A Few Thoughts on the Squadron Supreme

One of the first comics I remember reading was an issue of Avengers that was the conclusion of a 2-part story, and was entitled "Brain-child to the Dark Tower Came" (that's always struck me as a goofy title, but I suppose they can't all be "A Clash of Titans!" or "When Worlds Collide!"). I could tell it was continued from a previous issue because of the little bit of recapping near the start, but it'd be years before I'd find a copy of # 85 so that I could read it for myself. It didn't really matter, though, as the action in this issue was more than enough to hold my interest once I got past the preamble.

I can't remember whether or not I'd read a Justice League of America story prior to getting this Avengers issue or not, though certainly by the time I'd read # 86 so many times that its cover was coming loose, I had. The reason I wonder such an odd thing is because it featured the Avengers teaming up with a little known team by the name of the Squadron Supreme, who, as you'll soon see, had a very definite and unmistakable tie to the JLA. I didn't know it at the time, but this was, sort of, the fourth appearance of that group. Obviously the preceding issue, which featured the start of this story, was their third foray into the four colour format. But what I didn't discover until many years later was that the same group of characters had appeared about a year earlier, in Avengers #s 70 and 71, but they were called the Squadron Sinister then. Those others were in fact a different group of men, with the same powers and costumed identities, but villains where the Squadron Supreme were heroes. Confused yet? You should be!

Here's how it all went down. In trying to think of foes for the Avengers to fight in a high-stakes, real life chess match in issues 70 and 71, writer Roy Thomas decided to create a group based on his fan favourite DC superhero team, the JLA. Roy was working for Marvel Comics at this point in his career and had no opportunity to actually interact with the Justice League, but within the Avengers title he thought he could at least tip his hat in their general direction, albeit in the form of a villainous team. I'm sure part of the reasoning must've been that, were he to cast them as heroes, there'd be less reason for the two superteams to fight, and also more chance of DC suing or otherwise taking action to protest this rip-off of their intellectual property.

And so Thomas created four new villains: Hyperion, the sole survivor from a subatomic world, with virtually the same powers as a certain Last Son of Krypton; Nighthawk, an acrobatic mortal with exceptional strategic prowess and an array of handy dandy gadgets, ala Batman; a super-speedster named the Whizzer who was clearly based on DC's Flash, although Marvel already had its own version in Quicksilver; and finally Dr Spectrum, wielder of a power prism with which he could make his thoughts reality, just like Green Lantern could do with his emerald ring. So there we had a mini-JLA, with four of the mainstays transformed, renamed, and turned bad. And much fighting ensued! The good guys won the day, and the Squadron Sinister faded away into obscurity again.

Which brings us back to Avengers # 86. The first part of the story, which happened in # 85, had the Avengers travelling between dimensions, trying to get back home after being hi-jacked to Arkon's world in # 84 (isn't comic continuity great?), and wouldn't you know that they arrive on what looks like Earth, only to find that their headquarters are occupied by Hyperion, Nighthawk, the Whizzer and Dr Spectrum, among other costumed characters. Sure that they've landed in a nest of vipers, the Avengers attack! Finally it becomes clear this isn't the same group they fought previously, and calmer heads prevail. It turns out that this group, completely unrelated to the previous one, are a team of heroes in this dimension, just like the Avengers are in theirs (and the JLA are in theirs, although that wasn't mentioned, of course). Having finished with the obligatory fight, the heroes can now team up, assuming there's a threat for them to battle together. Which, the end of # 85 reveals, there is: Brain-Child, a mutant kid who's intelligence has grown exponentially as he's moved through childhood! Now, as a teenager, he practically runs this other-Earth through dint of how far advanced his mind is, and his crazy experiments crossed with a deathwish are threatening to blow the Squadron's world to Kingdom Come!

All of which is backstory to Avengers # 86's tale, almost none of which I knew when I read (and re-read, and re-read) it as a child of seven or eight. All I could fathom was that this group of Avengers (who were all strangers to me) were teaming up with another group of (equally unknown) heroes to battle some big-brained menace Hell-bent to destroy his own world! Very strange stuff, but I loved every panel of it! In the end, the two groups prevailed, and barely had time to shake hands before the Avengers were whisked back to their own world by some psuedo-scientific means. I'm still unclear as to why DC didn't make a stink about this, since now the Squadron was even more JLA-like, considering they were now heroes and had new members who were still more dopplegangers of JLA members (a Green Arrow analogue, someone just like the Atom, and so on).

Over the years that followed, I slowly pieced together all of the above. Some of it came from eventually acquiring some of those earlier issues through used book stores, church bazaars or mail order services. Some information came out in subsequent appearances by the Squadron Supreme, as they were far from the one trick ponies that their predecessors, the Squadron Sinister, had been.

In fact, the Squadron have their own monthly title these days, written by Babylon 5 creator, Joe Straczynski. This is a re-imagining of the group, rather than a continuation of what had come before. I think JMS wanted to take the group in a specific direction and didn't want to have his hands tied by what had gone before. So they've started over, and the characters are being fleshed out slowly, playing off and against their DC counterparts even more than was done before (Hyperion's alien nature is his central theme, for example, whereas Superman often seems to forget he's even from another planet!). And there's even a 9-issue series just underway, called Ultimate Power, which pits this new Squadron Supreme against Marvel's Ultimate universe's version of the Avengers (called the Ultimates). So you've got a revised and updated derivation of the JLA battling a juiced-up version of the Avengers... how weird is that?

That's all well and good (the current writers are telling very interesting and compelling tales) but it's too bad that the old group has sort of been abandoned. They had quite a colourful history, only the tip of which I've covered above. Some of the other highlights include:

- a 12-issue miniseries in the 80s in which they decide to end all crime on their world and end up running the planet, until Nighthawk rebels and begins working against them (and still more JLA doubles were introduced, bringing the SS up to date with the current membership of the Justice League at that time.. where were DC's lawyers when all this was going on?)

- a trade paperback collection of that story, printed not long after its writer, Mark Gruenwald, died, and which allegedly had his ashes mixed in with the ink, at his request!

- many more cool Avengers appearances, both as friends and foes

- a classic moment in the JLA/Avengers crossover miniseries, in which Avenger Hawkeye refers to the JLA as a "bunch of Squadron Supreme wannabe's", mistaking the copies for the originals, and vice versa

Despite being a rip-off concept (or homage, if you prefer), I've always had a soft spot in my heart for the Squadron, and probably always will. And it may all go back to that Avengers # 86, and the fact that it was among the first comics I ever read.