raul grau
Mar 9, 2005, 01:25 am
<img src="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/logos/cfdlogo.jpg" align=left border=0 alt="Comics For Dummies logo">By Raul Grau, RJacknite@aol.com
The Pack is Back!
Orwell got it wrong, 1984 was a great year. Sure, Big Brother Reagan was trying to reenact George Lucas films in geosynchronous orbit, but comic book fans could rejoice... Power Pack was more than enough goodspeak for anyone. This spandexed squad of superpowered siblings survived the grim n' gritty 80s virtually unscathed, but fell before the steamroller of 90s Image consciousness (if only Julie Power had gone through puberty sooner, that development might have saved the title... alas, the harsh constraints of Marvel time). But now there is no reason to fear, because (as the title should imply) the Pack is back, in not one, but two different titles showcasing two different eras of Packiness. However, what if you came onboard the comic book bandwagon after the era when they still cost sixty cents each (shame on you for being so young), or you are a regular Runaways reader, but have no idea who this Julie chick is (shame on you for being so uniformed)... what then? Well, then you have me to fill you in on twenty years of Pack facts.
The Powers were your typical family, just with a slightly foreshadowing sort of surname. Like most Americans in the early 80s, they struggled to make ends meet, cooped up in their palatial beachhouse, just getting by on the modest salaries brought in by a theoretical physicist with government contracts and his renowned artist of a wife. With not a stretchmark on her, Margaret Power had produced a quartet of soon-to-be special scions: Alex (the geek), Julie (the dreamer), Jack (the brat), and Katie (the baby). One night, as is wont to happen in Marvel Comics, an alien war kindly crashed into their little slice of suburbia, and, since kids are way too inquisitive for their own good, the four younger members of the Power clan chose to investigate. It turns out that Jim Power (the elder Power) had invented a matter/anti-matter converter that would solve the world's energy crisis, but it could possibly also annihilate the entire planet in the process (which, if you think about it, would certainly solve the world's energy crisis).
The good aliens (the horse-faced Kymellians) wanted to destroy the device and save the world, but the bad aliens (the lizard-like Snarks) wanted to save the device and destroy several other worlds... maybe Earth too, they were a little unclear on that point. The parents were grabbed by the Snarks, but the kids ended in Kymellian hands (hooves, maybe), and a dying horsey named Whitey (no, really, his name was Whitey) passed his powers on to the Powers. Alex become the flotastic, gravity-manipulating Gee (gee, what a great codename), Julie became Lightspeed (though she flew much slower than her hyperbole-laced name implied), Jack became Mass-Master (master of his own cloudy mass), and Katie became Energizer (like a battery, only more prone to explosive temper tantrums). Friday, their gal Smartship, provided each Power with a cute color-coded costume, and the Pack was born!... well, technically, they were born a few years earlier, but you know what I mean.
Armed with costumes and codenames, the Power kids could now freely ignore their complete and utter lack of heroing experience, and set about the task of saving the world, and their parents, in that order. They skillfully destroyed the converter by utilizing their other new ability- pure dumb luck, and then, by allowing themselves to be captured, the Pack was able to free their folks. They decided, in grand comic book tradition, to keep their powers secret from the parental Powers, and life returned to normal, except for the occasional attack by a mutant-hating bureaucrat named Carmody. Ma and Pa Power decided to uproot their clan, leaving behind the inherent dangers of idyllic suburbia, for the complete safety that would come from living in New York City... bring on the guest stars.
Say what you will about the fictional cities of the DC Universe, but having a Metropolis or a Gotham does keep their New York City from becoming overcrowded with superpowered folk... on the other hand, the Marvel version has to be the best protected berg in existence. In just their first few Big Apple issues, the Pack ran into Spider-Man (guest star supreme), Cloak, Dagger (those two tend to travel together), Dragon-Man (whom Katie took to calling Baby... before she put him in the corner), and Marrina (come on, you know, from Alpha Flight... with the green skin... ummm... she dated Namor for a while... oh, nevermind). Before you could ask yourself who was really the star of this title, those X-folks began wandering in (even then, one title was not nearly enough to contain them). first just Nightcrawler, Kitty Pryde, and a whole host of Morlocks who were just itching to get Massacred, and then the fledging team had their first actual crossover, sharing screen time with the whole X-Men lineup. It was cute to see five year old Katie Power bonding with Wolverine... who knew he was such a softy?
