So, looks like we're finally going to see Captain Britain in Avengers Arena.

So, it's coming. The first post Marvel NOW initiative appearance of Captain Britain. In the pages of Dennis Hopeless and Kev Walker's Avengers Arena.

I've actually held off with posting about Avengers Arena up until now. It's a book which has upset a lot of readers from the outset. Fans of characters from Avengers Academy, The Runaways, Darkhawk, and that kid from the Sentinel series Marvel did a few years ago. 

Why? 

Because from its very concept Avengers Arena is not going to be good for their health. 

Anybody who's ever read Battle Royale (or seen the film adaptation of it) will find the very deliberate aesthetic rather familiar... 

Because it is. Intentionally so. The villain of the piece even tells you (thought not in quite so many words) that this is where he got the idea.

What villain, you say?

Well, the clue is in words 'Murder World' appearing on the cover to issue one. Who remembers a guy named Arcade? Old Captain Britain, Spider-man, and X-Men villain? Redheaded fella with a penchant for creating elaborate games designed to kill superheroes?

Him. 

He's had a run in with X-Factor in recent years, and a brief encounter with some of the Secret Avengers, but in his spare time it seems he's been somewhat ramping up his 'Murder World' concept. Gone are the giant pinball machines and Alice in Wonderland themed death contraptions... 

He's gotten himself his own personal Murder World Island.

An island in an undisclosed location, which he chosen to populate with teen heroes, kidnapped from around the Marvel Universe, who are then pitted in a game of survival. Against themselves. The one teen left alive will be allowed to live. But in order to get there they'll have to kill all of the others. Some comrades. Some strangers. Kind of brutal.

The kind of stuff which makes certain fanbases very angry (there have already been petitions).

But naturally, these are teen heroes we're talking about here. They're not likely to just capitulate to such requests to kill each other. Which is why Arcade has made it perfectly clear that anybody who protests, or refuses, will also die. By his very own hands. 

Which might initially seem an idle threat, or indeed a little beyond Arcade's usual MO. But then this happened at the end of issue one.

Yeah. It would seem Murder World is not the only thing to have received an upgrade...

But Arcade, and his new-found near omnipotence aside, why is this book of particular interest to this Blog? Well, because while the majority of teens on this Island (and Darkhawk, who is not a teen any longer) are established members of The Runaways (Chase and Nico), Avengers Academy (Reptil, Hazmat, Mettle and X-23), have been a sidekick for Drax the Destroyer (Cammi) or spent time operating hacked Sentinels (Juston) the series also introduces a new set of teen characters who started to be referred to by writer Dennis Hopeless in his early interviews for the book only as the students of 'Braddock Academy'. With no further context offered.

When poked by another poster over on Twitter, however, Dennis Hopeless stated that it was:

Which certainly guaranteed that I'd be on board for the duration.

So, it seems that holding on to old grudges of being beaten TWICE by Captain Britain, Arcade has decided to kidnap some of his new students. We've not seen a lot of them in the four issues of Avengers Arena so far, but here's who they are:

Nara: Described as '...an Atlantean with abandonment issues'. One of Namor the Submariner's people, but so far we know nothing more than that.

Cullen Bloodstone: '--Of the Monster Hunter Bloodstones'. Presumably that makes him the Son of Ulysses Bloodstone, and younger sibling of Elsa Bloodstone.

Anachronism: Whose real name is 'Aiden,' but has chosen that codename. He dresses very much like a junior version of 2000 AD's Slaine, and carries a HUGE axe around with him. He has apparently inherited '...the body of an immortal Celtic Warlord...'

Katy Bashir: Who pretty much sums herself up, above. She's principally a Flier.

And finally, the guy who's on the cover to issue 5:

Kid Briton: Who is an alternate universe, teenage, Captain Britain. Although, to what extent was not readily apparent.

Until now. 

I've been holding off posting about these guys since November, simply because I wasn't certain that they were ever going to be shown to be truly linked to Captain Britain or British Marvel. I had hoped, but a Twitter response is not the same as in-panel proof. Well, today Comic Book Resources have put up a preview of Avengers Arena #5 which now puts any question of the matter beyond doubt.

