Vykin the Brave
56 years ago - Vykin the Brave is born on New Genesis.
39 years ago - Vykin the Brave attends the Academy of Higher Consciousness on New Genesis, where he first meets Beautiful Dreamer, Serifan and Big Bear, and becomes rivals with Mark Moonrider.
38 years ago - Vykin the Brave learns that Doctor Bedlam is hiding on New Genesis to steal a next generation mother box from the grounds of the Academy of Higher Consciousness. Serifan & Beautiful Dreamer help him find it, along with secret assistance from the groundskeeper Big Bear. Mark Moonrider tries to stop them and find it for himself, but ultimately they all work together, and Vykin is able to bond with the mother box, Maya, and stop Doctor Bedlam.
32 years ago - Vykin the Brave, Beautiful Dreamer, Big Bear, & Mark Moonrider all undergo the ritual for Serifan to relinquish his godhead and receive it anew, so his physical form aligns with who he is, bonding them together as the Forever People.
25 years ago - Vykin the Brave and the Forever People defy the commands of Highfather, banding together to go to Earth to save Beautiful Dreamer from Glorious Godfrey. Seeing the effects of Anti-Life on the planet, they choose to stay on the planet, helping free it's people.
23 years ago - Vykin the Brave and the Forever People stage a giant concert, helping enough of Glorious Godfrey's followers to turn away from Anti-Life to force him to abandon the planet. Knowing that he had many other Anti-Life experiments across the galaxy, they venture into space to begin freeing those people.
11 years ago - Vykin the Brave and the Forever People help refugees from Despero's campaign of interplanetary conquest band together and find a new home, becoming the gods of a new religion.
4 years ago - Vykin the Brave and the Forever People return to New Genesis at the request of Highfather to help navigate the Boom Tube inversion field around Earth. They lead the way for the New Gods to confront the Parademon wave invasion
1 year ago - Vykin the Brave and the Forever People travel into the territory conquered by Lady Styx to bring help to the people there.
The Forever People, as they appear in their own comic stories, were really about the group as a whole more than about any one individual. This isn't to say they weren't complete characters, of course... in fact, I would say that there's something almost magic in how minimally these five were focused on while still each being so loaded with personality. Maybe that's part of what Kirby was deliberately aiming for, to emulate something vibrant about the people of the 60s he was celebrating.
Of the five, Vykin was probably the most enigmatic. He seemed more stoic and serious, less given to personal musings than the others. Also, given how rare black characters were at the time, it IS possible that just the fact that he was in the comic at all was so revolutionary that also giving him as much personality as the others might have felt like overkill. Still, I think that we've managed to unpack a really fun character here, and I hope what we're envisioning comes through!
Of the five, Vykin was probably the most enigmatic. He seemed more stoic and serious, less given to personal musings than the others. Also, given how rare black characters were at the time, it IS possible that just the fact that he was in the comic at all was so revolutionary that also giving him as much personality as the others might have felt like overkill. Still, I think that we've managed to unpack a really fun character here, and I hope what we're envisioning comes through!
Vykin's Comic HistoryVykin and the rest of the Forever People appeared in their own series in 1971, arriving on Earth on their super-cycle, looking to save Beautiful Dreamer from Glorious Godfrey. We quickly meet each of them and learn what makes them unique... in the case of Vykin, that was his special connection to their Mother Box, a sentient supercomputer with a mystic connection to the mysterious Source. The Mother Box would go on to become a mainstay of the Fourth World fiction, with pretty much every major character having a special mother box specific to them (kind of like cellphones today), while the Forever People had one large Mother Box between them, operated by one person (like your house computer in the 90s).
Vykin was really defined by this relationship with the Mother Box, although it's probably also worth pointing out that Vykin also has the distinction of being only the second black superhero in DC's publication history after Mal Duncan. |
Our Vykin the Brave StoryFirst things first... Yes, we are changing that title. Vykin the Black is honestly a cool handle, but there's just no way that's going to fly in this context. (One discord reader said "maybe if he was Vantablack?") We tried a few different variations, and eventually realized what really mattered was name's cadence. Since he's clearly named to evoke Baldr the Brave from Norse mythology... there you go.
The animated Forever People from Young Justice was actually led by Vykin, and that informed a lot of how we ultimately decided to structure our version. The fact that he's the one who is bonded to a special "next generation" Mother Box (technically all of them should have their own standard Mother Box) does give him a sort of 'chosen one' vibe, and as we built them to mirror certain popular fiction, he just seemed to naturally step into the more central role of the team, while the traditional 'leader', Mark Moonrider, seemed better fit to play the team's bad boy outsider. What really made this concept for Vykin click for us is the art at the top of this page. Luciano Vecchio is prolific online with his superhero art, and while he's done versions of all of the Forever People he really found something special in his version of Vykin with it's obvious Mega Man inspiration. All of this taken together has, we think, really elevated him to become the central character of the Forever People. |