Marvel Comics

The result of the Fantastic Four being introduced.

Marvel Comics is an American publishing company most famous for publishing comic books set in the so-called Marvel Universe, and featuring superhero characters like The Fantastic Four, Spider-Man and the X-Men. Marvel has also published other books based off licensed properties such as The Wizard of Oz, Star Trek, Star Wars, Beauty and the Beast, Darkwing Duck, and Aladdin.

In 2009, Walt Disney Pictures acquired the company as a subsidiary. How this might affect the potential of further Gargoyles comics in the future is unknown for now. [1]

In 2025 on April 24th, a Gargoyles Meets the Fantastic Four crossover was announced to come out later in the year on October. Marvel is co-publishing the story with Dynamite Entertainment, the company currently holding the license to publish issues of the series since 2022. A preview of the crossover was included as an epilogue to Gargoyles: Demona #0. [2]

Comics

The Amazing Spider-Man

The Amazing Spider-Man is the flagship Spider-Man comic book, that was initially written by Stan Lee and drawn by Steve Ditko in 1963, and has been published almost continuously for more than nine-hundred issues. In issue #413 "Bug Story", written in 1996 by Tom DeFalco and drawn by Mark Bagley (in a story taking place during Ben Reilly's tenure as Spider-Man), Mysterio traps Spider-Man in a child's bedroom at the size of an action figure. One of the toys that attacks him is Goliath.

Star Trek

Originally based on the franchise's 1979 motion picture, the eighteen-issue comic series had issues written by Martin Pasko and lettered by John Costanza, who both worked on Gargoyles series published by Marvel. Constanza also did lettering for Disney Adventures magazine.

Beauty and the Beast

Based on the 1991 animated movie, the 1994 thirteen-issue comic series shared artists and crew from Marvel's Gargoyles series, including Greg Wright and Anthony Tollin. Hildy Mesnik was also the editor for the comic.

Aladdin

Based on the 1992 animated movie, the 1994 eleven-issue comic series shared artist Lee Nordling and editor Hildy Mesnik from Marvel's Gargoyles series.

Gargoyles

In 1995, Marvel published an eleven-issue comic book series, Gargoyles, based on the TV series of the same name. Though the stories published aren't considered canon by series creator Greg Weisman, he did plan a story for a later issue which was published eventually as "Reunion".

Starbrand & Nightmask

Written by Greg Weisman, Starbrand & Nightmask debuted in December 2015. In "Chapter Four: Initiation", Kevin Conner and Adam Blackveil's nearby-neighboring roommates at Empire State University are named Tri and Cedric.

In "Chapter Six: Evolution", as Kevin and Adam are fighting Va-Sohn and Joras-Kyl respectively, Kolobus states, "Well. This is diverting." Eternity responds, "You have no idea." Coldstone (with Iago in control) and Macbeth share the same observation when Demona (in her human form) fought Elisa in "High Noon".

Television

Two television series have also made references to Gargoyles: X-Men: Evolution and The Spectacular Spider-Man.

X-Men: Evolution

Broadway in X-Men Evolution

X-Men: Evolution is an animated series that ran for four seasons between 2000 and 2003. In this series, featuring the superhero team known as the X-Men, several of the principal characters (good and bad) are re-imagined as teenagers in high school. Gargoyles crew member Boyd Kirkland storyboarded a couple of episodes as well as Frank Paur directing several episodes of the series.

In the episode "No Good Deed", during a montage of faked heroics by the Brotherhood, Avalanche knocks a stone statue resembling Broadway off a building so that Blob can catch it.

The Spectacular Spider-Man

The Spectacular Spider-Man is an animated series featuring the character of Spider-Man, in his earliest days as a high school student still learning to cope with his powers and his responsibilities. Greg Weisman was the producer and story editor of the series.

For the Gathering of the Gargoyles convention of 2009, Weisman produced a radio play script titled "Religious Studies 101: A Handful of Thorns" which is a non-canonical crossover between The Spectacular Spider-Man and Gargoyles. crossing The two properties crossed over again with "Recruits", another radio play script written for CONvergence in 2014. This story also included the cast of DC Comics Young Justice, as well as a brief appearance by Tony Stark/Iron Man who is also from Marvel Comics.

Gargoyles crossed over with The Spectacular Spider-Man and Young Justice again along with Black Manta's Celebrity Hot Tub in "The Cosmos" for CONvergence in 2016, and "Musicology 101: Songs of the Theme" for CONvergence in 2018. The latter included a cameo of Professor X from X-Men also from Marvel Comics.

References to Marvel Comics from Gargoyles

• "The Silver Falcon" - Broadway's trenchcoat and hat disguise is a tribute to Ben Grimm/The Thing of the Fantastic Four on how he would disguise himself in public. Also, the way Broadway knocks out Dracon by flicking his fingers is also classic Thing. [3]

• "Double Jeopardy" - Among other things, Thailog's color differences were inspired by the Fantastic Four's uniform changing colors due to their travels into the Negative Zone. [4]

• "The Hound of Ulster" - Cu Chullain/Rory Dugan bears some resemblance to the Thor/Donald Blake persona. Greg Weisman has regretted the similarity. [5]

• "Mark of the Panther" - When attacking Anansi, Elisa calls him Spider-Man.

• "Eye of the Storm" - Despite trying to avoid it, Odin's designs were slightly inspired by Jack Kirby's design for the character in The Mighty Thor. [6]

• "The New Olympians" - The residents of New Olympus were influenced by The Eternals, The Inhumans and DC Comic's New Gods. [7]

• "Future Tense" - One of the influences of New York's condition was Days of Future Past as seen in The Uncanny X-Men #141-142. [8]

• "Strangers" - When discussing the designs for the Tazmanian Tiger, Greg discussed that his initials on the costume were similar to Daredevil's initials interlocking. [9]

• "The Gate" - The building that Brooklyn finds the Phoenix Gate on is the Daily Bugle.

In addition, In earlier developments of the series, David Xanatos was named Xavier. The name was changed because of similarities to Professor Charles Xavier (Professor X) from X-Men. [10] Further, the supervillain known as Ultron was an inspiration for Coyote in regards to him being rebuilt with the number model being included in his name. [11]

Most recently, Ken Haeser has drawn several variants for Gargoyles comic books for Dynamite Entertainment, ten of which are homages to older Marvel comic covers.

See Also

• Marvel Comics at Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia