Valiant  / Acclaim

In the early 1990's Valiant comics was launched under former Marvel Editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter. They started by using revived (and modified) versions of the Gold Key's three biggest heroes, whose rights they had procured. They established them in the same universe, and expanded it with new characters. In 1994 Valiant was bought by Acclaim Entertainment, shortly before the comic speculator bubble burst; Acclaim responded by taking a more direct editorial involvement than they had originally. In 1995 two imprints were launched - Armada produced licensed titles, while Windjammer was creator owned and set outside the shared Valiant universe. A year later, in 1996, Valiant was relaunched as Acclaim Comics. Old characters were reimagined, and in effect a new universe, dubbed VH2 by Acclaim, replaced the old universe, VH1 (for old time comics fans, think DC's switching from stories set on Earth-2 to Earth-1). It was eventually revealed that VH1's Solar had caused a paradox which had sent history down a different path. In 2000, after much of the Acclaim line had cancelled due to poor sales, Jim Shooter was asked back to merge the two realities via the story Unity 2000 - however, financial and other issues at Acclaim prevented the complete series being released. A few years later Acclaim Entertainment filed for bankruptcy; the rights to Magnus, Turok and Solar reverted to Random House, current owners of the Gold Key and Dell copyrights, while the others were auctioned off. At least some were seemingly bought up by Jim Shooter, as a relaunched Valiant Entertainment has published some reprint volumes in the last few years, and there is talk of revival of the line.

While Valiant and later Acclaim lasted, they established universes with strong mythologies. Ones where Spider-like aliens threatened the Earth, having a hand in the origin of some heroes (X-O Manowar) and battling the others. Ones where Harbingers (the Valiant equivalent of Marvel's mutants) were the new stage in human evolution. Ones where the superpowered blood of a twentieth century hero (Bloodshot) would create a dynasty that would stretch into the fortieth (Rai). And one where Quantum and Woody were not a couple.

For more information, check out this Valiant site here.

Valiant

Acclaim

Acclaim also published a sequel to the movie Waterworld.

Armada

Amongst Armada's output were licensed titles for card game Magic: The Gathering and the TV show Sliders.

Windjammer

Windjammer's creator-owned line largely saw the brief revival of characters originally published by other companies.

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