Offspring
13 years ago - Luke McDunnagh is born the son of Eel O'Brian.
4 years ago - 9-year-old Luke's powers manifest. He has to start practicing with his dad, Eel O'Brian.
Offspring is an interesting character, because while he's been firmly established as a regular character that exists in the DC canon, he's never really been featured in any part of the mainstream continuity. His two biggest roles have been in elseworlds stories, and most of his other appearances have treated him as a background character at best. We probably would have skipped him, but he fits so perfectly into our timeline that he becomes an absolute necessity, and in doing so we think he comes across as a pretty interesting character.
Offspring's Comic HistoryOffspring first appeared in 1999, as part of Mark Waid's sequel to his ground-breaking elseworlds story about his own future of DC, Kingdom Come. The Kingdom was a two-part series with a few spin-off one shots that featured the original characters of Waid's future, one of which was The Kingdom: Offspring, about Plastic Man's son.
A lot of the design elements of the Kingdom Come story have been adapted into the regular DC continuity, usually with pretty unfortunate results, but in 2002, Joe Kelly introduced a young Luke to the regular continuity. This version of Luke was growing up without his father, forced to discover his powers on his own. A few years later, during the one-year-later continuity reset the Teen Titans are understood to have gone through a few new membership drives, and among the groups of new characters was Luke, wearing a version of his costume from the Kingdom. |
|
|
Offspring appeared a few times over the next few years as a background character in the Titans, regularly referenced as someone who had been a Titan, but only 'offscreen'. He would show up in large group situations, including in the large battle that closed the series, but was never a featured character.
He largely disappeared from mainstream continuity after the New 52. The 2018 series the Terrifics included Plastic Man as a featured team member, and in doing so also reintroduced his son, who was now a more regular part of his life. Later on he actually joined the team alongside his father. They also worked together in Tom Taylor's huge book Injustice 2, another writer-focused series with it's own revisionist continuity. In it Luke and his father work side-by-side as quick-quipping partners. It's probably one of the best takes on the character you're likely to see, and is definitely going to inform our version of the character. |
Our Offspring StoryThe core motivating feature of Luke as he's featured in the regular continuity is the fact that he doesn't have a relationship with his father. This was introduced by Mike Kelly, the JLA writer that brought him into regular continuity. Kelly happens to be really good at writing darker, more complex characters, so this idea really worked in the world as he wrote it, but on a grander scale Luke has always felt a little less likeable when his relationship with his father is estranged.
The two best takes on the character come from Injustice & the Kingdom, where he has a great, loving relationship with his dad, and that's what we're going to do as well. Our take on the character is still pretty young because we're going to use him as a member of our future Teen Titans, so for now he's still a school age kid who regularly works with his dad to learn how to use his powers. Perhaps they sometimes have some basic adventures together, but for the most part his future is wide open. |
|
|
Offspring's CostumeLuke's original costume was designed by Frank Quietly, who is probably one of the most talented artists in the medium, but who can also lean gleefully into some strange stuff. The look he sported in the original Kingdom one-shot was absolutely perfect for the world of that one comic, but like a lot of the designs from Kingdom Come, they just don't work super-well outside of that story.
There have been a few really great attempts to modernize this costume. Here is the concept art for two of our favorites; from Injustice & the Terrifics. We think that if we're going to imagine an outfit worn by Luke as a member of our future Teen Titans, it should be the simpler one worn by the younger version here. When that look finally showed up in the comic, they added this collar, which we like. That swimming cap thing has always seemed weird, so we'd rather go with the exposed hair and visor as worn by the older version here from Injustice. This is a look that really works, right from when he first starts training with his dad to when he joins the Titans. |
Offspring & the TitansJust like all the character's we're adding to the future Teen Titans, the intention here is to build a team of characters that will all give us new perspectives into Damian Wayne, his relationship with his father, his legacy, and his capacity for both good and evil.... and then also, attempt to in some way emulate the character archetypes established in the Marv Wolfman & George Perez New Teen Titans.
In this case, the inclusion of this character should really speak for himself. Obviously, he's going to provide a lot of fun, playful energy to the team, a role we all recognize as the one Beast Boy filled. More importantly though, he's just a genuinely good kid who unironically loves his dad and appreciates the chance to fufil his legacy. This is going to be a super-interesting voice to add to Damian's Titans. |
|