In the late 1980s and early 1990s, comics underwent a massive surge in popularity and collectibility as superstar artists like Jim Lee and Todd MacFarlane became “rock stars,” thanks to their work on Marvel’s Uncanny X-Men and Amazing Spider-Man respectively. They, along with other Marvel artists, Rob Liefeld, Marc Silvestri, Erik Larsen, and Wilce Portacio, broke away and established their own company, Image Comics, which allowed them to own their creations and not simply serve as “work for hire.”
Image’s success led to an onslaught of new publishers jumping into the game and launching new superhero universes. Small publisher Malibu Comics launched their Untraverse imprint, which boasted an entirely new roster of interconnected superheroes. While the competition was stiff, Ultraverse established a solid fanbase with retro-style heroes that seemed to ignore the “extreme” trend that was happening with Image and other publishers.
Among the headliners in the Ultraverse were: Hardcase, a.k.a. Tom Hawke, a Hollywood actor, with enhanced strength, agility, and durability; Prime, a Shazam-like 13-year-old who morphed into a massive superhuman adult thanks to some mysterious goo; and Prototype, the Iron Man of this universe, with the distinction of being Hispanic.
In the fashion of the Avengers and Justice League, Malibu united its three main Ultraverse characters into a super squad, the Ultraforce, which also included the creepy Ghoul, the sole survivor of a short-lived team called the Exiles; Topaz, an alien warrior queen; Pixx, a teen with illusion powers; and Contrary, the mysterious benefactor who united them.
After the success of FOX’s X-Men animated series in 1993, and with the general surge in popularity of comic books and superheroes, other networks licensed various comics to turn into cartoons, which would, hopefully, in turn, allow for the creation of action figures and other merchandise. (Last week, I discussed the WildC.A.T.s cartoon, based on Jim Lee’s Image series of the same name.)
Created by DIC Productions, L.P., and Bohbot Entertainment, an Ultraforce cartoon aired on the USA Network beginning in 1994. It featured the entire team from the comics, as well as guest appearances by other Ultraverse characters Night Man and The Strangers, as well as established villains like the conqueror Atalon, android NM-E, vampire Rune, and mystical Lord Pumpkin. Mimicking X-Men, the Ultraforce opening credits featured the characters with their own logos, lifted directly from the covers of Malibu Comics (where applicable).
The cartoon followed the comics and included such changes as Prime’s transition from a clean-cut hero to an edgier, more “extreme” ’90s style character with long hair and spikes on his costume.
Among the cast was Andrew Jackson (who recently appeared on The Boys as Love Sausage) as Prime with Amos Crawley (Billy Madison) as his youthful alter ego, Kevin Green, Alyson Court (Jubilee on X-Men) as Pixx, Catherine Disher (Jean Grey on X-Men) as Topaz, Janet-Laine Green (Mother Bear on Little Bear) as Contrary, Rino Romano (Spider-Man on the 2000 Spider-Man series, Batman on The Batman, current narrator of Curious George) as Prototype, Peter Wildman (Mojo on X-Men) as Ghoul, and Rod Wilson (Davis Davenport on Good Witch, and Brian on The Umbrella Academy) as Hardcase.
The Ultraforce cartoon was not a success and only lasted for one 13-episode season which you can watch on Tubi. The animation style is pretty rough– DIC was never known for great visuals, especially when it came to an action show. Like WildC.A.T.s, the cartoon was a dumbed-down adaptation of the comics, while also trying to copy X-Men, and mixing in subpar action cartoon cliches for good measure.
Galoob did produce a tie-in toy line, which included action figures of Prime, Hardcase, Topaz, Nightman, Prototype, Ghoul, Atalon, and NM-E, plus two vehicles. In addition, limited editions were released of some of the figures, limited to 5,000 pieces, and even 504 pieces. But the 5,000 piece limited editions were easy to find marked down to $1 as the line bombed at retail. Galoob did have plans for a second wave and created a prototype of the Swamp Thing-like character Sludge, the fact that no one bought the first assortment torpedoed any further additions. Like the cartoon it was based on, the toyline looks and feels like a poor X-Men bootleg.
The comic book market began to decline in the mid-90s. DC Comics expressed an interest in buying Malibu comics and the Ultraverse as sales flagged, but Marvel swooped in and bought it in late 2014. The popular rumor, perpetuated by Marvel themselves, is that the company wanted Malibu’s innovative digital coloring system, but the truth was that they simply wanted to keep DC from getting the Ultraverse characters and titles, as that would have given them a larger share of the comic book market than Marvel.
To further perpetuate the cover story, Marvel continued to publish some Ultraverse comics and even established that this universe was part of the Marvel multiverse. To further connect them, Marvel moved one of its biggest stars to the Ultraverse, um… the Black Knight. However, by 1996, Marvel ditched the Ultraverse, moved the Black Knight back to the 616, and the characters have rarely been seen again, although, in 2003, writer Steve Englehart was hired to plan out a relaunch.
That never came to fruition and Marvel publisher Joe Quesada cryptically hinted that Marvel won’t publish the Ultraverse characters due to some nightmarishly complicated legal licensing issues, but he added that there was another, bigger reason why they won’t use them saying, “there is a bigger one, but I really don’t feel like it’s my place to make that dirty laundry public.”
Besides Ultraforce, the Ultraverse spawned a live-action series Night Man series that aired in syndication from 1997-99. Though not part of the Ultraverse, you may have heard of another Malibu Comics property that has been adapted into live-action– Men in Black.
However, on a more positive note, it appears that Rachel House’s character from Thor: Ragnarok is Topaz, the same character that appeared in Ultraverse.
So it appears that Marvel/Disney retains the rights to the Ultraverse, so it’s entirely possible that other creations could return in some form or another. It does not, however, appear that Disney owns the rights to Ultraverse cartoon, or if it does, it has so far chosen not to make it available, not that there is much demand.
Were you a fan of the Ultraverse comic? What did you think of the cartoon adaptation?
