Midnighter
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Midnighter is a fictional comic book superhero, best known as a member of the rogue superhero team, The Authority. Created by writer Warren Ellis and artist Bryan Hitch, he first appeared in Stormwatch (vol. 2) #4, before later going on to appear in various Authority books and series, and his own eponymous ongoing series. He was created in the archetypical vein of Batman, but unlike Gotham City's protector, Midnighter has superhuman abilities.
Midnighter is notable for being one of the few gay superheroes in print. He's married to fellow Authority member Apollo and both have adopted Jenny Quantum.
Midnighter is rarely seen without his costume. The few times he has appeared without a mask have revealed both short blond or brown hair. In an issue of Stormwatch: Team Achilles he admits he's a redhead but dyes it blond.
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[edit] Fictional character history
[edit] Stormwatch
Midnighter, alongside his future husband Apollo, was part of a top secret Stormwatch team (that was an analog to the JLA) created by the first Weatherman, Henry Bendix. Nobody but Bendix himself knew of the team's existence. Bendix built them as superhuman and, when they donned their costumes and spoke their codenames, their previous identities ceased to exist.
However, this secret team was all but destroyed during their first mission, Apollo and Midnighter being the only survivors. They went rogue and spent the next five years undercover fighting for a finer world and searching for Bendix in the alleyways of America. One mission took them to Britain, where they thwarted Bendix's attempts at experimenting on children to create superhumans, in the process developing links with MI5. They remained unknown to Stormwatch until Christine Trelane found the files about their team after Bendix's fall.
Jackson King, formerly Battalion, now the new Weatherman, ordered them found, not being sure if they were heroes or villains. Midnighter and Apollo were after weapons made in the "Nevada Garden", a relic of the first Engineer. He ordered Fahrenheit and Hellstrike to tag them with fetishes so they can be transported into SkyWatch. Midnighter and Apollo first attacked the Stormwatch team, believing them under Bendix's orders. However, they ceased the attack once they were told Bendix was dead. With King's help, they violently retrieved the Garden from the U.S. Army, and King granted them what they asked for: new lives away from Stormwatch.
This story is available in the Stormwatch TPB A Finer World.
[edit] The Authority
Some time later, Jenny Sparks convinced both him and Apollo to come out of retirement and join her new group, The Authority. Unlike other groups, The Authority are ready to fight for a finer world, even if it brings them into conflict with various world governments, including the United States government. Midnighter and Apollo's relationship, though hinted in previous issues, was revealed in The Authority # 8.
During the Transfer of Power storyline, in which the Authority was captured by an enhanced assassin operative called Seth, and replaced with government agents who took their powers, Midnighter was the only one not captured. He escaped with Jenny Quantum and later managed to return to the Carrier. He killed Jack Hawksmoor's replacement Street by running him over with a motorcycle and shot Teuton in the head with a nail-gun, thus rescuing his lover Apollo, who was imprisoned aboard the Carrier. He then proceeded to kill the rest of the Authority's replacements, but while trying to take the Carrier back, Midnighter was almost killed by Seth, who had pulled out his primary heart (the Midnighter apparently has a backup) but The Doctor managed to save him. Shortly thereafter Midnighter and Apollo were married and adopted Jenny.
Midnighter took a central role in Ed Brubaker and Dustin Nguyen's Revolution maxiseries. A visitation, apparently from a future Apollo, convinced Midnighter that he was on the path to becoming a malign dictator. To avoid this fate Midnighter quit the team, precipitating its break-up, and returned to life fighting solo on the streets. Raised alone by Apollo, Jenny exploited her powers to age herself to young adulthood and reformed the Authority. Having convinced Midnighter to rejoin the team Jenny discovered he was being manipulated by a dimension-hopping Henry Bendix, hitherto assumed dead. Midnighter fought for Bendix before the Engineer was able to break the mind-control; Midnighter then killed Bendix by ripping out his spine.
Circumstances have twice forced Midnighter, very much against his will, to team up with Kev Hawkins, a homophobic former-SAS soldier and eponymous protagonist of the Authority: Kev miniseries (written by Garth Ennis) - a relationship made worse by the fact that on their first meeting, Kev killed him, Apollo and the rest of the Authority, though the Carrier resurrected them. On their last meeting they took down MI5's Royal Oak project, an attempt at replicating Bendix's experiments.
[edit] Midnighter (series)
In November 1 2006, an ongoing Midnighter series began, written by Garth Ennis and illustrated by Chris Sprouse. After returning from a mission in war-torn Afghanistan, Midnighter was attacked while passing through the Carrier's teleportation portal by unknown agents, and kidnapped. He awoke in a facility in Hamburg, Germany, where a man named Paulus told him that he was disrupting his ability to guess his opponents' moves, and that he had removed his secondary heart and replaced it with a remote-detonated bomb. Paulus gave him the choice of either working for him, or dying, showing him a photograph of the person he wants Midnighter to kill: Adolf Hitler.
[edit] Grifter & Midnighter
In March 2007 a mini-series, Grifter & Midnighter, will chart the team up between Midnighter and Grifter. It will be written by Chuck Dixon, with art by Ryan Benjamin. [1]
[edit] Powers
The world's deadliest killing machine, Midnighter's neural induction allows him to calculate over a million possible combat scenarios in a second. Allowing him the perfect counter to any attack (he's famous for taunting his opponents with lines like "I already know what you're going to do"). He has fibre-lined muscle increasing his strength, durability, and reflexes. Midnighter has shown that he can move faster than the human- and even superhuman- eye in a quick speed burst. Although this is likely due not so much to superhuman speed as it is a result of his complete and perfect anticipation of his enemies moves. He can dodge a bullet because he knows EXACTLY where you're going to shoot it, or exactly where you're going to punch, etc. (Any martial artist will tell you this is how an illusion of speed in real-world combat is achieved.) He can survive in anaerobic environments for short periods. He also has a secondary heart allowing him to survive wounds that would be otherwise fatal.
He also possesses a super-enhanced immune system, to the point where AIDS was defeated in six weeks and the common cold never stays more than a couple of minutes. After The Doctor overdosed himself with heroin, doctors used a shot of Midnighter's blood to jumpstart his system by unblocking opiate receptors. ("Every drop is as deadly as every other part of me" ). Though not on the level of certain Marvel or DC characters, Midnighter does heal much faster than a normal human, and has implants that numb him to most pain.
Midnighter is also quite adept at stealth, and has used both a nightstick and a telescoping staff in close combat. His personal arsenal also commonly incorporates throwing stars. He is a close-quarters killer, having quite effortlessly slaughtered close to 30 superpowered soldiers by himself, without being so much as touched by them.
[edit] External links
- DC's profile page for Midnighter #1, with links to subsequent issues.
- The Midnighter action figure
- International Hero profile
- Review of Midnighter #1
