Night Thrasher (Dwayne Taylor)

Night Thrasher
Dwayne Taylor and Silhouette Chord. Art by Mark Bagley.
Publication information
Publisher	Marvel Comics
First appearance	Thor #411 (December. 1989)
Created by	Tom DeFalco (writer) Ron Frenz (artist)
In-story information
Alter ego	Dwayne Michael Taylor
Team affiliations	New Warriors Taylor Foundation Midnight's Fire Folding Circle
Abilities	Immune to telepathy, skilled martial artist, advanced bodyarmor

Night Thrasher is a fictional character, a superhero in the Marvel Comics universe, who first appeared in Thor #411, and was created by Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz.

Publication history

Night Thrasher is the founder and leader of the New Warriors, and head of the Taylor Foundation. Although he possesses no superhuman powers, he has trained himself extensively in many martial arts, and is adept at building technological devices.

Night Thrasher is very similar to DC Comics' Batman, with almost exactly the same origin story (driven to fight crime after parents murdered in front of him as a child, although the circumstances of his parents' deaths was later greatly elaborated upon as something more than simply a random criminal act) and power set (trained human with gadgets).

In X-Men (vol. 2) #29 and X-Force (vol. 2) #32, it is revealed that Night Thrasher has ties to the Hellfire Club, a mysterious group of aristocrats and adversaries of the X-Men.

Night Thrasher had two legal guardians when he debuted in the New Warriors' origin issue: Andrew Chord and Tai. Chord has not been seen since mid-volume 1, and Tai died in issue #25 after revealing her plans to use the New Warriors to gain immeasurable power. It is assumed that Night Thrasher has simply outgrown his need for a legal guardian (in the letters page for New Warriors #39 it was stated that Dwayne was 19 years old).

Fictional character biography

Early Life

Dwayne Michael Taylor led a hard life. As a child, he saw his wealthy parents slain before his very eyes. This event drove him to hone himself into a human fighting machine in the pursuit of vengeance. Over time, this desire for revenge later evolved into an obsessive desire to punish all wrongdoers.

Night Thrasher vs. the Punisher.
Art by Mark Bagley

He was unable to fully remember the exact circumstances of his parents' deaths, and was unable to remember the face of their killer, he assumed that this was due to his mind trying to block the memory. Later in life he discovered that the entire circumstances of his parents' death and his own rearing by his guardian Chord and an elderly Asian woman named Tai, had in fact all been orchestrated by Tai herself.

The driven, and conflicted young man lived a dual existence, during the day he ran the Taylor Foundation, and at night he relentlessly trained himself to human perfection, and studied with the best teachers money could buy. He then began patrolling the streets of New York City, in order to fight crime and to provide a testbed for his skills.

Early adventures

Silhouette and Midnight's Fire were operating as independent vigilantes in the streets of New York City when they met Dwayne who was also doing the same thing but as a solo operative, a short while before he became Night Thrasher. The trio began an organized effort to lessen the influence of New York City street gangs. Silhouette and Midnight's Fire were the children of Andrew Chord who was serving at the time as Dwayne's guardian.

Their partnership ended when Silhouette was shot and paralyzed from the legs down in a sting gone bad. Midnight's Fire blamed Dwayne and became a cop killer and a druglord in order to lure Dwayne into a physical confrontation he could not possibly win. Later the partially paralyzed Silhouette reunited with Dwayne, distancing herself from her brother's evil actions.

Dwayne creates a suit of special body armor, partially as a response to the threat of Midnight's Fire who was determined to kill him, and also because he felt it was the most effective way to carry out his mission.

The New Warriors

Night Thrasher meticulously researched several young solo heroes, and selected three as targets for recruitment. He based his group on the Fantastic Four, with him being the Reed Richards of the group: the leader and brains. Each additional member was slated to reflect roles of each of the FF. The first of his recruits was Richard Rider, the then-retired, and supposedly depowered, Nova (filling the role of The Thing, due to his sheer power). Deducing he could reignite Rider's powers with a high-stress incident, Night Thrasher abducted Rider and dropped him off a building. Although Rider was understandably upset at Night Thrasher for risking his life, the fact that the incident allowed him to regain his powers, his greatest desire, made him feel obliged to join the team.

Almost immediately after gathering his other two chosen teammates, mutants Firestar (filling the Human Torch slot) and Marvel Boy, currently known as Justice (filling the Invisible Woman slot), the four young superheroes became involved in an emergency. The former Herald of Galactus, Terrax, had re-formed his body and was causing a good deal of destruction in downtown NYC. Arriving at the scene, they found another couple of superheroes, Namorita and Speedball. The six young heroes battled the raging villain and managed to neutralize him via the use of ersatz (but effective) teamwork. In the aftermath, the Avengers showed up and stole the show, leaving some of the young heroes bitter about being slighted. Nevertheless, the six agreed to form together into a new team, naming themselves what a reporter had called them — the New Warriors.

The Warriors fought crime together fairly successfully for a respectable amount of time, but Dwayne stumbled across some alarming inconsistencies in the sham that was his life. He first discovered that his company was involved in very shady practices, and this initial inconsistency led him inevitably to unravel the lies that he had been fed since childhood. Nothing was as it seemed. In the end, a bizarre mystically-oriented conspiracy was revealed, along with new villains in the form of the Folding Circle, and Tai's true role was made clear.

