Line #24 Comicbook/AtariForce


1	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/AtariForce-comic2_8759.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:300:[-Atari Force v.2: Less Dorky Than Our Parents-] ]]
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4	''Atari Force'' is the name for several comic book series developed and published by Creator/DCComics.
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6	The original series was first published in 1982 as a set of promotional giveaways with selected Platform/Atari2600 video games. It covered the efforts of the Atari Force as they participate in "Project Multiverse", a mission to [[TheMultiverse travel across dimensions]] and find a new planet for humanity to inhabit after the current UsefulNotes/{{Earth}} is pushed to the brink of collapse by global warfare. While most of the stories were standalone, the team repeatedly clashed with the Dark Destroyer, an interdimensional EldritchAbomination out to conquer the multiverse. The stories were written by Gerry Conway and Roy Thomas, with art by Ross Andru and Gil Kane.
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8	The DC graphic novel ''ComicBook/StarRaiders'' is a SpinOff of issue #3. The pack-in comics can be [[http://www.atariage.com/comics/index.html read here]].
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10	The second series was first published in 1984 as a regular monthly comic under the DC label. Set 25 years after humanity's resettlement, it centered on the adventures of the children of the original crew. Their lives are disrupted by the return of the Dark Destroyer, who has discovered the dimension where humanity has relocated and is preparing to avenge his earlier defeats by humiliating Martin Champion and then destroying the universe. The writers were Gerry Conway and Mike Baron, with art primarily by Jose Garcia-Lopez; later issues featured backup stories by Keith Giffen, Paul Kupperberg, Klaus Janson, James Fry and others.
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12	The arcade game ''Liberator'' (essentially, ''VideoGame/MissileCommand'' in reverse) is based on this series (hence the marquee reading "Atari Force: Liberator"). Specifically, it's based on a special insert preview comic called "Codename: Liberator".
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14	Atari Force shouldn't be confused with [[Pinball/TheAtarians the Atarians]].
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16	----
17	!! The various ''Atari Force'' series provide examples of:
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20	[[folder:Tropes A-B]]
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22	* AbusiveParents: The Canopean Hive Mother. She tortured Morphea telepathically as a kid because Morphea had a personality of her own, feelings and referred herself as "I", the pronoun forbidden for the Canopeans. Morphea's conditioning is so deep that even after she got a new life and got over her past, she still refers to herself as "this one", like proper Canopeans say. [[spoiler: Except when she fought Dark Destroyer in Kargg's mind - and won.]]
23	* AcePilot: Martin Champion, who's been to the Moon four times, commanded two lunar missions, and saved a team of lunar colonists with an emergency rescue flight complete with [[ComingInHot crash landing]].
24	* AliensSpeakingEnglish: Mostly subverted with some exceptions; Taz will only speak one word of (barely intelligible) English at the end of a word balloon.
25	* AllOfTheOtherReindeer: The first story in the comic book special shows that Dart and his only friend Dalia were bullied in New Earth Academy - Dalia, because of her difficulty to keep up with the Academy training, and Darth because she is a mutant due the radiation absorbed by her parents on space. The hostilities from the other girls were so intense that the two were forced to escape to a distant, hostile planet and become bounty hunters.
26	** Played with the rest of the team. Even the characters that have friends or relatives outside the force experience situations of rejection and/or harassment. Martin is treated as insane by the government, Christopher has the same treatment as Darth, Morphea was scorned and repressed in her planet because of her feelings of loneliness, Taz lost her planet and husband for an army of conquerors, Babe was taken from his loving family to be treated as a slave and a valuable trophee and Hukka was either rejected or seen as food by the other inhabitants of his planet before he was adopted by the former Atari Force.Pakrat is persecuted by his own brother because he doesn't fit in his family's ideals of honesty and righteousness(justified because he is a criminal, but it would be simpler just to disown and cut all ties with him. Rudent takes his famiy's honor in such an extrem that decides to kill Pakrat in a sidestory).
27	* AllThatGlitters: The comic book special story where Pakrat discovers crystals that he thinks are valuable that are made from [[SolidGoldPoop Babe's shedding skin scales]]. At the end of the story, Pakrat finds out that after a while they turn to dust.
28	* TheAtoner: Blackjack and Kargg.
