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BABY WILDEBEEST hulks out. |
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The future Baby Wildebeest |
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THEY GROW UP SO FAST! Baby hulks
out in NEW TITANS #91 [1992]. |
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Baby 'Beest
The Wildebeest Society was formed as a criminal organization intent on accumulating
vast fortunes through whatever illegal method was deemed necessary. To that
end, the original Wildebeest, who became the Society's leader, created the
clever strategy of permitting only one member to be seen in public at any
one time. This created the belief that there was only one Wildebeest, a menace
whose method of operation was so complicated it could not be discerned by
police or super-powered adventurer alike, as the approach to each robbery
or action bore no resemblance to that of any other Wildebeest attack.
The Society began as a small organization, but was soon taken over by a
member of the super-hero group known as the New Titans. Jericho, a mute body-possessor,
was possessed himself by an evil force who wished to take over and inhabit
the bodies of Jericho's super-powered partners. The altered Wildebeest Society
began a series of genetic, chemical-organic experiments designed to create
the perfect recipient host body for the evil force to possess.
The Society began with the genetic alteration of humans and animals. All
their experiments failed but one. That one, labeled X-24, a human/pantha,
escaped only to later join the New Titans as Pantha in their battle against
the Wildebeests.
The Society also experimented with the creation of living Wildebeest host
bodies. Only one body - a true, living Wildebeest baby - was genetically created
before the New Titans destroyed the Wildebeest's plans and the Society.
Pantha becomes Baby Wildebeest's reluctant mother in NEW TITANS #88 [1992]. |
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A Pantha and Baby Wildebeest bonding moment. |
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Growing Up Wilde-y
Although infant in intelligence and age, the Wildebeest body was genetically
programmed to grow in size and power in preparation for becoming a host body.
Thus, with the evil energy force destroyed, the Wildebeest baby quickly grew
into a twelve-foot powerhouse with the brain of a peanut. Whether his intelligence
will grow or not is unknown.
Red Star, Pantha and Baby Wildebeest leave the Titans and form a
unique family unit in NEW TITANS #114 [1994]. |
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The Titans returned to our world with the newly created Baby Wildebeest.
Pantha also elected to remain with the Titans for the time being. The Baby
Wildebeest bonded to Pantha as his mother, much to her chagrin. Pantha also
developed an attraction to fellow Titans member Red Star.
Baby Wildebeest acted as a normal toddler, with the body of a miniature Wildebeest.
However, when angered, Baby instantly transformed into an adult Wildebeest
powerhouse – fiercely protective of his friends and loved ones –
particularly Pantha (or "momma", as he had grown to call her). Despite
her disparaging remarks about Baby Wildebeest, Pantha was obviously developing
some affection for the creature.
After reaching a series of dead ends concerning her origins, Pantha elected
to leave the Titans. When Red Star learned that the team was to be funded
by the U.S. government, he also elected to leave; he didn't want to work for
the government yet again. Having established a bond, where Pantha would go,
Baby Wildebeest would follow. As a rag-tag dysfunctional family,Red Star,
Pantha and Baby Wildebeest decided to travel off together, leaving the Titans
behind.
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Baby Wildebeest is brutally killed by Superboy Prime
in INFINITE CRISIS #4 [2005] |
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Life and Death
Red Star, Pantha and Baby Wildebeest later settled in Science City, Russia. There, they lived as a fractured family unit while serving the Russian government. The trio also continued to assist the Titans when called.
When Superboy from Earth Prime ran amok during the Infinite Crisis, Superboy called on his Titans allies to subdue his Kryptonian doppelganger. The misguided Superboy-Prime inadvertently decapitated Pantha and slaughtered Baby Wildebeest before being pulled into the Speed Force by the combined might of the super-speedsters. Red Star was left to mourn his fallen friends.
The Wildebeest baby has incredible strength. When provoked, it (being genetically
created, "Wildy" is neither male nor female) can juggle sixteen-
wheel trucks with little effort.
Wildebeest's intelligence, however, seems to be in direct contrast to its
strength. Fortunately, Wildebeest is a good-natured baby who listens to the
Titans; although it is easily manipulated by others, it will generally follow
their commands. It has especially taken to the Wildebeest-hating Pantha (who
was the 'Beest's original X-24 experiment), and insists on calling her "Momma."
Sources for this entry: DC Who's Who Binder Series supplemented by titanstower.com
Prelude
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THE NEW TITANS post-Titans Hunt |
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New Titans took a radical change in direction with the controversial "Titans
Hunt" storyline with issue #71. The Titans Hunt story itself ran from
New Titans #71-84.