That certainly looks like it's Braddock Manor in the background. I have no idea what they are fighting there, but it's certainly Elsa Bloodstone, Spitfire, Meggan Braddock and Union Jack trying to contend with it. Which for me is all the link I need.

As for Kid Briton? Well, the preview not only features Captain Britain, but confirms that Kid Briton is also 'Brian Braddock'. A younger Brian Braddock from an alternate Earth. A guy OUR Brian Braddock feels has potential, but...

So, basically it's a bit like 'What if Captain Britain had all that power but was an impetuous ass-hat?' :) 

Kid Briton was 'pulled out' of his native dimension? Whether that was 'rescued from' or brought to ours for training, of course, remains to be seen. Only time will tell...

I was already on board with this book. I'm twice as on board now. 

But characters I have a vested interest in aside, it's actually been a really solid, character focussed book so far. Forget the controversy, it's actually really well put together. I cannot recommend it enough.

But if you need a British Marvel based incentive? Well, there ya go.. :)

Avengers Arena #5 is out next Wednesday (27th February).

So it IS Ultimate Jamie Braddock.

Further to the post I put up a couple of weeks back the nice people at Marvel had an Ultimate Universe Q and A session via their Twitter account (@Marvel) with Ultimate Line Editor Mark Paniccia.

Well, what better opportunity to test my pet theory that it is in fact JAMIE Braddock dressed up in the Captain Britain costume in that preview art from Jonathan Hickman's new Ultimates series. It certainly looked a fair bit like him. And as it happens...

A simple (and purely) one word answer, but there you have it!

Phew. Thought I was going to have another Secret Avengers fiasco on my hands for a moment there... :)

So, yes, we will get to see an Ultimate Universe debut for Brian's older brither. Great news.

In other vaguely British character news (Vaguely, because technically she was born on American soil) the following image has been popping up online over the past couple of days:

That would be Elsa Bloodstone, heading up a new Legion of Monsters series, spinning out I'm told (Because shamefully I did not pick it up) of last year's 'Franken-Castle' arc of The Punisher, by Rick Remender. Unfortunately it doesn't appear that Remender himself is writing it (Loving his Uncanny X-Force, at the moment) but I'll be keeping an eye out for this one.

More British Marvel's out there, you may not be so aware ARE still out there... or British.

As I hope I've made clearer in recent times this Blog does not focus purely on the characters who were created by Marvel UK in the 70s, 80 and 90s. It's the larger part of what I do here, granted. But beyond that I do also like to explore the lives of British characters who were created by Marvel in the US, and remain part of the Marvel Universe as a whole.

And there's a few more of those than you might actually realise.

Blade would be the first example. When he started showing up in Captain Britain & MI13 I think it surprised a few people who largely thought of the character to be synonymous with Wesley Snipes to have actually been born in Britain. Eric Brooks is a perfectly British sounding name, of course.

Since the end of Captain Britain & MI13 we haven't really seen Blade. He will be appearing in the upcoming Spitfire One-shot as well as in X-Men: Curse of the Mutants - Blade #1.

Catchy title, huh? It's part of this new Vampire event by Victor Gischler. I've not really drawn much mention to it, because it effectively began by ignoring parts of the brilliant Vampire State storyline from last year. Gischler revived Dracula, with a radically different and somewhat alien appearance, only to kill him again in the course of a few pages.

Apparently this is a new Vampire Status Quo... But a fair number of Tomb of Dracula fans on CBR's forums have been pointing out that a number of details in this story just don't tally with past continuity. A great shame, for them. I know several long term Marvel Vampires fans who were really looking forward to this event, but have been left feeling quite disappointed so far. So, on current form, I wouldn't expect any acknowledgement of where Blade has been residing for the past year, or any other MI13 guest appearances in that one-shot.

Though I'd love to be proven wrong, of course. And at least they appear to be keeping his costume and tattoos.

Another example most people miss is Jessica Drew, aka Spider-Woman, current Avenger and Agent of S.W.O.R.D.

