The final entry in our series on the Wanderers looks at the clone resurrection version of Elvo.
Elvar's Look and Powers
Where his original look wasn't bad, I have always thought the clone version--notwithstanding the thigh high boots--was an improvement. For one, the original yellow and purple color scheme was pretty garish. It's difficult to pull that off. Green and black are much a better combo.
Second--and I realize mileage will vary here--I liked the more elf-like look given Elvar. I've got to believe that the morphological affinity of "Elvo" with "elf" was part of the inspiration. Elvar combines the tropes of both the snarky elf and the agile sword wielding elf in one character. The former trope is illustrated by other examples like Marvel's villainous Elf with a Gun (introduced in July 1975).
The agility and swordsmanship combo was, of course, well established in fantasy literature. Interestingly, Elvar's uniting of the elvan swordsman with superhero tropes was aped by Marvel's Excalibur version of Nightcrawler who, seemed to be wielding a saber every time you turned around. I don't recall that being a part of Nightcrawler's basic depiction prior to Excalibur. The basic chronology here makes me suspect that Elvar may have inspired the changes in Kurt Wagner. (However, as an admittedly arm's-length reader of both the X-Men and the Excalibur, I realize I may just be ignorant of "the elf's" backstory. Perhaps some well-versed X-fan can clarify the situation for us?)
Does he look like a refugee from the Dark Crystal? Sure, but I submit that's still better than looking like a guy with a yellow beach bucket on his head.
The power upgrade made Elvar a bigger asset to the team and just a more interesting character generally. First, he got enhanced agility. Second there seem to have been some changes in regards to the energy properties of his sword. As noted in the post on Elvo, however, there's inconsistent information about the precise parameters of those changes.
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