ICYMI: A New Universe Snuck Into Ewing And Ward’s ‘Ultimates’

Over the course of the past year, across a number of titles, Al Ewing has slowly been re-establishing and redefining what the Marvel Universe looks like following the remaking of reality at the end of Secret Wars. This week in the pages of Ultimates #12, Ewing and Christian Ward tapped a new universe to introduce a team of familiar heroes. Spoilers for the issue follow.

In recent issues of Ultimates, an NSA agent named Philip Nelson Vogt has been tasked with observing the team and assessing their stability and threat level. Sadly, after the events of Civil War II, the president made the decision to shutter the Ultimates, partly due to the information supplied by Vogt and his agents.

In the absence of The Ultimates, the government still needs a superteam to handle those threats, and so Vogt’s team of Troubleshooters now have a whole new level of responsibility, and they all seem very familiar…

If you’re unaware, The Troubleshooters are all made up of characters from the short-lived but fondly remembered New Universe line of comics, most commonly attributed to Jim Shooter. Other creators, including Archie Goodwin, Mark Gruenwald and Tom DeFalco, had a huge part in creating the New Universe, which was intended to be a more grounded, real-world take on a world with a superpowered individuals.

So who’s who on The Troubleshooters, and what do we know about them from New Universe?

• Kathy Ling, AKA Shockwave, was a member of Psi-Force, and has the power of telekinesis.
• Jim Tensen, AKA Justice, was a solo hero and star of his own title with the power to create offensive energy weapons with one hand and defensive energy shields with the other, among other abilities. His name was John Tensen in the original comics.
• Terry Jessup, AKA Voyager, was a member of Psi-Force has the ability to enter the astral realm, although now it seems that he only exists in an astral form. His name was Tyrone Jessup in the original comics.
• Dionne McQuaid, AKA Indigo, was a member of the team Black Powers, and has the power to create solid energy constructs.
• Simon Rodstvow was an enemy of Psi-Force and an agent of a Russian team known as Red Sun. He has a number of powers, most notably molecular combustion.
• "The Troubleshooters" team-name also comes from New Universe as a short-lived group of heroes who worked with the hero Spitfire in the first eight issues of her series.

All of the super-powered people in the New Universe gained their powers from the mysterious White Event, and seeing how the Marvel Universe had its own White Event in 2013, which produced the new Starbrand and Nightmask, it’s not out of the realm of possibility that people were affected. While I know my boss is rooting for the return of DP7 [bring back Lenore Fenzl --- ed.], I’m holding out hope for a new Kickers, Inc in 2017.