The mildly annoying Carmody returned as the flat-out silly Bogey-Man, but, as spillover from their crossover with Thor, Beta Ray Bill and the Warriors Three were around to help. Next came a crossover with Fantastic Four and the newest, youngest, and only non-blood related member of the Pack, Franklin Richards, the Tattletale (think about it, if the roster stayed dependent on familial ties, they would have needed to invent a cousin Oliver eventually... and we all know how well that would turned out). Then came Secret Wars II (like Secret Wars, but with a jerry curl), and within that crossover, the Powers had a second crossover with Thor... a crossover within a crossover, now that is impressive. Unfortunately, Kurse, the angriest elf you will ever meet, smacked Maggie Power into a coma, and vengeance drove Alex to almost Peter Parker-like levels of angst. Luckily, the holidays were coming... those always cheer people up.
Thanksgiving came in the form of a double-sized issue and the strangest holiday dinner ever fictionalized. Try to envision Cloak, Dagger (see, together again), Kitty, Wolverine, Beta Ray Bill, Franklin, Leech, Annalee, and the Powers, all enjoying a light cranberry sauce together. Christmas was no simpler, with baby-stealing demons trying to open a perpetual portal to Limbo, a full three years before anyone had ever heard of Inferno. Fortunately, Cannonball and Wolfsbane of the New Mutants were around keep that from happening (I am afraid to ponder what sort of nightmare world that would create). Plus, Mirage, the newly minted valkyrie, stepped in to keep Maggie on the breathing side of death. After that, Spider-Man dropped by to apologize for missing the Thanksgiving festivities, and shared a valuable life lesson- real heroes eat their brussel sprouts (of course, if Spidey is the posterchild for heroism, then real heroes also whine about their lives constantly).
For a brief time, the Powers were able to wrest their series away from the regular cameo crowd, and engage in a storyline that was a little bit different... and a whole lot more Shakespearean. The kids were again captured by the Snarks (the lizard people even stooped so far as to impersonate Jarvis, God of Butlers, to do it), but they no longer sought the converter... this time, they literally wanted the powers of the Powers. The Snark Emperor Bhadsha was dying, and their order of succession was based upon Darwinian survival of the fittest... whoever happened to survive the ensuing war with the most attached limbs would be declared the fittest. Queen Mother Maraud wanted to give the Power's powers to her son, High Snark Jakal, using the transfer machine she had previously utilized to give Chancellor Hadj the healing abilities of Ambassador Yrik (father of Kofi), but Hadj learned that Maraud was actually poisoning Bhadsha, and... oh, forget it. In the end, Bhadsha survived in Jakal's body, Maraud was banished, Friday was as dead as a sentient ship in a comic book could be, the Powers had their powers switched, and everybody celebrated the expedient end to an intergalactic war with some homemade lentil soup... oh, and Cloak and Dagger helped a little.
After the shooting and soliloquies were over, new powers meant new codenames for the Powers, so Gee became the Destroyer, Mass-Master upgraded to Counterweight, Energizer switched to Starstreak, and Lightspeed, for some strange reason, choose the name Molecula, Mistress of Density (a title sure to terrify any superstitious, cowardly lot). It had been nearly a year since their last crossover, so the Pack strapped on their silver booties, and joined in on the Mutant Massacre... though, between them, they did not Massacre a single Mutant. The kids fought Sabretooth to a standstill (take that, Creed's reputation), listened to Cyclops deliver an aside on his questionable integrity (you abandon one wife and suddenly you're a moral leper), and introduced Leech and Caliban into the X-Factor fold (then, presumably, they showered, because Morlock tunnels can be a bit smelly). Following that, the Pack broke into Avengers Mansion (revealing the pajama choices of Black Knight, Hercules, and Jarvis), the parentally negligent Fantastic Four finally reunited with Franklin, and Alex learned about gun safety from Spider-Man, Hobgoblin, and the appropriately named Johnny Rival (his... umm... rival). Power Pack stayed on the socially conscious track, next exploring the evils of drugs, and the equally evil evils of drug dealers with gigantic thighs.