New editor Jonathan Peterson felt the book had grown
to complacent. From the letter column of #71: "You see, what we all agreed
on was the fact that the Titans as a group had become too settled in. Things
were far too quiet. So we gleefully decided that it was time to, well how
can I say it, "shake things up." And I mean A LOT. Over the course of the
next few months things are not going to be what you expect. I can guarantee
it. Over the course of the next few months the Titans Universe will change
in ways you never thought we'd dare to change it. You'll see an entire new
evolution in the characters themselves and in the debut of a new team. That's
right--I said a new team. It's been ten years since the Titans debuted and
to celebrate that fact we thought it was time to introduce some all-new team
members. Where does that leave us? Well, in the months ahead some Titans will
stay...some will go...some will die...some will get marr--oopsl Don't want
to spoil all the surprises."
Jonathan Peterson later revealed more about Titans Hunt in an interview with titanstower.com: "Marv realized that while Titans had
once been a lynch pin of DC...I mean, it rivaled the X-Men at one point in
sales and popularity...it was now nowhere near that level. So even Marv knew
changes had to be made. And to be honest, that's how I presented it to him.
I literally just asked him, "Yeah, but are you REALLY having fun writing
the book anymore?" And Marv replied, "No, not really. After all
these years, I'm not sure I have many stories left in me to tell. I mean,
what's left?" At that point I pulled out my notes and said, "Look,
issue 71 (if I have the number right) is going to be the tenth anniversary
issue. After 10 years there's more than enough history for us to screw with...to
just jump in the pool and have fun with. So let's just stir the pot. I mean,
what's the worst that can happen?"
The Titans Hunt generated excitement and interest, but editor Peterson left
the book before the ambitious three-phase storyline was finished. Peterson
was the driving force behind these changes, and the book was left in a state
of disarray [New Titans #92 was his last]. The "Titans Hunt" had
written out some long-time members and introduced new members Pantha, Baby
Wildebeest, Red Star and Phantasm. The storyline also introduced the time-tossed
Team Titans (also featuring a new Terra) in New Titans #79. After the smoke
had cleared, the book was directionless and flooded with new characters.
The Hunt Itself
 |
| A 2004 commission of Wildebeest by Tim Seeley. |
During the Titans Hunt, Golden Eagle was slain, Cyborg was nearly destroyed,
Titans Tower was demolished, and Phantasm was revealed to be Danny Chase, who
was himself slain along with Raven's mother Arella as the Titans defeated the
Wildebeests. Raven was transformed utterly and disappeared. Also, in order to
defeat the society, Deathstroke was forced to slay his own son, Jericho.
One of the problems the Titans have had for many years was playing to the
status quo." says Wolfman, "We weren't doing anything. I was bored
with it. And so were the readers-we just weren't pushing." New editor
Jonathan Peterson was instrumental in pushing for changes. When Peterson took
over the book, Wolfman says artist Tom Grummett, inker Al Vey and outgoing
editor Mike Carlin got together for three days to come up with the current
storyline that has them all excited again.
"I was really thrilled," says Wolfman. 'Occasionally, I like my
characters so much that I never want them to go through any major problems,
and of course, that's what makes the stories interesting. Jonathan kept at
us, and we kept coming up with new characters and a new direction. We couldn't
believe how well the new stuff tied in to everything we had been doing for
11 years on Titans.
"The status quo was becoming stale, not the characters. We were following
the same type of stories that we had been doing. Mike Carlin and I had been
talking about changes. too, but we never got to work on it to the degree we
wanted. Jonathan was Mike's assistant, so he knew of all this and was gung-ho
to make the changes.
"We all sat down and came up with the ideas together. We were able to
bring in things from the first issue and have them tie in precisely with what
we wanted to do, so nothing came out of left field. Everything actually functions
within things that have happened before, yet it's actually all brand-new.
That's what makes it really exciting for us. We could have come up with anything,
but this actually ties into continuity, and we very clearly set it up years
ago!"
One of the best examples is Jericho, who betrayed his fellow Titans when
he became the leader of the Wildebeest Society "The stuff with Jericho
very specifically ties into the first five issues of the second version of
the Titans, when he tries to cure Raven after she has been taken over by Trigon.
Jericho tried to enter her and was horribly repelled. The ending of that particular
story made the whole changeover into what we currently have. Also, the very
first real storyline in Titans in years ago was a Raven storyline - why Raven
assembled the whole team. So in a way. it goes right back to their origins."
Although Wolfman says he obviously didn't plan the current events a decade
ago, he was surprised at how many plot seeds were planted.
"We were able to pick up on threads we had left," he says. "When
a writer is in this mode with continuity stories, he leaves things behind
specifically unsettled, even if he doesn't know it. I've had too many situations
in the past where I've been able to tap into things and go. 'Why did I leave
this here?' and it was obviously an unconscious thing to be picked up on later.
