The Return of Milestone

Static - co-created by Dwayne McDuffie, the fan favorite writer of DC's top-selling "Justice League of America" - will be joining "Teen Titans" as an active team member.

The supercharged hero is arguably the former DC imprint's most recognizable character thanks in large part to the animated series, "Static Shock," that ran for four seasons from 2000 to 2004.

Late Saturday night, McDuffie, one of Milestone's co-founders, also confirmed for CBR News that two of his most popular creations will appear in his next arc of "Justice League of America," beginning in #27.

"You will definitely see Icon and you'll definitely see Hardware," revealed McDuffie. "And the Justice League will be going up against Milestone's Shadow Cabinet too."

Icon is an ageless alien stranded on Earth, who possesses the abilities of superstrength, superspeed and flight while Hardware, is an alias for Curt Metcalf, an inventor who battles crime with his high-tech gadgets.

Along with "Static" and "Blood Syndicate," "Icon" and "Hardware," were amongst Milestone's first launch of titles in 1993.

Shadow Cabinet has been dubbed "the JLA as run by the CIA."

As for Static, McDuffie said, "He's a 15-year old fanboy, who has ended up with superpowers. And he has decided to be a superhero because that's what you do when you get superpowers. He's just like any of us if we got superpowers."

"And despite everybody asking him all the time," quipped McDuffie, "he's not related to Black Lightning."

Most of Milestone's heroes are based in the fictional Midwestern city of Dakota.

A city, according to McDuffie, that has always been planted firmly in DCU.

That being said, McDuffie couldn't say how the two worlds eventually collide in terms of DCU continuity, but did say that question would be answered in the months ahead.

"There is something a lot more complicated going on from the point of view of all the characters in the DC Universe," said McDuffie. "The city of Dakota has always been there. There's something else going on but that won't play out for quite sometime."

He did confirm the 'complicated something' has nothing to do with Grant Morrison's "Final Crisis."

McDuffie said he is thrilled the two companies were able to make this announcement today.

"We're really excited to see it happening. These are great characters. I think we found a way to make them a good fit in the DC Universe. It's a good fit for both companies and for both sets of characters and I think the fans are going to be really pleased."

He also confirmed DC and Milestone had been talking about this deal for 'about a year.'

"Both sides hoped we could pull it off," said McDuffie. "There is a lot of complicated stuff both contractually and creatively. We had to come up with stuff that made sense to both sides but we finally did.

"And it really is going to be great for us to have our characters be in books that are so well known and alongside Superman, Batman, etc. And we are going to add a bunch of exciting, new, young characters to the DCU. So everybody wins."