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Quote1 Here we all are, with nothing, but our wit and our will to save the world. So stand and fight. Quote2
Nick Fury[src]

History

Nick Fury was born on July 4th, 1950.[1][7] He was the executive head of the Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division, internationally and publicly known as "S.H.I.E.L.D." Fury is also credited as a possible co-creator/designer of the Avenger Initiative as well as the special operations commander. He has been in active service since the 1980s at the earliest, where he participated in a black-ops, off-the-books raid that saved several hostages.

Alien Activity[]

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When investigating reports of a flying woman crashing into a Blockbuster, Fury met the Kree warrior Vers and learned that the Skrulls had arrived on Earth, eventually joining forces with Vers to carry out a further investigation after his then-partner Agent Coulson was replaced by a Skrull. During the investigation, Fury and Vers learned that Vers was actually Carol Danvers, a former test pilot for Project Pegasus, who had been working with a renegade Kree scientist, Mar-Vell, who had been posing as human Doctor Wendy Lawson. Working with Carol's old friend Maria Rambeau, Fury and Danvers learned that Mar-Vell had been attempting to assist the Skrulls after learning that they were actually refugees rather than conquerors, and that Carol's powers were actually the result of exposure to the energy of the Tesseract that Mar-Vell had been using as a power source. After Carol drove off the Kree forces, she departed to help the Skrulls find a new planet. Fury was left with an injured left eye, but began to make plans to set up a new defence protocol that would protect Earth from future exceptional threats by gathering a group of powered individuals together to oppose these challenges, which Fury named the 'Avengers Initiative' after Carol's call-sign when she was a pilot.[1]

Avengers Initiative[]

After Tony Stark publicly announced his identity as Iron Man, Fury went to Stark's home in Malibu, California to talk to him about the Avenger Initiative.[8] Stark initially did not want anything to do with Fury, and ordered him to leave.[8] As Fury drove away, he ordered Agent Coulson to contact Agent Romanoff, saying that they would need her help.

Fury's Big Week[]

Nicholas Fury (Earth-199999) and Anthony Stark (Earth-199999) from Iron Man 2 (film) 001

Nick Fury handles his problem

Six months later, after Stark's out-of-control behavior resulted in the Mark II Iron Man armor falling into the hands of the U.S. Military, Fury confronted Stark for becoming a problem that he had to deal with. As well as providing information on the background of Ivan Vanko, Fury and Romanoff provided Stark with information and materials from his father, which proved instrumental in finding a replacement power source for his personal arc reactor.

Fury met with Stark once again after Stark had defeated Ivan Vanko's attack on the Stark Expo. Stark had proven himself unsuitable for the Avenger Initiative, but after informing him of this, Fury offered to recruit his services as a consultant.[9]

Fury's recruitment drive then turned to people who had been involved in a destructive incident in Puente Antiguo, New Mexico. He summoned Culver University astrophysics professor Erik Selvig, who had been closely associated with the incident, to an underground S.H.I.E.L.D. facility, and then drew the scientist's attention to a secure, portable storage case. Fury revealed a glowing cube within the case and suggested that it was a source of immense power, although nobody had been able to determine a means of tapping that power. Selvig accepted the challenge to investigate the object further.[10]

Shortly thereafter, the World Security Council officially approved the activation of the Avenger Initiative, but ordered Fury to recruit Emil Blonsky. Unhappy with this decision, Fury put Agent Coulson on the case, who in turn scuttled the plan of recruiting Blonsky by sending Stark as an intermediary instead.[11]

Finding Captain America[]

Nicholas Fury (Earth-199999) from Marvel's The Avengers Wallpaper 0001

The Initiative was slowly losing traction by the time another potential recruit was found. Steven Rogers (Captain America), the world's first "superhero, had been frozen in Arctic ice since World War II, and had miraculously survived his entombment. Fury oversaw his recovery and rehabilitation, personally intercepting him when the man awoke and escaped into the heart of New York City.[12]

Phase Two[]

With little to show for his efforts in bringing together a group of extraordinary people, Fury shelved his plan and began focusing on weaponry instead. "Phase Two", as the offshoot idea came to be called, involved re-engineering weapons technology that had emerged in the hands of Hydra years earlier, as well as other cutting edge, or alien, technology. The Tesseract, that he'd assigned Professor Selvig to investigate, formed a significant part of this puzzle.

When the Tesseract began emitting unexpected levels of gamma radiation, Fury was quick to personally take charge of the operation. The emissions proved to be a prelude to the appearance of Loki on Earth, and neither Fury, nor his personnel had the power to stop Loki escaping with the cube.

