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Bearers of the Quantum Bands
Wendell Vaughn
Wendell Vaughn
A former agent of SHIELD, Wendell Vaughn is a cosmic-powered superhero known as Quasar. Equipped with the Quantum Bands, powerful wristbands that tap into the unlimited power of the Quantum Zone, Quasar was appointed Captain Marvel's successor as Protector of the Universe by Eon. Originally naming himself Marvel Boy after the Silver Age hero who owned a similar pair of wristbands, Quasar gradually carves out his own identity as one of Marvel's most powerful cosmic heroes.
Quasar has been in charge of Project PEGASUS, led the short-lived teams the Starmasters and the Annihilators, been a valued member of the Avengers and the Guardians of the Galaxy, and acted as Avatar of Infinity.
- Back from the Dead: He's died a few times.
- Brought Down to Normal: After a year or two in quantum energy form, he's turned back to flesh-and-blood on entering the Cancerverse.
- Butt-Monkey: If he appears in a story written by Jim Starlin, he's gonna be humiliated.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Mark Gruenwald created Maelstrom in 1980 for the specific purpose of eventually becoming Quasar's Arch-Enemy when he got his own series...which didn't happen until 1989.
- Chick Magnet / Even the Guys Want Him
- Domed Hometown: Vaughn finds the ruins of a domed city on Uranus, revealed to be the same city where the original Marvel Boy grew up.
- Energy Beings: During Secret Invasion, Vaughn returns from the dead as an energy being similar to the constructs created by the Quantum Bands.
- The Everyman
- The Fettered: Wendell's superiors noted that he lacked a "killer instinct" to win at any and all costs.
- Flat-Earth Atheist: Possibly an Author Avatar as well. Eventually became more agnostic/Deist."Maybe I'm not the atheist I thought I was. Maybe I just haven't found the God that's right for me."
- Flying Firepower: Possesses the Quantum Bands, which allow him to fly at lightspeeds and fire quantum energy.
- Handwave: During Avengers: Standoff, he's stepped down as Quasar for reasons that are never fully explained. After Secret Empire, he's back in the job again.
- Human Popsicle: Vaughn entered a form of suspended animation for his trip from Earth to Uranus.
- Instant Expert: Averted. Vaughn doesn't become truly proficient with the Quantum Bands until his encounter with Eon.
- Played straight with his new moveset when he was made of quantum energy.
- Legacy Character: In his debut, he was the new Marvel Boy. This lasted a grand total of one issue before he renamed himself Marvel Man. Becoming Quasar took a few more years.
- Look What I Can Do Now!: After taking a four year journey to Uranus, where Eon opened his mind to the full potential of the Quantum Bands, Quasar uses a Quantum Jump to return to Earth. Total return time: 15 seconds.
- Meaningful Name: Wendell means 'Wanderer' and given to the fact that at the end of his solo series, his name fits as he was on a forced exile to Space from Earth.
- The Mentor: Serves as this to Richard Rider when he became the third Quasar.
- Mistaken Identity: Meeting for the first time at the Project: PEGASUS facility, the Thing attacks Quasar after mistaking him for Crusader, Marvel Boy's evil duplicate. Eventually the two become good friends.
- Named After Somebody Famous: Wendell Elvis Vaughn
- Nice Guy: Vaughn is the kind of guy who calls everyone "sir" or "ma'am", even his enemies on occasion.
- No-Sell: Mental attacks won't work on Wendell, period. His mind can be read, but not affected.
- Only Mostly Dead: How he survived his demise in Annihilation. He tried to teleport away, and only some of him made it out.
- Only Sane Man: Wendell hates the seemingly obligatory hero-vs.-hero fights, and if caught in or near one will do everything in his power to defuse it; talk his way out of it, put up a barrier between the fighting parties...
- Pretty Boy: Depending on the artist, the most prominent example is when Greg Capullo draws him in several issues of the solo series. In one issue, he was even called 'Pretty Boy' by a villain.
- Shout-Out / Take That!: Possibly at Green Lantern with William Wesley, a cocky test pilot with Heroic Willpower who explodes after an experiment with the Quantum Bands goes wrong.
- Technical Pacifist: Because he wields great power, Vaughn follows a standard operation procedure to avoid killing his enemies. He contains the threat with a Q-Field, drains him or her of energy (if applicable), then attacks with various quantum constructs as necessary.
- Teleporter Accident: His teleports don't always teleport... everything he wants to.
- Thou Shalt Not Kill: Despite graduating from the SHIELD academy and being considered highly capable by his superiors, Wendell was considered unfit for field duty because of his refusal to do anything to win, including killing.
- Time to Unlock More True Potential: Vaughn's encounter with Eon opened his mind to the full potential of the Quantum Bands.
- Transformation Trinket: His Quantum Bands.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: Available only in energy being form. In Nova #18, Quasar took on the form of the Hulk to battle a genetically augmented Skrull.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: Relationships with Old Man Vaughn were strained, partly because he was just generally not good with expressing his emotions to begin with.
- The Worf Effect: Killed at the mid-way point of Annihilation to show how dangerous Annihilus was. He got better eventually.
Phyla-Vell
Avril Kincaid
Avril Kincaid
- Affirmative-Action Legacy: A gay (human) woman, succeeding Wendell.
- The Bus Came Back: After the events of Secret Empire, Avril went missing, and was just generally presumed to be outright dead. In the 2019 Guardians of the Galaxy annual, Wendell revealed he learned she was alive... somewhere. It took until 2020 for her to turn up again, having since been found (somehow).
- Body Swap: Can do this with Wendall Vaughn by striking the Quantum Bands against each other.
- Character Shilling: Her appearances in Nick Spencer's Captain America had characters talking up how really, supremely impressive and powerful Avril is.
- Living Macguffin: A large part of the plot of Secret Empire is how Avril, and only Avril can take down the planetary shield Earth has, not any of the other cosmically powered beings Marvel has lying around, even the ones who could canonically flatten any Quasar. And then she gets knocked into a coma by the Chitauri.
