Issue(s): Night Thrasher #1, Night Thrasher #2, Night Thrasher #3, Night Thrasher #4
Cover Date: Oct 92 - Jan 93
Title: Four Control: "Strength" / "Money" / "Power" / "Compassion"
Credits:
Fabian Nicieza - Writer
Dave Hoover - Penciler
Dave Hoover / Jimmy Palmiotti, Don Hudson, & Keith Williams / Ian Akin - Inker
Dan Cuddy - Assistant Editor
Danny Fingeroth - Editor

Review/plot:
Based on no evidence at all, it's my theory that Rocket Racer was originally going to be used in the New Warriors, but he was already spoken for as part of the Outlaws/Silver Sable group that was in use around the time that the New Warriors were introduced (Rocket Racer even got some promo short stories in random issues of Marvel Tales). So Night Thrasher was invented to play that role. I base this theory on the fact that all of the other New Warriors were pre-existing teen characters, and Rocket Racer would have fit in nicely. And it's as good an explanation as i can think of for how Marvel wound up with two black skateboarding super-heroes. I know a lot of people dislike Night Thrasher, but when i think about how he could have been Rocket Racer, i actually like him a lot better. Rocket Racer is inherently goofy, whereas Night Thrasher plays the role of a deadly serious character, a good contrast on a team that includes Speedball. And while Rocket Racer was tech-savvy, he didn't have an origin like Night Thrasher that allowed him to play the role of the team's financier. So i think Night Thrasher works well as a team character.

That said, i don't think much of him getting a solo series. That's in part due to the fact that what makes the New Warriors work is the team dynamic; i don't think any of the characters should have had concurrent solo books. As for Night Thasher specifically, unfortunately i think everything relating to his origin - the Dragon's Breadth and the Folding Circle and all that - and all of the corporate intrigue around his inherited business - e.g. the ties to Gideon - is pretty uninteresting. At this point i think the New Warriors should be on their own without Tai and Chord, and with Night Thrasher's wealth never more of a plot point than Warren Worthington's. So this story, which resolves the tension between Night Thasher and Chord and is all about Night Thrasher picking some new members for his board of directors, is not at all what i'm looking for.

Chord is kidnapped from his hospital bed. This turns out to be a problem beyond the fact that it's a health risk for him, because Night Thrasher thinks that the rest of the Taylor Foundation's board is going to try for a hostile takeover, and Night Thrasher needs someone on the executive board to sign a document so that he can retain control of it. So he has to go around to the other members of the board and see if he can find out who kidnapped Chord and who is still loyal to him. He gets some kind of nonsense from the first of the board members, Gai No Don, that sets him on the rest of his quest.

In the process he fights Bengal...

...Lotus Newmark...

...this bozo named Tantrum (a clever bit is where Night Thasher just pays Tantrum, a mercenary, more than he was already getting)...

...and Gideon again.

It turns out that Chord kidnapped himself in order to set Night Thrasher on this quest. So none of the other board members were kidnappers. However, one turns out to have been embezzling, and another was actually an LMD controlled by Gideon. So Night Thrasher replaces them with Walter Rosen from GeneTech and Father Janes, the priest that Bengal once targeted but who turned out to be innocent. Gai No Don turns out to be shady as well, a former North Vietnamese general that currently pulls the strings on a South Vietnamese gang called the Poison Memories, but that's deliberate. Night Thrasher wants someone on the board "who is proficient -- even comfortable -- in performing the kinds of tasks we're not".

Since Night Thrasher has to travel the world to meet the board members, we're also introduced to Sprocket, a new pilot that works for the New Warriors.

Sprocket was appearing at the same time in the regular New Warriors book.

The skateboard does make an appearance in this miniseries...

...and not only that, but Night Thrasher converts it into a snowboard.

If you are into corporate intrigue, issue #3 does have some nice moments, like Night Thrasher convincing Gideon's company Oprah Industries to not take over GeneTech or the Taylor Foundation (it turns out that the Taylor Foundation started GeneTech) by appealing to the stockholders' interest in pursuing scientific advancements, not quarter over quarter profits. That still ends with a fist fight between Night Thrasher and Gideon, though.

Quality Rating: C

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: Namorita is wearing her old costume but i don't think that should be a consideration. The MCP have this between New Warriors #28-29.

References:

• Chord was hospitalized in New Warriors #18.
  
• His life was saved by Tai in New Warriors #21 as part of a larger evil scheme that was featured in New Warriors #22-25.
  
• Night Thrasher fought Bengal and met Father Janes in New Warriors #7-9.
  
• When the New Warriors arrive at Genetech, Walter Rosen tells his peers that it has nothing to do with the recent altercation they had with Cloak and Dagger, which started in Amazing Spider-Man annual #26.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

I was admittedly a kid (and the target demographic) when New Warriors came out, but I've always liked Night Thrasher as a more realistic Batman type character (no cape, body armor instead of spandex, etc).

In my opinion it often works out for the best when some established character can't be used and a new character in a similar mold is created for a series. Night Thrasher's backstory, though still very comic book, would not have worked for Rocket Racer and it was the central subplot to the first 25 issues of New Warriors or so.

Your theory about Night Thrasher’s origins makes a lot of sense, Fnord. I haven’t read much about how the New Warriors was created, but it looks like a team put together as a marketing/editorial project, rather than one creator’s (Nicieza’s) vision. Maybe the “lab grown” team was set to include RR, and when Nicieza was tapped to write the project, he asked to turn RR into a new character instead. I know there had been a “Young Avengers” pitch around the time New Warriors was in the works that would have involved many of the same characters.

Here's Fabian describing how the team was put together:
https://news.marvel.com/comics/23696/marvel_75_new_warriors_heroes_for_the_90s/
"Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz put the team together by, not to sound dismissive about it, flipping through a Marvel Universe Handbook and seeing which characters might work best together. They also created Night Thrasher and his initial back story. That was all part of a series bible received by the various writers who were pitching to get the gig."

Night Thrasher plays the role of a deadly serious character

Not with that name he doesn't.

The only thing sillier than a comic called 'Night Thrasher' is a comic called 'Night Thrasher: Four Control'.

"Night Thrasher" is the answer to the question "What's your superhero porn star name?"