| Challengers of the Unknown | |
|---|---|
 Challengers of the Unknown #1 (1958), cover art byJack Kirby. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics |
| First appearance | Showcase #6 (February 1957) |
| Created by | Jack Kirby (possibly withJoe Simon or Dave Wood) |
| In-story information | |
| Base(s) | Challengers Mountain |
| Member(s) | Kyle "Ace" Morgan Matthew "Red" Ryan Leslie "Rocky" Davis Walter Mark "Prof" Haley June Robbins |
TheChallengers of the Unknown is afictional group of adventurers appearing incomic books published byDC Comics. The quartet of adventurers exploredparanormal occurrences while facing several fantastic menaces.[1]
The characters' provenance is uncertain. Various sources credit the group as the sole creation of artist and storytellerJack Kirby,[2] a co-creation with writer Dave Wood[3] or a co-creation with Kirby's former partnerJoe Simon.[4][5] Following the end of theChallengers comic, DC has revived the characters in different incarnations over the years.
Some have claimed that Kirby reworked the basic concept of the series withStan Lee in 1961 to createThe Fantastic Four, the first creation that marked the rise ofMarvel Comics.[6]
The adventuring quartet the Challengers of the Unknown debuted inShowcase #6 (February 1957), in an uncredited story attributed toJack Kirby for art and to Kirby and Dick Wood for script, under editorJack Schiff.[7]
The series continued in the bimonthlyShowcase for three more appearances (#7, 11–12, April 1957, December 1957 – February 1958)[8] then moved to its own title, starting with issue #1 (May 1958).[9] Kirby moved on after issue #8 (July 1959), withBob Brown succeeding him as artist.[10] The title continued through issue #75 (September 1970), followed by two reprint issues. The series was canceled with issue #77 in 1971 (January 1971). In 1973, three reprint issues were published (#78–80).[10][11] The team's lineup was briefly enhanced with the inclusion of the paranormal sensitive Corrina Stark toward the end of this run.
The Challengers had a short-lived 1976–77 revival inSuper-Team Family #8–10. The group then returned to its own title continuing the number with #81. During this period, they were joined byDeadman andSwamp Thing, and associate June Robbins got a uniform and official status. No explanation was given for Corinna Stark's departure, nor June's joining the team. The revived series was canceled with issue #87 in 1978.Adventure Comics Digest #493–497 (1982) featured an expanded version of the team's origin.
The Challengers returned in alimited series,Challengers of the Unknown (vol. 2) (1991), by writerJeph Loeb and artistTim Sale. It ran eight issues and was reprinted intrade paperback asChallengers of the Unknown Must Die! (2004). This series depicted the Challengers in middle age, breaking up after a tragic accident and coming back together as a team. Loeb hoped for a monthly title, and planned at least a second limited series, but neither volume materialized. Elements of this revival later appeared in several Superboy stories around the turn of the millennium, as asecond, unrelated group had a title in the late 1990s as part of theWeirdoverse line.
In 2000, DC published a one-shot,Silver Age: Challengers of the Unknown, done in the style of the originalSilver Age of Comic Books Challengers.
The roster included Ace Morgan, Prof Haley, Rocky Davis andRed Ryan, with their occasional companion June Robbins.[12] Ryan was killed and briefly replaced by his younger brother Marty, a pop singer who used the anagram ID of Tino Manarry. Red Ryan returned from the dead and Tino was written out after suffering an injury that left him blind. Toward the end of the original series, a woman with an occult background named Corinna Stark acted as a fifth member of the team.
