Life and death are cheap in the world of Marvel Comics. It has been joked that the afterlife of Marvel has a revolving door, with few characters guaranteed to stay dead. However, once a character is resurrected, there is generally a bit of time before they die again. And yet, one major Avengers villain was just brought back from the dead only to be killed again pages later.
The death and rebirth occurred in New Avengers #10 by Sam Humphries and Ton Lima. The series centers upon a team of anti-heroes who have no issues with killing their enemies. The team is made up of Black Widow, Namor the Sub-Mariner, Bucky Barnes, Eddie Brock as Carnage, Clea, and the Laura Kinney Wolverine.
This squad of Avengers was formed to hunt down the Killuminati; a twisted team of clones based on the Illuminati. Behind this team, however, was a mystery “Shadow Boss.” As the team confronted the Killuminati, the Shadow Boss was revealed as one of the Avengers most infamous foes.
What Avengers villain just came back and died?
The Shadow Boss was Baron Zemo, operating through an AI based on his thought patterns. The true Zemo died leading HYDRA in an invasion of Latveria during One World Under Doom. However, Zemo had a convoluted contingency plan in place to bring about his resurrection. This involved using the Killuminati as a distraction, as he implanted a telepathic “Other Woman” inside Black Widow’s head. She, in turn, would manipulate the New Avengers, as the science to create his perfect new body was perfected.
However, the New Avengers got wise to the plan after Bucky discovered the Other Woman personality. To that end, Black Widow used her own skills to bring down Zemo’s organization from within. Thankfully, the same blocks that kept her from knowing about the Other Woman also kept the evil persona from knowing what Natasha was doing.
This enabled Black Widow to both hack the Zemo AI and alter the chemical opposition of the new Zemo clone body. Allowing the clone to be created was necessary, as the Other Woman was programmed to “die” once Zemo was reborn. However, the Zemo clone began melting almost as soon as he emerged from his vat. Despite his painful death being certain, Black Widow still killed Zemo directly, with one headshot as his body melted to nothing.
New Avengers #10 is now available at comic shops everywhere.