During this time, Dwayne became the legal guardian for Rage, a young boy in a man's superpowered body. Rage had lost his grandmother in a revenge scheme targeted at the New Warriors' friends and family.

The Folding Circle

During this time, Dwayne pretended to join the Folding Circle in order to infiltrate them, but he neglected to tell the Warriors this. His obsession with justice, still fueled by his parents' deaths, and his anger issues led to him leaving the team.

In the aftermath of his departure, the Warriors were never quite the same. The lineup changed a bit, and Dwayne was an off-again, on-again ally. He suffered setbacks along the way, including losing his girlfriend and teammate Silhouette to his alleged half-brother Donyell (Bandit). Dwayne was also no longer the undisputed leader of the Warriors. Most of the group turned first to Namorita and then later to Justice for leadership. He later involved himself with Psionex but eventually returned to the team in the last issues of the volume.

New Warriors (vol. 2)

In Nova the Human Rocket vol. 3 #1, Night Thrasher disbanded the team and decided to travel abroad, training in various martial arts disciplines. Learning of a plot against Iron Fist by the Hand during that time, Night Thrasher rejoined the Warriors in order to save Iron Fist's life. After the adventure, he left again. In the volume's last issue (#10), he returned to the team, so that they could be molded into an effective superhero team again.

New Warriors (vol. 3)

Dwayne Taylor eventually 'retired' from being a hero, but stayed semi-active while running the Taylor Foundation. He wished to use the foundation to make the world a better place, and became heavily involved in cancer research. He gatherered a top notch staff of microbiologists, one of whom developed what appeared to be a cure for cancer. Actually, the cure turned out to have been the work of the biologist's mutant son, who had used his powers to 'tell' the cure what to do. This revelation destroyed investor confidence in the Taylor Foundation. The scientist died trying to prove his cancer cure worked by testing it on himself.

Dwayne salvaged the remains of the Taylor Foundation, and adopted Microbe, the mutant son of the dead microbiologist. Dwayne approached a television production company to bankroll and promote a new team, packaging their adventures as a reality TV show. He reassembled a new team of Warriors, plus Microbe, and they travelled the country.

"Civil War"

Main article: Civil War (comics)

Night Thrasher was among the four New Warriors that started the Marvel Civil War. When Nitro exploded, Night Thrasher apparently died in the blast. His death was confirmed in Civil War: Front Line #1.

New Warriors (vol. 4)

In the aftermath of the Civil War, a new team calling themselves the New Warriors have appeared. They are recruiting underground, undiscovered, and de-powered heroes who strongly disagree with the Superhuman Registration Act. While most of these New Warriors are new to the team, the leader and recruiter has revealed himself as Night Thrasher, though the true identity of this person is unknown for the first few issues. Night Thrasher's grave contained only the torn remains of the costume he was wearing during the Stamford incident. In New Warriors #6, it was revealed that this new Night Thrasher was in fact Donyell Taylor, Dwayne's half-brother, whom he had previously fought as the villain Bandit.

Powers and abilities

Night Thrasher's Mark I armor, New Warriors #9 art by Mark Bagley

• According to the villain Genecide, Dwayne has some unspecified "advanced DNA". And in issue #10 Emma Frost states he was somehow naturally immune to telepathic probes; this was later revealed to have been caused by Tai, either due to her tampering with his memory or a deliberate effort on Tai's part to ensure that no one else could manipulate Dwayne and interfere with her plans for him.
• Night Thrasher possesses excellent fighting ability; he has been able to hold his own against the Punisher (Thrasher would have won had the Punisher not managed to discharge a submachine gun at close range). His strength was further enhanced, though not to a truly super-human degree by his Mark II combat armor.

Equipment

• Night Thrasher wore a special suit of light articulated combat armor he originally designed to survive physical combat with Silhouette's brother Midnight's Fire. He also carried a pair of Escrima sticks which he called his "Battle Staves" which attached to special slots in the back of the Mark I armor, and an armored high tech skateboard which also hooked onto the back of his armor. The left wrist of his armor contained a thin adamantium garrote wire. The Mark I armor also had a hidden compartment in which he had a Micro Uzi machine pistol stored for emergencies. His skateboard could also be used as a shield or as a weapon, with a wide concealed blade; it could also be modified for use as a snowboard.
• The wrist gauntlets on his armor could fire pepper spray, sleeping gas or explosively launch his "Battle Staves" which were holstered alongside his forearms in the Mark II armor. His gauntlets could also deploy grapnel lines and contained retractable blades, as well as an extendable computer tap. He also had a utility pack with various shaped explosives, smoke capsules, caltrops, and ball bearings. The Mark II armor also had an advanced active camouflage system.

Other media

Philadelphia Lo-Fi artist Swimmingpool The Band (Link To MySpace) recorded a recent song called "Rob Reynolds, Marc Spector & Dwayne Taylor" (The Real Names of The Sentry, Moon Knight, and Night Thrasher respectively). It's featured on his Reverbnation page.

External links

• Marvel.com Night Thrasher page