Prepublication solicitations for variousCountdown to Final Crisis tie-ins referred to the group ofDonna Troy,Jason Todd,Kyle Rayner, and "Bob" (a nefarious, renegade "purist"Monitor), as "Challengers from Beyond". This group went on a quest through the newly formed multiverse to findRay Palmer, whom Bob claimed was essential to the survival of the universe. Eventually the Earth heroes were betrayed by Bob, who sought to kill Palmer, rather than protect him or acquire his aid. Palmer, Troy, Todd, and Rayner found themselves involved in a war between the Monitors andMonarch's forces. Later they traveled toApokolips, where they teamed up withJimmy Olsen,Forager,Karate Kid andTriplicate Girl. After returning to Earth, Troy, Rayner, Forager, and Palmer decided to team up again. They traveled to the Monitors' headquarters, where they informed the shocked beings that they would be watching over them as a sort of interdimensional border guards.
The 2007 revival ofThe Brave and the Bold series features a storyline involving the Challengers.Destiny of the Endless reveals toSupergirl andLobo that hisBook of Destiny has changed because there appeared to be men who existed, but were not recorded in the book, and their undocumented actions made the book unreliable. Destiny cast the book away, and it was eventually recovered by Batman and Green Lantern with the help of the Challengers, the men in question, who become the new holders of the book. Destiny later reclaims the book.
Leslie "Rocky" Davis appears regularly inDoom Patrol, in which he serves as something of a counselor to the members of that team, and resides on Oolong Island.
In 2011, theDC Universe was dramatically altered, giving very different back stories to many of its heroes and villains. This version of the Challengers incorporates elements of the original and 1990s lineups.
The Challengers were formed for a reality television contest, when several notable people were assembled by archaeologist presenter Clay Brody for his "Challengers" program. Clay, the contestants, producer June, and pilots Ace and Maverick, were lost in the Himalayas when their plane crashed under mysterious circumstances.[13] All but one of them showed up weeks later, remembering a recuperation in Nanda Parbat, in which the city's elder told them to beware the unknown, but also to challenge it. Returning to civilization, the group found a talisman that had led Clay to pick them, and a note explaining that it was one of a set.
The Challengers program was retooled to take advantage of the quest. With their home base on a Metropolis soundstage dubbed "Challengers Mountain", the group sought out the talismans in far-flung corners of the world, usually accompanied by some oddity, like warrior statues or giant-ant-spewing portals. Their greatest initial challenge came when in a short period their show was cancelled and they were attacked by their dead friend, "Ace" the pilot. Though he killed two of them, they managed to defeat him, and the survivors vowed to find the rest of the talismans and save the world.
The original Challengers Prof, Ace, Red, and Rocky were on a mission on an Earth in the Dark Multiverse when Prof was badly wounded. He figured out how to use the dark energy to heal himself. In doing so he inadvertently sent his dark multiverse counterpart to the multiverse. The Dark Prof created a new Challengers that he could use to collect the remains of an ancient god whose remains were flung through time and space when the Source Wall was destroyed. The Dark Prof recruits Trina Alvarez, Moses Barber, Krunch, and Bethany Hopkins as the most current incarnation of the team. They soon discover his evil intentions and send him back to the Dark Multiverse, saving Ace, Red, Rocky and Prof in the process.[14]The DC Comics 5 issue Limited series "Challengers of the Unknown" returned with a new story in "All In" by Christopher Cantwell and Sean Izaakse. The original team, Ace Morgan, June Robbins, Prof Haley, Red Ryan, and Rocky Davis, will be featured, collaborating with the Justice League to address threats to the galaxy. A mysterious foe from their past, connected to the Darkseid wave, will play a significant role in the narrative.
DC published two other series, also titledChallengers of the Unknown, featuring the original Challengers' concept combined with a new set of characters.
The Challengers were revamped by writerSteven Grant in vol. 3 (1997), which had a totally new group of characters and was one of four series making up theWeirdoverse group of titles. This ongoing series ran 18 issues, through 1998. This team of paranormal investigators met the original Challengers and even had Rocky agree to advise them.
One more revamp was done byHoward Chaykin in a six-issue miniseries (vol. 4, 2004–2005). This series had another new group of characters and was entirely unrelated to the previous two incarnations.