29	* BarbieDollAnatomy: Babe, Hukka and the Tazlings.
30	* AuraVision: Blackjak temporarily had this ability with the organic eye that the Tazlings had given him.
31	* BerserkButton: Never trap Pakrat in a corner, because he'll come out of it fighting!!! And don't disrespect Morphea nor torture someone when she is around[[MamaBear (especially Babe)]], or you'll experience her Mind Sting!
32	* BigBad: The Dark Destroyer, natch.
33	* BitterSweetEnding: [[spoiler: Morphea and Kargg prove the existence of the Dark Destroyer. With that, all the members of the Second Atari Force get together again and escape from prison. However, Dart is separated from her parents,Chris from [[ParentalSubstitute Lucia Caytlin]] and Martin from his friends, and they'll probably never see them again. The corrupt government of New Earth may persecute them and harass their beloved ones. And the members of the group have no idea of the things they are going to find in Old Earth.]]
34	* BountyHunter: Dart and Blackjak.
35	* BreakOutTheMuseumPiece: In the second series, the ''Scanner One'' was actually a museum piece, and it was still functional and fully stocked!
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38	[[folder:Tropes C-D]]
39	* TheCameo: [[ComicBook/MartianManhunter J'onn J'onzz]] and [[Film/ETTheExtraTerrestrial E.T.]] make cameo appearances in Pakrat's three-part side-story arc.
40	** The Hukka puts in an appearance in an issue of ''ComicBook/AmbushBug''.
41	* CarpetOfVirility: Blackjak.
42	* ChronicVillainy: After humanity was given a second chance to live in peace by joining a federation of worlds in order to resettle on New Earth, about twenty years later they are now back to building war weapons, as seen in the penultimate issue of the second series. This drives the disillusioned Martin Champion to transport himself and his second Atari Force team back to Old Earth to resettle there.
43	* CigarChomper: Professor Venture (a female example) and Captain Hunter.
44	* ContinuitySnarl: The final second Atari Force team story that appeared in the ''Atari Force Special'' #1 in 1986, "Second Skin", where the ''Scanner One'' had to settle down on a planet due to Babe's shedding scales causing problems with the ship's engines, is rather difficult to place within the continuity of the main series. Ideally, it should be placed between the story where Babe and Hukka found Taz and the story where Tempest went back to New Earth to find out the history of the first team's encounter with the Dark Destroyer, except that in the main series' continuity, Tempest was still recovering from injuries that he sustained from the Dark Destroyer at that point, whereas in the ''Atari Force Special'' story he appears to be in full health.
45	* CrapsackWorld: The backstory establishes Earth as one of these, ravaged by endless war and terror attacks. [[DividedStatesOfAmerica The United States has been shattered]], the UsefulNotes/UnitedNations is dead, famine and disease are rampant, billions have already died, and a hemispheric drought has reduced the planet's arable land by a million acres. It's desperate enough that humanity's last hope is to ''travel across dimensions'' to find a new planet for everyone to colonize...
46	* CreepyCentipedes: In the first series, Martin Champion fights with a giant alien centipede-like creature. It's a rather subtle ShoutOut to Atari's arcade game ''VideoGame/{{Centipede}}''. (As an interesting side note, there's a DC Comics pack-in comic book that came with the Atari 2600 ''Centipede'' cartridge, where the titular centipede is much less creepy-looking.)
47	* ADayInTheLimelight: except for Morphea,Blackjack and Kargg, all the other members of the team had their own stories illustrating how their lives were before the events of the main story arc. Dart, Taz and Babe have one each; Pakrat has two and Chris shares a a day of his childhood with Hukka, whom had at least four days in the limelight before being adopted by the first Atari Force team.
48	* DeathByChildbirth: Lydia Champion, at the birth of Christopher. [[spoiler:It's later revealed that this was due to the Dark Destroyer stealing her life force.]]
49	* DidTheyOrDidntThey: Dart and Blackjack. [[spoiler: Oh, they did it. Twice, probably more.]]
50	* DontCelebrateJustYet: In the second series, when Martin Champion felled the Dark Destroyer in the human form of Champion, Dart tells him something to this effect, saying that she was unable to stop the Dark Destroyer's anti-matter bomb from detonating due to her tampering with the device.
