CHARLEMAGNE
Real Name: Unrevealed
Identity/Class: Human, conventional weapons user
Occupation: Mercenary, assassin
Group Membership: None
Affiliations: Wolverine (Logan/James Howlett);
formerly Russian agents, Spider-Man (Peter Parker)
Enemies: Russian agents, Spider-Man, agents of multiple national intelligence/security agencies
Known Relatives: None
Aliases: Charlie
Base of Operations: Currently unrevealed;
formerly a mansion in eastern Berlin, mobile;
First Appearance: Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (February,
1987)
Powers/Abilities: Charlemagne was an exceptional spy, assassin, and both armed and unarmed combatant. Her tracking skills rivaled Wolverine’s, and she could evade even him due to her intimate knowledge of his abilities. Customarily carrying a 9mm handgun of European design, she was experienced in using firearms, knives, and other weapons. Depending on how long she and Wolverine had known each other, she may have had a slowed aging factor.
Height: 5'7"
Weight: 132 lbs.
Eyes: Green
Hair: Auburn-red
History:
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (fb) - BTS) - Charlemagne was a well known
mercenary, working for whoever paid her. Wolverine considered her his best
friend.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (fb) - BTS) - Charlemagne made a lot of money free-lancing as an intelligence agent, and she stored it in various accounts in various countries.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (fb) - BTS) - Charlemagne took a job for Russian agents (see comments). As it was during the Cold War, Wolverine advised against it, telling her she couldn't trust them (nor could she trust the CIA or anyone at this time), but she stubbornly took the job anyway. She learned something that made her dangerous to the Russians, and after she completed the job they targeted her for death.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (fb)) - In eastern Berlin, Wolverine and Charlemagne fought and slew 50 Russian operatives, escaping death at 100 rounds of ammunition, followed by clubs, bottles, and bricks. Then the second string arrived, covert Russian agents who had been in deep cover posing as German townsfolk; the fact that these people were blowing covers that had taken years to build made Wolverine realize how bad they wanted Charlemagne. Badly injured, Charlemagne was no longer able to fight, but Wolverine set her down and then unleashed himself on their attackers. He slew them all, but when he was done, Charlemagne was gone, having escaped and left behind her trademark charm, a private joke between the two of them that said she had won.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (fb) - BTS) - Charlemagne went deep into cover, but swore vengeance on the Russian agents who had betrayed her. Years later, she resurfaced, finding and slaying them wherever they were, leaving behind a heart-shaped charm at the site of each killing. Her actions eventually drew heat from a number of national agencies who considered her a security threat to the entire planet.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (fb) - BTS) - Charlemagne slew a number of covert Russian agents based in Manhattan.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (fb) - BTS) - Charlemagne slew a pair of covert Russian agents who had long been posing as Manhattan store owners Sophie and Burt.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1) - Spider-Man saw Charlemagne walking down the streets a short distance from Sophie and Burt's shop. He had no idea who she was (he'd never heard of Charlemagne at this point) but was soon distracted from her when a young woman announced that something had happened to Sophie and Burt.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 - BTS) - From a rooftop,
Charlemagne slew a pair of covert Russian agents in Times Square. She was long
gone before Spider-Man, the police, or SWAT could locate her.
Daily Bugle reporter Ned Leeds discovered that a number of
covert Russian agents had been recently murdered. He correctly suspected
Charlemagne to have been behind these killings and got Jonah Jameson's
permission to travel to Berlin to investigate, taking along Peter Parker as his
photographer.
