Issue(s): New Warriors #14
Cover Date: Aug 91
Title: "The breeze of an underwater wind"
Credits:
Fabian Nicieza - Writer
Mark Bagley - Penciler
Sam DeLaRosa - Inker
Eric Fein - Assistant Editor
Danny Fingeroth - Editor

Review/plot:
John Byrne gets a thanks "for the key which opened the lock to the treasure inside".

This is largely a Namorita solo story, although it has some nice downtime scenes for the other New Warriors, and Speedball and a guest-starring Darkhawk accompany Namorita on part of her adventure. The reason most of the Warriors aren't active is because, according to Namorita, they've been "kind of weirded out the last few weeks", implicitly because of their experience in the Sphinx's alternate reality in the previous arc.

So when Namorita responds to an anonymous tip that illegal smugglers are operating at the docks, she only brings Speedball with her. They run into Darkhawk just as Namorita is discovering that the smugglers are moving Atlantean artifacts...

...and so they have a Misunderstanding Fight.

Speedball breaks up the fight.

Namorita flies out to the ship that delivered the smuggled goods, leaving Speedball and Darkhawk to engage in some postmodern conversation.

Namorita finds the leader of the smugglers, and identifies him as Sea Urchin.

The way she says his name, i thought maybe he was a character from an old Sub-Mariner comic that i forgot about, but that's not the case. He's a new character, and he doesn't even like being called Sea Urchin (and why would you want to be called anything but your real name, if your real name was Jeremy Swimming Bear?). You'll note that the Sea Urchin name comes from the "environmentalist media"; we'll later learn that he was dubbed that for his unethical (but not necessarily illegal) salvaging operations.

Sea Urchin has hit Namorita with heat and he's able to pin her down and beat her badly. She wakes up at Namor's Oracle office building, having been retrieved by a police helicopter after Speedball and Darkhawk called the police to arrest the smugglers.

Namorita, despite being badly beaten up, is ready to go after Sea Urchin again. Namor argues against it. It's said that Sea Urchin is legally in his rights to salvage Atlantean artifacts as long as the sites have been abandoned by Atlanteans.

Speedball was originally ready to round up the rest of the New Warriors and go with Namorita, but Namor convinces him and Darkhawk to go home. Namorita, however, is undeterred. Namor finds her wearing some ancient Atleantean armor that tradition says should only be used when the wearer is ready to fight to the death.

When Namor continues to object, she hits him where it hurts, saying that the treatments that he's using nowadays to regulate his mood swings have gone too far in the other direction.

Namorita locates Sea Urchin again, but this time they're under water. Namorita has all the powers of a "true Sub-Mariner", including the ability to absorb electricity. Too bad she doesn't have an opportunity to blow up like a puffer fish.

This time, Sea Urchin is no match for Namorita, but she can't bring herself to kill him.

It's too bad Darkhawk didn't stick around for this, because it might have helped him with his own decision making on the subject of killing.

Namorita goes back to shore to deal with the rest of the smugglers, and it turns out that one of them is an undercover operative from Project: Earth, the radical environmental group that the Warriors came into conflict with recently. It was this guy, Michael Shauneghann, that gave Namorita the anonymous tip earlier, and he now says he has enough proof of Sea Urchin's illegal activities to put him away.

As an aside, i know that there are lots of environmental groups in real life, but if there is going to be a recurring radical environmental group, it's too bad that they weren't combined with Humans Off Planet (HOP) from Punisher and/or Front for Organic Responsibility and a Clean Environment (FORCE) from Namor.

Now the downtime scenes. Silhouette has convinced Night Thrasher to mend fences with Nova, after dropping him off a building to see if he still had his powers back in the New Warriors' first issue. Nova actually seems past that at this point - he's just happy to have his powers back - but Night Thrasher still has a peace offering for him: a replica of his original costume. Nova wore that costume in the alternate reality last arc, maybe as a way to test out fan reaction, and this fan, at least, reacts with "yes yes yes!".

And Firestar and Marvel Boy go out on a date.

I like this issue more for the little moments - the downtime scenes, Speedball and Darkhawk's interactions - than the main story.

Quality Rating: C+

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: The rest of the New Warriors have been "kind of weirded out the last few weeks". Since Nova gets his blue and yellow costume in this arc, Nova's appearances throughout Infinity Gauntlet and in Amazing Spider-Man #351-352 should take place after this issue. That works well for Darkhawk's appearance, since where i'm placing this story it falls into the same gap in his regular series as his Infinity Gauntlet appearances, and the same can be said for Namor (and i'll also note that Namor explicitly doesn't have his ankle wings here).

References:

• Night Thrasher dropped Nova off a building in New Warriors #1.
  
• The New Warriors met Project: Earth in New Warriors #7-9.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

The New Warriors was one of my favorite series out at this time.

The bombing of Project: Earth's ship in a French dock is probably a reference to the bombing of Greenpeace's "Rainbow Warrior" ship in New Zealand by French agents in 1985. One person was killed.

How ironic that the armor you should only wear when fighting to the death is an outfit you wouldn't want to be found dead in.

@ Berend -

And yet, it looks better than Firestar's pants for her date.

Yeah, that armor is butt ugly. And she continues to wear it after this issue for some reason.

Just when Nova gets out of his ugly brown costume, Namorita slaps this on. It's like there's a rule that one New Warrior always has to look awful.

I don't understand why You focus on the costume so much, If the Infinity Gauntlet shows perfectly healthy Namorita with long hair...

Definitelly Namorita situation places this issue after Infinity Gauntlet & Fantastic Four 356 no matter what costume Nova is wearing...

See the comments of (of all pages) Slapstick #1-4.

changes nothing...

I still think New Warriors 14 (and Slapstic 1-4) should take place after FF 356

so... Infinity Gauntlet, Fantastic Four 356, Slapstic 1-4 where Namorita is well (who cares about Nova costume, when we talk about serioues character injuries) and later New Warriors 14, New Wariors 15-17 nad so on...

Of course (thank god!) it's not my decision, but I Namorita body> Nova costume

fnord prefers No-Prize-esque explanations when possible, and it's easier to no-prize Namorita (as implausible an explanation as it may seem) than Nova. For what it's worth, both the MCP and a commenter on the FF #356 page agree with him.

Hair grows. Wigs exist. Namorita is already confirmed to engage in contradictory behaviour between New Warriors and Sub-Mariner appearances. Why wouldn't she put on a wig (well a clip-on pony-tail) to convince others that she's "fine" and wasn't just horrifically beat up and humiliated?

Nova's costume being different, is a much more major change and is harder to reason away.

ALTHOUGH, in Silver Surfer #52, we see the assembled heroes in Avengers Mansion and Nova is incorrectly shown wearing his brown costume. Maybe Doctor Strange saw this and thought "Kid Nova" wouldn't intimidate Thanos in the slightest so used a special spell to make his costume appear as his classic Nova uniform/a Nova Corpsman uniform.