"I took The Authority and I stripped out all the plots, logic, character and sanity. (...) It's an absolute distillation of the superhero genre. No plot lines, characters, emotions, nothing whatsoever. It's people posing in the street for no good reason. It is people getting kicked, and then exploding. It is a pure comic book, and I will fight anyone who says otherwise. And afterwards, they will explode."
Monica Rambeau (Formerly known as Captain Marvel and Photon): The leader of the group. She used to lead The Avengers, and reminds her teammates of this fact at every available opportunity.
Tabitha "Tabby" Smith (formerly known as Time Bomb, Boom-Boom, Boomer, Meltdown, Firecracker, and Mutate #35): A trailer-trash klepto with the "mutant powers of blowing things up and stealing all your stuff" (actual description). Her theft of the Beyond Corporation's Marketing Plan provided the impetus for the team to leave the employ of H.A.T.E.
Elsa Bloodstone: Daughter of a famous monster hunter, she was the series' resident Action Girl.
The Captain (Formerly known as Captain Power, Captain Ron, Captain L. Ron, Captain Universe, Captain Ultra, Captain Avenger, Captain Avalon, Captain Marvel, Captain ☠☠☠☠, and various others before finally giving up): An idioticFlying Brick from Brooklyn who received his powers from benevolent aliens while drunkenly stumbling home. Subversion of The Good Captain and frequent victim of The Worf Effect. The only member of Nextwave created specifically for the series.
The series ran for twelve issues, with each story arc being two issues long (although a case can be made for the final arc actually being four issues long). Plot wasn't a high priority, and served mostly as an excuse for the team to beat things up and cause things to explode.
This series provided examples of:
Action Girl: Elsa Bloodstone is capable of kicking anything's ass. Anything. Even if it doesn't have an ass. Monica and Tabby also apply.
Alternate Continuity: Started out as one, but afterwards many references to it were made in the main titles, and the characters involved started displaying their personalities and costumes from the series in all their other appearances.
Note however that the Marvel Universe has thousands of alternate timelines so Nextwave could have taken place in something other than the official one (#616). It's even possible that the whole story was nothing more than a comic book, as Earth 616 has its own Marvel Comics company, whose comics don't always reflect the actual reality of that world (eg. The Mighty Thor is presented as being an alien, not a god, in them.)
Anime Anatomy: Fin Fang Foom has no genitals whatsoever.
Oh, you cannot imagine how annoyed he is.
Asshole Victim: Officer Mac Mangel, A cop one week from retirement... Who beats up drug dealers (when he doesn't get his cut),threatens prostitutes (when he doesn't get his cut), and beat up a mugging victim opon learning he still has some money left. He is transformed into some kind of robotic monster when trying to sell what he thinks is a stray cat.
Back from the Dead: Beyond brings back Dirk Anger as a zombie after he accidentally hanged himself.
The Inquisitor: Pay allegiance to God or get your robot face kicked in.
Aaron: My robot face is beautiful and will not be kicked by the likes of you fleshy ones. And I don't believe in your God. God is for fleshy ones. I am robot. And your God will throw up when he sees what I have done to you.
Badass Longcoat: The "Nextwave outfit" consists only of a Badass Longcoat thrown over whatever superhero costume/civilian duds the team members happen to be wearing.
Also the ginormous suicide pistol nearly used by Dirk Anger. Cow sized rounds? Oh Jesus...
Bigger on the Inside: the team aircraft the Shockwave Rider, explicitly kept that way by Applied Phlebotinum which is later damaged, forcing a hurried bail-out.
And yet Monica appears in Civil War in her Nextwave attire...
Any recent appearances of Monica, Tabhita, or Aaron had them display connections with Nextwave, suggesting the miniseries was loved enough to be put in continuity anyway.
Do Anything Robot: Aaron contains pretty much every conceivable sharp pointy object ever made within his body. Read the trope article and become enlightened.
Dumb Muscle: The Captain isn't a terribly bright guy, but at least he cops to the fact that, for instance, he "can barely speak English." He can also, you know, tear your head off with one hand.
Expy: Dirk Anger, H.A.T.E., and S.I.L.E.N.T. are stand-ins for Nick Fury, SHIELD, and HYDRA, respectively. (Warren Ellis wanted to use the originals, but was shouted down. After seeing what he did with them, that's kind of a relief.)
Although Brian Bendis and John Hickman later recycled the idea, making both SHIELD and the goofier version of HYDRA sub-divisions of a larger HYDRA network; presumably, Marvel editors refused the earlier idea not because they were afraid of it... But afraid of Ellis.
