The Storm and The Phantom: notes towards crossovers October 19, 2007
Posted by Don in "Challenger" Storm, The MARDL-verse.Tags: "Challenger" Storm, comics, crossovers, pulps, Red Phantom, video games, writers
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In comics, crossovers always fascinated me. The idea of a meeting between two characters who never before interacted, whose universes never before seemed connected at all, appeals to me. It expands their universes, while shrinking them a bit, and opens up new possibilities for both.
The pairing of a high-adventure character with a mystery-vigilante character is one of the most potent and enjoyable versions of a crossover. The Superman-Batman pairing practically dominated my experiences reading The Brave and The Bold when I was growing up, and when The Shadow met with Doc Savage in their late ’80’s DC comics, my world was rocked.
In the world of my characters (the MARDL-verse, if you will), it’s a given that eventually Challenger Storm will cross paths with The Cipher, and eventually the aviation theme will bring Storm and The Black Wing together. But the collaboration between authors, the push pull of like-minded but differently themed creators and creations… that would be a load of fun.
One of my faithful MARDL feedback-crew, Luis-Gabriel Leal is no stranger to pulp styled creations. His creation, The Red Phantom, is an interesting amalgam of The Spirit, The Shadow, and Hellboy: an “occult detective” who investigates the otherworldly and the fortean. He’s generating a lot of interest in his character with a site blog similar to this one (but HE gets FAN LETTERS and COMMENTS… I’m not bitter, I’m just saying). He also shares a very similar view as I do regarding the comeback of pulps and their place in the world of entertainment.
The Red Phantom takes on a recurring foe, the assassin known as The Quiet Man, by artist Mike Wood.
Of course, over multiple email and IM conversations, a crossover began a ‘brewin’.
Here’s a bit about their first meeting, a story hammered out by Gabe and myself:
“Storm and his associates were returning from a mission in Greece. The others had gone back via a tramp-steamer of Storm’s employ, while Cliff himself was going to fly his supply plane back. An unexpected detour landed him in Italy, where he was contacted by a mysterious message that persuaded him to take on a passenger… a disguised Red Phantom. Mistaken identities landed the two at the opposite sides of bullets and fists, but the two were sidetracked from their struggle by Mussolini’s forces, whereby they realized they were on the same side.
One adventure and one bout of heavy drinking in Miami later and they were fast friends.
Since then, they had worked together numerous times, often involving things that Cliff had a hard time believing existed. He was starting to come around from the skeptical side, though…”
It would be another classic yin-yang pairing: high-adventure and mystery-man all over again. But the opposites don’t stop there: Clifton Storm is a man of science, Red Phantom more versed in esoterics. Storm’s identity is known publicly by the world at large as “Challenger”, the adventurer, while the Red Phantom is so mysterious we wouldn’t even know how or where to start looking for his secret identity.
Personalities: Storm is calculating, self-doubtful at times. The Red Phantom is impulsive and cocky. However, they are both intelligent and knowledgable. They are also both reckless… Storm’s recklessness is done with meditation and knowledge of the possible outcomes, while the Red Phantom’s is pure blind impulse. He follows the words of Adolph Adler: “Trust only movement. Life happens at the level of events, not of words. Trust movement.”
Even the creators of these gentlemen are alike, yet different. Gabriel is more fond of basing his stories around “what ifs” based on actual historical events, while I (although I love history) like to base my creations in a pulp-era world that never happened, a la Sky Captain. But, like our creations, we share common grounds… like sammiches.
It’s actually a good mix of characters, though. The characters have a great back-and-forth banter with each other, making the team-ups a lot lighter-hearted than you’d expect.
And what form would these tales take? Well, so far everything is in the planning stages, but we have a few ideas.
-Storm and Red fight a mysterious, apocalyptic cult known as Ouroboros.
-The duo learn the mysterious, conspiratorial truth about Amelia Earhart’s disappearance.
-The final crossover idea is slated to be a video-game. Gabe and I both are gamers, and the discovery of FPS Creator software has us collaborating on a game-crossover featuring our characters:
December, 1939…
In the final days of the decade, as a new World War looms ahead, fear grips the globe.
Armies of the undead erupt from their graves. Strange airships attack helpless cities. Mechanically augmented soldiers strike at unsuspecting military bases, then disappear without a trace.
And in a fortress in a forgotten and ancient city… a war-scarred madman, kept alive by magic and technology, plots his next move…
The world in peril turns to the only men who can save it, the greatest heroes of their time: the mysterious occult detective known as The Red Phantom, and the globe-trotting adventurer and troubleshooter Clifton “Challenger” Storm. But they are also under attack themselves. Can they hope to overcome the odds to stop the plans of the mad lich known as The Prussian?
From the gritty streets of New York to the sunny beaches of Miami, from the hidden tombs of Egypt to the lairs of Nazi super-science in the heart of Berlin, The Red Phantom and Challenger Storm must overcome staggering odds and ever-increasing hordes of bizarre enemies… leading them straight to a forgotten land and the final showdown with The Prussian… a man who has overcome death itself!
We are standing in the middle of a hurricane.
I am excited for this.
Cool! The fan-base is growing!
Hey, I was just surfing the net for fellow pulp writer-fans and wanted to say I appreciate what you’re doing. I have published a bit with Wild Cat Books, who are doing a ton of pulp-oriented stuff.
But man, you thought of The Cipher as a character-name and I spent all day thinking I had invented it, but nooooo…
Anyway, rock on–
Hey, man. Thanks for stumbling across the site here, and I appreciate the kind words.
You know, usually, I’m in your position (thinking I’ve thought of a cool name or story, and then finding out someone beat me to it). Sorry, I got to it first, LOL.
Thanks again