Assembling The Avengers[]

Desperate for a solution to the problem of Loki's possession of apparently limitless power, Fury reactivated the Avengers Initiative. He effortlessly brought Steven Rogers in and dispatched agents to call in the help of Tony Stark and Dr. Bruce Banner. In short order, Loki made his first public appearance, and was apprehended, heralding an unexpected further addition to the collection of extraordinary people when Loki's brother Thor arrived, making demands of his own for Loki's extradition.

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Nick Fury, Director of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Fury could do little to quell the rising tensions in a ship now packed with egos, and problems only escalated when some of these people uncovered his deceptions surrounding Phase Two. With arguments boiling over, Loki played his hand, and Fury and the others were caught completely off guard when the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier came under attack in a daring commando raid by Loki's soldiers. Fury returned to his post on the bridge to take command of the situation and was instrumental in warding off an assault there.

In the wake of the battle, Fury found agent Coulson mortally wounded by Loki's hand. He resolved to use Coulson's sacrifice to his advantage, exploiting it to give a "push" to Stark and Rogers. Despite the ethically questionable nature of the plan, it proved to be effective, and the men set off in pursuit of Loki shortly thereafter.

Battle of New York[]

The Avengers Initiative may have finally come to fruition, but Fury's role in their battle was not yet done. The World Security Council issued orders to send a nuclear missile into the vicinity of Manhattan, which Fury refused, but then overriding orders saw one fighter jet escape him after he knocked another out of action with a rocket. He radioed a warning to Stark however, thus giving time for Iron Man to avert the crisis.

The Avengers Initiative ultimately won out. Fury's defiance of the World Security Council may not have been forgotten, but his methods and actions had saved the world. He resolved to call upon the Avengers should they be needed again, and made further assurances that they would come.[13]

Agent Coulson[]

Some time afterwards, Fury resolved to revive Agent Coulson, and had Coulson's body sent to a secret facility called the Guest House, hidden even from S.H.I.E.L.D. records. There numerous, unethical procedures from Project T.A.H.I.T.I., a project once supervised by Coulson to heal a mortally wounded Avenger, but was deemed too dangerous to a person's mental health, were used to resurrect the agent, and later Fury took further steps in granting Coulson's requests for assets and personnel to furnish a new S.H.I.E.L.D. team.[14] Fury assigned Agent Melinda May to come up with the parameters for the team, knowing that Coulson would recruit her, and to keep him updated on Coulson's status.[15]

Fury later reprimanded Coulson for the damages to the Bus following an altercation with Peruvian soldiers over a Hydra weapon. He refused any new aesthetic additions be placed on the Bus and further warned Coulson that his civilian consultant, Skye, a known member of the Rising Tide, was a risk.[16]

After Coulson learned the truth behind his supposed recuperation in Tahiti, Fury sent over a folder containing all the information regarding his resurrection.[17] Subsequently, Fury went off the grid when Coulson sought to contact him for the truth behind the Guest House and the GH-325 drug used to heal his wounds.[18] When May later informed him that Coulson knew of the Guest Host corpse from which the GH drug comes from, Fury returned to the Triskelion to give Coulson the full truth. However, circumstances prevented them from meeting, as Coulson's plane was remotely hijacked by Victoria Hand.[15]

Project: Insight[]

Following the battle for New York, the government granted S.H.I.E.L.D. more funds to invest in homeland security, for which "Project Insight" was created, a security network formed by three heavily-armed helicarriers to protect the Earth. However, Fury discovered something dubious was going on and hired the mercenary Georges Batroc to hijack a S.H.I.E.L.D. boat related to Project Insight, so during the rescue mission, Black Widow would secretly recover confidential files.

After recovering the data, Fury attempted to open the files but discovered they were highly protected. He persuaded his friend and World Security Council member Alexander Pierce to delay Project Insight as S.H.I.E.L.D. could've been compromised.[3]

The Winter Soldier[]

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Fury was soon attacked by the mysterious Winter Soldier and corrupt S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. He barely escaped alive and made it to Captain America's house, where he told Steve that S.H.I.E.L.D. was compromised and should trust no one. Before being gunned down by the Winter Soldier, who had tracked him down, Fury gave Steve a flash drive with the confidential files. Nick was transported to a hospital, but once there his vital signs failed and the doctors were unable to revive him. His body was recovered by Maria Hill.

Fury had successfully faked his death by using a drug which greatly reduced his pulse, and was taken to a secret location to recuperate. Only a small handful of trusted people had any knowledge that he had survived, and this small group expanded when Maria Hill returned from a rescue mission with Captain America, the Black Widow, and their ally Falcon in tow.

