It’s really hard to pin down the first superhero. There are all kinds of antecedents in folklore and mythology, and some more recent precursors like old west masked vigilantes or The Scarlet Pimpernel or what have you.
I like to say that the first comic book superhero was Japan’s Ōgon Bat from 1930 who debuted as a kamishibai character. Kamishibai was a kind of public storytelling accompanied by illustrations.
Anyhow, my point is, superhero comics were around in the lead up to World War 2 and, thus, there were a whole bunch of them connected to that war. Timely Comics – the predecessor to Marvel – published their first Captain America adventure (featuring him punching Nazis – a thing shockingly that was not universally celebrated in America even at that time) a full year before the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Cap was joined by a whole bunch of different characters during the golden age, including Bucky, the original android Human Torch and his teen sidekick Toro, The Sub-Mariner aka Namor, The Whizzer (a speedster, not a man with super urine), Miss America (kind of like Timely’s version of Wonder Woman), and a host of other characters, all determined to kick Nazi ass. If you can believe it, it was considered incredibly patriotic to treat these fascist anti-Semites and racists like the scum that they are instead of electing them as MAGA Republicans.
The first group of Timely Nazi-punchers were called The All-Winners Squad, created in 1946. The line-up featured Cap, Bucky, Torch, Toro, Namor, Whizzer and Miss America fighting Nazi. The Invaders were created in 1969 as a World War II group and were basically this same team, minus Whizzer and Miss America.
As Marvel did what they could to make these groups part of official continuity, the idea was that The Invaders came first and inspired the All-Winners Squad. Since they’d already established that Captain America had gotten frozen in ice at the end of WW2, they brought in a couple other characters to become “new” Captain Americas. Honestly, Captain America’s fictional history is a mess.
In 1976, Marvel created another World War 2 era team using former timely characters called The Liberty Legion. This group consisted of Whizzer, Miss America, The Patriot (who becomes one of the replacements for Captain America after he gets frozen), Blue Diamond (the group’s Superman), Jack Frost (who has ice powers), Red Raven (like a less interesting Hawkman), and The Thin Man (who was stretching in the comics as early as 1940, before Plastic Man, Reed Richard, or the Elongated Man).
So the good news for us when we try to imagine how you’d work these folks into the MCU is that the history is already a retconned mess. The better news is that most of these characters don’t currently exist in the MCU. The best news is that, thanks to Agent Carter, we have a way of introducing all of this bunkum as well as justifying why we haven’t heard of it yet.
Here’s my pitch. Once the WGA strike is over, get with me Disney/Marvel. I’m your dude here.
So, yes, there are Nazi to fight in Europe and fascists to fight in Japan, but there’s also trouble on the home front in the U.S. There’s Nazi spies, sympathizers, sleeper agents, etc. The Strategic Scientific Reserve (led by Tommy Lee Jones’ Colonel Chester Phillips and Dominic Cooper’s Howard Stark, but we mostly see Peggy Carter) decides to gather a team to function as a sort of super OSI.
But who?
Cap and Bucky are out. Namor, too because of his position in the MCU. I don’t really feel stretchy powers are as fun in movies as in the comics, so no Thin Man. The Patriot/Jeffrey Mace died a heroic death in Agents of SHIELD, so he’s out. I’m going to suggest Red Raven and Jack Frost appear as background and support characters.
As far as who is in, let’s start with Madeline Joyce/Miss America. Joyce is a Hawksian woman – fast talking, whip smart and tenacious as all get out. Katherine Hepburn 1940 with a mask. In our world, she’s a product of the Strategic Science Reserve, but not a deliberate one. She’s an heiress (this is important) and a huge fan of Captain America. She gets her powers when her rich father is given a tour of some Strategic Science Reserve project that he’s helping to fund. She flirts her way into a lab and – in a sort of Willy Wonka moment – interacts with some equipment that she should. Joyce emerges with flight, super strength and nigh-invulnerability. She’s itching to kick Nazi butt, but thus far hasn’t been allowed to do it. Played by Maitreyi Ramakrishnan please.
Let’s totally include the original Human Torch. “The Synthetic Man” was introduced (vacuum sealed in a container) in Captain America: The First Avenger and all us geeks immediately knew that was the original Human Torch. So Torch will be part of the team, though I propose we at least make Torch initially more robot and less human. Somebody like Jay Hernandez.
Since it’s already confusing to have two Human Torch characters (our android and Johnny Storm from the Fantastic Four) and since I kind of dislike the boy sidekick trope, instead of Toro, we’re going to include Torch’s partner from that era, Sun Girl (thought we’re going to only ever call her by her civilian name, Mary Mitchell). I suggest that she is a brilliant scientist/adventurer (with a solar ray gun that she invented) who works for Torch creator Phineus Horton. In our show, its pretty firmly established that she also was the primary creator of the Torch but Horton took full credit. Also, she should totally 100% be played by Sasheer Zamata. I’ll die on this hill.
Blue Diamond offers some interesting possibilities. He’s kind of an Indiana Jones adventurer-archeologist who gets his powers from a magic diamond/Nazi sub attack (that kills all his friends, so he is especially ready to punch some Nazi). Blue Diamond will be this group’s tank. Yes, he hits hard, but mostly he can take a shit ton of damage. Plus, instead of his golden age costume, we can just play up the “completely transformed by a blue diamond” thing and make him look wicked cool. Somebody like Jesse Plemons (though I understand he’s being added to the MCU somewhere else).
Whizzer‘s origin story is bonkers. Basically, he gets his powers from mongoose blood. I mean there’s more, but let’s not explore that in this show. We can make “mongoose blood” kind of a two word punchline. Whizzer is incredibly resentful that he’s not been allowed to fight Nazi in Europe. He’s fast, but he’s nowhere near Quicksilver fast. He has super speed and super reflexes, but he’s not exactly able to outrun a burst of machine gun bullets or run so fast that he’s not detected. The Strategic Science Reserve has determined that he can be put to better use in the U.S. but wow he wants to be on the frontlines. No casting ideas.
Finally, I suggest we use Fin – another Timely character from the period – a dude who can survive underwater. We can thus have a Namor type character without using Namor. Fin is obscure enough that we can kind of do anything we’d like with the character. Let’s make him a World War 1 era seaman whose already seen a good deal of action as a beyond-top-secret spy for the allies. Let’s use Hawaii’s own Daryll Bonilla.
So this is our field team. They report to Agent Carter who sends them on mission impossible style cases to capture and punish Nazis and Nazi sympathizers in the United States and foil their plots.
But, since it’s also useful to have character stuff going on during a series, some of the ongoing first season plots could include:
- Robert Frank/Whizzer keeping everyone at arm’s length as he continues to push to be sent overseas (and we can do one of those “just as he decides he wants to stay, he gets sent overseas” things).
- Mary Mitchell/Sun Girl upgrading Torch to something much more like an actual A.I. humanoid, with personality and everything. Furthermore, the tension between Mitchell being the true field leader of the entire team but the impossibility of actually recognizing a black woman in that position in the 1940’s. I kind of see her as the actual main character of the show.
- Madelyn Joyce/Miss America realizing that powers aren’t enough to make her an effective agent and working her ass off to become the best she can be every time she’s met with one of her training/ability shortcomings.
- Blue Diamond/Elton T. Morrow (no seriously) becoming less and less human due to the diamond thing, even as Torch becomes more human. His moral compass starts to go all kablooey as the series progresses.
- The Fin/Peter Noble wanting to do anything he can to stay in the game and kick Nazi butt, even though his abilities are kind of weakening with age.
We will make a million billion dollars. I’m telling you.