A member of the super-hero team the
Avengers published by
Marvel Comics.
Simon Williams is the real name of Wonder Man. Born the
youngest son of industrialist Sanford Williams, Simon entered
the family business, Williams Innovations at a young age and
took over as CEO when his father died. With his company in
debt and lacking the necessary business skills, Simon took to
embezzling from the company to invest in outside ventures in
an attempt to save the company. His crime was discovered and
he was arrested and sent to trial. Found guilty of the
charges, Simon was sent to jail.
He was bailed out of jail by the Enchantress who convinced
Simon to undergo a procedure by Baron Heinrich Zemo to give
him the power to attack Iron Man and the Avengers. Iron Man
is associated with Stark Enterprises whose success Simon
blamed for the failure of his company. Simon was exposed to an
ionic ray that gave him great strength and invulnerability.
However, the procedure was fatal and was killing Simon. Attacking
the Avengers, Simon, who called himself Wonder Man, had almost
beaten the Avengers when he had a change of heart and rebelled
against the Enchantress and Zemo. Having proven himself a hero,
Wonder Man died.
The Avengers buried Wonder Man, after having recorded his brain
patterns. These brain patterns were later used by Ultron to
give personality to his creation the Vision.
Wonder Man was not dead, but in a death-like state. For many
years, Wonder Man's body underwent a metamorphasis, becoming more
than human, powered by the ionic energy in his body. His body
was stolen by his brother Eric, in his guise as the Grim
Reaper. The Grim Reaper employed the help of Black Talon to
raise Wonder Man to a zombie state and have his body attack the
Avengers. The Avengers defeated him and soon Simon began to come
back to life.
Simon served as an Avenger for many years. He was a member of both
the east coast and west coast branches of the team. He formed a
fast friendship with the Beast and a romantic attachment to
fellow teammate the Scarlet Witch.
When the west coast branch of the Avengers was shut down, Iron
Man formed a new team called Force Works to meet the challenges
that faced them. Wonder Man joined Force Works and during its
first mission, lost his life preventing a spaceship from crashing
to Earth.
He stayed dead for a time, until the Scarlet Witch summoned
him in an energy form back from the dead. Eventually using her
mystical powers, the Scarlet Witch was able to restore Wonder Man
back to full life.