In the script, Ellis describes H.A.T.E. as "What SHIELD would be if you were as drunk as I was when I wrote this" and Dirk Anger as "Most definitely not Nick Fury. At all."
Leet Lingo: Tabby often uses Net acronyms when speaking out loud. "'Zomg'?"
The Captain: Beats the pus out of me.
Lethal Joke Character: Meet Forbush Man. He wears a pot on his head and red jammies, and is capable of shattering your mind by trapping it in a horrible alternate reality with a different art style.
Made of Explodium: "Oh my God, they explode. My life has taken on new meaning."
The Man Behind the Man: Number None, really a baby M.O.D.O.K. in disguise, was the Giant Floating Head Behind The Man for Dirk Anger... And then he turned out to be an underling of Devil Dinosaur.
Narrator: The captions served mostly to hang a lampshade on the tropes being employed here. The captions also have No Fourth Wall — at one point, they pop up to indicate that the current panel showing the Shockwave Rider was inserted precisely so people could crop it out and use it as signature/avatar images on message boards. Ironically, it's remarkably difficult to find a scan of.
"Unless you stole it off the internet"
Monster Modesty: Fing Fang Foom's shorts are a subject of extensive derision.
Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: The third story features such wonderful creations as the man-eating drop bears and samurai robots. Bloodstone destroys an army of the latter with a shovel.
Plant Person: Arguably, Beyond's Human Resources operatives, who are based on genetically-modified kelp, grown in gardens, and driven by software. Their level of sentience is suspect, however.
Monica: "But they're alive, right?"
Aaron: "Depends on your definition of alive. They have more in common with broccoli than they do with you. Or me."
Monica: "I hate broccoli. Let's kill 'em."
Power Walk: The Nextwave team does this at the end of one comic.
Quirky Miniboss Squad: Number None assembles several teams of second-rate supers to fight Nextwave.
One's a collection of characters formerly featured in "What The!?," Marvel's own self-spoofing comic (all that's missing is Spider-Ham). Several are just bizarre. The one that doesn't show up is a squad composed of notable gay superheroes (given different names, of course); Sun-King and Midniteman are references Ellis' own creations Apollo and Midnighter, while Polestar is Northstar and Slightly Creepy Policewoman is Renee Montoya.
Reality Ensues: Lampshaded when Elsa runs out of bullets, Hollywood lies a lot you know.
Reconstruction: Ellis' earlier The Authority was basically the JLA without all that pesky Thou Shall Not Kill nonsense. As indicated by the page quote, Nextwave is pretty much that, except with lots more irreverent parodies of the Marvel universe and much more explosions.
Refuge in Audacity: Here's but one example out of many — Dirk Anger is so depressed (when he's not in a manic episode) that he plays Russian Roulette. A little sad, yes? Now, what if we mentioned he did it sitting atop a giant gun bigger than he is with the barrel twisted around to point at him? Comedy gold.
Aaron: I could make you pregnant. Elsa: Not unless you could do it from over there, Clanky. Aaron: I am full of very useful devices.
Rule Of Cool: When the aforementioned samurai robots appear, Elsa Bloodstone realizes that her handguns aren't nearly cool enough to defeat them, so she drops them and fights with only a shovel.
"Biological systems are hideous. I can't believe they have all this garbage inside them and not want to kill themselves."
Secret Identity: Averted with a vengeance. Except for The Captain, none of Nextwave really uses their former code-names at all; in Monica's case, this is probably a blessing, since as they point out, there's been way too many Captain Marvels.
Keep in mind that the only reason The Captain uses his code name is that he can't remember his real name.
Senseless Violins - Elsa Bloodstone keeps her arsenal of guns in a guitar case.
The art styles in the alternate realities are based on the art of Paul Pope, Daniel Clowes, Mike Mignola, and embody various '70s comics themes.
The giant revolver that Dirk Anger is sitting on is directly based on a panel from Elektra: Assassin by Bill Sienkiewicz and Frank Miller where Nick Fury is doing target practice in a very similar weapon; the major difference is that Axe Crazy Anger’s uber-revolver has its barrel bent back towards him so he can use in a very over-the-top game of Russian Roulette.
Training from Hell: Elsa Bloodstone's monster-hunter training, which includes being thrown into monster pits while she's an infant with only a spoon to her name.
The Undead: Dirk Anger's suicidal retirement is not accepted by H.A.T.E.
Unreliable Narrator: The characters have several flashbacks which totally violate everything we know about the characters (like Monica flash-frying an annoying yappy dog as a kid; she wasn't even supposed to have superpowers then) but they're all so funny we don't really care.
Writer On Board: Writer Warren Ellis' well known distaste for the Modern Age of comics and the Dark Age of comics is evident, but is funny rather than annoying.
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