DC's Supervillain Captain Boomerang Explained

Who is Captain Boomerang? The short answer is that he's a shameless crook who will do just about anything to make a buck. He doesn't boast any supernatural abilities. Instead, he carries an arsenal of boomerangs that he wields with lethal skill. Predictably, Boomer's weapons aren't just run-of-the-mill boomerangs. Some are rigged with explosives, some can cut through throats, and some can electrocute. 

While he acts as a lone wolf in his earliest appearances, as time wears on, Boomer becomes more of a team player, even though he's never very good at getting along with whatever team he's in. He's joined forces with the other prominent villains of the fictional Central City, and more famously, he's one of the villains often pressed into service for the United States government by the tyrannical Amanda Waller.

Digger Harkness isn't the most patient of men. He has a short temper and can turn on his allies with little provocation. Sadly, he's also not shown himself to be a particularly forward-thinking guy. Particularly in early appearances of the Suicide Squad comic, Digger regularly makes racist and sexist comments about his teammates. A native Australian, Digger sees himself as a patriot to his homeland, though ironically, readers would eventually learn that — because of his criminal exploits — most of his countrymen are ashamed of him.

What do you do once you've created enough villains designed to go after a specific superhero? You bring them all together in a team, of course! In the case of Flash's villains, bringing together the speedster's bad guys creates the Rogues — one of the most enduring groups of villains in the history of DC Comics.

Captain Boomerang is one of the founding member of the Rogues. He's there in 1962's The Flash #130 to join forces with contemporaries like Trickster, Captain Cold, the Top, and Mirror Master against their common enemy. Over the years, more bad guys like Heat Wave and Weather Wizard would join, and just about any villain who spent enough time taking their lumps fighting the Flash would find their way to the Rogues. In some cases, the Rogues have almost stepped into more heroic territory. Along with taking down scores together and combining forces against the Flash, every now and then, the group stands against other villains whose actions against Central City jump across the kind of moral lines the Rogues won't cross.

While Boomer is one of the first bad guys to count himself among the Rogues, eventually he becomes less and less associated with the group as his destiny takes him to a very different collection of bad guys.

Hypothetically, if you ever had to be in the Suicide Squad, Boomer is just about the last guy you'd want to team up with. While Captain Boomerang's portrayal changes a bit depending on who's writing him, one thing that tends to remain consistent is that he has no problem with backstabbing his teammates. 

Boomer betrays one of his colleagues in one of the team's earliest adventures. In 1987's Suicide Squad #1, tired of listening to Boomer mock other team members, Mindboggler uses her powers to reveal Boomer's biggest fears. In the following issue, Boomer sees that Mindboggler is about to be gunned down from behind by the villain Rustam. He whips out a boomerang to intervene but stops himself, remembering how Mindboggler humiliated him. He then escapes as Rustam shoots and kills Mindboggler. 

In 1988's Suicide Squad #9, Boomer betrays a teammate by using him as a something of a test subject. Boomer isn't sure his superiors mean it when they threaten to detonate the explosives strapped to the squad members' arms, so he convinces Slipknot that they're bluffing. After a heated battle, Slipknot tries to escape the squad, and he pays with his life when he learns the explosives are all too real. 

Boomer's treachery isn't just part of his early portrayals with the squad. In 2017's Suicide Squad #13, Boomer murders fellow teammate Hack by stabbing her with one of his boomerangs. So yeah, he's not exactly what you'd a call nice guy.

Of the many things that distinguish Captain Boomerang from other characters, the foul-tempered crook is behind one of the funniest and longest subplots in the history of Suicide Squad comics. 

In 1988's Suicide Squad #21, Amanda Waller is walking about Belle Reve prison and considering her recent challenges when a whipped cream pie flies into her face. Suspecting Boomer is the culprit right away, Waller has him summoned, and on his way to see her, a pie gets him in the face. It would take three years for the pie-thrower to be revealed. In 1989's Suicide Squad #26, Vixen gets a pie in the face while getting frisky with Bronze Tiger, and Bronze Tiger gets one a moment later. Both Daily Planet reporter Lois Lane and Nemesis take a dessert to the nose in Suicide Squad #23, and Jewelee and Doctor Light fall victim to the sweet, creamy attacks in the following issue.

The final pie victim is Major Victory in 1990's Suicide Squad #37. Boomer tries to frame fellow squad member Punch by filling his locker with pies, but he's found out regardless. It's discovered Boomer used his boomerang tech to get himself in the face, throwing suspicion off himself early. Boomer quits the squad, laughing in Waller's face that there's nothing she can do to punish him. In a pretty extreme example of going far to prove someone wrong, Waller has Boomer helicoptered to a deserted island and left there. 

Before his death in Identity Crisis, Digger Harkness connects with his grown son, Owen Mercer. Mercer not only inherits his father's talent with boomerangs, but he's capable of bursts of super speed. After Boomer is killed on his final job, Mercer becomes the new Captain Boomerang.

Mercer's early career as Captain Boomerang has a lot in common with his late father's. He begins working with the Rogues, and he eventually joins the Suicide Squad. Unlike his father, Mercer actually finds his way into a group of bona fide heroes, as he enjoys a turbulent time with Nightwing and the Outsiders.

It's ironic Mercer manages to reach levels of heroism his father never could because, ultimately, his actions would reach even lower than those of Digger Harkness'. During the 2009-10 DC Comics line-wide event Blackest Night, like many of DC's heroes and villains, Digger Harkness is reanimated as an undead beast. And then the Rogues discover that Mercer has been feeding innocent civilians to Harkness in a futile attempt to return him to normal. Enraged that his fellow Rogue has acted so abominably, Captain Cold shoves Mercer into a pit with his undead father, who subsequently rips his son's heart out. 

Jai Courtney brings Digger Harkness to life on the big screen with 2016's Suicide Squad. Courtney's portrayal of Digger Harkness brings a lot of humor to the action-packed film, and it's clear Courtney and the filmmakers drew heavily from the source material. Still, there are some significant differences between the comic books and movie.

Like the Captain Boomerang of the comics, Digger starts his criminal career as a Flash villain. Ezra Miller cameos as the Scarlet Speedster, capturing Digger in a flashback. And just like the source material, Courtney's version of Digger can't stand Amanda Waller (Viola Davis). The film adapts Digger's manipulation of Slipknot into unintentionally killing himself from 1988's Suicide Squad #9. Also, we see early on that like his comics counterpart, Courtney's Boomer prefers to avoid fighting. When the rest of the squad first clashes with the strange creatures in Midway City, Digger hangs back and cracks open a beer, only engaging when he has no choice.

There are important differences between Courtney's Digger and the source material, however. He's overall less nasty to his teammates, ultimately shows himself to be much more of a team player, and in particular, he comes off as a lot tougher than the comic book version. For example, when guards release him from a body bag, Digger immediately stands up and attacks the nearest guard. That's something the comic book Digger would probably never do unless he already had his boomerangs on him because, otherwise, the guard might hit him back.