Freak Force
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Freak Force is the name of a fictional team of bounty hunters operating out of Chicago, Illinois in the Image Comics series Savage Dragon, all created by Erik Larsen -- many during his adolescence. The team is composed of 'super freaks' (the slang term for super powered humans) that were the support cast of the series. Debuting in Savage Dragon they later had their own 18 issue series, and a mini-series some time later. Dart was featured in one min-series, while Superpatriot had three.
With the exceptions of Superpatriot and Mighty Man, all of the team were part of a failed 'freak force' programme in the Chicago Police Department. The police department were interested in hiring new super-powered police officers, because the Dragon was being loaned out so much. Dart was one of the first, she has been working as a vigilante out of the city of of Detroit. Horridus joined soon after the Dragon rescued her from her parent's basement. Ricochet and Barbaric has encountered the Dragon on a previous mission. However, it was soon revealed Ricochet was too young and she was denied entrance. While sulking, she helped rescue Rapture from a homicidal pimp.
There was a number of initial mistakes. Barbaric almost killed many members of the criminal orginization Vicious Circle during a teleportation escape attempt. Dart badly injured the villain Cesspool, who filed a lawsuit. The brass wanted the crew to wear police uniforms, which would restrict their fighting abillity. This, and other factors, soon lead to the team leaving the police department.
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[edit] The Series
Issues #1 mostly set the scne and introducted the team's downtown headquarters as well as a shambolic fight against a nuclear powered character Major Disaster, and issue two tying into the long-running Covenant Of The Sword sub-plot that would not be resolved until the 75th issue of Savage Dragon some years later. Chelsea Nirvana, the daughter of Mighty Man's old villain Dr. Nirvana, tricks her way into becoming the secretary for the group.
Issues #3, #4, and #5 featured the series' first story arc, with Chelsea Nirvana using one of her father's old inventions to clone Mighty Man, Ricochet and Barbaric (twice, after failing to remember Superpatriot was mostly robotic) resulting in a public battle between the clones and the originals. Vanguard, an ally of the Dragon, was sucked into the fight. During clean up, Mighty Man, Barbaric and Ricochet were attacked by Inhabitor, who was able to stretch inanimate objects, mostly floors and walls.
Issue #6 detailed the origins of Mighty Man and Rapture, and so in turn, the fate of Chelsea's father, who was killed during experimenting on Rapture. This is the incident that gave Rapture her superpowers. Issue #7 featured an appearance of the dangerously insane Detroit hero Killkat (later of the Deadly Duo) who is obsessed with Dart. Chelsea and Inhibitor team up.
Issues 8 & 9 introduced Jake Farrel, a government agent and old 'acquaintance' of Superpatriot, who enlists them to defeat metal eating ants that crash landed in Brazil. The story again guest-starred Vanguard, and was a cross-over with Cyberforce. Issue #10 was the only issue to feature The Dragon in any major way, in a stand-alone story featuring a bullied and abused teen Joey Finklebarr who wakes with incredible strength and murders his abusive father and classmates. He defeats Freak Force, but is talked into surrending by the Dragon.
The final issues were divided up into three major story-arcs. 11, 12 and 13 had Jake Farrel once again drafting Freak Force, this time with two members of Superpatriot's old team The Liberty League Mr Big and Hornet to remove The Cosmic Cops, who had commandeered New York with intentions of taking the populace. Horridus was revealed as being half extra-terrestrial. She accidentally sabotages the Cosmic Cops, who flee. However both Mr Big and Hornet perish and Rapture's leg is broken. Annoyed at the team's performance Dart quits. Issues 14 and 15 feature Bludgeon, who was given powers by Johnny Redbeard. Mighty Man and Ricochet are in comas and it is Joey Finklebarr who saves the day. Dart and Mighty Man's friend, Phyllis Deeder, are captured by Chelsea and Inhibitor.
Issue #16 has a further confrontation with Chelsea, Redbeard and various other characters. Freak Force disbands, some of the group perform a rescue mission at a super-freak detainment camp and Chelsea changes genders.
This story continued on into the regular Savage Dragon series. Chelsea and Inhibitor’s gang, made up of her henchmen and other freed prisoners continued on with villainy. The Nixed Men, further creations of Johnny Redbead, joined up. She-Dragon mistook Chelsea Nirvana for Johnny Redbead, for Chelsea had changed into that form. The gang-lead Cyber-Face killed a number of Chelsea's men, then had Negate, who could remove powers, nuetralize Chelsea. She ended up looking exactly like her father. Chelsea later gained some measure of revenge by killing Mighty Man's human host. Dart soon gained Mighty Man's powers.
[edit] Freak Force Mini-Series
Released some time after the initial series ended and set after the Mars Attacks Image event, Larsen was again involved overseeing the project, which was written by Eric Stephenson and illustrated by Andy Kuhn.
The Mini-series had one story, that of the attack of the 'Frightening Force', a new team of enemies organised by Chelsea Nirvana, now a normal powerless man attacking the group out of revenge shortly after they became funded by Peter Klaptain, a rock singer who likes to insinuate he is the vigilante Star (when in fact it was a policeman Chris Robinson, who was his bodyguard, and in this story, his Limo driver) and added Star to the team's roaster, there is one sub-plot that of a prison break by a villain Ultimatum that releases Joe Finklebarr, Finklebarr is essential to ending the battle between Freak Force and Frightening Force, killing Inhibitor and Star. Negate takes Finklebarr's powers from him returning him to a normal boy.
Dart is not part of the major story, she is on holiday with her lover Justice, one of Superpatriot's children, the other, Liberty appears heavily pregnant, having been impregnated by Martians during the Mars Attacks Image event, Ricochet is also revealed to be pregnant.
Freak Force were absorbed into The Dragon's S.O.S project, a government sponsored team replacing Youngblood who were killed during the Mars Attacks Image event (in truth Rob Liefeld creator of the team was no longer part of Image Comics after being voted out by his co-founders for alleged talent poaching) Barbaric and Ricochet were married in Savage Dragon issue 41 to help a lucrative merchandising deal, Rapture was killed an issue later while on an S.O.S mission and Dart was crippled in issue 47, she later gained the powers of Mighty Man.
[edit] This Savage World
After killing Damian Darklord, The Savage Dragon caused an alternate Earth to exist, and now, the original Earth the previous Freak Force series happened on was destroyed, however all of the Freak Force existed on this world:
Superpatriot has been the most featured, along with Mighty Man, originally under the control of the villain Cyberface, who was now running America, he is now a major support role, Anne Stevens, alive in this reality, had never realised she could become Mighty Man, and had to be shown by The Dragon and has been gradually getting more adept at her superheroing. Dart was taken by re-occurring Savage Dragon villain Mako to a desolate island during a prison break that originally occurred in Savage Dragon (series) 3 but was recently killed during a battle between Mako and The Dragon, Barbaric and Ricochet were part of a gladiatorial arena that also included Madman and Rapture was fat and repulsive, they were teamed up once in a tongue in cheek back-up story.
[edit] External links
- SavageDragon.com - Larsen's official site
