Barricade

A creature of the early 1990s independent comics boom, Barricade burst onto the scene in 1994's Edge #1, brought to life by the formidable pairing of writer Steven D. Grant and legendary artist Gil Kane for Malibu Comics. Though their catalog footprint is compact, the pedigree of that debut — Kane's kinetic linework, Grant's sharp storytelling — gives Barricade an immediate credibility that transcends raw issue count. Running through the mid-nineties alongside a colorful cast that includes Edge, Mr. Ultimate, and the memorably named Phase Shifter and Filth, this character is a genuine artifact of Malibu's ambitious, anything-goes era of superhero publishing, well worth seeking out by collectors with a taste for the road less traveled.