The fugitives related spoke of their discovery that S.H.I.E.L.D. had been influenced by Hydra almost since its foundation, and Pierce was the conspiracy's leader. Pierce wanted to use the three helicarriers to massacre any person who could interfere with Hydra's new world order, and planned to launch them soon. Fury gave them a set of three control chips (one for the core of each helicarrier), with which to override the helicarriers' fire control systems and scuttle Pierce's plans.[3]

Fight Against Hydra[]

As Captain America and Falcon got into the helicarriers and successfully reprogrammed them, Nick revealed his survival to Alexander Pierce, and with the help of Black Widow, forced him to release every single one of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s secrets to the world. He even managed to circumvent his deleted retinal scans by revealing to Pierce that he had a second retinal scan in the form of a scan of his damaged left eye. Pierce snatched an opportunity to escape, whereupon Fury shot and killed him.

After leaving S.H.I.E.L.D. in ruins behind him, Fury burned his possessions and, after saying goodbye to Steve Rogers, went to Europe in order to hunt down Hydra's remaining cells.[3]

Fury would make his survival a secret to all but a few select agents, such as Maria Hill, Eric Koenig, and Phil Coulson.[19]

Fury made a surprise reappearance when he came to the rescue of Jemma Simmons and Leo Fitz after they were ejected from the Bus into the ocean. He implored Simmons to lead him to Coulson, which enabled him to join his colleague in an under-resourced assault on a Hydra cell led by John Garrett. Fury came prepared however, and provided Coulson with the Destroyer gun to wear down the Centipede soldiers defending the Cybertech facility. He and Coulson then trash-talked Garrett, long enough for Skye to break Garrett's control over Mike Peterson, allowing Peterson to turn on Garrett.

Back aboard the Bus, Coulson gave the former director of S.H.I.E.L.D. a stern rebuke over using TAHITI to resurrect him. In turn, Fury calmly pointed that he was not suffering any major mental side effects and stated that the reason he brought Coulson back was because in his eyes, Coulson is an Avenger. He then gave Coulson a little black box, with the instructions needed to rebuild S.H.I.E.L.D., and appointed Coulson as the new director. Fury then departed to pursue a clandestine undertaking of his own.[20]

Off the Grid[]

Nick Fury (Earth-199999) from Avengers- Age of Ultron

After the Avengers lost their first major confrontation against Ultron and retreated to the Barton farm to regroup, Nick Fury made contact with the team to inform them that he had been tracking Ultron's movements, including his attempts to access Earth's nuclear weapons stockpile and his efforts to create a new body for himself. Realising that something was acting to counter Ultron's hacks, Tony was able to recover what remained of J.A.R.V.I.S. while Rogers, Barton and Romanoff stole Ultron's new body, allowing them to combine the two with the Mind Gem in Loki's scepter to form the new entity that came to be known as the Vision. When Ultron attacked Sovokia, Fury used an old Helicarrier to help the Avengers evacuate civilians while destroying Ultron's robot army. He later met with the Romanoff and the new roster of Avengers at the New Avengers Facility.[21]

A year later, Fury was leading a covert team of super-spies with Hill and Cameron Klein. He and Hill were debriefed on the aftermath of the Avengers' dissolution over the Sokovia Accords. He felt as though the conflict distracted them from preventing larger, intergalactic threats. Months later, he caught up with Rogers, Romanoff, and Wilson who were operating extra-judicially in Syria and pleaded with Rogers to repair his falling out with Stark.[22]

Infinity War[]

Months later, Fury and Hill were driving in Atlanta and investigating Stark's disappearance when they got notice of an alien invasion in Wakanda. At that moment in Wakanda, Thanos eliminated half of the universe's population, including Fury and Hill, using the Infinity Gauntlet. However, Fury was able to send a last-ditch message to Carol Danvers before disintegrating.[5] Five years later, after the Avengers traveled through time to gather past versions of the Infinity Stones, Banner assembled the stones and resurrected the fallen, including Fury. During the ensuing battle, Tony Stark sacrificed his life to finally defeat Thanos, and Fury afterwards attended Stark's funeral.[6]

Vacation in Space[]

Nicholas Fury (Earth-199999) from Secret Invasion (TV series) promo 001
Some time later, Fury retreated to space in a Skrull flagship and had Talos impersonate and replace him in the meantime. Fury gave Talos Tony Stark's Sunglasses with the E.D.I.T.H. A.I. to give to Peter Parker. After Stark's former employee Quentin Beck deceived Talos and exposed Parker's secret identity as Spider-Man to the world, Talos contacted Fury, forcing Fury to end his "vacation" and return to Earth.[23]

Attributes

Abilities

Nick Fury is a master strategist and an astute judge of character. He uses these talents to great effect in his leadership of S.H.I.E.L.D., coming up with various plans for a variety of scenarios.

Weaknesses

Paraphernalia

Equipment

Fury formerly operated with technology years ahead of traditional forces.

Weapons

  • US military firearms (standard and automatic).
  • Smith and Wesson M&P (sidearm)

Transportation

Formerly S.H.I.E.L.D. vehicles

Notes

Trivia

See Also

Links and References

References

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