Written by Mark Gruenwald – Breakdowns by John Buscema – Finishes by Jackson Guice – Lettered by Janice Chiang – Colored by Michael Higgins
Taking No For An Answer
Issue #7 begins directly after the events of Captain America #314, making it clear that the crossover wasn’t just a marketing stunt. If you skipped it, you missed part of the story.
Nighthawk returns to his world with Mink, Remnant and Pinball, three former members of the Institute of Evil who would rather fight the Squadron than risk being subjected to Behavior Modification.
Their first stop is Master Menace. Nighthawk asks his old enemy to join the resistance, but Master Menace refuses. He prefers to work alone.
And Nighthawk leaves.
After everything we’ve seen over the past few issues, this moment stands out. Nighthawk believes the Squadron has to be stopped and the stakes couldn’t be much higher. But when Master Menace says no, Nighthawk accepts his answer. It’s a stark contrast with his former team.
Gruenwald adds more context that explains why.
The opening page of this issue also recounts Nighthawk’s origin. Discovering that his wealthy father had been an unscrupulous businessman who hurt people to build his fortune, Kyle Richmond responded by dedicating himself to being something different.
Now he’s once again dedicating himself to becoming the antithesis of people who were once close to him. That means he not only has to stop the Squadron Supreme, but refuse to become like them in the process.
Comic Book Tropes
After six issues of superheroes debating politics, free will and whether they have the right to reshape society, Squadron Supreme #7 gives us an evil twin.
Mark Gruenwald takes one of the oldest tropes in comic books and knows exactly what to do with it.
Master Menace reaches through a dimensional portal and pulls another Hyperion into this world.
This Hyperion has his own history in the regular Marvel Universe, and it’s uniquely 1970s Marvel. For our purposes, the important part is that he wants to find Thundra, the warrior woman he loves.
Master Menace makes him an offer: help destroy the Squadron Supreme, and Menace will help him find her.
There’s a darker version of the hero. There’s a dimensional portal. There’s a supervillain making a deal involving a warrior woman from another world. It’s all wonderfully conventional comic book stuff.
And that feels especially appropriate coming immediately after Captain America #314. One of the things that continues to fascinate me about Squadron Supreme is that Gruenwald never seems interested in proving that this series is above conventional comic book storytelling.
The evil double is one of the most familiar superhero tropes imaginable, and Gruenwald uses it to complicate the Hyperion we’ve spent six issues trying to understand.
Lie Of Omission
This world’s Hyperion and Foxfire arrive at a prison whose warden refused to allow Behavior Modification to be used on his inmates.
Hyperion tells him that the machines have been damaged in transit, delaying the program and their scheduled visit.
Except that’s not what happened.
Amphibian deliberately destroyed the machines because he believed what the Squadron was doing was wrong.
It’s a small lie, but a significant one.
Hyperion and Foxfire are trying to convince the warden that Behavior Modification is safe and beneficial. What Hyperion doesn’t tell him is that members of the Squadron themselves have serious doubts about it. Amphibian destroyed the machines because of those doubts. Golden Archer used one to force Lady Lark to love him. The former members of the Institute of Evil can question what they’re asked to do, but they can’t refuse.
Hyperion may see his lie as harmless. He believes in the program and wants the warden to accept something he genuinely thinks will help. But once again, his good intentions are shaping how much of a choice someone else is actually being given.
The warden is technically free to make his own decision. Hyperion is simply making sure he doesn’t have all the information when he makes it.
Same As The Old Boss?
Master Menace lures the real Hyperion away with a fake meteor, banishes him to another dimension and replaces him with his counterpart.
The new Hyperion returns to Squadron City pretending to be injured and suffering from amnesia.
Almost immediately, this version of the character feels different. He’s rougher around the edges, more selfish and driven largely by whatever he happens to want at the moment. He isn’t particularly interested in saving the world or improving society. He likes fighting. He likes women. And once he meets Power Princess, he likes her.
