10 Marvel Super Teams That Should Be In The MCU

Hired by H.A.T.E. (the Highest Anti-Terrorism Effort) to track down and dispose of what are referred to as ‘Unusual Weapons Of Mass Destruction’, the NextWave squad are a group of badasses.

Composed of former Avengers leader Monica Rambeau, who used to be called Captain Marvel back when she was relevant; Tabitha ‘Boom-Boom’ Smith, a shoplifting delinquent who creates her own explosives; Aaron Stack, aka the alcoholic, misanthropic Machine Man; the immortal monster hunter Elsa Bloodstone; and the Captain, an utter idiot who is accidentally given powers by clueless aliens.

This Sounds Supiciously Like Futurama With Superpowers

That's kind of the point, yeah. NextWave was a pastiche of the genre, a superhero slugfest book that lovingly took the p*ss out of itself and the usual superhero tropes.

I Mean, H.A.T.E. Sounds Like A Parody Of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Spot on, but with a hiccup. The team initially understood that they’d been recruited to protect the world from monstrous threats, until finding out that their employers H.A.T.E. were in fact terrorists themselves, and that these U.W.M.D.s were put in place by their own bosses as a marketing strategy.

The entirety of NextWave’s activities are therefore against their own former employers, following this stolen marketing strategy to find and dispose of the U.W.M.D.s before they kill a whole load of people.

Wait, Wait, Wait - So It's A Comedy, Then?

Yeah, it's funny as f*ck. The original twelve-issue series was an ultraviolent, ridiculous celebration of the worst excesses of the superhero genre, so over-the-top that it until recently it was considered to have taken place in an alternate Marvel Universe.

That's what makes it ideal as an addition to Marvel’s more adult Netflix line-up. NextWave would represent an antidote to the grim, film noir vibe of those shows, telling the story of a squad of powerful but stupid superheroes that had been tricked into working for supervillains, breaking free and taking the power back. Think My Name Is Earl, but with gratuitous explosions and swearing.