Stormwatch Stormwatch (run by a fictional United Nations) is overseen from a satellite by its director, the Weatherman. The Weatherman was Henry Bendix, who had cybernetic implants connected to his brain to better monitor the world situation and his Stormwatch teams in action. His field commander was Jackson King (also known as Battalion, an American telekinetic). Other founding members include
Hellstrike (an Irish police officer who is an energy being), Winter (an ex-Russian Spetznaz officer and an energy absorber), Fuji (a young Japanese man, an energy being trapped in a containment suit) and Diva (a young Italian woman with sonic powers). The team first appeared in the eponymous
comic book Stormwatch, published by
Image Comics and owned by
Jim Lee. Early writers of
Stormwatch included Jim Lee,
Brandon Choi, H. K. Proger and
Ron Marz; early artists included
Scott Clark,
Brett Booth, Matt Broome and Renato Arlem. Marz, who had worked on
Marvel Comics'
Silver Surfer and developed
Hal Jordan's
Green Lantern replacement
Kyle Rayner at
DC Comics, took over the writing while
James Robinson was writing
WildC.A.T.s. Robinson and Marz, directed by Jim Lee, intertwined the books' storylines over several months. Around this time, two two-issue miniseries were published:
Stormwatch Team One (written by James Robinson) and
WildC.A.T.s Team One (written by Steven Seagle). In the intertwined miniseries, the groundwork for both teams was laid in the mid-1960s by a core group consisting of Saul Baxter (Lord Emp),
Zealot,
Majestic, John Colt (the template for
Spartan),
Backlash, a young Bendix and Jackson King's father Isaiah, all of whom would be members of (or figure prominently in) the later Stormwatch and
WildC.A.T.s teams. In this series "WildStorm", the publishing imprint name, was a code word used by the United States Government: "Wild" was extraterrestrial life-forms, and "Storm" was invading forces. Robinson's
WildC.A.T.s and Marz's
Stormwatch culminated in the "
Wildstorm Rising" storyline, during which both teams were disrupted; Stormwatch incurred casualties, and the WildC.A.T.s were believed dead. After WildStorm Rising,
Alan Moore took over the writing of
WildC.A.T.s. After a second imprint-wide crossover,
Warren Ellis took over writing
Stormwatch with #37 (July 1996).
Warren Ellis and Stormwatch Vol. 2 Warren Ellis's run would refocus the stories and redefine the cast of characters while tying-up the first volume (with issue #50) and spanning the entire 12-issue run of the second volume. His version of
Stormwatch injected sexual and horror elements, thinly-disguised political commentary and criticism of the United States government into the stories. The accompanying art was toned down from the more-exaggerated 1990s superhero-style, which dominated the early Image Comics, helping to emphasize the science fiction aspect of the storylines. During this period Ellis used
Stormwatch to introduce the concept of the Bleed, a space between
parallel universes which later featured in
Planetary and other comics set in the Wildstorm Universe. By the end of volume one Ellis made Henry Bendix a manipulative villain. Ellis continued to write the book into
Stormwatch volume 2, until the August 1998
WildC.A.T.s/Aliens crossover (also written by Ellis) which saw the Stormwatch team decimated by
xenomorphs (the creatures from
the Alien film series). Most of the Stormwatch characters Ellis had not created were killed off in this story while the surviving characters he had created became the main cast of Ellis' new series,
The Authority, including
Jenny Sparks,
Jack Hawksmoor,
Apollo, the
Midnighter, and
Swift (who debuted in Stormwatch vol. 1 #28, written by
Jeff Mariotte) as well as two new characters who were successors of
the Engineer and the Doctor from Ellis' "Change or Die" storyline.
Stormwatch volume 2 ended with a story, set after
WildC.A.T.s/Aliens, in which the United Nations disbanded Stormwatch. The last scene, a conversation between former members of Stormwatch Black, introduced The Authority and promoted its first issue. Other survivors from the original team (including Battalion,
Christine Trelane, and Flint) appeared briefly in
The Authority, and King and Trelane became central characters of
The Monarchy. Ellis's use of concepts and characters he developed in Stormwatch extended into other WildStorm projects as well. Notably,
Planetary. In the 11th issue of
Planetary,
John Stone, a secret agent modeled after a combination of
James Bond and Nick Fury (of
Jim Steranko's
Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.) works for a 1960s precursor of Stormwatch named
S.T.O.R.M., working out of a command center known as
S.T.O.R.M. Watch. References were also made to Jenny Sparks, the Bleed, and the ability to teleport via "doors."
Stormwatch: Team Achilles In September 2002,
Stormwatch was revived as
Stormwatch: Team Achilles, written by
Micah Ian Wright. The series followed a human UN troubleshooting team dealing with superhuman-related problems. The planned final issue (#24) was never published, although its script is available for download online.
Stormwatch: Post Human Division Stormwatch was one of several comic books restarted after Wildstorm Comics' WorldStorm event. This version was launched in November 2006 with writer
Christos Gage and penciller
Doug Mahnke. The series ended after issue #12, but resumed in August 2008 as part of the World's End event with issue #13. In the new series several dead characters (Hellstrike, Fuji, Winter and Fahrenheit) were resurrected and reformed as the new version of Stormwatch Prime (now sponsored by the United States), and a separate branch office —
Stormwatch: P.H.D. (Post-Human Division) — was opened in New York.
The New 52 DC Comics announced in June 2011 that the team would be incorporated into the DC Universe in a new series, written by
Paul Cornell and drawn by Miguel Sepulveda, as part of the
September 2011 relaunch of its comics.
Peter Milligan took over the book in issue nine after leaving
Justice League Dark with issue eight. This Stormwatch, an organization which has protected Earth from alien threats since the
Dark Ages, is commanded by a group known as the Shadow Cabinet: a four-member group of Shadow Lords referred to as "the dead", and represented by an entity which can negate the group's powers and is aware of their secrets (except Harry's). Rejecting the title "superheroes", Stormwatch — Jack Hawksmoor, Apollo, Midnighter, Jenny Quantum, the Engineer, the
Martian Manhunter (who left the team after wiping everyone's memory of him), who was later revealed to be Merlin), Emma Rice, the Projectionist (who controls the mass media) and Harry Tanner, the Eminence of Blades (the world's greatest swordsman) — exist in secret and consider themselves professional soldiers. Their base is a hijacked Daemonite spaceship in Hyperspace, later upgraded into the Carrier.
Jim Starlin wrote
Stormwatch with #19, erasing the team's history as a 1,000-year-old organization and restarting its history again. Apollo and Midnighter were returned to their original costumes as the core of a new Stormwatch team with the Engineer, Hellstrike,
the Weird and new characters Jenny Soul, the Forecaster, and Force. After Starlin's run ended with #29, Sterling Gates wrote the series' 30th and final issue which restored the previous version of the team. The team then appeared in
The New 52: Futures End weekly limited series. ==Collections==