Throwback Thursday: The History of Nightcrawler
Mar 10, 2022
One of the most popular mutants to ever appear alongside the X-Men wasn’t actually a part of their original lineup. Nightcrawler made his debut in May 1975 in Giant Size X-Men #1 alongside Storm, Colossus and Thunderbird.
The events of Giant Size X-Men featured this new generation of X-Men joining forces with the original team’s leader, Cyclops, to rescue members of the team who had disappeared on a mission. After saving them from the sentient island of Krakoa, the new generation of X-Men continued to work with the old team.
Nightcrawler was created by Len Wein and Dave Cockrum – and was almost a DC character. Cockrum had created Nightcrawler and submitted him to be a part of DC’s “Outsiders” team in the Legion of Super-Heroes series, but was rejected. When Cockrum and Wein went to work on the new X-Men, the design was brought over to Marvel and thus, Nightcrawler became a mutant; he also became German in the move to Marvel because editor Roy Thomas had specifically asked for a multi-national team.
Nightcrawler stood out from other mutants insofar as he was slightly more colorful with his blue skin making him stand out in a crowd, for sure. His abilities include teleportation (always accompanied by the popular “bamf” sound effect), though he has also been able to blend seamlessly into the shadows, and his prehensile tail gives him an advantage in combat.
After spending several years with his fellow mutants on the X-Men, he left the team to join forces with Captain Britain in the UK alongside Shadowcat and Rachel Summers. The group they formed was called Excalibur, and while Captain Britain originally led them, Nightcrawler soon took over. After Excalibur disbanded, he returned to the X-Men. Since then, he’s featured prominently into storylines such as “House of M” and “Messiah Complex,” plus starred in his own book multiple times, the most recent one began in 2014.
This eye-popping box set includes 12 brand-new hardcovers that collect this entire epic, featuring stories by top DC talent including Geoff Johns, Peter J. Tomasi, Ivan Reis, and many more!
Plus, this box set also includes a set of nine plastic rings from across the spectrum of the many Corps that are a part of this story!
Includes 12 new hardcover collections!
• Blackest Night: Prelude collects Green Lantern #26-28 and 36-43, and Final Crisis: Rage of the Red Lanterns #1
• Blackest Night collects Blackest Night #0-8 and pages from Untold Tales of the Blackest Night #1
• Blackest Night: Green Lantern collects Green Lantern #44-52
• Blackest Night: Green Lantern Corps collects Green Lantern Corps #39-47
• Blackest Night: Black Lantern Corps Book 1 collects Blackest Night: Batman #1-3, Blackest Night: Superman #1-3, and Blackest Night: Wonder Woman #1-3
• Blackest Night: Black Lantern Corps Book 2 collects Blackest Night: The Flash #1-3, Blackest Night: JSA #1-3, and Blackest Night: Titans #1-3
• Blackest Night: Rise of the Black Lanterns collects The Atom & Hawkman #48, Phantom Stranger #42, Green Arrow #30, Adventure Comics #7, Starman #81, The Question #37, Catwoman #83, Weird Western Tales #71, and The Power of Shazam! #38
• Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps collects Blackest Night: Tales of the Black Lanterns #1-3, Adventure Comics #4-5, Untold Tales of the Blackest Night #1, stories from Green Lantern #18-20, 40, and 49, Green Lantern/Sinestro Corps: Secret Files #1, Tales of the Sinestro Corps: Superman-Prime #1, and pages from Blackest Night #0
• Brightest Day: Green Lantern collects Green Lantern #53-62
• Brightest Day Book 1 collects Brightest Day #0-11
• Brightest Day Book 2 collects Brightest Day #12-25
• The Book of the Black collects sketch material (both previously released and new), series proposals, variant covers, posters, Blackest Night outline scripts,
This article originally appeared in Gemstone Publishing’s e-newsletter Scoop.
****
Amanda Sheriff is Gemstone Publishing’s Associate Editor, serving as the writer/editor of the e-newsletter, Scoop. She is the author of The Overstreet Guide to Collecting Movie Posters, The Overstreet Guide to Collecting Concert Posters, and The Overstreet Guide to Collecting Horror, and co-author of The Overstreet Price Guide to Star Wars Collectibles and The Overstreet Price Guide to Batman.
