Wednesday Comics: Fallen Angels

I ran across a copy of the Fallen Angels collection for a great price this weekend. I was not particularly surprised to see it on discount. Few older comics readers probably remember it, and few younger readers are likely intrigued by an obscure limited from the late 80s. I think they're missing out, but then I'd probably by a Steeltown Rockers collection, too, so make of my judgement what you will.

So, for the uninitiated, Fallen Angels was an 8 issue limted series from Marvel written by Jo Duffy and drawn by Kerry Gammill, Marie Severin and Joe Staton. It was originally going to be called The Misfits and house ads use that name up until right before the release. It tells the story of a team (maybe more of a social group) forming from a group of disparate, predominantly young characters.

First there's a group of super-powered young thieves that Vanisher is playing Fagin to: cyborg Gomi with his cybernetically enhanced lobsters Bill and Don, Ariel with teleportation powers, and Chance with the ability to randomly enhance or limit other people's powers. Add to that crew the (relatively) bigger-named young mutants Sunspot and Boom-Boom, and throw in Multiple Man and Siryn for good measure. Finally--and this is the real wildcard--mix in Devil Dinosaur and Moonboy.

What do they do? Well, they hangout. They have misadventures. Learn some lessons--like not to trust Vanisher, who's really more laughable than a serious threat. They also get shanghaied to Ariel's strange home dimension Coconut Grove, but manage to evade becoming test subjects.

It's hard to know what Duffy was going for here. There doesn't seem to be a strong rationale for this particular group of characters. But it's pretty well done, and has a quirky charm about it. It's worth checking out.