Your Favorite Avengers' Tragic Backstories

The Avengers are known for stopping the bad guys and preventing the world from falling into disaster, again and again. From pushing back an alien invasion of New York City at the last minute to bringing back everyone Thanos snapped out of existence at the end of Avengers: Infinity War, the members of this super-team have plenty of experience in saving the day. 

Perhaps one reason the Avengers have made a blockbuster habit of putting themselves on the line for the sake of others is that they all suffered some form of loss during an earlier part of their lives, making them more compassionate toward the suffering of others — and helping prepare them for the immense sacrifices they'd be called on to make later on. Think about it: almost every Avenger in the Marvel Cinematic Universe has lost something or someone close to them that put them on the path to becoming superheroes. From Captain America being separated from everyone he knew when he crashed a plane full of bombs into the Atlantic Ocean to Gamora being torn away from her family by a crazed warlord seeking to wipe out half of her planet, the tragedies these heroes have faced clearly shaped who they were and how they used their powers. 

While each hero went through a different process for coping with the pain and suffering he or she faced, they all came out stronger and better people because of their experiences. With that in mind, here are some of the most tragic origins of your favorite Marvel superheroes.

Another Avenger with a tragic origin story is Steve Rogers, a.k.a. Captain America — otherwise known as the First Avenger. Rogers desperately wanted to serve in the U.S. military during World War II, but was repeatedly rejected during the recruitment process due to his small stature and slight build. His gumption was appreciated by Doctor Abraham Erksine, who recruited him into Project Rebirth and injected him with the experimental super-soldier serum that turned Rogers into Captain America.

Immediately after the procedure was completed, however, Erksine was assassinated by a HYDRA agent. Later, while attempting to apprehend Arnim Zola, Rogers lost his best friend and fellow soldier Bucky Barnes in a fall during combat, only to be forced into doing battle with his long-lost compatriot years later after Barnes was brainwashed into becoming the Winter Soldier. Of course, every hero deals with loss, but Cap's victories have often been tainted by tragedy: after defeating the Red Skull, for example, he was forced to crash the Skull's bomb-laden ship into the Arctic Ocean, tearing himself away from Peggy Carter, the woman he loved. When Rogers finally awoke in the modern era after decades in deep freeze, he was thrust into a new period of time he knew nothing about. Given the loss of his mentor Erksine, his friend Bucky, and the selfless sacrifice of his love for Peggy, Captain America's origin story is one that has been repeatedly marred by tragedy. 

Among the more tragic backstories in the MCU is that of Peter Quill, a.k.a. Star-Lord. When Quill was a young boy, his mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer (which, as it turned out, was caused by Quill's father — but more on that later). Immediately after the death of his mother, Quill was abducted from Earth by the alien known as Yondu, which tore him away from the only life he'd known and thrust him into a life of crime. Quill was forced to become an intergalactic outlaw by Yondu, who threatened to eat him on multiple occasions if he didn't. 

Last, and perhaps most heartbreaking, is what Quill was forced to do to his father Ego. As mentioned earlier, Ego caused the cancer in Quill's mother because — to make a long story short — his relationship with her was a distraction from his quest to take over the universe. Quill and Ego ended up doing battle with each other, which resulted in the death of Ego. With the death of his mother, his outlaw youth, and the murder of his father, Quill's backstory definitely has its fair share of tragedy — and that's all without even getting into his star-crossed love affair with Gamora.

Although Tony Stark's hardships were often mitigated to an extent by his insane wealth, he still suffered no shortage of tragedy and heartbreak. When he was a young man, Tony lost both of his parents in what was initially thought to be a car wreck but would later turn out to be one of the Winter Soldier's assassinations. This forced him to take charge of his father's company at a young age — and although he did very well for himself, achieving world renown as a manufacturer and seller of cutting-edge munitions, the loss of his parents still always shadowed him. 

Years after the deaths of his parents, during an overseas demonstration of his company's missiles, Stark was attacked and struck with bits of shrapnel from an explosion, some of which nearly struck his heart. Forced to rely on a handmade ARC reactor implanted in his chest simply in order to stay alive, Stark built his first Iron Man armor as part of a plot to escape from the Ten Rings terrorist organization that nearly killed him — and although it was successful, he was unable to rescue the scientist who saved his life and helped him build the suit. After losing his parents, nearly dying in a terrorist attack, and failing to rescue his savior, Stark was able to use his tragic background in order to become a better person — and ultimately made the ultimate sacrifice, giving up his own life in order to thwart Thanos' nefarious plans once and for all.

Wanda Maximoff's backstory definitely has its share of tragedy. When she and her brother Pietro were young, their parents were killed by bombs, and the sibling only survived due to another missile failing to explode. That missile had the Stark name on it, which caused the siblings to direct their grief and hatred toward Tony Stark and, by extension, the Avengers. HYDRA was able to exploit this, and convinced Wanda and Pietro to undergo experiments that would give them the power they needed to gain their revenge. Eventually, the siblings escaped from HYDRA and decided to work with Ultron due to his desire to kill Tony Stark. 

The Maximoffs eventually joined the Avengers to stop Ultron — yet while they succeeded, it came at great cost, as Pietro sacrificed himself to save Clint Barton and a child. Through the loss of her parents by Stark missiles, her manipulation and subsequent experimentation by HYDRA, and the loss of her brother in the battle of Sokovia, the Scarlet Witch's origin story is clearly tragic in nature — and the tragedy only continued later, as she lost the love of her life when Thanos killed the android known as Vision by forcibly removing the Mind Stone from his body.

Doctor Strange's origin story is steeped in misfortune. A successful neurosurgeon, Stephen Strange's bad luck begins when he gets into a car accident that renders him unable to use his hands. Following this, he sells off nearly all of his possessions in order to fund efforts to heal his wounds, an obsession that ends up pushing away his love interest, Christine Palmer. While Strange is eventually able to salvage his bond with her, he's unable to pursue a deeper relationship with Christine — or anybody else, really — after his efforts to regain the use of his hands lead him to become a Sorcerer Supreme and, eventually, the protector of the mystical sanctum based in New York City. (It's a long story.)  

Strange's journey from shallow surgeon to magical protector is not without its setbacks. Aside from the emotional difficulty involved, he's almost immediately pitted against the nefarious Kaecilius, then forced to confront Dormammu, the ruler of the Dark Dimension, with the fate of the universe hanging in the balance. (No big deal, right?) Although Strange hasn't faced the level of tragedy that some of his fellow Avengers have had to cope with, he did lose his career and had to basically rebuild himself as a person, making sacrifices along the way.