"This stuff was clearly set up. Jericho's personality had drastically
~ changed over the last few years anyway. Granted, that wasn't tied in with
what we were doing, but it certainly leaves it open to be interpreted as retro-continuity;
you could explain some of it because of what we're doing now. I (lent think
I've ever been in a series of meetings where so much was accomplished that
it shocked us. We knew where we wanted to go, we knew we wanted to shake things
up."
|
BABY WILDEBEEST
From DC Cosmic Teams Card Set, 1993 |
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The New Team
Along with the deaths, Wolfman has introduced new team members Phantasm and
Pantha in the last storyline. 'When the dust has settled, there will he a
slightly different group of Titans." I don't want to pinpoint the competition,
but unlike other books, those characters are not going to come back, with
the status quo maintained and the exact same group they began with. Some of
these characters are gone for good because they're dead! We've been very careful
in The New Titans - when we say they're dead, they're dead!"
There still won't be a solid Titans membership roster. Instead, the team
will vary.
"That's one thing I like about the current set-up," says Wolfman.
"Not all of the characters are going to be there. Cyborg is currently
brain-dead. How long that will last hasn't been worked out. There's going
to be a two-part Cyborg story appearing in DC Showcase at some point that
puts the final kibosh on his easily getting back his brains. We don't have
that resolution timed out - it's a long-range story, but right now, he's little
more than a robot. Troia will be out of the group. Raven and a couple of the
others are pretty much out. The only ones we know for sure are Nightwing,
Starfire, Changeling, Phantasm and Pantha - but I may he wrong at this moment.
Those are the characters who are technically supposed to stay.
"[Readers] first reaction was, 'How dare you do this? How dare you get
rid of the characters that we've grown to love for 11 years?' Slowly, everybody
saw that this was a major change, and they started to become interested in
the book. Now, the reader reaction is 98 percent positive. incredibly so.
People don't know where we're going, and they want to read it. We've done
exactly what we wanted to do, and now we have to maintain that by continually
shaking up the status quo."
New Faces
Jonathan Peterson: "I thought we could always "bring people back"
one way or another...but first I thought we should try the whole "new
blood" approach. I mean, that only made sense to me. Any way you look
at it, in a revamp, you've ALREADY seen the other character. So would you
rather see an upteenth revamp...or something new? Me...I vote for new."
The Titans were joined by new members: the violent Pantha, former ally Red
Star, the mysteriously re-formed Phantasm (now an amalgam of Danny Chase,
Arella and the souls of Azarath), and Baby Wildebeest (a leftover genetic
experiment from the Wildebeest Society).
Baby Wildebeest as a Titan
Titans Membership:
New Titans #86-114
| Wildebeest by Ariel Olivetti |
|
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Jonathan Peterson, Titans Editor: So yeah, it became my idea to have the
Wildebeest hunt the Titans down with the end result being that a "wildebeest"...
a real one that is...would join the group. [laughs] Which was purely an accident.
In getting ready for the meeting, somehow in scanning the books and making
my notes, I had jotted that down wrong.
I still remember that. At the meeting I was saying "Those Wildebeest
creatures were cool. We need one of those in the group" and Marv [Wolfman]
was saying "Those were men in costume" and I was like "They
were? Dang, sorry, Marv...I just reread the whole run in one shot, so some
details all blurred." So Marv says, "So you mean a guy in a Wildebeest
suit joins, like an Iron Man type guy" and it was Al Vey who said, "No,
Jonathan said it wrong but is right. It should be a REAL wildebeest."
And Tom [Grummett] lit up and said "yeah! A real one!" And Marv
said "What does he do?" and I said "Hulk! He'll be our group's
Hulk. He'll be our 'strong guy'" Baby Wildebeest came about in a meeting
[that followed].
So came Baby Wildebeest in New Titans #85. Pantha was at first fearful of
the Baby Wildebeest, which bonded with her as his 'mama,' much to her chagrin.
Although she protested, it was obvious she began bonding with the creature
as well [New Titans #86-90]. In New Titans #88, Baby Wildebeest also starts
to demonstrate the ability to grow in size and strength to that of an adult
Wildebeest. Wolfman notes Baby Wildebeest "is fun because he allows room
for some comic relief and he also allows us to see a different side to Pantha."
That may be true, but it also diluted Pantha's original role as the 'loose
cannon' of the group.
The rest of Pantha's Titans career consisted of further 'wacky moments' with
Baby Wildebeest, a blossoming attraction to Red Star, and constant attempts
to discover her true origins, meeting with dead ends. As a rag-tag dysfunctional
family, Red Star, Pantha and Baby Wildebeest decided to travel off together,
leaving the Titans behind in New Titans #114.
Top of Page
Creating Baby Wildebeest
Titans Editor Jonathan Peterson on Baby Wildebeest [from The Titans Companion, 2005]
TTC: How did that go?
