Marauders

The Marauders refers to one of two teams of fictional characters appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The original Marauders team included mutant warriors and assassins employed by the X-Men's enemy Mister Sinister, a mad scientist villain often intent on creating a perfect race of superhumans. At different times, the Marauders have been tasked with Sinister to perform kidnappings, assassinations, mass murder, or to simply fight Sinister's enemies. At different times, Marauders have been killed in combat, but often Mr. Sinister later uses his cloning technology to re-create them. This team of Marauders has appeared in many different stories of the X-Men franchise, as well as stories featuring other Marvel Comics heroes. In 2019, the Dawn of X event involved the X-Men and many allies and enemies creating a new all-mutant country on the living island Krakoa. Teleport gates that only work for mutants were then created at various points on Earth, allowing any mutant who wished to join the new community to instantly do so. Kitty Pryde then formed a new team of "Marauders" to transport mutants to Krakoa who lived in countries that did not recognize the sovereignty of the mutant nation and/or obstructed the local teleport gates leading to the island. This team also works to protect mutant travelers and refugees from threats. The team's series Marauders debuted in 2019. Publication history The first Marauders team debuted in The Uncanny X-Men #210 (Oct. 1986), during a crossover called the "Mutant Massacre" where the team were sent to slaughter a community of sewer-dwelling mutants called Morlocks. This issue introduced the characters Arclight, Harpoon, Malice, Scalphunter, Scrambler, and Riptide. With the exception of Malice, these characters only appeared in issue #210 as figures in silhouette, but then made their full debut in the following issue The Uncanny X-Men #211. Two other Marauders known as Blockbuster and Prism made their first appearance in a later chapter of the "Mutant Massacre" featured in X-Factor #10. The original Marauders team also included the villains Sabretooth and Vertigo, but each had actually been introduced into comics years earlier, while the rest of the Marauders were created for the "Mutant Massacre" story by writer Chris Claremont and artist John Romita Jr.