<span class="SFPTagline"> From SCIFIPEDIA </span>

The Defenders is a fictional comic book superhero team owned by Marvel Comics. They are unusual in that their original members didn’t really want to be a team. Still, their founder Doctor Strange would pull them together for crisis after crisis, until they had their own team identity.

The original non-members of the non-team was Doctor Strange, the Incredible Hulk, and the Sub-Mariner. They were soon joined by the Silver Surfer. They were all incredibly powerful characters, all of whom would not exactly be likely members of a superhero team. The Defenders would eventually come to acknowledge their own team existence. Soon, other core group members such as Valkyrie and Nighthawk would join. Later members such as Hellcat, Son of Satan, and Gargoyle would also join the core team. Members would come and go every issue, some would be “Defenders” for just an issue or two, and the entire core team was almost never present. You really never knew who would be in one story or another. During a summer crossover storyline, Hawkeye was a Defender and took arms against his former Avenger team mates.

The Defenders began in the giant-size Marvel Feature #1 (December, 1971), written by Roy Thomas with art by Ross Andru. The group went through many changes for 125 issues. The group, particularly the original four members, has re-united from time to time for story arcs in one comic or another. There has also been mini-series, with many different permutations of the team.