BETA FLIGHT
PURPOSE: Training ground for Alpha Flight
AFFILIATIONS: Alpha Flight, Canadian Government
ENEMIES: Great Beasts, China Force, etc
CURRENT MEMBERS: Unrevealed
FORMER MEMBERS : Box (Roger Bochs); Feedback; Flashback; Flinch; Flex; Ghost Girl (Lilli); Goblyn;
Manbot; Manikin; Marrina; Murmur; Ouija; Pathway; Persuasion; Puck (Eugene Judd);
Radius; Talisman (Elizabeth Twoyoungmen); Witchfire
OTHER MEMBERS : Guardian (clone of James Hudson, mentor); Shaman and Windshear (former mentors)
UNIVERSE : Marvel Universe, Earth-616
BASE OF OPERATIONS: Department H, Ontario, Canada; formerly Tamarind Island, British Columbia, Canada
FIRST APPEARENCE : Alpha Flight #1 (1983);
HISTORY :
Beta Flight was a Canadian team of superhumans organized by the Canadian government's Department H in
order to serve as training grounds for eventual recruitment for its first string of agents, Alpha Flight.
The team served as a transitional stage from the entry-level Gamma Flight, so as to receive more advanced
training before proving themselves enough to finally join Alpha Flight and be able to participate in major
missions. The first Beta Flight had grown to five members: the original Box (Roger Bochs), Flashback, Marrina,
Puck, and the original Talisman, until the entire Alpha Flight program and Department H was disbanded by the C
anadian government for financial reasons.
However, when Canada was invaded by the Great Beast, Tundra, Guardian was the only hero at the scene. He tried
to intervene alone, but his wife, Heather Hudson, used the former Alpha Flight equipment to assemble the team
once more. She noticed that two of its members were former Beta Flight members that were about to be promoted
before the government shut them down, indicated by the gold rim on their activation cards. Thus, Puck and Marrina
arrived to help defeat the Beast. The heroes elected to continue acting as a team, creating an unofficial version
of Alpha Flight.
Months later, when Alpha Flight was virtually destroyed along with their headquarters by the being known as Bedlam,
Alpha Flight realized they had taken on many young protégés: the Purple Girl (now, Persuasion) who had originally
tried to take over Alpha Flight, Laura Dean (now, Pathway) and her sister Goblyn who were agents of Bedlam, and
Manikin who had been the laboratory assistant to Alpha's enemy, Scramble. The elder heroes referred to them as an
unofficial Beta Flight team and helped to shelter and train them as the teams recuperated. At the time, both teams
found themselves on a series of adventures, hopping from planet to planet and even from dimension to dimension.
When they finally returned to their reality, the team nearly caused an international incident in China by suddenly
appearing in the middle of a conflict between the People’s Republic of China and pacifist monks. Afterwards, though,
Alpha and Beta Flight returned to Canada.
In the Flights' disappearance, the government created a new Gamma Flight to replace Alpha Flight. The three teams
clashed, and Alpha Flight was forced to go on trial. Ultimately, Alpha Flight rejected the government's support
and decided to operate independently once more, and the unofficial Beta Flight continued to remain alongside them,
although Manikin soon left the team to pursue full-time medical work.
Gamma Flight continued as the government-sponsored team, and all teams eventually met again to fight Llan the
Sorcerer. Gamma Flight was nearly destroyed in the final battle, but Llan was defeated. Afterward, Alpha Flight
was again reinstated as Canada's official superhero group, with members of Gamma and Alpha Flights reshuffling
into various levels of Beta and Alpha Flight, as per Hudson's original vision of recruitment. Beta Flight
consisted of Feedback, Goblyn, Pathway, Persuasion, and Witchfire, with Alpha Flight's associate Windshear
acting as a mentor. Ultimately, however, after a climactic battle with the Horsemen of Apocalypse, both teams
and Department H were dissolved, and all members when their separate ways.
Department H has since been reinstated and a new Alpha Flight was formed. When investigating the new complex,
Heather Hudson stumbled across a laboratory labeled Beta Flight with restricted access. The exact nature of these
labs remain unrevealed, but when Department H began restructuring under the auspices of Mr. Gentry, the Beta Flight
wing was opened to reveal it housed three young superhumans, Lilli, Ouija, and Flinch, presumably who had been
experimented upon. The three were invited to stay in the main Alpha Wing. Lilli, in particular, was given a
costumed identity of Ghost Girl and taken under the wing of the veteran heroes.
At some point, the teams were reshuffled once again, and former Alphans Radius, Flex, and Murmur joined Ghost
Girl as the new Beta Flight. Heather Hudson remarked that the move was deemed necessary by Department H as
these were the most inexperienced members in need of additional training, and Guardian’s clone, once believed
to be the true Guardian, was instated as Beta Flight’s mentor.
Recently, it was revealed that Radius and Murmur were rendered powerless when the Scarlet Witch restructured
reality, throwing Beta Flight’s current condition in question.
For more Information see Entries for Alpha Flight
and Omega Flight.
SIGNIFICANT ISSUES :
Pictured as second stage of Alpha Flight recruitment (Alpha Flight #1, 1983);
unofficially created to train young protégés (Alpha Flight #42, 1987); officially
instated as a training ground for Alpha Flight (Alpha Flight #90, 1990);
Beta Flight wing opened to reveal superhuman test subjects (Alpha Flight #14, 1998);
Beta Flight mentioned as being reorganized (Wolverine #142, 1999
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