Origin
Jack Monroe was born in Iowa and had a largely traumatic upbringing that he mostly had repressed. He was son to parents who were post-war Nazi sympathizers. He and his sister were routinely beat by their father who hoped the beatings would stop his children from sharing with anyone the contents of their home’s basement.
Jack, not realizing the nature of what his father kept in the basement, took some of the Nazi memorabilia and other war paraphernalia to school for Show and Tell. He was later approached by the FBI which led to his parents being arrested on the grounds of being traitors. Jack and his sister received a lot of hatred around town for their parents actions, which also uncovered several other Nazi sympathiszrs living in the town, but what scarred Jack the most was witnessing both his parents executed on the electric chair before his eyes.
Jack was relocated to a foster home in Connecticut and as he grew older, he began to idolize Captain America and Bucky for their efforts against the Nazis in the war. While at school, he met a Captain America-obsessed teacher, who legally changed his name to Steven Rogers and had plastic surgery to resemble the real Captain America, and the two formed a close friendship based on their shared admiration of Captain America.
When a communist Red Skull surfaced, the two decided to inject themselves with an untested Super Soldier Serum that “Steven” had discovered years earlier. “Steven” became the new Captain America and Jack Monroe became his Bucky. The two fought for freedom against communists and enemies to the US such as Electro.
Unfortunately, since the duo had been given a new and untested version of the serum, there were some side effects. The serum had affected their sanity and they became violent and unstable. The duo began seeing anyone slightly different as possible threats to America and would regularly attack people of different ethnicities and nationalities. At times, the duo would question their own actions not entirely sure what they were doing and were soon apprehended and placed in suspended animation in the hopes of one day finding a cure for their condition.
Creation
Jack Monroe was created by Steve Englehart and first appeared in Captain America #153. However, he is a retconned character and his first published appearance is considered to be in Young Men #24.
Major Story Arcs
The Secret Origin of Captain America
Years later, a disgruntled government employee, unhappy with the current state of the country, re-released the two into the world without consent hoping the duo would “sort out the country”. The two resumed their hero identities and set out to kill the current Captain America, not realizing he is in fact the original.
Unable to find him, they spent a great deal of time assaulting people of different race and ethnicity, this included beating and torturing the Falcon for information, attacking Sharon Carter and infiltrating the Avengers mansion and stealing a Quinjet. Eventually the pair located the real Captain America and capturing him. After discovering their identities, the real Captain America and Falcon best them both in a fight and the duo are apprehended and once again thrown into suspended animation.
The Grand Director and “death”
After a while, both are handed over to a mental institution, with the hopes of curing them of their craziness. But unbeknownst to SHIELD, the institution is in fact ran by super-villain Dr. Faustus.
Faustus encourages and brainwashes “Steven Rogers” into becoming the neo-Nazi Grand Director and as a test that his mind-meddling has worked has him shoot Monroe in cold-blood. An action that later causes “Steven” to attempt to kill himself.
Return and Nomad
Decades later, it was revealed Monroe was only shot with blanks and the government agency SHIELD had been able to reestablish Jack’s sanity. Monroe, with nowhere else to go, shows up on the real Steve Rogers doorstep. After some initial unease at the possibility of it being some sort of a ruse, Steve and then-girlfriend Bernie, accept Jack into their life and allow him to stay with them.
Jack acts as the real Captain America’s Bucky for a while but eventually takes on the identity of Nomad (a guise Captain America himself once used) afraid that he cannot live up to the original Bucky’s legacy. Captain America and Nomad act as partners for quite a while, fighting intense battles against such foes as Baron Zemo and the Red Skull, however Nomad was often prone to mistakes, clumsiness and rashness. His dated viewpoint also proved troublesome when he first re-encounters the Falcon and later meets the pacifist, or “the wimp”, Dave Cox.
Nomad is often seen suffering from confidence problems and feels he doesn’t deserve to be Captain America’s partner and constantly tries to prove himself to his mentor. More than enough times he is too headstrong and winds up easily brought down in a fight.
With Captain America regularly being called away on Avengers business, Nomad was left to act solo. He was fraught with often being mistaken for Captain America and demanding little respect from his opponents. After a while, Jack began to feel confident in himself and managed to get a job as a bag boy at a supermarket where he also developed a crush on a girl. When a villain called Madcap attacked the city sending people into crazy spins, Jack ditched his job to fight against Madcap. After a long fight, Nomad eventually succumbed to Madcap’s power and begins to have a crazy outbreak of his own, in the process, he sees his own reflection as Captain America’s.