The Fallen Angels (whose membership included such hot characters as Siryn, Madrox, and Moon Boy) received an epilogue in Power Pack of all places, with Sunspot trying to prove his heroism, while inadvertently paraphrasing Hamlet the entire time. Katie then learned a lesson about responsibility from Madcap, of all people, but promptly forgot all about it when she rushed blindly into the Fall of the Mutants. Power Pack successfully saved the city from the death-spiralling Ship, only killing one Horseman of the Apocalypse in the process (awww... their first accidental murder, they grow up so fast), but X-Factor stole all the credit. In between getting blown up by Cyclops in X-Factor and getting blown up by Cyclops in Marvel Comics Presents, Master Mold went hunting for Franklin, the littlest member of the infamous Twelve, and got himself blown up by Power Pack.
Continuing to petition for the title of X-Pack, the kids saved Rebecca Littlehale, a little girl with the absolutely worst mutant power ever- the ability to uncontrollably teleport to any light source she sees (luckily, she never spent much time staring at gigantic nuclear furnaces in the sky, because that would be bad). Then, the Pack teamed with the New Mutants to again save Rebecca (who has decided upon the codename Lighttrakker for her nonexistent heroic career), this time after she was kidnapped by the all-but-forgotten Bogey-Man. Carmody wanted to sell the girl to some used soul dealers in Limbo, but Magik dropped him into a portal from which he would never emerge. Two months later, an Inferno overtook the city, and Carmody emerged as the Boogy Man (no need for hyphens now, he had become an overweight demon in a cheap suit... ooooh, scary). They successfully defeated the updated Boogy (well, they successfully drove him to suicide, at least), but he had already done the unthinkable... he forced the kids to confess to their parents about their spandexed hobby. Jim and Maggie went through every emotion from saddened shock to shocked sadness, before settling on simply having simultaneous nervous breakdowns. Power Pack would never be the same again!... until later in the same issue, when Mirage convinced the distraught duo that it was all a trick. Hmmm... that's odd, is there a powerboat and some sharks off in the distance?
The biggest names in the Marvel Universe continued to pop in with the Pack, including Punisher and Dakota North (I swear, she was a major character at one time). Then Katie took a trips to Elsewhere, a surreal, sideways world, where classic comic strip characters rule, and costumes get cleaned... unstable molecules have nothing on Elsewhere. Franklin returned for an eco-friendly arc involving Douglas Adams-style dolphins, but the issue count was again reaching a multiple of 25, so the Snarks needed to visit. Numinus (the only cosmic entity to ever pattern itself after Whoopi Goldberg) sent the Pack on a minor errand, which led to the complete destruction of the Kymellian homeworld... whoops. Luckily, the universe was reassembled quite quickly through a series of massive coincidences, and the Powers emerged unscathed, just with another set of power switches... you know, those become less surprising each time.
From there, a series of increasingly threatening threats loomed before the Powers, from Mysterio, to Typhoid Mary, to Doctor Doom, to Galactus, and then to the Ringmaster (admittedly, it is a bit hard to top Galactus). Once again, their secret powers became less secret, and, once again, their parents went through fun levels of permanent nervous collapse. It did not really help matters much when Alex, experiencing worst puberty in recorded history, transformed into a Kymellian, shocking his mother into her latest coma. The Pack faired well in their last major confrontation, a massive (and rather unfunny) brouhaha involving the Fantastic Four, the Red Ghost, and some super apes, but lost their war with low sales. The following year, the Power Pack Holiday Special fundamentally returned the Pack to their 1984-era status, with Alex a human, powers rearranged back to their original arrangement, and secrets secret again, allowing the team to rest comfortably in whichever comic book limbo that Dakota North was waiting for them in.
Two years later, a slightly older Alex Power was invited to escape obscurity, however briefly, as a member of the New Warriors, who were basically Power Pack with sex appeal. He surreptitiously stole the superpowers of his siblings, and redubbed himself Powerpax, in a show of support for the siblings he had just surreptitiously stolen the superpowers of. He did feel guilty enough about his deception to swear to the other Powers that he would never do such a thing again, but not quite guilty enough to stick to that promise for more than six issues... still, he did change his codename to Powerhouse, but that might just have been an attempt to forget that the others even exist. The presence of a former Packer did nothing to stave off cancellation, and Alex rejoined the other Powers at their uptown brownstone in obscurity.
