Warning! Spoilers for Taskmaster #5
After spending five issues trying to figure out who killed the Avengers’ Maria Hill, the finale of Jed MacKay’s Taskmaster series revealed that Hill has actually been alive all long, manipulating everything from behind the scenes. An underhanded move like that proves that Hill is not only one of Marvel’s greatest spies, but she’s more of a successor to Nick Fury than his own son.
Fans more familiar with the movies than the comics may be surprised to learn that the black Nick Fury - the one who takes after Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury - is actually Nick Fury Jr. The original Nick Fury was a white male who had been around since Captain America’s World War II days and used something called the Infinity Formula to keep himself young into the modern era. However, the popularity of the movies led to the introduction of a new Nick Fury more similar to Jackson’s portrayal. This version, originally called Marcus Johnson, was introduced in Battle Scars #1 by Christopher Yost, and was eventually revealed to be the son of Nick Fury, who disappeared after Jason Aaron’s Original Sin event. Johnson then took up the Nick Fury mantle, but while he proved to be an equally capable spy, the son was nowhere near as cutthroat as the father.
While he claimed to serve the greater good, the original Nick Fury was ultimately not very heroic. He manipulated and used people as he saw fit, even going so far as letting children die in Secret Warriors. He also killed Uatu the Watcher and committed countless other war crimes. In contrast, Nick Fury Jr. is much more similar to the heroic MCU Nick Fury. Sure, he might play a little dirty when it's required, but in espionage, that comes with the territory. At the end of the day, Junior’s moral com is much more functional than his father’s - and Maria Hill’s, for that matter.
The way Hill manipulated Taskmaster, Black Widow, and Fury Jr. into getting the Rubicon Trigger operational was nothing short of cold-blooded. She may not have any allegiance to Taskmaster, but Fury and Widow were supposedly her friends, and Natasha says as much. “You treated us like assets,” she says, “Not friends. Not teammates.” Hill simply responds, “I did. And I’d do it again.” This calloused behavior isn’t exactly new for Hill, either. Back in Marvel’s Civil War event, Hill was in charge of SHIELD while they ran internment camps for uned superpowered individuals. Even Marvel basically confirmed SHIELD were the villains of Civil War, proving Hill has been on the wrong side pretty often for someone who claims to have the world’s best interests at heart.
Ultimately, it makes sense for Marvel’s spies to exist in a more morally grey area than their superheroes. While the new Nick Fury leans more towards the hero side, Hill takes after the original Nick Fury in that her mission comes before everything else, and it doesn’t matter who she has to use to accomplish it.
