Origin

Night Shift is a group of supernaturally oriented villains originally organized by the Shroud. The Shroud's true purpose for the group is to combat evil that occurs during the night hours, sleazy underworld crime figures in particular. The Shroud was an actual crime-fighter who wanted the public and the criminal underworld to think he was a crime-lord. This was an elaborate charade so he could attack the underworld from within. The Shroud organized the Night Shift as his allies in pursuit of this strategy.

The original group consisted of: Dansen Macabre, Tatterdemalion, Tick-Tock, Gypsy Moth, Digger, Needle, Brothers Grimm, and the Werewolf, Jack Russell. The Misfit would later join the group. None of the members knew that the Shroud was an actual crimefighter except Jack Russell.

Creation

The Night Shift was created by Mark Gruenwald and Tom Morgan in 1987 and first appeared in Captain America # 330.

Story Arcs

Night Shift vs The Avengers

Two of the more important actions came when they assisted Captain America against Dr. Malus and the Power Broker, whose experiments flooded the sewers in Los Angeles with rejected mutations from the Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation.

The second occurred when the Shroud was absent, and Dansen Macabre ordered an attack against the West Coast Avengers in retaliation for the arrest of Digger. The attack was unsuccessful but Night Shift escaped with the Shroud's assistance. Their headquarters is a haunted estate in the Santa Monica Mountains called the Tower of Shadows.

Moon Knight was advised to come to the Tower of Shadows in Santa Monica by Jack Russel to get information he wanted on the Zodiac member, Van Lunt. Moon Knight encountered various booby traps before he engaged the Shroud in battle. This was a test, an initiation rite for Moon Knight. The Shroud wanted Moon Knight to take his place as leader, but he declined because he recently joined the Avengers.

The Night Shift members discovered that the Shroud was an actual crimefighter and dumped him from the group. A new Hangman would take over as leader of the Night Shift, and all the current members were supernaturally augmented by the powerful demon, Satannish in exchange for their souls. Satannish was conjured up during a national televised fight between the West Coast Avengers and the Night Shift. All the Night Shift members were getting stronger after Satannish appeared. The Scarlet Witch and Dr. Strange told the Night Shift that the Hangman offered their souls to the demon so he can become a movie star. The Night Shift members agreed to give up their demon-given energies to power up the West Coast Avengers. The Night Shift decided to help the Avengers and they attacked Satannish together. Satannish was forced to leave the earthly plane and all members of the Night Shift lost their augmented abilities.

The Blazing Skull confronts a Night Shift member named Digger and wanted him to answer some questions. A fight ensues and the Blazing Skull knocks out Digger. Captain America intervenes and wants to talk to the Blazing Skull because he thinks he is connected to the Red Skull. Some Night Shift members arrived which included Needle, Misfit and the Brothers Grimm. They interrupt their fight and take on both men for messing with Digger. However, the Shifties are taken down by Captain America and the Blazing Skull. Blazing Skull revealed to Captain America that he was an occult investigator and was working for Dr. Druid. He was sent to check out the Night Shift characters after Druid heard they had some recent supernatural dealings.

Marvel Zombies

During Norman Osborn’s dark reign, most of the members of The Night Shift fell under The Hood’s criminal network. From secure HAMMER files, Hood learned of a multiversal zombie plague which his master, Dormammu wanted. Because he expected “spooky stuff,” he ordered Dansen Macabre to prepare her team to meet with the sorcerer, Black Talon, to discuss terms. The team this time only consisted of Digger, Tatterdemalion, Needle, and Dansen.

During their meeting with Talon, Hood sensed The Midnight Sons, working for ARMOR, on the trail of the zombie plague, were approaching them. The Night Shift ambushed them but lost the upper hand rather quickly. After being beaten pretty good, the Night Shift was infected by the zombie plague after it evolved to go airborne thanks to Morbius’ failed vaccine. Sensing a more powerful magic user in Jennifer Kale, Dormammu made a deal with her. She would access his dark magic to confuse the hivemind of the virus before trapping it in a receptacle, which in this case was Simon Garth. This includes pulling the virus from the Night Shift members, curing them.

They would then teleport away with The Hood.

Superior Spider’s Men

While holding up a city bus in New York City, the Night Shift faced off with Doctor Octopus, who was currently active as the Superior Octopus. This time the team consisted of Dansen, Digger, Skein, the Brothers Grimm, and newcomer Waxman. Rather than lock them up, Otto decided to offer them a job. Due to his interests in business and science, he was not always able to patrol the streets and offered the Night Shift the chance to turn over a new leaf. They agreed and started working for Otto, who had eventually returned to his Spider-Man identity.

They would go on to back Otto up when former Galactus host, Terrax, showed up to take over the world, and they helped him clean up collateral damage and look for survivors in the wake of his destruction. Unfortunately, they lost their jobs when Otto made a deal with Mephisto to return to his original body without the memories he shared with Spider-Man affecting his moral compass.

The Offer’s Security Team

The name would be co-opted briefly by a mercenary security team hired by The Offer to protect him from the seedier elements of the criminal underbelly. This team consisted of Bushwacker, Finesse, Doughboy, and Eel.

They met their match when The Offer was targeted by a new Punisher, aka Joe Garrison. He was a former SHIELD operative nicknamed the Gravedigger of SHIELD. He almost instinctively knew how to counter each mercenary, including Finesse whose powers are to counter incoming attack.

Shroud’s Revenge

During a moment of identity crisis, The Shroud sought to prove himself a hero once again. After seeing Moon Knight on his own redemption arc, he decided to pattern himself after his old friend. The first goons he went after was his old team The Night Shift, specifically Waxman, Digger, and Tatterdemalion. He was especially vicious, burning Tatter, melting Waxman, and dropping Digger from a building.

Other Versions

L.A. Kingpin

The classic roster of The Night Shift was recruited by Snapdragon in Moon Knight (2011) # 3 by Brian Michael Bendis. Snapdragon needed them to go after Moon Knight, who had set himself up on the West Coast and was fighting against the criminal network of Count Nefaria, the L.A. Kingpin. When they failed, Count Nefaria killed them, burning them to ash. They returned from the dead inexplicably after that series ended, as did another character, calling the canon of the series into question.