I’m a longtime fan of the Archie superheroes – most often categorized as the Mighty Crusaders. I first encountered them during their 1980s revival as part of the Red Circle line and I own pretty much every issue they published during that time. Yeah, the stories weren’t always that great and the continuity was… well, to put it kindly, it was fluid. During this time, I had several favorite characters — the Fly, the Shield, and a newcomer named Darkling.
Darkling didn’t really get an origin — she just kind of showed up one day (Mighty Crusaders # 3) and quickly joined the team. She seemed to have some mystical connections but all of her powers seemed centered around her cloak, which allowed her to trap people in its folds and then teleport them elsewhere.
Years later, I followed the Archie heroes through their revivals at DC (first as Impact and then, later, as the Red Circle again) and at Archie itself (the New Crusaders). Darkling was only a factor in the New Crusaders period and it was unclear during that time if she was the same Darkling from the 1980s or a relative or someone using the same identity. This time around, she was able to control shadows and was far more emo than she’d been back in her original incarnation.
Recently, Archie has been reviving their heroes in a series of digest appearances and one-shots. Darkling has just gotten one of her own — written by Sarah Kuhn and drawn by Carola Borelli. In this adventure, we see Darkling getting a reboot. She’s Darla Lang (as she was during the New Crusaders period) and she’s now a student at Ivy Hollow University. Reference is made to her being somehow cursed by the cloak she always wears but, again, we don’t get a real origin explaining the cloak’s past or how Darla came to wear it or even why it’s a curse. Darla is busy trying to find a way to end her curse and she’s also aware that a number of students have gone missing as of late — when a podcaster named Phoebe Hayashi comes to Darla asking for her help in solving the mystery, Darla wrongly assumes that Phoebe has figured out that Darla has powers provided by the cloak. As a result, when a tentacled monster appears out of a strange portal, Darla saves Phoebe and outs herself as a magic user. Phoebe provides Darla with her codename, suggesting Darkling, and the duo uncovers the truth about who’s kidnapping the other students — and along the way, Darkling gets the costume that she’s wearing on the cover. It’s a variation on the outfit she wore back in the 1980s, by the way. Power-wise, Darla is still able to teleport people via her cloak but she’s also able to perform actual magic spells, as well.
The story is quite good — it’s the kind of all-ages affair that the more modern Archie material reads as and the friendship between Darla and Phoebe feels believable. I wish they’d provided more explanation about Darla’s past but maybe that’ll come if there’s a sequel to this story. The art was great — the covers are definitely sexier than the interior depictions of Darla. It’s hard not to notice that Darkling is buxom and posed provoctively on most of the variant covers whereas in the book itself, she’s much more covered up in terms of clothing. Borelli really excels on facial expressions.
I’d love to see a limited series from this creative team, delving into Darkling’s origins, her connection to the cloak, and maybe how she meets up with the Crusaders. I’m assuming this is a totally new continuity, though I suppose it could be retrofitted to be before her other appearances.
Recommended!
Barry Reese - Writer of Badass heroes 