When Nomad comes to he returns to his job and is fired for sneaking out of work, discovers the girl he likes has a boyfriend and once again accepts he has failed to beat Madcap. After all these failures, Jack decides to pack his bags and leave, but not before beating Madcap first.
Nomad shows up at Madcap’s hideout and talks with Madcap and begins to understand Madcap’s plight and appears to side with him, but this is partly all a rouse on Nomad’s behalf. Later the two do battle, witnessed by Captain America, and Nomad finally defeats Madcap. Upon doing so, he speaks to Steve about how he’s sick of living in Captain America’s shadow and the last few days have proven to him he can be his own man.
Nomad with the CSA
Years later, Jack returned to assist Steve who was now acting as The Captain after the Commission on Superhuman Activities had relinquished his right to be Captain America. During the time spent together, Jack began to feel disillusioned with Steve’s lack of action and attitude towards criminals and soon abandoned Steve and his gang angrily. Nomad continued to fight crime on his own, dealing with the more “mundane” and “important” issues Captain America wouldn’t such as drugs and street crime. He redesigned his costume, as well as taking care of a child he took to calling ” Bucky“, and literally became a nomad, traveling the country, fighting against evil. He quickly found a nemesis in the shape of the crime-lord Umberto Safilios who was responsible for, among many criminal activities, killing several girls. As Jack tried his hardest to get to Safilios, he unraveled more layers of what seemed to be D.E.A. corruption.
Soon when this led him to become involved in trying to thwart a Government arms deal, he became the target of the Commission who were skeptical about his sanity. Andrea Sterman was assigned to research Jack’s history to deduce whether or not he was a threat and began to develop feelings of sympathy for him which led her to frequently go against her employers and side with Jack. Captain America also began to take notice of Jack’s new attitude and disapproved of the way he was handling things and was particularly unhappy about him now carrying guns. The two later came to serious blows when the Commission wished Jack to be apprehended for his interference in Government operations.
Jack was soon held prisoner by American and Russian government operatives, in league with Safilios, who intended to use Jack as a Scapegoat and potentially kill him. After Captain America was convinced by Sterman that Jack was being used as a scapegoat, the two briefly reconciled to fight for Jack’s freedom. The escape attempt climaxed with Jack executing Safilios as well as shooting practically everyone else present. After doing so, Jack realizes soon after this wasn’t the way to fix things and he begged Captain America to let him leave with “Bucky” and give them both a chance. Captain America grants his friend his wish and allows the two to leave hoping that they can both find their way.
Jack remained a target for both the Commission and SHIELD who assigned a task force consisting of Andrea Sterman, Jack Norriss and U.S.Agent to apprehend Jack. The team succeeded and Jack was offered to have his criminal record expunged in exchange for him murdering the Slug.
Jack went to Vegas to get the Slug where he crossed paths with Daredevil and the Punisher and came into the line of fire of several mob bosses such as Tombstone, Hammerhead and The Hand among others. On top of everything, Bushwacker kidnaps Bucky believing her to his sister-in-law’s daughter and Deadpool crosses paths with Jack while trying to assassinate Bushwacker’s sister-in-law’s ex-husband.
After The Punisher manages to save Bucky, Jack locates the Slug and struggles to decide whether to kill him or not. Daredevil insists that it isn’t the right thing to do, whereas the Punisher recommends Jack do it. Jack eventually realizes he can’t do it, so the Punisher tries to rectify this but is unable to when he discovers he has no ammunition. Constantly moving across the country and trying to solve people’s problems, Jack soon allowed a woman nicknamed “Horseshoe” to accompany him on his journeys. The two developed a relationship, however Jack soon discovered “Horseshoe” was also a serial killer who was injecting unsuspecting men with HIV as she traveled alongside him.
After several adventures alongside baby Bucky, Giscard Epurer set in action a plan to reunite “Bucky” with her mother, who he had tortured to help her clean up her act and had taught her how to fight. After her mother kidnapped her back, Jack tracked the two down, and seeing the mother was now clean and trying to get her life back on track, tearfully parted ways with his adopted daughter.