Jessica was born in London, to two British parents. They did then move to Wundagore, where Jessica grew up, and I guess we don't tend to think of her as being British so much because we rarely see her in that context. Although she did start her recently cancelled ongoing series in London, where she was contacted by SWORD's Agent Brand.

Jessica has been a pretty much ever present face in Marvel over recent years. A favourite of Avengers supremo Brian Michael Bendis she was part of his New Avengers launch roster. It was revealed in Secret Invasion however, that the Jessica we saw there was, in fact, a Skrull. The Skrull Queen to be precise. Which has confused matters somewhat.

She remained with New Avengers until the recent reboot, and can now be found on the main Avengers team, penned by Bendis and pencilled by John Romita Jr.

Another closet Brit you might not know is X-Men character Fantomex.

Fantomex was created by Grant Morrison, for his New X-Men run, as a French accented bio-mechanical agent come adventurer type. Only the French accent was something which Fantomex would later make clear was a fake.

He too is technically British.

Fantomex was created in 'The World' a secret, self-contained, lab environment. Which just happened to be on British soil. So while Fanntomex tends to go where he
pleases (And I very much doubt he owns a proper Passport) ignoring International borders, he is technically a British National.

Fantomex recently returned from obscurity as one of the endless cameo appearances from X-Men characters past and present, in the pages of Matt Fraction's Uncanny X-Men.

Unlike many of those cameos though, it was unveiled last week that this was not going to be an isolated appearance of quite so little significance. At the end of X-Men: Second Coming #2 it was shown that Fantomex is going to be part of the regular cast of Rick Remender's up coming Uncanny X-Force, which will be arriving shortly, alongside Archangel, Deadpool, Wolverine and Captain Britain's twin sister Psylocke.

You see. More than you might think.

And of course there is one more upcoming British Marvel appearance I should probably mention. As this one I am sure the majority of folks will miss. And it occurs... here:

That's the cover to Frankencastle #21, again by Rick Remender and art by Dan Brereton.

Very Hammer Horror, no? Old school monster movie. Which fits the odd tone of the Frankencastle series very well. Which for those of you unfamiliar with the concept (And frankly it IS somewhat unbelievable when you first encounter it) you might want to take a look here.

And when you've finished asking 'What the Hell?' understand that the reason we are interested in this stems from the object which the League of Monsters are using to restore Frank Castle. A piece of 'Bloodstone'.

Where does that ring a bell from?

Well, possibly from here:

Ulysses Bloodstone, monster hunter and adventurer.

But sadly Ulysees is dead.

We're more interested in his heir. For Ulysees had a daughter.

Elsa Bloodstone.

You may know her from the 2001 limited series by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning.

Or more recently from Warren Ellis' NextWave.

And, yes. She's British. Born over here. And inherited her Father's Bloodstone, along with a house full of Hammer style eccentricities, upon his death.

I don't think we've seen Elsa since NextWave. She's a character whom I had hoped might have been used by MI13 at some point, had it continued. Although she did appear to go through a rather unexplained progression, from insecure teen to adult, between here own series and NextWave. It still works, mind. As funny as all hell in places, too.

So keep an eye out for all four of these. They may only be titbits in the grand scheme of things, sure. But they are still flying the flag for the UK in their own little ways. So don't forget 'em!

(UPDATE: It has been pointed out to me that Jessica Drew's origin has been amended slightly, in recent times. In the 2005 Spider-Woman: Origin limited series, by Bendis, Reed and the Luna brothers, the sequence of events is changed somewhat. 

In her previous origin Jessica was a child when the family moved from London to Wundagore. In Spider-Woman: Origin the Drews move to Wundagore while Jessica's mother is still pregnant, and her powers come as a result of her Mother being accidentally struck by a beam from her Father's experiment, while she was still in the womb. Which would mean that while she was concieved on British soil she would technically be a National of the Eastern European nation of Transia, in which Mount Wundagore is found.... 

Whether that origin will stand the test of time, I guess we'll have to wait and see. The fact that Jessica returned to London in her own mini would certainly tie a part of her to Britain.)