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Mystique and Destiny Spiral, getting acquainted with Super Sabre. Avalanche is gawking in the background.

Freedom Force is a long-defunct U.S. government team originally made up of Mystique's Brotherhood of Evil Mutants (plus Spiral). They later acquired other members along the way to eventually form a core group of nine in their heyday---which varied depending on who was straying from the team and who, unfortunately, was dead. They were more often than not used as villains. So why do I like them? Well, admittedly I prefer a lot of villains over the various heroes, but FF was an interesting bunch of characters in their own right. When written by Chris Claremont at least, they were complex and motivated people depicted in shades of grey---while they started out as villains, they became more sympathetic during their tenure with FF and many began to lean towards heroism. And they were by no means a monolithic organization. There was a trio of old war heroes, there was the former Brotherhood (whose members existed along a varying spectrum of morality; some eager to do good, while others weren't), there was Spiral with motivations all her own, and briefly Spider-Woman who was so incompatible with the team that she betrayed them. I don't much like her for this, and she wasn't around for very long anyway, so she'll receive less attention here. But I like this old team so much (and feel many of the members have been given the short end of the proverbial stick) that I decided to give them their own web page. The characters are---or were, at least---so good that they don't deserve to be forgotten. The plan right now is to have a different theme each month, starting out by featuring a character, and later moving on to other topics that will hopefully be fun (please allow me this bit of colour in my otherwise meaningless life ;) ). So welcome to the Freedom Force page, please peruse all it has to offer, and enjoy!

Stonewall Spider-Woman, pictured while still with the team.

Crimson Commando, Super Sabre, Blob, Pyro, Avalanche.

What's New?

Mystique, as a member of the X-Men. Blob, depressed over being depowered.

April 1, 2007 is now the eighth anniversary of this website. And it's been way too long since this feature was updated; I may just retire it soon (the feature, not the website). One reason is a lack of time, and another reason is a general lack of ideas. I think I'd have more ideas if more of the characters in question --- the various members of Freedom Force, naturally --- were appearing in comics on a regular, or even semi-regular basis. But few of them are, which also explains why I don't buy a lot of comics these days. Admittedly, Mystique is currently appearing monthly in the X-Men series, and Spider-Woman (now Arachne) will be in the Omega Flight limited series. However, as I believe I've mentioned before, I'm no fan of Spider-Woman, and she's a peripheral FF character at best, having had only four appearances with the team and betrayed them when leaving. Destiny, Pyro, Stonewall, and Super Sabre still remain dead, despite Marvel's many resurrections. Blob was depowered over a year ago, and hasn't appeared since [note: he has now appeared in X-Factor #18, out in mid-April]. Avalanche retained his powers, but hasn't been seen since that terrible Exodus-Black Tom Brotherhood, over two years ago. Spiral appears very sporadically. Crimson Commando did appear briefly in House of M a while back, but that's the one and only time he's appeared since 1994. So you can see my dissatisfaction. One of the things that gets me is how the dead and off-panel characters have been largely forgotten. Not once has Pyro ever been mentioned by his friends since his death. You would think that a friend dying from a nasty disease --- who turned on you and foiled your plans the day he died --- would merit some kind of remembrance, even if a bitter one. But the survivors don't seem to have noticed that he's gone, or that he ever existed. Mystique occasionally remembers Destiny (not as often as I'd like, given the closeness and length of their relationship), but that's the extent of any FFer noting the existence/passing of their dead or missing teammates. I think this is why I'm so amused and even excited for a cameo appearance of FF in Marvel Zombies: Dead Days and Marvel Zombies vs Army of Darkness; it's nice to know the team (and at least some of the characters) hasn't been entirely forgotten by Marvel, even if it's just them briefly as flesh-eating zombies in a non-continuity horror/comedy series. And it's unfortunate things have come to that, really. Here's hoping that by this time next year, I'll have less reason to be so pessimistic.

Freedom Force lineups.
Recounts the roster of FF at various points in their history.

Character bios.
In lieu of the old 'Previous Bios of the Month' page, there's now a separate page and bio for each member of the team. Click here to go to the index.

Freedom Force chronology.
This is, as far as I can tell, the correct chronology of FF appearances (it tends to be a bit convoluted). It also briefly details the events of each issue, to form a bit of a narrative on the stuff they've done.

Frequently Asked Questions.
Common FF-related questions...and answers. Trivia, too! Question submissions welcomed.

Mystique chronology.
An issue-by-issue listing and write-up of Mystique's canon appearances to date.