Another four years passed without a Pack, but then 2000 brought a narrow glimmer of hope in the form of a miniseries... which proceeded to do its best to stamp out that foolish glimmer. Oh, the full team was back in all their costumed glory (with new costumes at that), but somehow Power Pack, volume two, found a way to be too different and too familiar simultaneously. Some of the Powers had been aged slightly, while others... well, Alex, who now went by the name Zero-G, had been retrograded from his Warrioring. Katie had become a genius when no one was looking, but had also grown less experienced with her own powers, and the parents were now in on the big secret, with no explanation or sheer insanity... though Maggie once again gained her own health crisis. The Snarks were the only villains of the day, and the Pack again restored stability to a world that always seems to enjoy anarchy more. The scientific trivia was gone (I probably learned more about inertia from Alex Power than I ever did from my high school physics teacher), and, probably worst of all, there were no guest stars. How can you call a book Power Pack and have no guest stars?
Now, nearly five years later, we find ourselves at the cusp of a Packdom renaissance, where you can literally pick your own Pack. If you yearn for a more innocent era, then the Marvel Age Power Pack miniseries will hopefully fit the bill, with preteen drama, a superpowered secret, and at least four cosmically-charged guest stars. Writer Marc Sumerak did just finish up Guardians, a series about children with an interstellar secret, so he should be well suited to the title. However, let's say that you are someone who grew up with the Pack, and, for some inexplicable reason, you would like to see them grow up a little bit too... well, a full reunion has yet to happen, but the Julie Power currently appearing in Runaways should soothe your Where are They Now? worries. Julie has finally come into her teenaged own, seeking the movie starlet life while hanging with the other former American Idols who comprise Excelsior. There might be a larger storyline going on as well, involving characters who are not Julie, but, really, what do they matter?
Power Pack was Not Another Teen Title... for one thing, for most of their existence, the Powers were not teens. They were kids, and they complained, cried, cheered, and charmed the way real children would. They were at the heart of every major Marvel moment, creating a realm of continuity that had not happened before... or since. Granted, either one of those Pack facts would be enough to dissuade most modern readers, but together they could work again as nostalgic gold.
The Pack is back, though if past history is any indication, the return will not last for long, so enjoy it while you can. Choose between the prepubescent Pack or the postpubescent Julie... or choose not to choose, and just buy both. Without a show of support for Power Pack and Power Pack-related titles, how will Lighttrakker ever earn her own series?
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Raul Grau had always planned to someday write an article about Power Pack, so their return gave him the valid excuse he needed. His favorite Marvel character is, surprisingly enough, Jack Power, simply because pint-sized sociopaths are the most interesting kind of sociopaths.
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The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and are not reflective of ComiX-Fan or its other staff in general.
The Pack is Back!
Orwell got it wrong, 1984 was a great year. Sure, Big Brother Reagan was trying to reenact George Lucas films in geosynchronous orbit, but comic book fans could rejoice... Power Pack was more than enough goodspeak for anyone. This spandexed squad of superpowered siblings survived the grim n' gritty 80s virtually unscathed, but fell before the steamroller of 90s Image consciousness (if only Julie Power had gone through puberty sooner, that development might have saved the title... alas, the harsh constraints of Marvel time). But now there is no reason to fear, because (as the title should imply) the Pack is back, in not one, but two different titles showcasing two different eras of Packiness. However, what if you came onboard the comic book bandwagon after the era when they still cost sixty cents each (shame on you for being so young), or you are a regular Runaways reader, but have no idea who this Julie chick is (shame on you for being so uniformed)... what then? Well, then you have me to fill you in on twenty years of Pack facts.
The Powers were your typical family, just with a slightly foreshadowing sort of surname. Like most Americans in the early 80s, they struggled to make ends meet, cooped up in their palatial beachhouse, just getting by on the modest salaries brought in by a theoretical physicist with government contracts and his renowned artist of a wife. With not a stretchmark on her, Margaret Power had produced a quartet of soon-to-be special scions: Alex (the geek), Julie (the dreamer), Jack (the brat), and Katie (the baby). One night, as is wont to happen in Marvel Comics, an alien war kindly crashed into their little slice of suburbia, and, since kids are way too inquisitive for their own good, the four younger members of the Power clan chose to investigate. It turns out that Jim Power (the elder Power) had invented a matter/anti-matter converter that would solve the world's energy crisis, but it could possibly also annihilate the entire planet in the process (which, if you think about it, would certainly solve the world's energy crisis).
