And yet, when I was coming of age as a comic book reader, there were various Marvel Comics villains who had a status quo, one which would be reflected across the entire line of Marvel titles. It's basically gone away since then; villains may effect a temporary status quo -- as when Norman Osborn became the head of the Initiative in the company-wide Dark Reign -- but when the story wraps up, the villains are packed up until the next time they appear.
There are three villains whose 1980s status quo is, I think, interesting to reflect upon: the Kingpin; the Hellfire Club; and Freedom Force.
Although the Kingpin had been a New York crime boss in the pages of the Amazing Spider-Man since 1967, it wasn't until 1981 that Frank Miller reinvented him in the pages of Daredevil and the villain became a real mainstay of the Marvel Universe, one with a very identifiable status quo. The Kingpin became an untouchable criminal mastermind, maintaining the public facade of Wilson Fisk, philanthropist, while in actuality spearheading all organized crime in New York. Heroes such as Daredevil and Spider-Man would confront the Kingpin, but ultimately acknowledge they were powerless to stop him; the Kingpin had worked the system, had allies in law enforcement and the government. The heroes could fight back against him, but he could never be fully overcome.
Until, of course, he was. In 1992, Dan G. Chichester's storyline 'Last Rites' brought down the Kingpin, with Daredevil and S.H.I.E.L.D. employing evidence going back to the Miller run to bring about his downfall. This was not the end of the Kingpin as a comic book villain, but it was the end of that 11 year stretch when he was an undefeatable crime boss. Writers since then have frequently brought him back, but just as frequently brought him down again. The Kingpin has no staying power as an antagonist anymore. He'll always be around the fringes of Daredevil, but ever since we readers saw him taken down once, we've known he can't win.
The Hellfire Club had been a concept Chris Claremont had been toying with in many of his comic books until they made their proper debut in he and John Byrne's Uncanny X-Men in 1980, right in the middle of what would become known as "The Dark Phoenix Saga". Most (but not all) of the Hellfire Club's membership were mutants, but they saw themselves as elites, above the rest of their kind. They represented an interesting "third option" to the X-Men's "peaceful co-existence" with humans or Magneto's "no peace" with humans. The Hellfire Club didn't care about co-existence or waging war, just to feather their own nest. It was something of a libertarian approach to the mutant-human conflict -- the Hellfire Club had money, influence and power; they didn't care about the rest of mutantkind except as to how they might profit from them. For instance, they made a deal with the US government to manufacture Sentinels, doing so in part because it meant they could prevent themselves from being targeted by the Sentinels. Like the Kingpin, the Hellfire Club had power -- they were a resource the X-Men themselves had to occasionally make peace with to fight another foe. No matter who made up the club's ranks, their purpose remained the same.
Until Chris Claremont was unceremoniously booted from the X-Men franchise in 1991. The new writers spent a lot of time dismantling the status quo they had inherited, and for some reason took aim at the Hellfire Club. In a series of brief subplots mostly scattered in different X-Men titles (but principally in those by Whilce Portacio), the Hellfire Club's leadership were killed off by a new group called the Upstarts who had a sinister purpose of their own, and that was... erm...
The Upstarts were a pretty lousy replacement for the Hellfire Club. Their goals were only hazily defined and mostly were playing a "game" that involved attacking different X-Men characters. It was typically bad 1990s super villain plotting. With the failure of the Upstarts there were various attempts to bring back the Hellfire Club, but none of them stuck. Virtually every time the Club appears now, it's with a brand-new membership and the promise of many stories to come... until the next time they appear and have been completely revamped again.
Finally, take Freedom Force. This team debuted in 1981 in Claremont & Byrne's X-Men as a new incarnation of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants led by Mystique, but in 1986 Mystique cut a deal with the US government, obtaining status for her team as an official government group. Renamed "Freedom Force", Mystique and her allies were now on the right side of the law -- emphasizing the X-Men as an outlaw group. Freedom Force would sometimes respond appropriately to criminal threats, but at their core they remained the X-Men's enemies and took a ghoulish delight in going after the X-Men with the blessings of the government!
This lasted up 'til 1991 when, again, Claremont was let go. Several members of Freedom Force were killed and the rest absorbed into a new version of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants (which didn't last very long). The US government replaced Freedom Force with a new team called X-Factor, made up of various heroes adjacent to the X-Men. Unlike Freedom Force, the characters in X-Factor were genuine heroes; they would still be forced to play the part of government stooges from time to time, but it certainly eased the tensions between the X-Men and the government.
Change is good and no status quo should last forever. Creators should also try to make their mark on a series, not simply mimick what came before. Bringing down the Kingpin isn't a bad idea (in fact, "Last Rites" is a very good story); dismantling the Hellfire Club could have led to an interesting new threat (if the Upstarts hadn't been so lame); perhaps the time had come for Freedom Force to be retired, as with the end of the Cold War events such as the Iran-Contra affair seemed mere history (and Peter David's X-Factor was fun).
And yet, something was lost for each of these groups and to the Marvel Universe. The Marvel Universe became a gentler place to live; it seemed to say organized crime could be dismantled; profiteers would be engulfed by fellow consumers; government corruption would cease.
In the 1980s, most of Marvel's super heroes were vigilantes and outlaws; not just Daredevil, Spider-Man and the X-Men -- the Hulk barely counted as a hero; and while the Avengers had security clearance with the US government, it was as much as a curse as a blessing as the government constantly interfered with their activities, dictated who could be on their team, withdrew equipment and funding at a moment's notice, etc. Nick Fury was one of the only reasonable government figures in the Marvel Universe yet even he would be kept at arm's length from the Marvel heroes because of his allegiance to S.H.I.E.L.D.
There was a sense that the Marvel Universe was being run by forces beyond the heroes' ability to counter. Like the greatest villain of the Silver Age, Doctor Doom, many Marvel villains were untouchable. Their schemes could be beaten, but they were part of the system, as the Kingpin, Hellfire Club and Freedom Force were. In the 1980s, the Kingpin's status as crime boss of New York was not a problem the heroes had to solve -- it was a status quo they had to endure.
Today, of course, everything is different. Marvel's villains hatch schemes which have vaster implications, playing on bigger scales, but defeating the plot is basically the same as defeating the villain. It's now understood that whatever new modus operandi the villains may have, they will be defeated eventually, then come back again with a different scheme. And the heroes? Far from being persecuted by the government, these days to be an Avenger is essentially to be a government agent (certainly it seems to be paired with membership in S.H.I.E.L.D. now).
Is it any wonder that so many of the big 'events' from Marvel in the last two decades have been about the heroes fighting each other? (Civil War, Civil War II, Shadowland, World War Hulk, Secret Empire, Time Runs Out, Avengers vs. X-Men, Inhumans vs. X-Men) It feels as though the heroes' great existential battle against the system (the status quo) has been won -- so what's left except to fight each other?
All images from the Grand Comics Database
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