The Avengers

### Team Aliases

Cap's Kooky QuartetEarth's Mightiest HeroesEarth's Mightiest Super-HeroesMighty AvengersThe World's Mightiest Crusaders

## History

The first founding members of the Avengers first banded together when Loki, the Asgardian God of Mischief, banded together with the saturians to manipulate the Hulk in order to draw his half-brother, the god of thunder Thor, into battle. Loki tricked the Hulk into batting with members of the NYPD. The Hulk's friend Rick Jones and his Teen Brigade radioed S.H.I.E.L.D. for help, with in the hour, Director Nick Fury had assembled a team of superhumans from Ant-Man & the Wasp to Captain Mar-Vell. The makeshift “Hulkbuster Squadron” of Ant-Man, Wasp, Captain Marvel, Iron Man, & Thor battled the Hulk in downtown Manhattan, holding him off until Betty Ross was able to be located and brought to calm him down.

Seeing his scheme failed and fearing Thor’s wrath, Loki resorted to direct measures and used the Saturian home ship to takeover the empire state building. The Hulkbusters plus the monster joined together to battle the God of Mischief’s attack leading to the 5 forming a super team named The Avengers by Hope Pym.

### Return of The Captain (Early 2006)

Soon after the team’s formation, The Avengers were once again contacted by Director Nicholas Fury who informed them of the discovery of Captain America’s body. Cap was quickly thawed out and in order to help him adjust to life in the current day, he was sent to live with and assist The Avengers. Captain Rogers’ return brought about more threats for the Avengers including….

### Enter The Masters of Evil ( Late 2006)

Seeing Cap’s return, Baron Heinrich Zemo formed a team to go against his great grandfather’s arch enemy known as “The Masters”. The team originally consisted of Zemo, The Black Knight, Melter, Radioactive Man, & The Executioner, & The Enchantress. Along with them was Simon Williams, a former movie star who was convinced by Zemo to undergo a form of the super soldier serum, he became the Wonder Man but later defected to the Avengers mid battle after realizing the evil of The Masters, leading to Zemo shooting and killing Williams. Wonder Man’s death lead to most of the Avengers quitting and Avengers Mansion being taken back by Tony Stark. The only remaining member was Captain America who soon after held a membership drive.

### The Kooky Crusaders (2007-2008)

Left as the last member of the Avengers, Steve Rogers began recruiting members to continue the team with. Of those selected by The Cap where:

Hawkeye/ Clint Barton: Expert marksman and wielder of trick arrows, Clint Barton fought Iron Man with Black Widow but sought redemption.

Black Widow/ Natasha Romanov: Trained acrobat and a graduate of the red room, Fought Iron Man with partner Clint Barton and seeks to redeem the

Quicksilver/ Pietro Maximoff & the Scarlet Witch/ Wanda Maximoff: Children of Magneto. They had previously been coerced into joining the Brotherhood of Mutants by Magneto, and wanted to change course.

Falcon/ Sam Wilson: Former gang member who joined SHIELD at the behest of Cap and a trained fighter with an exoskeleton that allows flight. Seeks to impress his idol.

Cap acted as the team leader and had a pretty successful team all things considered, They were able to dispatch the newly renamed Masters of Evil and their Power Man. Later people such as the Black Knight, Black Panther, Hercules, & lost X-Man Beast joined Cap’s team and would last about a year as the main team.

#### Crimson Cowl’s Crusade (2009)

In his time away from the Avengers, Tony Stark became obsessed with some how resurrecting Wonder Man, Stark took personal responsibility for his death believing Zemo's bullet was originally for him. Failing at every turn, Stark asked former Ant-Man Hank Pym for help and was given carte blance with all of Pym's technology. While trying to bring Wonder Man back, Tony accidentally activated Pym's old Ultron robot, an artificial intelligence and helper to Hank back in the day. Over the years Ultron had grown bitter seeing Pym choose his family over him, and Ultron became obsessed with earning his "father's" love and somehow was convinced he needed to take over the Earth to do so. Ultron broke out the Masters from prison and attacked the Avengers Mansion resulting in the death of Edwin Jarvis. Javis' death was a huge blow to Tony Stark and many other Avengers both formerly and presently. This lead to the rejoining of the original Avengers and the Cap's new Avengers. With the help of Hank Pym the Avengers were able to defeat Ultron and rescue the Vision, a robot Ultron created to assist in the defeat of the Avengers with brainwaves based off of Simon Williams'.

### East and West (2009-2012)

With the Avengers finally reunited, the team had way too many members to all live in the Avengers Mansion. A grieving Tony Stark present his idea for the East and West Coast Avengers. Half of the Avengers would move to the West Coast and assist there while the other half stays in New York and they all come together when bigger threats emerge. To see the rest of the West Coasst Avengers' history check out their page (insert here).

#### Government Woes (2009)

Through the two years with Cap as the team leader, the Avengers formed a closer and closer relationship with the government having Cap as the chairman of the group they basically were a Shield team and the Avengers computer even had direct access to certain US government and military networks, this caused the NSC to take a more active position with the group sending NSC agent Henry Peter Gyrich to be a liaison between the two. Gyrich instituted certain policies to the East Coast Avengers that tightened admission requirements and attempted to force the team members to register their identities with the government. Cap became fed up with the man’s actions and dropped the team’s relationship with the NSC and the America from his name, becoming the Nomad for a while before Falcon convinced him to go back to the Captain moniker.

### Galactic Storm

When war broke out between the alien empires of the Shi'ar and Kree (with Skrull meddling), Earth became a key point of conflict. A warp-gate in the Sol system was crucial for both sides in traveling the great interstellar distances, but was having a destabilizing effect on the sun. The Avengers sent teams to Hala and Chandilar in attempts to stabilize the diplomatic situation. After the Kree Supreme Intelligence detonated a Nega-Bomb, killing most of the Kree (in order to jump-start the survivors' evolutionary processes), the Avengers were divided on how to respond. Several Avengers led by Iron Man (Black Knight, Vision, Hercules, Sersi, and Thor) chose to execute the Intelligence for its act of genocide. This violation of the Avengers' "no-killing" rule would put these Avengers in defiance of Captain America and cause a significant rift in the team for some time

## Trivia and Notes

### Trivia

* There are two spin-off teams of the Justice League: Dark Justice, which takes care of mystical and magical threats; and The Team, that goes on covert ops the Justice League can't do. The members of these teams aren't recognized by ARGUS as members of the Justice League.
* They (mainly the founders) are considered the "third generation of costumed vigilantes", operating from the 2000s to the present.
* No real ritual or ceremony exists after a hero accepts the invitation to join the Justice League. Sometime later when people can be rounded up, there might be a little welcoming party. Eventually they'll get a field trainer that will give them a tour of JL facilities and mentor them through their first few monitor duty shifts, responses, and missions.
* Batman wasn't officially voted out from the Justice League, but he no longer comes to the meetings.
* If a member of the League dies, their number can be taken by a new replacement.
* Any Leaguer who is also a member of the Outsiders is not recognized by ARGUS. They don't recognize Oracle's membership either, because no one has ever seen her in person. Outsiders don't have permission to use Justice League facilities, but Leaguers have allowed them to do so.

### Notes

* The hero Green Arrow sponsored to join the League in 2017 was originally Cerberus, but following the reboot, Hank Henderson was erased from Earth-27's continuity.
* Current speculation of the League's next recruits include Freedom Beast, Aztek, and Equinox.

## Links and References

* Appearances of Justice League
* Team Gallery: Justice League
* Membership of Justice League

1. ↑ The Justice League Dilemma