Criminal Intent

Melissa Gold, formerly the Thunderbolt known as Songbird, is on a mission to track down four escaped fugitives: Cottonmouth, Plantman, Headlok, and her former team leader, Clint Barton, aka Hawkeye.[1] To hunt them down she has found herself reverting back to her Screaming Mimi persona. This is bad company for Clint, particularly since he is secretly working for SHIELD to prevent the group from getting ahold of some old weapon created by the late Justin Hammer. This has all been masterminded by Mentallo, a mutant telepath who has hitched a ride inside Headlok’s body. Already the situation is getting out of hand when a Guardsman charged with bringing them back in was killed trying to arrest them.

She doesn’t think that Clint would have intentionally killed the man, but wonders if he had. She tries to go to sleep but she can’t stop thinking about her previous life as a member of the Thunderbolts, and being in love with her teammate Mach-3 (Abner Jenkins). She admits that being a hero and falling in love were the hardest things she had to do, and perhaps this is why it is so easy to slip into old habbits.[3]

The following morning, Melissa arrives at the Freeman’s Roadhouse in Kalispell, Montana. This is an old haunt from her criminal days and a good place for information. She quickly catches up with the bartender before getting down to business. When she asks him about the escaped fugitives, he reminds her about their no snitching policy. She then uses her sonic powers to force him to give up what he knows. That and the paper trail lead her to a costume shop in Bellingham, Washington. The owner recognizes Melissa, but one look at her and he realizes that he’s actually talking to her Screaming Mimi persona. Once again, she uses her sonic powers to force answers out of him and learns that after being set up with fake IDs, they went up to Vancouver, Canada. On her way out, Melissa sees her old Screaming Mimi costume on display and scoffs at it, but has fond memories of being part of the criminal Grapplers. As she follows their trail and can’t understand the eight stops they made along the way. However, the solution eventually comes to her one morning in the show and suddenly it all makes sense.

She realizes that the break out has something to do with the late Justin Hammer, so she heads to Crecy Enterprises, a business owned by Hammer, that the Thunderbolts had trashed in the recent past.[4] As she stakes out the facility, she notices no sign of violence and wonders if Hawkeye is going along with whatever Mentallo’s scheme is. Inside, Clint has brought some secret data that he and his group recovered from Hammer’s other facilities and presented it to the head of Crecy Enterprises, a man named Carpenter. Clint wants to exchange the data for having the manacles that prevent the fugitives from using their powers or being more than a few meters apart. While these arrangements are being made, Melissa wonders how to handle the situation and questions who she is loyal to. That’s when she spots a tornado in the horizon that is making its way to Crecy Enterprises, signaling that trouble is on its way.

Inside, Clint asks Masterson why their shackles haven’t been removed. The fugitives are told that the proximity and power dampening functions have been deactivated, but they decided to keep the neuroshock devices operational as it would benefit Hammer Industries corporate interests. Realizing that they have been double crossed, Cottonmouth is about ready to attack Masterson when — suddenly — the wall blows out. This was caused by Cyclone, a super-powered mercenary for hire. With his power over wind, he is able to incapacitate and knock out Hawkeye and his fellow fugitives. However, before Cyclone can steal Justin Hammer’s legacy, he is stopped by Songbird.

When Hawkeye wakes up he discovers that the battle is over. Hammer’s technicians have been imprisoned in solid sound constructs along with Cottomouth and Headlok/Mentallo. The only people who are free are Hawkeye (who has his manacles removed) as well as Plantman. He is allowed to be free because they still need to know why Mentallo chose him for the breakout. Cyclone, unfortunately, was able to escape but Melissa was at least able to prevent him from getting away with the data he tried to steal. On top of this, they don’t know what Hammer’s final scheme was, just that it involves Cyclone and the nation of Symkaria.[5] Hawkeye wants to get to the bottom of this mystery and Melissa is more than happy to help him. From her jeep she tosses Clint a bag that contains his Hawkeye costume, bow, and trick arrows.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the sun, on the duplicate world of Counter-Earth, the rest of the Thunderbolts are still alive. The team has decided to remain here and help restore civilization on the destabilized planet.[6] They have traveled to the Himalayan Mountains to the abandoned city of Attilan.[7] Their leader, Baron Zemo, tells the Thunderbolts that they are going to make this the new capital of Counter-Earth!