When acquaintances miraculously survive a plane crash unscathed, they conclude that since they are "living on borrowed time" they should band together for hazardous adventures. The four—pilotKyle "Ace"Morgan, daredevilMatthew "Red"Ryan, strong and slow-wittedLeslie "Rocky"Davis, and scientistWalter Mark "Prof"Haley—became the Challengers of the Unknown.
Soon famous, the Challengers accept many "unknown challenges" fromThe Pentagon, mad scientists, and people with a problem. Over time the "Challs" establish the hollowed-out Challengers Mountain as headquarters. Later they adopt anhourglasslogo to symbolize time running out. They encounter genies, common and sophisticated thieves,rocs, aliens and robots good and bad. Their adventures later veer toward superheroics, and take in everything from occult menaces toBermuda Triangle mysteries. The Challengers travel through space, time, and other dimensions. They encounter the likes of theDoom Patrol,Deadman,Swamp Thing,Jonny Double, and theSea Devils, with whom they fight the criminal groupScorpio.[15] June Robbins, a computer genius and archaeologist, joined the Challengers for many adventures as an "honorary" or "girl" Challenger. June first officially joins the team after the rogue robot 'Ultivac' seemingly kills one of the original Challengers. However that man returns thanks to heroic efforts of modern medical science.[16]
When Red is killed,[17] a teen rock star/engineering genius immediately wages a vendetta against the three-man team. "Tino Mannaray" turns out to be Martin Ryan, Red's kid brother, who blames the team for his death. Red eventually returns; though blown up, he had been dosed with shape-changing Liquid Light and rendered amnesiac, but still nearly conquered the Pacific as aTiki god.
As the team's challenges become more occult, Red's brother Tino is blinded. Red donates an eye to his brother and dons an eye patch. Eventually Red receives an eye transplant. Prof becomes possessed by an evil spirit and is shot by a villain. While he recovers, Corinna Stark, a mysterious blonde with mystical knowledge, invites herself onto the team. The Challengers fight occult alien-monsters in backwoods villages and dark dreams, and Rocky and Red fight for Corinna's affection.
The Challs are later semi-retired, their mountain a theme park, and their adventures disregarded as cooked-up articles in a tabloid,The Tattletale. The nearby town has renamed itself Challengerville, managing to thrive on the team's name. A cosmic entity, which prides itself as "the personification of all evil", influences the entityMulti-Man to blow up the mountain. The town is destroyed. Hundreds die, including, seemingly, Prof and June.[18] The surviving Challengers are placed on trial, but eventually freed with the testimony ofSuperman. They are, however, ordered to disband.[19]
A tabloid reporter, Moffet, becomes involved with the group after several unexplained incidents. Moffet begins to piece together many seemingly unrelated massacres. Red became a violent, vigilante mercenary. Ace becomes an addled mystic, losing new-found friends due to inattention and incompetence. Rocky becomes lost in a life of luxury and ends up in an insane asylum.
Eventually the three reunite, and with Moffet's aid, find a strange portal near what was once Challengerville. They discover Prof and June, pregnant, "alive" in a strange "phantom zone". The dark demon confronts them and the final battle comes down to Moffet and a neutron bomb. The decision to attack is literally taken out of his hands by Multi-Man, who sacrifices himself to destroy the demon.[20]
"The New Challengers of the Unknown", including ghostly Prof and June, were poised to take on menaces in the dark corners of the world.[20]
Later, four new Challengers pursueX-Files-like horrors. They are Clay Brody,NASCAR driver; Brenda Ruskin, physicist; Kenn Kawa, radical games designer; and Marlon Corbet, commercial pilot, who also miraculously survived a plane crash. They stopped sacrificial wackos, drug-juiced zombies, vengeful ghosts,Amazon cults,Lovecraftian monsters, mass suicides, humming buildings, and other oddities. They were advised by Rocky Davis, older and grayer and alone. It was eventually revealed that the original Challengers were dematerialized by a mad scientist's ray-weapon. The same ray caused both plane crashes, as well as others. Soon the original Challs reappeared, helped the young Challs defeat the madman, then walked back into oblivion (minus a wounded Rocky) to shut down a runaway Tesla field. The young Challengers vowed to fight on.
