Marvel reveals the secret of the mysterious Voyager — and it’s a doozy

A character that Marvel has been teasing since September finally had her history revealed. In this week’s first issue of Avengers: No Surrender, a 16-issue weekly series bringing all three Avengers teams to save the Earth, we finally heard the story of Valerie Vector, the mysterious Voyager.

Marvel’s been teasing the identity of Voyager since the September kick off of its Legacy relaunch. The company revealed her design (seen above) and her name and codename, but very little else. The only other thing we had to go on was a very brief scene in Marvel: Legacy #1, the comic that kicked off the relaunch.

Marvel Comics

In it, we see the iconic statue of the founding members of the Avengers at Avengers Mansion — featuring Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, the Hulk, Ant-Man, the Wasp and Voyager.

Wait, hang on ...

Voyager has been the subject of a LOT of fan speculation since this appearance, with theories about her identity ranging from Valeria Richards, Reed and Sue Richards’ super-intelligent daughter, to Kobik, the sentient Cosmic Cube at the heart of last year’s Secret Empire storyline. Marvel executive Tom Brevort stoked the enthusiasm of obsessive nerds by telling them that Voyager is “the most important character in the Marvel Universe that you don’t remember.”

And now, in the pages of Avengers: No Surrender #1, we’ve been told.

[Warning: This post will contain spoilers for Avengers: No Surrender #1.]

It turns out that Voyager is a founding member of the Avengers that nobody remembers. Or, at least, she’s been retconned to be, as of Avengers: No Surrender #1. The current cosmic catastrophe has somehow snapped her back into our plane of existence, and snapped her entire existence back into the main Marvel reality. All of the Avengers fondly remember her again, and they remember her presence during major milestones of Avengers history.

Mark Waid, Al Ewing, Jim Zub, Pepe Larraz/Marvel Comics

Now the mighty Marvel hero is helping the Avengers save the Earth once again — although it’s likely that there will be some complications along the way.

Many fans have also pointed out that Voyager’s “a forgotten character retconned into existence” isn’t the first time this trope has been used. In fact, it’s not even the first time it’s been used by Mark Waid, who is co-writing No Surrender. Waid gave the same sort of back story to the DC Comics character Triumph in the ’90s — he was a founding member of the Justice League that everyone had forgotten.

And, in a very convoluted way, No Surrender #1 references all of that. Bear with me now: Voyager was erased from our universe while fighting a member of the Squadron Sinister. The Squadron Sinister is a team of Marvel supervillains who were created to ape DC Comics’ Justice League. And the brand new member of the Squadron Sinister that Voyager was fighting when they were accidentally erased from existence?

Well, he’s a guy named “Victory” that looks an AWFUL lot like Waid’s DC Comics superhero, Triumph.

DC Comics

Also, you know, “Triumph.” “Victory.” Get it?

If you do, you might just be ready for a universe where reality is warped as often as Marvel’s.