Recurring Characters

Thunderbolts (Hawkeye, Songbird, Plantman), Headlok/Mentallo, Cottonmouth, Cyclone

Continuity Notes

1. Hawkeye started leading the Thunderbolts in issue #21. He agreed to go to jail in exchange for Presidential pardons for the rest of the Thunderbolts back in Thunderbolts #50. While in prison, Hawkeye was contacted by Mentallo who convinced him to break out of jail in order to find the lost treasures of the late Justin Hammer. What nobody knows is that Clint agreed to do this as part of a covert SHIELD mission. See Thunderbolts #51, 52, and Life Sentences #1. Justin Hammer, FYI, had just recently died as seen in Iron Man: Bad Blood #4. In Melissa’s flashback, we see a scene from when Hawkeye led the Thunderbolts against the Hulk, that happened in Thunderbolts #34.

2. Mimi is the name that Melissa gave herself when she ran away from home and had to fend for herself. It was a new tough-as-nails persona that she created for herself, as explained in Thunderbolts #21. She later began calling herself Screaming Mimi when she first became a costumed criminal circa Marvel Two-In-One #54.

3. Melissa and Abner have been in a romantic relationship dating back to Thunderbolts #3. At the time of this story, she believes her teammates had been killed during their battle with Graviton in issue #58. In reality, they were all transported to Franklin Richards’ Counter-Earth, as we saw in the following issue. They will be reunited in issue #74.

4. The Thunderbolts previously clashed with Justin Hammer when Abner was forced by the Commission on Superhuman Activities as the Beetle to infiltrate Hammer’s criminal operations. See Thunderbolts #35-37.

5. So what is it exactly that Justin Hammer knew about? Basically, and alien ship that is hidden beneath Symkaria. Look, it’s complicated, just check out Thunderbolts #65, 67, 69, 71, 73, and 74-75, okay?

6. Counter-Earth was thrown into upheaval by the Dreaming Celestial who caused a series of cataclysms that destabilized the entire planet. See Heroes Reborn: Doomsday, Ashema, Masters of Evil, Remnants, Young Allies, and Doom.

7. Attilan was home to Counter-Earth’s version of the Inhumans, as seen in Fantastic Four (vol. 2) #8. However, the city was abandoned after the heroes of Earth-616 returned to their proper homes in Heroes Reborn: The Return #1-4, which included members of the Inhuman Royal Family (even though they were originally from Counter-Earth, but that’s neither here nor there so don’t worry your pretty head about it.)

Topical References

• The narrative says that Songbird’s Screaming Mimi persona is like Nike, saying she doesn’t think she just does it. Nike, in case you’ve been living under a rock for the past 40 years is a brand of sports shoe that was at the height of its popularity at the time this comic was published. Their slogan from 1988 to 1998 was “Just Do It.” This should be considered a topical reference as Nike is a real world brand, and they no longer use this slogan. Also a more contemporary analogy could probably be used in its place.

• The cost of a motel stay in this story is $87.90, that would be about $148 in 2023.

• Melissa’s narrative refers to her moment of realization as a Homer Simpson moment and says “D’oh”. Homer Simpson is one of the primary characters on the animated sitcom The Simpsons which began airing in 1989 and after 34 seasons (time of this writing) will probably still airing when the universe enters heat death. One of Homer’s catch phrases is exclaiming “D’oh!” whenever he does something stupid or is made to look foolish. This would usually be considered a topical reference, but now that Disney owns both Marvel Comics and The Simpsons, this would be looked at as brand synergy.

• Justin Hammer’s secret data is depicted as being on a disc (probably a CD given the date of publication) which was a common form of data storage when this comic was first published. While storing data on disc media is still a thing it has long since fallen out of popular use in favor of newer technology that have proven to be a better alternative. As this is a technology on its way into obsolescence its depiction here should be considered topical.