Posted in: Comics, Marvel Comics | Tagged: dan abnett, Darkhawk, imperial, jonathan hickman

Everything You Knew About Darkhawk Was Wrong… Again

Everything You Knew About Darkhawk Was Wrong... Again, according to Jonathan Hickman and Dan Abnett (Spoilers)

Darkhawk, Christopher Powell first appeared in Darkhawk #1 published by Marvel Comics in 1991, created by Tom DeFalco, Danny Fingeroth and Mike Manley, with powers based on the link between a human character and an android from the Null Space dimension, and ran for fifty issues, before joining New Warriors, Runaways and Loners. Considered by some a bit of a joke character, that changed when he went cosmic with Nova and War of Kings: Darkhawk, written by current Marvel EIC C. B. Cebulski, Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning, and then War of Kings: Ascension and beyond

His origin saw him discover a mysterious amulet that allowed him to switch places with a powerful android that his mind controlled. Much layer, Powell discovered that the android was stored and repaired aboard a starship in a dimension called Null Space. Five Darkhawk amulets were commissioned by alien crime lord Dargin Bokk, while a rogue sixth amulet became Darkhawk. However War of Kings: Ascension suggested all of this, including Bokk, was fictional.

Later, another Darkhawk, Talon, told him that they were the final two members of the Fraternity of Raptors, an order created as "the curators of history, and the custodians of the future". Darkhawk's body is a Raptor, a techno-organic construct that possesses enhanced physical abilities, including strength, agility and reflexes, powered by the extraterrestrial amulet embedded in the chest, a seed from the Tree of Shadows in Null Space. Powell later discovers the Fraternity have a history of kidnappings and assassinations, a vision of his father tells him that much of what he believed about the armor was false, concocted by his own mind. Darkhawk's home ship does not really exist, instead, the body currently not inhabited rests at the Tree of Shadows in Null Space, and the reason Chris Powell can even become Darkhawk is because the human body is not fully compatible with the Raptors, stops his body being taken over by the intended personality known as Razor, and that there are many more Raptors out there. The Raptors' leader Gyre tells Powell that the amulet is really the key to unleashing the Ratha'kon or Dark Starhawk, which the Shi'ar intended to be a "predator" to the Phoenix Force.

So Darkhawk has already been through "everything you knew was wrong". Well, turns out it's going to be a third time, in today's Imperial War: Imperial Guardians #1 by Dan Abnett, Jonathan Hickman, Luca Maresca, Cory Smith

As it seems his own destiny, becoming Darkhawk, is up for grabs. Apparently, this was never just an accident. And something is speaking to him.

A longer game that's more than thirty-five years since Darkhawk was first published, with the anniversary for next year. And everything he knew about being Darkhawk was a lie… again.

And it looks like the visions he has been getting, courtesy of the armour, are looking at the upcoming Intergalactic War.

We have a new Imperial Guardians series coming next year. From this it looks like it may well be a little Darkhawk focused. And a brand new reality for the character….

Imperial War: Imperial Guardians #1 by Dan Abnett, Jonathan Hickman, Luca Maresca, Cory Smith
SPINNING STRAIGHT OUT OF THE PAGES OF IMPERIAL! As the events of IMPERIAL explode in fatal fashion, the SUPER-SKRULL finds himself at the center of a seditious scheme with consequences that will be felt by the entire cosmos! But he's not the only superpower looking for answers – an unlikely team is on the hunt to avert disaster before galactic order is lost for good!

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