Luke Cage IS the New Warriors.
New AVENGERS. Rage was in the NEW WARRIORS (and Avengers).
I don't usually do "wish list rosters" because in the end, any roster is really only as good as it's writer, and the writer is only as good as the reader believes they are. Bendis can make a gold roster look boring, mundane, and trivial, while Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning can have a book that exclusively stars Misty Knight and Paladin and make it compelling.
But since it's that time of the year again when everyone does ideal rosters, may as well get it in. First I'll start out with the rosters of books I am currently (as of this post at least) still reading.
SECRET AVENGERS:
Steve Rogers
Beast
Moon Knight
War Machine
Valkyrie
Ant-Man
Blue Marvel
All I've really done is added Blue Marvel as a 7th member of the team, since that spot has usually always fluctuated (it has been filled by Nova and Prince Of Orphans). This is naturally Kevin Grevioux's character from ADAM: LEGEND OF THE BLUE MARVEL as well as a strip in AGE OF HEROES and likely some other anthology soon. To me, Blue Marvel is "the Sentry done right". He's a retconned in Silver Age hero who is very powerful who the world has somehow never heard of. The key differences are that his design is better, his origin is better, his power level more stable, and the reason for him being "off the grid" for so long makes perfect sense. He also wasn't as much of a "Mary Sue" as Sentry was for Paul Jenkins (Bob was magically the best friend of the Hulk, Spider-Man, the X-Men, the FF, and every Marvel hero; Blue Marvel is only friends with Namor and the Watcher). Plus, he hasn't been devolved into a maniac for a decade like Sentry was.
Blue Marvel has a good reason to be a "secretive" member, since his past involves some political ugliness committed upon him and he is still largely unknown to most people in the Marvel Universe younger than, say, their mid 40's. He also is a powerful character who could flank War Machine and Valkyrie well, as well as having military experience as a former soldier, AND brains as a scientist and college professor alongside Beast. While Blue Marvel/Adam Brashear may not be a character who can sell his own solo series, I do think he could make a solid part of a well written team book.
Hell, in a way Blue Marvel is halfway there already; since coming out of his forced retirement, he's usually avoided simple bank robbery patrols and focuses on efforts across the world. About the only mention of him outside of a Grevioux strip was in THUNDERBOLTS when they had Hyperion, who Blue Marvel apprehended in that AGE OF MARVELS strip, show up. Luke Cage seemed aware of him, at least. Given his own experiences with the civil rights era of the 60's, he might have some interesting perspective alongside Steve Rogers on things. I see the character as having a lot of potential.
AVENGERS ACADEMY:
Giant-Man/Hank Pym
Quicksilver
Tigra
Justice
Speedball
Jocasta
She-Hulk
Cadets:
Reptil
Mettle
Hazmat
Veil
Finesse
Striker
Much as with the last team, I really only added one member. Having only one female "counselor" on staff who isn't a robot (who occasionally become inert to go make binary with Ultron) seems to be a gap to fill. I don't know what Jen Walters is up to in INCREDIBLE HULKS, but she's one of few B or C list Avengers members who fits the trifecta of being female, well known, and once supported her own series. Thus, she is someone who could maybe bring in new readers if her joining the team was announced and promoted. She also has quite a perspective. She's related to and empowered by the Hulk, who has often been seen as a menace. She has embraced her powers and been a successful Avenger, Fantastic Four member and lawyer. She has also been wanted by the police for a crime she didn't commit, as well as an outlaw during the SHRA era. Plus, she is aware of the law and could be one of the few adult Avengers who could perhaps be aware of the PR cycle alongside Striker.
Firestar isn't here because she's part of the unofficial YOUNG ALLIES and in character she's stated a few times she really wants to try being a college student and cancer survivor more than being a full time heroine. Given that she's been lost in the crowd as a full time heroine I don't mind seeing something different.
In terms of the cadets, the book already has a lot of character and I didn't want to add to them so that others got lost in the shuffle. The difficulty of adding new members, though, is the premise of the book. In theory, the Academy is there to "train the heroes of tomorrow the right way". In practice, it is damage control on some of the young metahumans Norman Osborn mangled the worst, who demand the most hands on attention and training. Would a new student who has nothing to do with Osborn fit in? Would the rest of the cadets embrace or resent this newbie? I suppose it would be a story, I just am not sure these cadets have finished theirs yet.
If I HAD to come up with an interesting new member, while the new Thunderstrike (Kevin Masterson) was offered a spot on the time, I think a long forgotten character, Janet Sorenson, would fit in better. She's the mutant daughter of Equinox, a D-List Spider-Man villain from the 70's who hasn't had too many stories before the SHRA era. His powers were always being in a state of thermodynamic flux so he could generate intense heat & cold; these were due to the ever-reliable lab accident origin. His daughter, Janet, was presumably conceived afterward, although the "sliding time scale" thing might make things difficult. Equinox was empowered in 1974 and by 1994 he had a 6-10 year old daughter, which makes sense in REAL time but maybe not "Marvel time". At any rate, Janet inherited her father's powers to a degree, in that she could start fires and explosions. Her father tried to get her to stop causing destruction with physical abuse, but the Falcon later showed him the error of his ways, and referred her to the X-Men for training, which never happened. Equinox later became a member of the Initiative under both Stark and Osborn. He met with other costumed criminals seeking identities outside the U.S. by Vienna during CIVIL WAR. Given that "Marvel time" usually isn't said to be more than about 15-16 years now at best, Janet probably shouldn't be much older than about 13-14 or so. Still, she'd fit the motif of someone with an unstable power with a less than glamorous legacy that the rest of the cadets have.
As for the rest...so long as Bendis is on them, it really doesn't matter if it has Iron Fist or Thor or Spider-Woman or whatever. He'll botch it.