51	* DreamingOfThingsToCome: Dart gets precognitive dreams of Blackjak's death. She also dreams of the Atari Force relocating to Old Earth at the end of the second series.
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54	[[folder:Tropes E-G]]
55	* EasilyForgiven: Blackjack doesn’t hold any grudge at Dart [[spoiler: after she shot his right eye. Okay, she only did that because she thought he had killed her only friend, then apologized and patched him, but still, it was his eye.]]
56	** Zigzagged with Blackjack after his FaceHeelTurn and recovering. Morphea and Dart forgive him because they understand he was mind-controlled/psychologically abused by Dark Destroyer [[spoiler: through a mind implant that the tazlings removed]] , but the rest of the crew is not so forgiving. Especially Martin, whom refuses to let Blackjack pilot the Scanner One through the zone collapsed by [[spoiler: Dark Destroyer’s anti-matter bomb]], even though he is the only one able to avoid its radiation clouds, thanks to the reading-aura eye the tazlings gave him. Martin won’t relent until [[WhatTheHellHero Chris calls him out, since it's the only way to save all of them]].
57	* EldritchAbomination: In its original form, the Dark Destroyer is a planet-sized tentacular monstrosity.
58	* TheEmpath: Morphea
59	* EmotionEater: The Dark Destroyer feeds on the torment, fear, and pain of others. It uses its telepathic powers to conquer weaker races and provoke wars to sustain itself. He also has a torturer named Psyklops who locks his victims into reliving painful past memories, as in the case with Morphea.
60	* EnemyMine: In a Taz side story, Taz is forced to fight her way to the surface with the help of a member of the opposing alien species that she is trapped with. Once they get topside, though, Taz recognizes the alien as the one who killed her mate and ends up killing him.
61	* EvilKnockoff: [[spoiler:The Dark Destroyer creates a clone of Martin Champion to serve as a host for itself.]]
62	* ExposedExtraterrestrials: Babe.
63	* ExpressDelivery: The Dark Destroyer pulls this on a backwater planet creature that he enters into to become born in the form of Martin Champion, speeding up the process to the point where it ends up killing the mother.
64	* EyepatchOfPower: Blackjak has a cybernetic camera eye attached to his left eye socket that can detach itself and fly around to allow its owner to see other places.
65	* FaceHeelTurn: [[spoiler:Blackjak.]]
66	* FacialMarkings: Dart and her previous mercenary partner Dalia not only have markings on the left side of their faces, but also all over the left side of their bodies. Like her father Mohandas Singh, Dart has a red tilak on her forehead.
67	* {{Fainting}}: Pakrat faints when he realizes that Martin Champion has destroyed the nav-chip on the Scanner One.
68	* FakeKillScare: Done in the second series [[spoiler:with an entire ''dimension''. After the Dark Destroyer has detonated his antimatter bomb, the heroes believe their home universe has been destroyed. It isn't until later that they learn otherwise.]]
69	* FantasticRacism: Most people on New Earth sees Chris and Dart as freaks because of their mutations caused by the radiation of space. The capitain that kidnapped Babe insists that the kids' race has no feelings.
70	* FiveTokenBand: Egregiously so in the first series. Li San O'Rourke is even ''Chinese/Irish'', just to squeeze in an extra ethnicity.
71	* FlatScare: Christopher Champion (Tempest) pulls this on a guard at a museum where the Scanner One spaceship was stored.
72	* FoodSlap: In a Pakrat side story, his female friend Ferra dumps a whole bowl of Draconian loose juice on Pakrat before she leaves the party, looking insulted.
73	* FunWithFlushing: Hukka attempts to flush the robotic Bob down the toilet in a side story. However, he ends up awakening Bob's evil side.
74	* GentleGiant: Babe. Justified as he's an infant from a species that grow into ''mountains''.
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77	[[folder:Tropes H-M]]
78	* HappinessIsMandatory: In the second series, we see in Psyklops' invasion of Morphea's mind that Canopean society, which emphasizes being in a collective hive mind, enforces each being to live without concern for their own personal needs — a situation which Morphea is constantly punished for by the Hive Mother due to her feeling of loneliness.