Jack turned to alcohol following the break-up between him and his “daughter” and one night, in a drunken stupor, wound up being captured by Dr. Faustus who psychologically manipulated him into following in his father’s footsteps and becoming a Nazi. Jack shaved off his hair and went about with a team of like minded skinheads, until Captain America showed up and helped Jack snap out of it. At the behest of his former partner, Jack allowed Faustus to live and turned him over to the authorities where he was sent to jail.
Jack, who was now fully aware of his traumatic past and his part in their execution because of Faustus, tracked him down in prison weeks later and shot him in cold blood stating that having his death on his conscience will be no worse than being responsible for his own parent’s death.
Jack soon found himself the target of many agencies when a boy he bullied as a child and who’s parents were exposed as Nazis alongside Jack’s, grew up to be a senator. Bart Ingrid had ties to a Neo-Nazi movement. Jack eventually assassinated Ingrid and was placed back into suspended animation after Vernon Hatchway helped fake his death.
Scourge
He was later placed under mind control by government agent Henry Gyrich. Gyrich, who was known to have no love for super-humans, forced Nomad to become the new Scourge of the Underworld. It was his duty to eliminate evil with the saying, “Justice is served.”As the Scourge, Monroe was confronted and subdued by the Thunderbolts. Upon discovering his identity, they also found out that he was under mind control. Monroe decided to go back to his crime fighting ways.
He started to become weaker after each incident and started having hallucinations. Seeking treatment for his ailment, Dr. Jane Foster suggested that the breakdown of the Super Soldier Serum in his system was responsible for Monroe’s growing mania, though Dr. Foster also believed the Nanites in Monroe’s brain during his time as Scourge may have exacerbated his condition. His body could no longer sustain the action.
Death
Losing his sense of reality, Nomad began to fight innocent people he believed were enemies. Receiving news of the Scarlet Witch‘s breakdown, Monroe attempted to contact Steve Rogers. Before he was able to, Nomad was assassinated by the Winter Soldier (the original Bucky Barnes). The Winter Soldier’s mission at the time was to track down and eliminate anyone that had been injected with the serum.
Other Nomads
Upon discovering a high-ranking government official was involved with the Secret Empire, Steve Rogers became temporarily disenchanted with the United States Federal Government, renounced the Captain America title and invented the Nomad identity in which to continue fighting for justice. Steve struggled to establish respect and a public identity in this new guise and changed the costume design regularly, most notabley after tripping over his cape during a fight. After a few months wherein he defeated Viper among others, Steve decided he represented the American Dream as Captain America, not the United States Government. He subsequently resumed his role as Captain America.
When the Commission of Superhuman Activities removed Steve’s right to the title of Captain America, Jack Monroe offered to return the Nomad identity to Steve. Rogers declined, however, saying that Jack had now made something of the identity.
Years later, a new Nomad surfaced in California in the shape of Edward Ferbel. This new Nomad Initially seemed like a glory hound who was secretly sabotaging Captain America’s crime-fighting efforts and then showing up to play to the camera as the true hero. It was later revealed he was working for the Red Skull in his attempts to get to Captain America by discrediting him and ruining his reputation. After a few adventures, often frustrating Captain America, Ferbel was gunned down in cold-blood by Ameridroid. Ironically, Captain America was later blamed for the murder and for having done nothing to prevent it.
After Jack Monroe, Rikki Barnes took on the Nomad identity decades later.
Powers and Abilities
Jack Monroe has advanced “super-soldier” strength to a similar standard as Captain America. Jack, however, isn’t entirely aware of the extent of his strength and on occasion has almost killed people by not properly restricting himself in a fight.
As well as his strength, as Nomad, Jack carries two “stun discs” which he uses as projectiles. Jack himself as derided these and while battling Machete and Zaran lost one of them for a day. His jacket and cape are also bullet-proof.
As well as his strength, Jack Monroe has displayed skills in infiltrating his enemies’ hide-outs by developing undercover personalities or feigning alliance. Despite these abilities, Jack prefers not to think too much and instead “just hit things”.
Physical Characteristics
- Height: 5’11”
- Weight: 200 lbs.
- Eyes: Brown
- Hair: Brown
Other Media
Film
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
During Sitwell’s interrogation he makes mention of an honor student in Iowa that is a threat to HYDRA. It can be made to assume that who Sitwell was referring to was Nomad as he is the only one with connections to Captain America that is from Iowa.