The Avengers became the most profitable, if not most popular, superhero team in the 2010s. The Marvel Cinematic Universe made the Avengers stars, showing general audiences something that comic fans have known for ages. The Avengers are an amazing group, combining the greatest heroes of the Marvel Universe into a potent fighting force. The Avengers were given the appellation of “Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”, but as the years have gone on, they’ve proven that they are the mightiest heroes in the Marvel Universe. One of the most fun parts of Avengers comics are the roster changes, giving readers entirely new team dynamics. The Avengers have fielded some amazing teams over the years, giving readers superhero action they could never get from a single hero.
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Not every Avengers roster has been great, but there are some that stand far above the rest. These are the Avengers teams that every comic fan thinks of when they think of the team, and they’ve faced off against the some of the greatest threats in the Marvel Universe. These ten rosters of the Avengers are the best, creating teams that could not only defeat any foe but also give readers the most entertaining stories out there.
10) The First Avengers Unity Squad
The Avengers and the X-Men have always been colleagues, to an extent, but they were never friends. This became apparent in 2012’s Avengers Vs. X-Men, as the two teams clashed over the Phoenix Force. After the conflict, Captain America decided to create a new Avengers team, one that combined members of the X-Men and the Avengers. Thus, the Avengers Unity Squad was born. There have been four versions of this team, but the best of them is still the first — Cap, Wolverine, Thor, Rogue, Havok, Wasp, Wonder Man, Scarlet Witch, and Sunfire. This was a powerful team, but what made it so great was the drama between the members. Rogue hated Scarlet Witch for her role in depowering the mutant race, with the team split in two over who to support. It was great watching them bicker and slowly come together, defeating the Apocalypse Twins and saving the Earth before AXIS blew everything to smithereens.
9) Cap’s Kooky Quartet
The Avengers went through a lot of changes in their early years. The team started out with Iron Man, Thor, Hulk, Ant-Man, and Wasp. The Hulk left almost immediately, and then Captain America was found and thawed out. However, this version of the Avengers didn’t last long, with everyone but Cap leaving. Captain America brought together a new team of Avengers, taking in three people who were villains at the time — Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, and Hawkeye. Cap giving these three villains a chance changed their lives and the history of the Avengers. Cap’s Kooky Quartet is a lot of fun, and what they lack in power (Scarlet Witch’s powers hadn’t fully developed and Quicksilver was slow compared to DC speedsters) they made up for in drama.
8) ’80s Avengers
The ’80s were a pretty good time for the Avengers, especially when the team was written by Roger Stern. Stern worked with artist John Buscema and created one of the coolest Avengers teams ever for classic stories like “Under Siege”. The ’80s Avengers were a pretty large team — Captain America, Captain Marvel II, Thor, Hercules, Namor, Doctor Druid, Wasp, Black Knight, Iron Man, Hawkeye, Mockingbird, and Starfox — with a good mix of power and personality. The team was led by Wasp, Captain Marvel II (Monica Rambeau will always be my favorite Captain Marvel because of this run), and Doctor Druid. This was classic Avengers goodness, with the team squabbling at times, but getting it done in battle. It was the last time the team was great until the late ’90s, an amazing team of Avengers for the decade of excess.
7) Busiek/Perez Avengers
The ’90s weren’t a great time to be a fan of the Avengers. While the Leather Jacket Era of the team was pretty good (real ones know what I’m talking about), the Avengers wasn’t the headlining team of the Marvel Universe, and that’s before we talk about the fiascos that were “The Crossing” and “Heroes Reborn”. However, in 1997, Marvel got writer Kurt Busiek and classic Avengers artist the late great George Perez to take over Avengers. They gave fans a new team, one that combined the classic Avengers team with some new blood. This team fielded Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Vision, Scarlet Witch, Wonder Man, and Warbird (current Captain Marvel Carol Danvers’ superhero identity of the time), with new members Firestar, Justice, and Triad joining the group. This was a return to form for the Avengers. It combined some of the best Avengers of all time with some cool new members, and gave the readers the kind of action and drama that they hadn’t gotten from Avengers comics in years.
6) The First New Avengers Team
New Avengers made the Avengers popular again in the ’00s, and they did it by taking a page from the Justice League playbook. The first roster of the New Avengers combined four of Marvel’s most popular and important heroes — Captain America, Iron Man, Wolverine, and Spider-Man — with some cool B and C-list characters — Luke Cage, Spider-Woman, the Sentry, and Ronin. Writer Brian Michael Bendis wasn’t writing big action epics, which was pretty disappointing at times because this roster would have perfect for that, but the interplay between members made the book somewhat entertaining. However, regardless of your opinion on the quality of New Avengers, it’s impossible to deny that this was an excellent Avengers team, and just what the team needed to make them popular again.
