I have something of a niche blog. It’s very geek-oriented, with a lot of talk about comic books. There’s a big audience for that on the Internet. But there’s probably a much smaller audience who tune in specifically for my personal take on comics and geekiness. Part of me wants to do a more general type of site, that appeals to a lot of people, but part of me also wants to focus on topics that interest me the most.

Hence this post about a single, tiny appearance of one of the Slingers!

Ricochet has returned to comics as a member of the Avengers Academy, according to a single panel in the latest issue.

He's down in the corner playing tug-of-war

For those of you who don’t know, The Slingers was a very short-lived Marvel comic book in the mid-90s, but it was one of my favorites of all time. It was my favorite comic after the cancellation of the Green Goblin series, and I bought and read every one of Slingers’ dozen or so issues. It was about a team of young heroes using a bunch of discarded Spider-Man identities. Long story. They were Prodigy, Dusk, Hornet and Ricochet, and their comic was just plain fun.

Once The Slingers was cancelled, the characters just faded into comic book limbo, making sporadic appearances here and there. Hornet got killed by Wolverine, Dusk was  a victim of the Puppetmaster in the Ms. Marvel comic (now cancelled) and Prodigy actually went on to become a rather important figure in Marvel’s Civil War and the Initiative. He had a starring role in the recent Youth in Revolt tie-in to Fear Itself. So Prodigy is going places. He even appeared in the video game Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2!

Ricochet, the ostensible star of The Slingers, had a brief appearance as a member of the Loners, a series that spun out of Runaways, about former 90s teen heroes who were trying to give up the life. I liked the Loners mini-series, and Runaways cameo, even though that was the start of turning Phil Urich into a super-villain. Alas. Anyway, it seems Ricochet is still in costume because he’s randomly been added to the cast of Avengers Academy

For those of you who might be Slingers fans, this is pretty cool news.