Pyro chronology and appearances list.
Contains all continuity and non-continuity appearances of Pyro that I'm aware of, each entry with a brief description of his role in that issue. If anyone knows of anything I've missed, please let me know---I'm a really obsessive completist, and there's got to be tons more stuff out there.

The case for What If? v.2 #66 being in continuity.
After much thought and input from others, I've decided that part of this issue is canon. See why.

Pyro article.
Or whatever it should be called. It's an info document about The Mighty Australian's powers, history, friends, et cetera. A bit of a labour of love---I reeeeally like Pyro.

Avalanche's powers.
A new document that details the use of Avalanche's powers, issue by issue. Why? Because he has a fairly wide variety of power stunts, and I obsessive-compulsively felt the need to list them.

A nifty alternate cover to X-Factor #8 (found in the back pages of X-Factor annual #3). The funny thing is that X-Factor looks like the villains here! Click on the picture for the larger version.

Action figures and related memorabilia.
If you collect action figures or compulsively chase after artifacts, this might interest you. It's a listing of all the FF-character related stuff out there (that I'm aware of; again, help here would be great, s'il vous plait...)

Fanfic Index
Fan Art Index
These pages are where you'll find FF-character fiction and art created by fans. New submissions are always welcomed!

Convention sketches.
So far, I've gotten fourteen sketches from four cons. I hope to get more in the future...

Upcoming stuff and rumours.
Definite spoilers here, so be warned. It's info about upcoming issues/plots concerning FF characters, taken from previews and the Marvel website.

Reviews.
Certain members of the team are always busy, so here are the reviews of recent issues they've appeared in (older reviews can be found in the Archives). Currently contains: Mystique #1, Mystique #2, X-Men Unlimited 48, UXM 428, Mystique #4, Mystique #5, Mystique #6, Mystique #7, Mystique #8, Mystique #9, Mystique #10, New Mutants v.2 #9, Mystique #11, Mystique #12, Mystique #13, Mystique #14, Mystique #15, Mystique #16, Exiles #50, Mystique #17, X-Men #161, X-Men #162, Mystique #19, Mystique #20, X-Men #163, X-Men #164, Mystique #21, Mystique #22, Mystique #23, Mystique #24, Hulk #83, and Hulk #84.

Image Gallery.
Growing archive of miscellaneous pictures that I've scanned. Some Freedom Force-era pics, and some from before and after.

My favourite pictures.
Go on, go look! Funny and charming images of FF characters. Mostly pretty silly.

My favourite pictures, page 2.
Some more of the humourous...and not so funny...FF character images.

Covers from France.
Original cover art (and some reprints) from French comics, featuring FF characters. They're pretty nifty!

X-Factor picture.
A neato picture of one of the proposed government X-Factor lineups, and definitely very interesting. Pyro...wearing black?! Scanned from The Dragon #3.

Blob and Avalanche in X-Corps.
For your enjoyment, some pictures of Blob and Avalanche dressed like Nazis.
And now Pyro dressed as one, too!

Avalanche without his helmet.
He doesn't take it off much, and he looks different every time.

Icons.
Headshot Internet icons, free to be used as you see fit. Currently available: X3 Pyro and Mystique, and comics-Mystique.

X2 movie pics.
Images of Pyro and Mystique from the X-Men 2 movie. Most were taken from the movie trailers.

X3 movie pics.
Images of Pyro and Mystique from the X-Men 3 movie. Fairly non-spoilerish, and most were taken from the movie trailer.

Brotherhood names.
A short essay about the possible literary origins of the Brotherhood members' names and backgrounds.
Updated May 2007!

Short editorial.
Takes me darn near forever to get around to writing these! Here's one about the death of Pyro.

Quotes Pages.
Interested in quotes relating to Freedom Force, the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, Pyro, and FF-character humour? You'll find all four lists here. The Pyro list is new.

Archive Gallery.
A collection of old issue reviews and previous Bios of the Month, for those who missed them the first time.

Site awards.
A collection of the awards this site has won. I am sooo grateful to have them. Thanks to all!

The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants and Freedom Force mailing list.
Yes, we've just expanded into the madcap world of mailing lists. Interested in discussing FF or any of the BoEMs? (including Magneto's, Toad's, etc) You can sign up here!

Links.
The non-fanfic links have moved to their own page...with some new additions.

You know you've got problems when even Spiral's scared.

A big round of applause for my loving husband, without whom I couldn't have put up this site (quite literally; he taught me HTML)! Thanks, Stan! :)

Special thanks to: David Morrison, Omar Sayyed, Clint Theron, Renee Komodowski, Michel Racaud, Tilman Stieve, and all those who have supported and enjoyed this site over the years.