79	* HoistByHisOwnPetard: The Dark Destroyer intended to destroy Martin Champion's New Earth universe with an anti-matter bomb, but instead ended up dying in the explosion of his own bomb when Dart accidentally deactivated the fail-safe mechanism.
80	* InspectorJavert: Rident Oly, though his pursuit of his brother Tukla is justified as he disgraced the Oly family name by becoming a criminal.
81	* KangarooCourt: The second Atari Force faces one of these [[spoiler:after returning to New Earth]]. Ostensibly, the team is on trial for the theft of ''Scanner One'', but it's part of a larger plan to imprison Tempest and weaponize his powers.
82	* KnockoutGas: The second Atari Force team attempts to get the advantage of the Dark Destroyer's team of mercenaries by having Tempest phase on board the ship and knock them out with sleeping gas. Unfortunately, the Dark Destroyer somehow redirects Tempest so that his phasing power directs him into the BigBad's personal chamber, leaving Dart and Pakrat in a guns-out battle with the Dark Destroyer's crew.
83	* LoveableRogue: Pakrat.
84	* LoveObstructingParents: Senator Jamieson forbids his daughter Melissa from dating Christopher. He sees Chris as a "freak" because of his powers and also hates Chris' father. [[spoiler:She betrays him later, so it was better that way.]]
85	* MaternalDeathBlameTheChild: Christopher Champion was believed to be blamed by his father Martin for his mother Lydia's death at birth. It was only years later that Dr. Lucas Orion, the physician present at the birth, realized that Martin blamed the Dark Destroyer for Lydia's death, as the Dark Destroyer's life force entered into Lydia, killed her, then entered into Martin while he was unaware due to grief, in order to know his unique genetic makeup so that he could be born as an Evil Knockoff of Martin.
86	* MerchandiseDriven: Played very straight with the first series, as an overt promotional campaign (both Atari Corp. and Creator/DCComics were owned by Warner Communications at the time). Averted by the second series, however, which was a straightforward science fiction comic.
87	* MistakenForThief: In Mohandas Singh's origin, he and his childhood friend were accused as thieves when a tourist accidentally dropped his wallet and had the police chase after them, only to realize his error, which cost Mohandas his friend's life. Fortunately, the tourist gave Mohandas a chance to leave his peasant life, which resulted in him becoming a brilliant engineer.
88	* MrFanservice: Blackjak.
89	* TheMultiverse: Not only can ''Scanner One'' travel to different dimensions, Tempest was born with the ability as well.
90	* MurderousMalfunctioningMachine: The friendly toy robot, Bob, who could only say his name cheerfully, went evil after one too many flushes down the toilet. It could still say nothing more than "Bob", but it said it in a much more menacing voice.
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93	[[folder:Tropes N-R]]
94	* NiceJobBreakingItHero: Played with; Martin Champion thinks he's inadvertently informed the Dark Destroyer as to what dimension humanity has resettled on, and assembles a new team to retrieve the probe to resolve the problem. [[spoiler:In actuality, the Dark Destroyer already ''knew'' where they were, and faked the incident as part of his plan to humiliate Champion before destroying the dimension.]]
95	* NotQuiteDead: [[spoiler:Blackjak.]]
96	* ParentalNeglect: Martin Champion does this to his son Tempest, largely because he blames him for the death of his wife.
97	* ParentsAsPeople: Mohandas Singh and Li San O'Rourke are loving, caring parents, both for their byological daughter, Erin Bia/Dart and their adoptive son, Christopher Champion. But they pushed their expectatives on Dart at a young age, demanding she excelled in everything and pushed her into studying in New Earth Academy, although she hated it.She eventually has to run away from the Academy after the other girls tried to beat Dart and her friend Dalia into a pulp, [[WoundedGazelleGambit then lied to the teachers that the two attacked them]]. When they trie to hide at Dart's home, they learn her parents already know everything through Captain Hunter, whom gives the two an ultimatum: either they return to the Academy or they agree into going into a mission in a distant planet. Dart eventually becomes a bounty hunter, but Mohandas Sing and Li San O'Rourke don't make any critics at her life style.
98	* ParentalSubstitute: Morphea is this for Babe after he was taken from his homeworld, and Professor Venture became the substitute mother for Christopher Champion, besides Mohandas Singh and Li San O'Rourke.
