The Avengers Roster: I
By Sean McQuaid
Complete descriptions of each individual's affiliation
with the Avengers are detailed below.
Iceman (Robert L. "Bobby"
Drake):
Longtime ally of the Avengers; has declined offers of Avengers
membership; founding member of the X-Men; former founding member of Champions
and X-Factor; former member of Defenders. Iceman is a mutant adventurer who has
repeatedly encountered the Avengers over the years, both alone and as a founding
member of the X-Men and the Champions; his powers enable him to create freezing
temperatures in his surroundings at will, and to produce ice and snow, the
configuration and quantity of which he mentally determines. More recently, he
has developed the ability to convert his own body to ice and reshape it at will;
he can also merge with and travel through water, and can even reintegrate his
body after it has been vaporized. He has declined offers of Avengers membership
but remains on good terms with the team. He is currently an active member of the
X-Men.
Invisible Girl (Susan Storm
Richards): See Invisible
Woman
First alias employed by Susan Storm (later Susan Richards) in the early years of
her career as a costumed adventurer. She later changed her alias to Invisible
Woman, wanting a more mature title. As the Invisible Woman, she served briefly
with the Avengers.
Invisible Woman (Susan Storm
Richards):
Former member of the Avengers (thirty-second recruit, resigned); active founding
member of the Fantastic Four. As a founding member of the famous team of
adventurers called the Fantastic Four, the Invisible Woman (originally known as
the Invisible Girl) was a longtime friend and ally of the Avengers for many
years before joining their ranks. As her alias implies, she can render herself
and other matter invisible, and can also generate invisible mental force. When
she and her husband, FF leader Mr. Fantastic, took a leave of absence from their
team to spend more time with their son, Franklin, the child was abducted during
the demonic invasion of Manhattan known as Inferno. Captain America led them and
other heroes in averting the crisis and rescuing Franklin, and then invited them
to join his new Avengers team (the team's eastern roster had temporarily
disbanded, so they were sorely in need of recruits). Convinced that they could
no longer hide from their lives as adventurers, the couple accepted Captain
America's offer but served only a very brief membership before returning to the
Fantastic Four (partly because Mister Fantastic challenged Captain America's
leadership too frequently). They did, however, agree to serve with the team as
reservists of sorts for a time. More recently, Invisible Woman, Mister Fantastic
and their fellow Fantastic Four founder Thing all declined further formal
participation in the Avengers, deciding to concentrate more fully on their work
with the Fantastic Four; however, while they may no longer be Avengers in their
own right, the Fantastic Four stand ready to assist the Avengers whenever they
are truly needed.
Iron Man (Anthony Edward
"Tony" Stark):
Active founding member and past chairman of the Avengers; former founding member
of Force Works (expelled); former informal associate of the Defenders; former
participant in the Iron Legion. A millionaire socialite and genius inventor who
secretly leads a double life as the high-tech armored adventurer Iron Man
(supposedly Stark's bodyguard), Tony Stark has been a vital part of the Avengers
in both his identities. As Iron Man, he helped found the team and continues to
participate in the group today. As Tony Stark, he donated his family home to
serve as the group's original headquarters (Avengers Mansion), invented or
serviced much of the team's specialized equipment, financed the team's early
operations, and later established the Maria Stark Foundation to fund the
Avengers in perpetuity. As such, Stark has been one of the team's most
invaluable assets, though he has also been one of their most troubled and
sometimes disruptive members over the years.
After helping to found the group, Iron Man served
with the Avengers until he and the other founding members took an indefinite
leave of absence early in the team's history (though he continued to act as a
financial backer to the group in his dual identity as Tony Stark). He served as
a sort of reservist on an irregular basis thereafter, but returned to active
membership during the Kree-Skrull War, later serving a term as the group's third
full-time chairman (a post he was appointed to by the previous chairman, Thor).
Stark went on indefinite leave again while
struggling to control his alcoholism, during which time he allowed his friend
and confidant Jim Rhodes to replace him, both as Iron Man and as a member of the
Avengers. Stark eventually returned to sobriety and to active Avengers duty as a
member of the team's new western roster, but he was later expelled after he
waged a vigilante campaign to seek and destroy any and all duplications of his
Iron Man armor technology. These "Armor Wars" concluded with Stark
faking Iron Man's death in battle, and then returning to activity under the
pretense of having hired a new Iron Man to replace the original.
Stark rejoined the Avengers as the "new"
Iron Man, but most of his teammates were not fooled and he soon revealed his
true identity to them. The other Avengers forgave the deception, and even
elected him to a short-lived stint as chairman of the team's western roster;
however, he continued to be an increasingly disruptive presence within the
Avengers' ranks, causing a deep ethical rift and lasting tension in the group
during the "Galactic Storm" mission, when he led a team of renegade
Avengers in trying to execute the Supreme Intelligence for its crimes of
interplanetary genocide. Shortly thereafter, Stark faked his own death again
(this time as Tony Stark) when he had himself placed in suspended animation
while his physicians worked to cure him of a degenerative neurological
condition. During his absence, he was again replaced as Iron Man by Rhodes.
Stark eventually revived successfully, but the revelation of his latest hoax was
the final straw that alienated many of the Avengers, even Rhodes.
Iron Man continued to serve with the group
occasionally as a reservist of sorts, and disrupted the team once more when he
attended a joint membership hearing to decide the fate of the group's faltering
West Coast division. Bitterly condemning the Avengers' lack of support for their
western roster, Iron Man led most of its remaining active members in resigning
from the Avengers altogether and forming a new team called Force Works, financed
by Tony Stark. Soon, though, Iron Man resigned from that team, too, due to his
frequently insubordinate attitude toward team leader Scarlet Witch.