Superboy discovers the missing Challengers—Ace, Red, Prof, and June—inHypertime. The team was waging guerrilla war against Black Zero (a Superboy variant). With Black Zero defeated, the team returns to Earth, but loses Red along the way. Reunited with Rocky inMetropolis, hosted byRip Hunter, the original Challengers vow to explore Hypertime, "the greatest unknown", to find Red.
Two Challengers partake inInfinite Crisis. Rocky Davis and Prof Haley help stem the escape of prisoners from Blackgate Prison.[21] Rocky fights in theBattle of Metropolis. He is one of dozens of heroes fighting the opposing army of theSecret Society of Super Villains. The Society is ultimately defeated.[22]
Later, on a world without superheroes, ablogger, ahip hop artist, an eco-terrorist, and two others discovers they had been genetically enhanced and chip-programmed to be soldier-pawns by the Hegemony, a cabal of billionaires who secretly run that world. Made slaves on a Moon base, three Challengers blow up the base, escape to Earth, and declare war on the Hegemony until (like the obliquely mentioned earlier Challengers) their "borrowed time" runs out.
InDC All In, the Challengers of the Unknown join theJustice League as maintenance workers on the Watchtower and collaborated with them to investigate what happened to the universe after Darkseid's apparent death.[23]
The Challengers make a brief appearance in theElseworlds miniseriesConjurers, set in an alternate DCU where magic is a part of mainstream society. These are the "Volume 3" Challengers, but given the nicknames of the originals: Kenn is "Prof", Clay is "Rocky", Brenda is "Red", and Marlon is "Ace". Since Kenn was always shown as the most "mystical" of the new Challs, it makes sense that he would be "Prof" in a magical universe, rather than Brenda, the team's scientist.
During Superboy's trip through Hypertime, referenced above, he briefly visits an Elseworld in which the Challengers were himself, Ace,Guardian, andDubbilex. The June who arrives in the DCU at the end of that story is also anElseworlds version, coming from a universe where she was a full Challenger from the beginning. She was apparently exchanged with the June of the main timeline when she was struck by Hypertime energies.
The Challengers also made brief appearances inJLA: Another Nail (when all time periods meld together) andThe Adventures of Superman Annual #7 (as part of a strikeforce of non-powered heroes).
They were prominently featured inDarwyn Cooke'sDC: The New Frontier miniseries (2003–2004). Various members were essential in many battles against menaces that arose throughout the series.
In the 1996 crossover seriesAmalgam Comics, the Challengers were merged with theFantastic Four to becomeChallengers of the Fantastic.
| Challengers of the Unknown | |
|---|---|
 Cover of issue #4, art byJohn Paul Leon andShawn Martinbrough. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics (Weirdoverse) |
| Schedule | Monthly |
| Format | Ongoing series |
| Genre | Adventure |
| Publication date | February 1997 – July 1998 |
| No. of issues | 18 |
| Main character(s) | Kenn Kawa, Clay Brody, Brenda Ruskin, Marlon Corbet |
| Creative team | |
| Written by | Steven Grant |
| Penciller | John Paul Leon |
| Inker | Shawn Martinbrough |
Started as a part of DC'sWeirdoverse group of titles, the 1996 series was published for a total of eighteen issues,cover dated February 1997 to July 1998. The characters were a mix of races and were, like the original group, the only survivors of a plane crash:
The 1996 series was originally conceived as the basis for atelevision series that never came about, as writerSteven Grant revealed in 2000:
COTU (as I took to calling it, to distinguish it from the Jack Kirby's original Challengers of the Unknown, nicknamed "The Challs") actually started a year earlier, when I was brought in to create a new COTU for a TV pitch DC wanted to make toWarners. Yes, it can now be told, and I freely admit, that we threw out the original team because,Space Cowboys aside, trying to pitch a concept built around four aging white guys to a TV market focused on a youth audience and pushing a veneer of multiculturalism (plenty of activist groups argue it's a pretty thin, even invisible, veneer, and they make a good case) would have been flat-out stupid, a waste of everyone's time and money. So: out with Ace, Rocky, Red and Prof; in with Brenda, Kenn, Marlon and Clay.[24]
This team investigatedparanormal disturbances across America as they were hunted by Saxon, a mystical being who also survived the plane crash that led to the team's formation. Though the series was generally unrelated tosuperhero conventions and the broaderDC Universe, the group participated in theSuperman storyline Millennium Giants and later have original Challengers member Rocky Davis as a mentor. After the comic was canceled, the characters did not appear in any comics until 2011'sNew 52 event that rebooted all DC Comics titles. When the Challengers appear in this new comic universe, it includes characters from the original and 1990s versions.
