Marvel Comics

This would be a great place for fans to discuss Marvel's versions of public domain characters such as Hercules, Thor and The Black Knight, among others.

In July Marvel is set to release the TPB of "Invaders Classic Vol 4." This volume includes Roy Thomas' 1993 Invaders mini-series in which he introduced the Battle-Axis. The Battle-Axis team was made up of public domain heroes that Thomas turned into villains. They included Dr. Nemesis, Spider Queen, Volton, and Human Meteor. Of those, Dr. Nemesis has become an important figure in the Marvel U, having been made first the co-creator of the original Human Torch, then having been deemed Marvel's first mutant. He even appeared in Marvel's history book, "The Marvels Project."

Haha...that's pretty funny. That's a pretty odd group to make into a super villain team. I think Volton was more or less just a character from ads. I guess the names "Dr. Nemesis" and "Spider Queen" sound like supervillains, though spider queen reminds me more of Wonder Woman than anything. Still, cool to know that more of the golden age characters are finding new life.

Did Marvel reprint the old Invaders drawn by Frank Robbins in the seventies, too? They where published here in Italy in the early 80s, and as a kid I really loved them. Hope there's an essential or some other kind of reprint of those stories!

I haven't read these issue in question but I read somewhere (sorry no soure) that Roy Thomas planned on having the battle Axis be doppelgangers of DC's Justice League. At some point he changed his mind and went with public domain characters. This kind of explains why he went with Spider Queen. She Still works as a Wonder Woman stand-in.

I think this was the subjected of an installment of the blog "Comic book legends reveled". I'll check and post back

Ok that last post had some very bad and information. This must be the reason that people check there sources before they open there big mouths.

Source: http://www.marvunapp.com

...Roy Thomas had originally intended Battle-Axis to consist of some of the minor wartime heroes of Timely Comics (predecessor of Marvel) but Mark Gruenwald nixed the idea...

The line-up was most likely something like this

Spider Queen=Silver Scorpion

Doctor Nemesis= Captain Terror

Human Meteor= Blazing Skull

Not sure about the rest.

I know Dr. Nemesis has appeared in X-Men recently to wreak havoc, but I've not read any of the books, I just know this from reading some solicitations recently.

Roy had a real knack for taking forgotten character and giving them that shot in the arm that revitelizes them for years to come.

I would love to see Roy Thomas revamp a bunch of golden age PD characters in a creator owned comic.

Yeah,me too,that would be cool!