The good aliens (the horse-faced Kymellians) wanted to destroy the device and save the world, but the bad aliens (the lizard-like Snarks) wanted to save the device and destroy several other worlds... maybe Earth too, they were a little unclear on that point. The parents were grabbed by the Snarks, but the kids ended in Kymellian hands (hooves, maybe), and a dying horsey named Whitey (no, really, his name was Whitey) passed his powers on to the Powers. Alex become the flotastic, gravity-manipulating Gee (gee, what a great codename), Julie became Lightspeed (though she flew much slower than her hyperbole-laced name implied), Jack became Mass-Master (master of his own cloudy mass), and Katie became Energizer (like a battery, only more prone to explosive temper tantrums). Friday, their gal Smartship, provided each Power with a cute color-coded costume, and the Pack was born!... well, technically, they were born a few years earlier, but you know what I mean.
Armed with costumes and codenames, the Power kids could now freely ignore their complete and utter lack of heroing experience, and set about the task of saving the world, and their parents, in that order. They skillfully destroyed the converter by utilizing their other new ability- pure dumb luck, and then, by allowing themselves to be captured, the Pack was able to free their folks. They decided, in grand comic book tradition, to keep their powers secret from the parental Powers, and life returned to normal, except for the occasional attack by a mutant-hating bureaucrat named Carmody. Ma and Pa Power decided to uproot their clan, leaving behind the inherent dangers of idyllic suburbia, for the complete safety that would come from living in New York City... bring on the guest stars.
Say what you will about the fictional cities of the DC Universe, but having a Metropolis or a Gotham does keep their New York City from becoming overcrowded with superpowered folk... on the other hand, the Marvel version has to be the best protected berg in existence. In just their first few Big Apple issues, the Pack ran into Spider-Man (guest star supreme), Cloak, Dagger (those two tend to travel together), Dragon-Man (whom Katie took to calling Baby... before she put him in the corner), and Marrina (come on, you know, from Alpha Flight... with the green skin... ummm... she dated Namor for a while... oh, nevermind). Before you could ask yourself who was really the star of this title, those X-folks began wandering in (even then, one title was not nearly enough to contain them). first just Nightcrawler, Kitty Pryde, and a whole host of Morlocks who were just itching to get Massacred, and then the fledging team had their first actual crossover, sharing screen time with the whole X-Men lineup. It was cute to see five year old Katie Power bonding with Wolverine... who knew he was such a softy?
The mildly annoying Carmody returned as the flat-out silly Bogey-Man, but, as spillover from their crossover with Thor, Beta Ray Bill and the Warriors Three were around to help. Next came a crossover with Fantastic Four and the newest, youngest, and only non-blood related member of the Pack, Franklin Richards, the Tattletale (think about it, if the roster stayed dependent on familial ties, they would have needed to invent a cousin Oliver eventually... and we all know how well that would turned out). Then came Secret Wars II (like Secret Wars, but with a jerry curl), and within that crossover, the Powers had a second crossover with Thor... a crossover within a crossover, now that is impressive. Unfortunately, Kurse, the angriest elf you will ever meet, smacked Maggie Power into a coma, and vengeance drove Alex to almost Peter Parker-like levels of angst. Luckily, the holidays were coming... those always cheer people up.
Thanksgiving came in the form of a double-sized issue and the strangest holiday dinner ever fictionalized. Try to envision Cloak, Dagger (see, together again), Kitty, Wolverine, Beta Ray Bill, Franklin, Leech, Annalee, and the Powers, all enjoying a light cranberry sauce together. Christmas was no simpler, with baby-stealing demons trying to open a perpetual portal to Limbo, a full three years before anyone had ever heard of Inferno. Fortunately, Cannonball and Wolfsbane of the New Mutants were around keep that from happening (I am afraid to ponder what sort of nightmare world that would create). Plus, Mirage, the newly minted valkyrie, stepped in to keep Maggie on the breathing side of death. After that, Spider-Man dropped by to apologize for missing the Thanksgiving festivities, and shared a valuable life lesson- real heroes eat their brussel sprouts (of course, if Spidey is the posterchild for heroism, then real heroes also whine about their lives constantly).
For a brief time, the Powers were able to wrest their series away from the regular cameo crowd, and engage in a storyline that was a little bit different... and a whole lot more Shakespearean. The kids were again captured by the Snarks (the lizard people even stooped so far as to impersonate Jarvis, God of Butlers, to do it), but they no longer sought the converter... this time, they literally wanted the powers of the Powers. The Snark Emperor Bhadsha was dying, and their order of succession was based upon Darwinian survival of the fittest... whoever happened to survive the ensuing war with the most attached limbs would be declared the fittest. Queen Mother Maraud wanted to give the Power's powers to her son, High Snark Jakal, using the transfer machine she had previously utilized to give Chancellor Hadj the healing abilities of Ambassador Yrik (father of Kofi), but Hadj learned that Maraud was actually poisoning Bhadsha, and... oh, forget it. In the end, Bhadsha survived in Jakal's body, Maraud was banished, Friday was as dead as a sentient ship in a comic book could be, the Powers had their powers switched, and everybody celebrated the expedient end to an intergalactic war with some homemade lentil soup... oh, and Cloak and Dagger helped a little.