JP: We all came out, and I explained to everyone, “We need to get back to the original core Titans,” and everyone agreed, but we had the problem of the age thing. So the next question was, “How do we get there?” It would be great if we could do another Crisis event to de-age everyone, but that would create too many problems, especially with Nightwing in the Batman universe. They had already introduced a new Robin, and they liked the idea of Nightwing showing up in the Batman books once in a while, where he’d say, “Yep, I know what it feels like to have Batman reject you!” So my idea was, if I can’t send them back in time, I wanted to do something with time to get them all back where we wanted them to be.
I wanted it to start with an event, and that became “Titans Hunt.” I wanted to start to whittle them all down because there just seemed to be so many Titans and honorary Titans. People like Golden Eagle. I’d flip through the characters and say to Marv, “Who is this? He hasn’t appeared in like thirty issues.” So I said to Marv, “We’ll do the ‘Titans Hunt’ stunt. It will last about a year. It’s gotta be like the old movie serials - something needs to happen every issue.” I felt something was wrong if you couldn’t think of twelve momentous things to happen to them in a year’s time, so we just started rattling things off. Nightwing: gets pissed off at Batman; gets married; has a kid; gets a new costume; quits the group. I encouraged everyone to toss out the most whacked ideas. I remember saying that I didn’t care for Golden Eagle, and that Donna Troy’s husband was a whiner and had to go.
Then on my list, I said “We need a cool look. Going over the past issues, I think these Wildebeest guys had a totally cool look. They were fun and funky. I think we should bring them back.” [laughs] At that early point, I said to Marv, “Actually, what we should do is add a Wildebeest to the group, just so we can use that costume design. That would rule!” Now, as I was going on, Tom and Al joined in. Tom was immediately saying, “Oh yeah! The Wildebeest ruled! I agree! Let’s put one in!” and I was saying, “Yeah, and new costumes! We gotta have those. That’s a foregone rule of any editorial shake-up.” [laughs]
[...]
TTC: So was that how the whole idea of “Titans Hunt” came about?
JP: Yeah, it became my idea to have the Wildebeest hunt the Titans down with the end result being that a “Wildebeest” - a real one that is - would join the group. [laughs] Which was purely an accident. In getting ready for the meeting, somehow in scanning the books and making my notes, I had jotted that down wrong. I still remember that. At the meeting I was saying, “Those Wildebeest creatures were cool. We need one of those in the group,” and Marv was saying, “Those were men in costumes,” and I was like “They were? Dang, sorry, Marv. I just reread the whole run in one shot, so some details all blurred.” So Marv says, “So you mean a guy in a Wildebeest suit joins, like an Iron Man type of guy?” and it was Al Vey who said, “No, Jonathan said it wrong but is right. It should be a real Wildebeest,” and Tom lit up and said, “Yeah! A real one!” Marv said “What does he do?” and I said “Hulk! He’ll be our group’s Hulk. He’ll be our strong guy.” Baby Wildebeest came about in a meeting to follow. We’ll come to that in a minute.
[...]
TTC: Let’s talk about the origin of Baby Wildebeest. How did all that fit in with your grand plan?
JP: Baby Wildebeest and the whole Wildebeest Society was sort of a product of reverse-engineering. We came up with that after we decided Jericho would be the leader. Everyone tossed out ideas at that point, so I’m not sure who actually came up with that idea. We just wanted to bring it back to the Wildebeests. Tom Grummett even loved drawing those guys. I remember the cover to one of the issues that we actually did, which I drew at the “Titans Summit,” [had] the Baby Wildebeest holding up all the machinery. I actually wanted to be a penciller, since I have a very strong art background. In fact, I almost went to college on an art scholarship, but elected to go to film school instead, which is another tangent, but because I do draw, I actually made tons and tons of thumbnails as an editor. Then we did the cover where Baby Wildebeest was running out in traffic. I remember people saying “I can’t believe you did that,” [laughs] but we did make the cover copy humorous.
We wanted Wildebeest to be the super-strength guy in the group, but we would see him grow up. He’d go from a baby to hulking out, and then Marv chimed in and said, “But he wouldn’t necessarily mentally mature.” So we were like “Exactly! He really will be the big dumb brute,” and then Marv came up with the idea that Baby Wildebeest would bond with Pantha because she was the sarcastic one.
The above excerpt is from The Titans Companion by Twomorrows Publishing.
Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the New Teen Titans, The Titans Companion is a comprehensive look at the history of the ultimate teen team - over 200 pages in all! From their early days in the 1960s as a team of teen sidekicks through their best-selling days in the 1980s and beyond, this book explores the history of the team through the eyes of its creators! Interviews with Marv Wolfman, George Pérez, Nick Cardy, Neal Adams, Dick Giordano, Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez, and others reveal the evolution of the series over the years. While artwork by Cardy, Pérez, Adams, Garcia-Lopez, and many more illustrates each era of Titans history! To order the book, click here
.
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