| Challengers of the Unknown | |
|---|---|
 Cover to issue #1, art byHoward Chaykin. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics |
| Schedule | Monthly |
| Format | Limited series |
| Genre | Adventure |
| Publication date | 2004 |
| No. of issues | 6 |
| Main character(s) | Zach Dyamond, Tessa Crowne, Rydell Starr, Kendra Harte, Holden Crosse |
| Creative team | |
| Created by | Howard Chaykin |
| Written by | Howard Chaykin |
| Artist | Howard Chaykin |
| Collected editions | |
| Challengers of the Unknown: Stolen Moments, Borrowed Time | ISBN 1-4012-0941-6 |
The 2004 series was a six-issue limited series, written and drawn byHoward Chaykin. Unlike the other two versions, this group didn't originate in a plane crash. Instead, it was made up of survivors of a large scale terrorist attack inLong Beach, California:
The Challengers of the Unknown have faced an array of villains:
The Challengers of the Unknown appear as character summons inScribblenauts Unmasked: A DC Comics Adventure.[26]
The 1950–60s series won the 1967Alley Awards for Best Non-Super-Powered Group Title and Best Normal Adventure Group.
| Title | Material collected | Year | ISBN |
|---|---|---|---|
| Challengers of the Unknown Archive Volume 1 | Showcase #6–7, 11–12,Challengers of the Unknown (vol 1) #1–2 | 2003 | 978–1563899973 |
| Challengers of the Unknown Archive Volume 2 | Challengers of the Unknown (vol. 1) #3–8 | 2004 | 978-1401201531 |
| Showcase Presents: Challengers of the Unknown, Vol. 1 | Showcase #6–7, 11–12,Challengers of the Unknown (vol. 1) #1–17 | 2006 | 978-1401210878 |
| Showcase Presents: Challengers of the Unknown, Vol. 2 | Challengers of the Unknown (vol. 1) #18–37 | 2008 | 978-1401217259 |
| Challengers Of The Unknown Omnibus by Jack Kirby | Showcase #6–7, 11–12,Challengers of the Unknown (vol. 1) #1–8 | 2012 | 978-1401234744 |
| Title | Material collected | Year | ISBN |
|---|---|---|---|
| Swamp Thing: The Bronze Age Vol. 2 | Swamp Thing (vol. 1) #14–24,Challengers of the Unknown (vol. 1) #81–87, DC Comics Presents #8,The Brave and the Bold (vol. 1) #122,176 | 2020 | 978-1401294229 |
| Title | Material collected | Year | ISBN |
|---|---|---|---|
| Challengers of the Unknown Must Die! | Challengers of the Unknown (vol. 2) #1–8 | 2004 | 978-1401203740 |
| Challengers of the Unknown: Stolen Moments, Borrowed Time | Challengers of the Unknown (vol. 4) #1–6 | 2006 | 978-1401209414 |
| DC Universe Presents Vol. 1 featuring Deadman & Challengers of the Unknown | DC Universe Presents #1–8 | 2012 | 978-1401237165 |
| New Challengers | New Challengers #1–6 | 2018 | 978-1401283445 |