After the shooting and soliloquies were over, new powers meant new codenames for the Powers, so Gee became the Destroyer, Mass-Master upgraded to Counterweight, Energizer switched to Starstreak, and Lightspeed, for some strange reason, choose the name Molecula, Mistress of Density (a title sure to terrify any superstitious, cowardly lot). It had been nearly a year since their last crossover, so the Pack strapped on their silver booties, and joined in on the Mutant Massacre... though, between them, they did not Massacre a single Mutant. The kids fought Sabretooth to a standstill (take that, Creed's reputation), listened to Cyclops deliver an aside on his questionable integrity (you abandon one wife and suddenly you're a moral leper), and introduced Leech and Caliban into the X-Factor fold (then, presumably, they showered, because Morlock tunnels can be a bit smelly). Following that, the Pack broke into Avengers Mansion (revealing the pajama choices of Black Knight, Hercules, and Jarvis), the parentally negligent Fantastic Four finally reunited with Franklin, and Alex learned about gun safety from Spider-Man, Hobgoblin, and the appropriately named Johnny Rival (his... umm... rival). Power Pack stayed on the socially conscious track, next exploring the evils of drugs, and the equally evil evils of drug dealers with gigantic thighs.
The Fallen Angels (whose membership included such hot characters as Siryn, Madrox, and Moon Boy) received an epilogue in Power Pack of all places, with Sunspot trying to prove his heroism, while inadvertently paraphrasing Hamlet the entire time. Katie then learned a lesson about responsibility from Madcap, of all people, but promptly forgot all about it when she rushed blindly into the Fall of the Mutants. Power Pack successfully saved the city from the death-spiralling Ship, only killing one Horseman of the Apocalypse in the process (awww... their first accidental murder, they grow up so fast), but X-Factor stole all the credit. In between getting blown up by Cyclops in X-Factor and getting blown up by Cyclops in Marvel Comics Presents, Master Mold went hunting for Franklin, the littlest member of the infamous Twelve, and got himself blown up by Power Pack.
Continuing to petition for the title of X-Pack, the kids saved Rebecca Littlehale, a little girl with the absolutely worst mutant power ever- the ability to uncontrollably teleport to any light source she sees (luckily, she never spent much time staring at gigantic nuclear furnaces in the sky, because that would be bad). Then, the Pack teamed with the New Mutants to again save Rebecca (who has decided upon the codename Lighttrakker for her nonexistent heroic career), this time after she was kidnapped by the all-but-forgotten Bogey-Man. Carmody wanted to sell the girl to some used soul dealers in Limbo, but Magik dropped him into a portal from which he would never emerge. Two months later, an Inferno overtook the city, and Carmody emerged as the Boogy Man (no need for hyphens now, he had become an overweight demon in a cheap suit... ooooh, scary). They successfully defeated the updated Boogy (well, they successfully drove him to suicide, at least), but he had already done the unthinkable... he forced the kids to confess to their parents about their spandexed hobby. Jim and Maggie went through every emotion from saddened shock to shocked sadness, before settling on simply having simultaneous nervous breakdowns. Power Pack would never be the same again!... until later in the same issue, when Mirage convinced the distraught duo that it was all a trick. Hmmm... that's odd, is there a powerboat and some sharks off in the distance?
The biggest names in the Marvel Universe continued to pop in with the Pack, including Punisher and Dakota North (I swear, she was a major character at one time). Then Katie took a trips to Elsewhere, a surreal, sideways world, where classic comic strip characters rule, and costumes get cleaned... unstable molecules have nothing on Elsewhere. Franklin returned for an eco-friendly arc involving Douglas Adams-style dolphins, but the issue count was again reaching a multiple of 25, so the Snarks needed to visit. Numinus (the only cosmic entity to ever pattern itself after Whoopi Goldberg) sent the Pack on a minor errand, which led to the complete destruction of the Kymellian homeworld... whoops. Luckily, the universe was reassembled quite quickly through a series of massive coincidences, and the Powers emerged unscathed, just with another set of power switches... you know, those become less surprising each time.