5) The First Dark Avengers Team
Marvel’s “Dark Reign” was an amazing time for readers, as Norman Osborn was given control of the superhuman national security apparatus that was created after Civil War. Osborn created his own team of Avengers, a good mix of power and skill that also was extremely entertaining to read. Osborn took Moonstone, Venom, Daken, and Bullseye and put them in the costumes of Ms. Marvel, Spider-Man, Wolverine, and Hawkeye. He brought in Noh-Varr, christening him Captain Marvel. He kept the Sentry and Ares from Iron Man’s last Mighty Avengers team, giving the group some major powerhouses. Osborn himself donned a suborned suit of Iron Man armor, painted it red, white, and blue, and became the Iron Patriot, combining the iconography of Iron Man and Captain America. Osborn’s first group of Dark Avengers was the best, giving readers some awesome stories about the villains trying to be good guys and the machinations of Osborn to keep the team from killing each other to save the day.
4) Post-Civil War New Avengers
Civil War changed the Marvel Universe for years. Iron Man was made Director of SHIELD, creating the Initiative to run the superhero community. Captain America was imprisoned and assassinated by Red Skull’s machinations. Most heroes on Cap’s side surrendered, but Luke Cage wasn’t having any of that. Cage was joined by Wolverine, Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, Iron Fist, Spider-Woman, Ronin, Jessica Jones, and Echo to create a resistance group against Iron Man. This version of the New Avengers was the coolest version of the New Avengers and had some amazing adventures, battling Iron Man’s Mighty Avengers, the Hand, the Hood’s supervillain union, the Skrulls, and more. This team was an exciting modification on the Avengers formula, and it’s still cool almost 20 years later.
3) Roy Thomas Avengers
Jack Kirby and Stan Lee created the Avengers, but Roy Thomas perfected them. Thomas’s run ran through the end of the Silver Age and the beginning of the Bronze Age of comics, and created a team that has become synonymous with the Avengers. This team had Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Giant-Man, the Wasp, Scarlet Witch, Hawkeye, Quicksilver, and Wonder Man, with Black Panther and Captain Marvel I showing up sometimes. This team defined who the Avengers would be in the future, with a good mix of power and experience. Thomas, with the help of artists Neal Adams and Sal and John Buscema, built the Avengers into a perfect fighting force, and helped save the entire universe multiple times.
2) Late ’70s Avengers
Roy Thomas’s Avengers expanded the team, and once he left, the team got even better. The late ’70s made the Avengers a veritable army, with creators David Michelinie, Jim Shooter, and the legendary George Perez giving readers some of the most beloved (and hated — they’re responsible for Avengers #200) Avengers stories of all time. Their Avengers team was massive — Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Yellowjacket, Wasp, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Falcon, Hercules, Beast, Wonder Man, Scarlet Witch, Jocasta, Quicksilver, and Black Panther. This team took the iconic line-up from the Thomas/Buscema/Adams run and expanded it greatly, leading to the classic story when government liaison Henry Peter Gyrich demanded the team to pare itself down. This roster was amazing, and could handle pretty much anything. For years, they were the most powerful Avengers team ever, but that would change in the 2010s.
1) The Avengers Machine
Jonathan Hickman’s Avengers run was flawless. Hickman took over after Bendis’s more Earthbound Avengers run and took them to the stars. Avengers (Vol. 5) #1 began with Captain America fearing that the Avengers needed to get bigger to face bigger threats, so him and Iron Man created what they would call the Avengers Machine, bringing together the most powerful and skilled roster of the Avengers ever. The Avengers Machine consisted of Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Wolverine, Spider-Man, Captain Marvel, Cannonball, Sunspot, Black Widow, Spider-Woman, Hulk, Hawkeye, Shang Chi, Manifold, Smasher, Hyperion, Captain Universe, Starbrand, Nightmask, Ex Nihilo, and Abyss. This was an Avengers team that could handle anything thrown at them, with Hickman putting them through their paces, with them winning an intergalactic war and battling against threats to the entire multiverse. This is the perfect Avengers team, and that’s all there is to it.
What’s your favorite Avengers team? Sound off in comments below.
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Image Courtesy of DC Comics -
Image Courtesy of DC Comics