Power Princess takes temporary command of the Squadron while also overseeing Hyperion’s recovery. She believes his apparent vulnerability is bringing out feelings she hadn’t previously recognized, and the two nearly kiss before she pulls away and returns home to Howard.
Hyperion follows her. After learning about their relationship, he is disgusted by the idea that Power Princess could love a physically elderly man.
Later that night, Howard dies, and this new Hyperion smiles as he comforts Power Princess.
Eventually, Gruenwald shows us why.
Hyperion murdered him to remove a romantic rival.
Direct and Indirect Harm
That reveal does something important for the series.
For six issues, we’ve watched the real Hyperion make increasingly troubling decisions. He helped take control of the United States. He supported Behavior Modification. He’s become frustrated with dissent. Even in this issue, he lies to the prison warden rather than admit what really happened to the machines.
It’s easy to look at that progression and conclude that we’re simply watching Hyperion become a villain.
Then Gruenwald gives us a much more traditionally villainous Hyperion. And the difference is enormous.
This Hyperion doesn’t need to convince himself that what he’s doing is for the greater good. He sees something he wants and takes it. Howard stands between him and Power Princess, so he kills Howard. Master Menace becomes inconvenient, so Hyperion attacks him savagely and abandons their agreement.
The real Hyperion’s actions aren’t suddenly excused by comparison. If anything, the distinction makes them more interesting.
The real Hyperion genuinely believes he’s saving the world. He doesn’t necessarily recognize the harm his decisions may be causing because, from his perspective, the Squadron is making things better.
Gruenwald has spent half the series showing us why that can be dangerous.
Now he shows us something much easier to recognize: selfishness and cruelty.
The Theft of Consent
Power Princess’s relationship with the impostor makes the issue considerably darker.
She believes she’s helping a longtime friend recover from an injury and amnesia. As she spends more time with him, she begins to develop feelings for him. Those feelings become more complicated by the death of Howard, a loss that leaves her grieving despite having always known that she would outlive him.
What she doesn’t know is that the man comforting her murdered her husband. She also doesn’t know that he isn’t the Hyperion she thinks he is.
Coming so soon after what Golden Archer did to Lady Lark, it’s difficult not to see another variation on the concept of informed consent.
Nobody has altered Power Princess’s mind. Her feelings are her own. But her choices are being made under completely false pretenses. By the end of the issue, she acts on her attraction to him without knowing who he really is or what he has done.
Once again, Squadron Supreme has given us a relationship in which one person possesses information the other would almost certainly need to make a very different choice.
Final Thoughts
Squadron Supreme #7 may have the most traditional comic-book plot of the series so far.
A morally compromised duplicate from another dimension replaces one of the heroes and infiltrates the team. Master Menace recruits him as a weapon, only to discover the obvious problem with recruiting someone who has free will: he can change his mind.
People are inconvenient that way.
But Gruenwald doesn’t use the evil-twin trope simply to give the Squadron a new villain. He uses it to put several very different approaches to free will and consent next to each other.
Nighthawk asks Master Menace for help and accepts his refusal. The real Hyperion wants the prison warden to make the choice he believes is right, so he withholds information that might push him in the opposite direction. His replacement goes much further, deceiving Power Princess because he wants her for himself.
The motivations and severity are radically different. Gruenwald never suggests otherwise. But the contrast is hard to miss.
Nighthawk gives someone a genuine choice and gets an outcome that may make everything worse. The real Hyperion manipulates a choice because he believes the outcome will make things better. His replacement manipulates a choice entirely for himself.
And that’s what makes the evil-twin plot such an effective comic-book trope for this particular story.
The new Hyperion is selfish, violent and cruel. In some ways, that makes him easier to understand than the man he replaced.
The real Hyperion believes he’s doing the right thing. Nighthawk believes the same.
But Gruenwald separates intent, choice and consequence. Doing what you believe is right doesn’t guarantee a good outcome. Getting a good outcome doesn’t necessarily justify how you got there.
Sometimes respecting someone else’s freedom means accepting that they may make the wrong choice.
Squadron Supreme Entry #9
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