stronger role in the greater Marvel U. So not only does the
fact that the hardcover is nominated for an Eisner help, but the
landscape of post-Secret Invasion Marvel Universe makes for a great,
organic way to introduce these characters to a new set of readers."
"It's not going to be like much else on the shelf," Parker said. "If
you want to view the Marvel Universe from a warped and exciting
perspective, this is your entry point."
