Who's who of the 90's X-Force

[rallamajoop]

While going through the latest Good Intentions chapter my beta reader pointed out I really ought to throw together some sort of quick guide to all the younger X-Force members who pop up in the story. Even if they're not much more than window dressing to the story I'm telling, Cable is sorta leading their team at this point in history, and there are a lot of names to keep track of.

The story as a whole is set around the period when the original New Mutants was replaced under Liefeld's pen with the first incarnation of X-Force, although only Cannonball and Boomer initially remained from the original cast. In addition to adding Cable and Domino, three of the New Mutants (Wolfsbane, Sunspot and Rictor) were written out in this period (presumably because they were deemed not EXTREEEEEMMMEE enough for the new creative direction) and replaced with Shatterstar, Feral and Warpath – though Sunspot and Rictor did get to rejoin later after Liefeld left the title.

For a mix of plot reasons and plain simplicity, in my own AU I've done a bit of picking and choosing of who's on the team.


A quick pictorial guide to the gang (minus Wolfsbane)

Cannonball

Also known as: Samuel Guthrie
Powers: Flight, invulnerable forcefield (only active while flying)
Character: Leader of the New Mutants/X-Force (or at least while Cable or other authority figures aren’t available). Develops a loose sort of father/son type relationship with Cable, implied to be a surrogate for Tyler, the son he lost. A major subplot at the time involved the revelation that Sam was an 'external' - a rare variety of mutant who are nearly immortal. In the early X-Force issues, Cable's objective in coming back to the past was supposed to have been to prepare Sam to defeat Apocalypse himself in the far future, as he'd have centuries of experience behind him by then. However, after Cable was written out of the regular X-Force cast and moved to his own title, this idea was largely dropped (though writers do occasionally still remember that Sam can live through being skewered through the chest to this day). Carryover from the original New Mutants team.
Last seen in today's canon: Leading Marvel’s latest incarnation of the New Mutants team

Boomer

Also known as: Boom Boom, Meltdown, Tabitha Smith
Powers: Can create plasma ‘time bombs’ which detonate after a few seconds
Character: Boomer is a loud-mouthed teenage girl as written by adult male comic-book writers from the early nineties. Loves fashion and boys, rarely shuts up. Carryover from the original New Mutants team.
Last seen: Relegated off into comic book limbo, occasional cameos here and there

Siryn

Also known as: Theresa Cassidy
Powers: Sonic scream
Character: Daughter of the X-Man Banshee, inherited the same powers. Romantically linked to Deadpool in the early years of his transition into a protagonist in his own right, though their relationship never really went anywhere. Joined in the early X-Force issues.
Last seen: Regular in X-Factor

Rictor

Also known as: Julio Richter
Powers: Earthquakes and shockwaves
Character: Rictor saw Stryfe kill his father long before the events of New Mutants and understandably took a long time to come to trust Cable. While these days he’s probably best known for his romantic relationship with Shatterstar, at this point in his history Wolfsbane seems to be his main romantic interest. Canonically, Rictor left the New Mutants shortly before they reformed under the name of X-Force, but rejoined later. At this point in the AU, the Stryfe issue remains an ongoing sore spot between him and Cable, as Rictor is less than entirely sure whether he's buying 'my clone did it' as an explanation.
Last seen: Regular in X-Factor

Shatterstar

Powers: Mostly just being good at fighting
Character: Raised in an extra-dimensional gladiatorial ring, at this early stage of canon Shatterstar has yet to develop much personality beyond ‘generic Klingon’, and has a creative team change or two to go before he and Rictor develop so much as slight UST. Joined the team in the final issues of New Mutants.
Last seen: Regular in X-Factor

Sunspot

Alias: Roberto da Costa
Powers: Solar-powered superstrength, skin turns black when active
Character: Like Rictor, Sunspot was also lead to believe Cable killed his father, and also left the New Mutants shortly before the name change, only to rejoin later. For AU purposes, I'm just going to say X-Force arrived in time to save his father's life, so Sunspot never left the team, and is on rather better terms with Cable.
Last seen: Regular in the latest New Mutants incarnation

Wolfsbane

Alias: Rahne Sinclair
Powers: Can transform into a wolf or a human-wolf hybrid
Character: Raised Catholic and never entirely comfortable with the whole mutant thing, Wolfsbane was a long time New Mutants member who was more or less abandoned on Genosha shortly before the end of the series (did I mention Liefeld was driving the plot back then? It showed). Hell with that; as far as I'm concerned she's still on the team.
Last seen: Regular in X-Factor




Finally, those two who are absent but namedropped in passing:

Feral

Also known as: Maria Callasantos
Powers: Cat-person
Character: A former Morlock who joined X-Force to get away from enemies from below, Feral’s name proved a little too accurate on a number of occasions, generally revolving around maiming her own teammates. For my own AU purposes, let's just say Cable realised she was going to be more trouble than she was worth rather more quickly.
Last seen: Relegated off into comic book limbo

Warpath

Also known as: James Proudstar
Powers: Superstrength, invulnerability
Character: Canonically, Cable invited Warpath to join his team around the end of New Mutants, but Warpath turned him down out of loyalty to his family back on the reservation. Then he discovered his whole family had been slaughtered and changed his mind. The question of just who murdered his family was promptly relegated to the backburner for a good 70 issues or so. Over here in AU land, we're not much into murdering family members for cheap drama, so Warpath never joined the team.
Last seen: Regular in X-Force a couple of incarnations ago, member of Storm's team in Adjectiveless X-Men during the last run

Next up (whenever I should get around to that): Six Pack and Clan Chosen. When writing superhero fic the one thing one never lacks for is a massive supporting cast.

Comments

[etrangere.livejournal.com]

For the "last seen" section: Sam and Roberto are currently in the Avengers. Tabitha was recently seen in Cable&X-Force (and is expected to join the team full time).

[rallamajoop.livejournal.com]

Eh, that section's really just there to give people a general idea how many of these characters still have some sort of active presence in the X-books as of recently. If I worry about up-to-the-moment accuracy, I'm going to be updating this forever.

Now that you mention it though, I think I do vaguely remember hearing about Cannonball and Sunspot joining the Avengers - then mentally filed it under 'things that are bound to last for all of five minutes' and forgot about it again. Must be a nice thing to have on your CV though.