NICK FURY : The Howling Super Agent Commando

"Every soldier must know, before he goes into battle, how the little battle he is to fight fits into the larger picture, and how the success of his fighting will influence the battle as a whole."--Bernard Law Montgomery
He'll be popping up a lot in Marvel Movies It's time to know more about this CBM Character - NICK FURY. This feature answers the questions - Who he is? What are his abilities? What are the changes he underwent? Who has portrayed him in Comic Book Movies?

Who is NICK FURY?
Nicholas Joseph Fury a one-eyed cigar-chomping World War II veteran who is still fighting today, as an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D or even as an agent of nothing. Considered as one of the greatest strategic minds in the Marvel Universe, a master of espionage, and a born leader.

NICK FURY is a WWII army hero and present-day super-spy. Created by artist Jack Kirby and writer Stan Lee, Fury first appeared in Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos #1 (May 1963), a World War II combat series that portrayed the cigar-chomping Fury as leader of an elite U.S. Army unit.

What are his powers and abilities?
Note: Due to the nature of comicbooks being an on-going tale, the character's powers along with his appearance, is in a constant state of flux.

NICK FURY's aging has been slowed greatly by the Infinity Formula, a serum created by Dr. Berthold Sternberg. Fury was first inoculated with the serum in the 1940s. Fury took the serum annually for many years. Due to its cumulative effect, Fury no longer needs additional doses to prolong his life span.

Abilities
NICK FURY was a trained paratrooper, ranger, demolitions expert and vehicle specialist. He holds an unlimited-tonnage, all-seas license as a commander of ocean-going vessels. Fury has completed Green and Black Beret Special Forces training, and has been an agent of the OSS (Office of Special Services) and a liaison of the MI-5 (British Secret Intelligence). He is a seasoned unarmed- and armed-combat expert, was a heavyweight boxer in the Army, and holds a black belt in Tae Kwan Do and a brown belt in Jiu Jitsu.

What are the changes in look he underwent?
1. Sgt. Fury
Sgt. Fury #1 (May 1963)
The first time we meet NICK FURY he was a Sergeant in World War II who led an elite unit, The Howling Commandos. Wearing a traditional soldier uniform. One thing you might notice is that he has the use of both of his eyes still. His adventures in WWII would last until 1974

2. Shield Agent
NICK FURY, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. #1(June, 1968)
Even though his World War II exploits are being told in Sgt. Fury, we see a modern NICK FURY as an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. This is where we are introduced to the iconic NICK FURY we all love, the eye patch is there, he is still chomping on his cigar and now wears the official S.H.I.E.L.D. agent uniform.

As an agent he has to be always dressed for the occasion:

3. Agent of Change
From S.H.I.E.L.D. agent to its director to becoming a fugitive. NICK FURY has seen it all, and like many good spies he still has a lot of secrets hidden, and lot of secrets to reveal. So, whether it is the Howling Commandos, the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents or the superhero community there is a good chance you would see NICK FURY leading the pack, but also has a hand hidden in pulling the strings.

4. Ultimate
Ok, so if you are that someone who reached this part, looking confused, asking yourself isn't NICK FURY black? Well, I have something to teach you and its called - MULTIVERSE.

A multiverse is a set of parallel realities. We have a Marvel Universe (uni which means one), and we have a Marvel Multiverse (multi means many). Usually when we talk about the Marvel Universe, we often talk about its mainstream continuity or its main universe, this is the universe that most of the Marvel comicbook character that we know of lives. In geektalk we call this as the 616 universe but there are other universes within the Marvel Multiverse and one of this is the 1610 universe or more famously known as the Ultimate Universe. In this universe we see familiar characters from the 616 universe but behaving differently or even looks different, this is where the black NICK FURY enters.

So, our eye-patched wearing cigar-chomping white dude in the 616 universe is a eye-patched wearing cigar-chomping black guy. (I hope that's clear because explaining this is giving me a headache).

This version of NICK FURY first appeared in Ultimate Marvel Team-Up #5 (August 2001).

NICK FURY in Live Media
1. David Hasselhoff
NICK FURY: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. is a 1998 made-for-TV movie starring David Hasselhoff. NICK FURY, here is retired and was approached to return to duty to take down agents of the terrorist organization HYDRA, led by the children of Baron Wolfgang von Strucker, an old enemy of his.

2. Samuel L. Jackson
In a fun, art imitating life imitating art scenario, we have Samuel L. Jackson whose likeness was used on the Ultimate NICK FURY on the pages of the Ultimates, now playing NICK FURY on several Marvel Movies that started in 2008 Iron Man movie.

sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Fury : http://marvel.wikia.com/Nicholas_Fury_(Earth-616) : http://www.comicvine.com/nick-fury/29-3202/ : http://marvel.com/universe/Fury,_Nick

Article requested by:

PaulRom
I'd love to see one on NICK FURY.

VanCityKid
A featurette on NICK FURY and/or SHIELD would be awesome

This is the 17th article in my Know Your CBM Character series. Any requests and suggestions for an article for this series write it down in the comment section BELOW.

Message to the CBM community:To those who are making requests, check first [here] because I might have done an article on the character already. If I have not please be patient, I will get on it as soon as possible (but consider the fact that I spend hours writing one of these articles). Try to limit your request to characters that already have been adapted to live media, so that the feature will at least be relevant to the site – Comic Book Movie(though I include TV characters).
Characters in Manga or Anime’, I am not particularly familiar of, I am not discounting these characters but it will probably take some time before I write a feature on them because I have to read up on these characters.
Thank you for reading these articles!
If there are errors on the feature article above, blame it on my age, humanity and ignorance. Just be sure to check the comment section for the corrections, any error I made will surely be pointed out and corrected by much bigger geeks (because there will always be a bigger geek out there).
-This has been PollMaster inviting you to the geekside. MABUHAY CBM and Godspeed!

P0llMaster
5/4/2011
DCMU

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