99	* PermaStubble: Blackjak, with only a full-grown mustache amid all the stubble.
100	* PregnantBadass: Taz, with the surprising bit being that [[spoiler:[[SamusIsAGirl nobody knew that Taz was female until Morphea found that out from a telepathic scan]]]].
101	* PuppeteerParasite: The Dark Destroyer, who used portions of himself implanted in Blackjak and Kargg to manipulate them. Both these parasites were removed from their hosts, though Morphea had to go inside Kargg's mind to mentally battle the Dark Destroyer himself.
102	* RagtagBunchOfMisfits
103	* RecursiveAcronym: According to canon, "Atari" stands for the "Atari Technology and Research Institute".
104	* RemixComic: "Mission: Phoenix" (pack-in comic #4) was originally written as a story for the spin-off arcade video game ''Liberator'', with the Malaglon originally resembling frogs.
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107	[[folder:Tropes S-Z]]
108	* SamusIsAGirl: Taz was referred to as being male up until Morphea discovered [[spoiler:[[PregnantBadass Taz was pregnant]]]].
109	* SatelliteLoveInterest: We don't know anything about how Blackjack's previous life was before he met Dart or the source of his crippling feelings of insecurity. Melissa's case is worse, for she seems to have been introduced just to illustrate the prejudice suffered by Christopher because of his mutation.
110	* ScreamingBirth: The backwater planet creature screams as it gives birth to the Dark Destroyer's humanoid form.
111	* ShootingGallery: In a Hukka side story, Bob zaps Hukka with his antenna in the same manner as with a bear target in a shooting gallery, with Hukka going back and forth between zaps.
112	* SigilSpam: The Atari "fuji" logo gets incorporated nearly everywhere, especially in the first series. Even the design of the ''Scanner One'' spaceship is a variation of the logo.
113	* SiliconBasedLife: Babe's species. Even as big as he is, he's an infant. He'll become a mountain when he grows up.
114	* SolidGoldPoop: Babe sheds skin scales that turn into crystals, which Pakrat thinks may be valuable, only to find out that after a while [[SchmuckBait they turn into dust]].
115	* SpinOffspring: In the second series, Tempest is Martin and Lydia's son, while Dart is Mohandas and Li San's daughter.
116	* StevenUlyssesPerhero: Martin Champion, leader of the Atari Force.
117	* SuicidalPacifist: Lucas Orion of the first team. When he and his comrades were being attacked by the Zylons, he refused to even pick up a gun to help his friends fight off the attackers. Fortunately, a CoolShip emerges to save the day, piloted by Lucas' allies.
118	* TeamMom: Morphea. And a MamaBear, too.
119	* ThinkingUpPortals: Tempest can create portals through which he can travel through different planes of the Multiverse, although he can only carry inanimate objects through the portals; living creatures end up destroyed through the portals.
120	* TitleDrop: Many Atari video games and properties have their names dropped throughout the series.
121	** The main computer for ''Scanner One'' is the [[Platform/Atari8BitComputers Atari 8000]].
122	** Issue #4 of the first series features "Mission: [[http://www.atariage.com/software_page.html?SoftwareLabelID=355 Phoenix]]"
123	** [[http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=7885 Galaxians]] was mentioned in issue #5 of the first series. Also an alien vaguely resembling a [[http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=7299 centipede]] appears in the same issue.
124	** Martin and Lydia's son, Christopher, is codenamed "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempest_%28arcade_game%29 Tempest]]".
125	** In the second series, one member of the team is a diminutive alien nicknamed [[http://www.atariage.com/software_page.html?SoftwareLabelID=554 Taz]].
126	** When the Scanner One re-enters normal space, the pilot of the ship says "[[http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=7216 Breakout]]!"
127	* TortureTechnician: Psyklops, a psychic vampire working for the Dark Destroyer who feeds off pain.
128	* UseYourHead: Both Martin and Christopher Champion used head-butts when physically fighting the Dark Destroyer in his humanoid form.
129	* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: The first series briefly mentions The Co-Op, a collection of government-owned multinational corporations. Though they are presented as a threat to Atari and Project Multiverse, they are never referenced again.
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131	[[/folder]]

Context Comicbook / AtariForce