I'm very curious about the WB comics version of Panacea. Like, I assume she was originally a supporting character introduced to handwave how supers could get punched through a building and be fine the next episode, but how did we get from there to the grimdark mind-control incest plot?
If you want an Amy retrospective you will pretty much get a new wave retrospective, because they are very interlinked (and a bunch of Amy's later characterization comes from some very specific new wave stories).
(Brocton Bay #1, with the early deformed dynamite and the first appareance of Lung the oriental dragon)
So, in the late 50s Wildbow comics found itself in a very messy legal situation because DC was suing every superman shaped character and WB Comics had 5 very superman shaped characters, so during it Wildbow kind of started throwing shit at the wall to see what would stick. And thats how we got the Brocktom Bay Brigade in the 60s, the first in a new wave of heroes (Yeah, thats why they got that name later).
Their backstory was simple, 4 adventurer's travel too deep into a cave in the amazon forest were they find a shinning meteorite, now they have superpowers. Now they have to defend their hometown from eeeeeevil.
They are Manpower, Lady photon, Brandish and The Dynamite (Fun fact, flashbangs were created by the british years later).
You would be forgiven if you thought it was a fantastic four ripoff, because it kind of was but in my opinion it's vibes were more doom patrol than ff.
But more importantly, they were fundamental pillars for the WBU. A lot of iconic things you think about when i saw Wildbow come from their original series.
Lung, Kaiser and the empire (who weren't nazis yet, but also they were absolutely a metaphor for nazis), Abaddon, Marquis and Brockton bay as a city itself. All came from the first, and only, Brockton Bay Brigade series.





