From there, a series of increasingly threatening threats loomed before the Powers, from Mysterio, to Typhoid Mary, to Doctor Doom, to Galactus, and then to the Ringmaster (admittedly, it is a bit hard to top Galactus). Once again, their secret powers became less secret, and, once again, their parents went through fun levels of permanent nervous collapse. It did not really help matters much when Alex, experiencing worst puberty in recorded history, transformed into a Kymellian, shocking his mother into her latest coma. The Pack faired well in their last major confrontation, a massive (and rather unfunny) brouhaha involving the Fantastic Four, the Red Ghost, and some super apes, but lost their war with low sales. The following year, the Power Pack Holiday Special fundamentally returned the Pack to their 1984-era status, with Alex a human, powers rearranged back to their original arrangement, and secrets secret again, allowing the team to rest comfortably in whichever comic book limbo that Dakota North was waiting for them in.
Two years later, a slightly older Alex Power was invited to escape obscurity, however briefly, as a member of the New Warriors, who were basically Power Pack with sex appeal. He surreptitiously stole the superpowers of his siblings, and redubbed himself Powerpax, in a show of support for the siblings he had just surreptitiously stolen the superpowers of. He did feel guilty enough about his deception to swear to the other Powers that he would never do such a thing again, but not quite guilty enough to stick to that promise for more than six issues... still, he did change his codename to Powerhouse, but that might just have been an attempt to forget that the others even exist. The presence of a former Packer did nothing to stave off cancellation, and Alex rejoined the other Powers at their uptown brownstone in obscurity.
Another four years passed without a Pack, but then 2000 brought a narrow glimmer of hope in the form of a miniseries... which proceeded to do its best to stamp out that foolish glimmer. Oh, the full team was back in all their costumed glory (with new costumes at that), but somehow Power Pack, volume two, found a way to be too different and too familiar simultaneously. Some of the Powers had been aged slightly, while others... well, Alex, who now went by the name Zero-G, had been retrograded from his Warrioring. Katie had become a genius when no one was looking, but had also grown less experienced with her own powers, and the parents were now in on the big secret, with no explanation or sheer insanity... though Maggie once again gained her own health crisis. The Snarks were the only villains of the day, and the Pack again restored stability to a world that always seems to enjoy anarchy more. The scientific trivia was gone (I probably learned more about inertia from Alex Power than I ever did from my high school physics teacher), and, probably worst of all, there were no guest stars. How can you call a book Power Pack and have no guest stars?
Now, nearly five years later, we find ourselves at the cusp of a Packdom renaissance, where you can literally pick your own Pack. If you yearn for a more innocent era, then the Marvel Age Power Pack miniseries will hopefully fit the bill, with preteen drama, a superpowered secret, and at least four cosmically-charged guest stars. Writer Marc Sumerak did just finish up Guardians, a series about children with an interstellar secret, so he should be well suited to the title. However, let's say that you are someone who grew up with the Pack, and, for some inexplicable reason, you would like to see them grow up a little bit too... well, a full reunion has yet to happen, but the Julie Power currently appearing in Runaways should soothe your Where are They Now? worries. Julie has finally come into her teenaged own, seeking the movie starlet life while hanging with the other former American Idols who comprise Excelsior. There might be a larger storyline going on as well, involving characters who are not Julie, but, really, what do they matter?
Power Pack was Not Another Teen Title... for one thing, for most of their existence, the Powers were not teens. They were kids, and they complained, cried, cheered, and charmed the way real children would. They were at the heart of every major Marvel moment, creating a realm of continuity that had not happened before... or since. Granted, either one of those Pack facts would be enough to dissuade most modern readers, but together they could work again as nostalgic gold.
The Pack is back, though if past history is any indication, the return will not last for long, so enjoy it while you can. Choose between the prepubescent Pack or the postpubescent Julie... or choose not to choose, and just buy both. Without a show of support for Power Pack and Power Pack-related titles, how will Lighttrakker ever earn her own series?
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Raul Grau had always planned to someday write an article about Power Pack, so their return gave him the valid excuse he needed. His favorite Marvel character is, surprisingly enough, Jack Power, simply because pint-sized sociopaths are the most interesting kind of sociopaths.
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The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and are not reflective of ComiX-Fan or its other staff in general.