Iron Man attempted to reconcile with the Avengers,
with some success, but the situation took a shocking turn during the crisis
known as "The Crossing", when Stark was exposed as the murderer of
Avengers associates Rita DeMara (alias Yellowjacket [II]) and Marilla (Luna
Maximoff's nanny), a crime for which he tried to frame Hawkeye. Stark was also
exposed as the party responsible for stealing much of the Wasp's fortune, and
murdered Force Works publicist Amanda Chaney while trying to conceal his crimes.
When the Avengers confronted Stark regarding these events, they learned he had
supposedly been under the mental influence of their old enemy Kang for years,
and that Stark had gradually gone mad and fallen under Kang's near-complete
control; in the end, though, Stark turned against Kang to save the Avengers,
sacrificing his life in the process. Much later, the Avengers learned that
"The Crossing" had actually been an elaborate hoax staged by Immortus
(disguised as Kang) as a means to demoralize and disorient the Avengers, and
that Iron Man had only been under the villain's mental influence for a matter of
months (a mental influence that began during the Galactic Storm mission, and was
a contributing factor in Iron Man's increasingly erratic and hostile behaviour
up until his death).
During their conflict with the Immortus-controlled
Iron Man, the Avengers had gone back in time to find a new Iron Man of their
own, one untouched by the mental manipulations of "Kang", and
recruited a teenage Tony Stark from an alternate timeline. With the Avengers'
help, the teenage Stark was outfitted and trained as a new Iron Man, helping to
resolve the "Crossing" crisis and later moving into Avengers Mansion,
aiding the team in their adventures as an honorary member of sorts. Teen Tony's
career as "Iron Boy" proved short-lived, however, when he was one of
the many Avengers lost and presumed dead in the battle with the supremely
powerful psychic monster known as Onslaught. In actuality, they all survived,
but were displaced into an alternate reality unwittingly created by the
near-omnipotent mutant child Franklin Richards when he subconsciously used his
powers to save the heroes. When the Avengers finally returned to Earth, it was
the benevolent adult Tony Stark of old who returned with them rather than the
teenage version. Apparently, Richards instinctively tried to restore Iron Man to
normal when he brought him back to his proper universe, merging the late adult
Tony with teen Tony and producing an Iron Man who seems to be the original adult
Iron Man in both mind and body.
Cleared of any wrongdoing in the Crossing case,
Iron Man participated in the post-Onslaught reorganization of the Avengers and
has been a mostly active member since then, though he has occasionally taken
further leaves of absence for health problems or other personal reasons. He
served briefly as deputy leader under chairman Captain America before stepping
down from the post due to time constraints, and was replaced in that capacity by
Scarlet Witch. Stark has rebuilt his friendships with most of his Avengers
teammates, including Rhodes, who has since retired from adventuring himself.
There have also been two significant new
developments in terms of Stark's Avengers associations: honorary Avengers member
Jocasta, originally a sentient robot, recently became a disembodied computer
intelligence and served as Tony Stark's personal assistant after he freed her
from enslavement at the hands of criminal technologist Madame Menace (she has
since left Stark's service after procuring a new android body of her own); and
the Avengers have recently recruited into their ranks the Jack of Hearts, a
costumed adventurer whom Iron Man had mentored for a short time when Jack was
starting out as a superhero.
Iron Man [V] (James "Rhodey"
Rhodes): See Rhodes,
Jim
Identity assumed for two extended periods by James Rhodes when he twice took
over the Iron Man role from his friend and employer, Tony Stark, the original
Iron Man. Rhodes later adopted an armored identity of his own as War Machine,
but has since abandoned that guise, too. Rhodes is currently retired from
adventuring, but has served with the Avengers as both Iron Man and War Machine
in the past. Rhodes was the fourth of the various "substitutes" who
have assumed Stark's Iron Man guise over the years, but he was the first and
only alternate Iron Man to play the role on a long-term basis, and the first to
join the Avengers (the only other Iron Man who ever joined the Avengers apart
from Stark and Rhodes was the teenage Tony Stark of an alternate timeline who
briefly served as an honorary Avenger).
Iron Man [IX] (the teenaged Tony
Stark of an alternate timeline): See Iron
Man
Former honorary member of the Avengers, now non-existent. When Immortus
(disguised as Kang) mind-controlled Avengers founder Iron Man into turning
against the Avengers during the crisis known as "The Crossing", the
Avengers went back in time to find a new Iron Man of their own, one untouched by
the supposedly longtime mental manipulations of "Kang". To this end,
they recruited a teenage Tony Stark from an alternate timeline. With the
Avengers' help, the teenage Stark was outfitted and trained as a new Iron Man,
helping to resolve the "Crossing" crisis and later moving into
Avengers Mansion, aiding the team in their adventures as an honorary member of
sorts. Teen Tony's career as "Iron Boy" proved short-lived, however,
when he was one of the many Avengers lost and presumed dead in the battle with
the supremely powerful psychic monster known as Onslaught. In actuality, they
all survived, but were displaced into an alternate reality unwittingly created
by the near-omnipotent mutant child Franklin Richards when he subconsciously
used his powers to save the heroes. When the Avengers finally returned to Earth,
it was the benevolent adult Tony Stark of old who returned with them rather than
the teenage version. Apparently, Richards instinctively tried to restore Iron
Man to normal when he brought him back to his proper universe, merging the late
adult Tony with teen Tony and producing an Iron Man who seems to be the original
adult Iron Man in both mind and body. Teen Tony and the body of the slain adult
Tony both disappeared without a trace, apparently absorbed into or otherwise
eliminated by the resurrection of the adult Tony Stark.
Last updated by Sean McQuaid on March 2, 2002.
Avengers and all related characters copyright 2002 Marvel Entertainment
Group, Inc. All text in this document copyright Sean McQuaid, 2002.