All of the killings also drew the attention of Wolverine, who
also headed to Berlin. Charlemagne slew a pair of Russian agents tailing
Wolverine, allowing him to catch her scent. Soon after, Wolverine recognized
Parker's scent as Spider-Man and he led Parker out of his hotel room (presumably
in case the place were bugged) to warn him and Leeds to to go home because they
were in way over his head. When Parker returned to his room, he found Ned dead,
and Parker had to wonder if Wolverine had led him away so Ned could be killed.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1) - Wolverine tracked Charlemagne's scent to a steel mill (a former Russian agent front) outside Berlin where he found Charlemagne and a number of dead Russian agents. The two kissed, and then she took him to her house in the hills outside the city where she told him that every intelligence agency in the world was after her, after which they shared a romance. Refusing to stay in hiding and knowing her enemies would find her no matter where they went, Charlemagne took Logan out to dinner at the Ganymed on Friedrich Strasse. Their food was poisoned it, and Wolverine realized this just seconds after Charlemagne did. She further told him that while everyone in the room was heavily armed and gunning for them and would attack soon enough, they should enjoy things while they could. Spider-Man then burst in, intending to save them but instead precipitating the assault. Charlemagne drew her gun and they fought their attackers for some time, but Charlemagne slipped out unseen in mid-battle.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 - BTS) - Charlemagne stayed two steps ahead of Wolverine, continuing to slaughter Russian agents, with him arriving only to find their corpses. Wolverine accused Spider-Man of ruining his plan to keep Charlemagne in check, hide her away, and keep the lid on things.
(Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1) - She later called Wolverine and
met at the Soviet cemetery at Treptow. He warned her that her enemies would
track the call there and kill her slowly and painfully, but she realized this
and embraced him, telling him to end it for her quickly. He popped his claws
into her, but flinched at the last second and failed to kill her. He steeled
himself to finish her, but then Spider-Man arrived and tried to stop him from
killing. Spider-Man and Wolverine battled, with things progressively escalating
as Spider-Man realized he might have to kill Wolverine to stop him. When a
helicopter from above shone a light on them, Wolverine ducked away, and then
Charlemagne snuck up behind Spider-Man allowing him to hear and sense her
approach. Figuring it was Wolverine, he turned and delivered a blow with the
rest of his strength. As she had planned, the injury swiftly proved fatal, and
she said her goodbyes to Wolverine, promising to see him in the next life. A
joint effort of international agents then approached, but when Wolverine told
them Charlemagne was dead, they all disappeared rapidly.
Spider-Man was haunted by having killed Charlemagne for some
time.
(Love Unlimited Infinite Comic#23 - BTS) - When Wolverine was targeted by the vampiric Annika he was accosted by illusions of women he'd been romantically involved with. As such Wolverine experienced a scene in which Charlemagne appeared alongside Amir, Gahck, Yukio, Rose and many others who taunted the X-Man while Annika fed on Wolverine's memories.
Comments: Created by James C. Owsley (now Priest), Mark Bright, & Al Williamson.
The death of Ned Leeds had little to nothing to do with Charlemagne. It was a kill order put out by the Foreigner for Leeds involvement as being the Hobgoblin (actually the pawn of the true Hobgoblin (Roderick Kingsley)).
The flashback with Wolverine and Charlemagne took place "a long time ago" in relation to a story that was written in 1987, before the collapse of the Berlin Wall. It was probably intended to have occurred in the 1970s, but since Wolverine has his metal claws, it can't be too long before the modern era.
Since Wolverine didn't have metallic claws 20 and counting years ago (right?), I'm going to refer to eastern Berlin, rather than East Berlin, and consider the reference to the Berlin Wall in the flashback to be topical. And I'll switch USSR to Russia, etc. KGB should probably be switched to FSB. Or do we just assume the metal claws to be artistic license/error? The Cold War aspect of the plot was fairly important.
It wasn't clear until halfway through the story that Charlemagne was a woman.
20 years after this story, Marvel produced a What If issue as a pseudo-sequel.
Charlemagne received profiles in Wolverine Encyclopedia#1 (December, 1996), Wolverine: Weapon X Files#1 (April, 2009) and the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A to Z HC#14 (June, 2010).
Profile by Snood.
CLARIFICATIONS:
Charlemagne' has no known connections to
images: (without ads)
Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A to Z HC#14 (main image)
Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1, p44, pan2 (full body)
Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1, p44, pan3 (closeup, with gun)
Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1, 59, pan2&3 (death)
Appearances:
Spider-Man vs. Wolverine#1 (February, 1987) - James C. Owsley (now Priest; writer), Mark Bright (penciler), Al Williamson (inker), Ann Nocenti (editor)
Wolverine Encyclopedia#1 (December, 1996) - Paul Benjamin, Peter Sanderson, Dave Rios, Mark Bourne (writers), Mark Bourne, Phil Crain, Dan Shaheen, Mark Paniccia (editors)
Wolverine: Weapon X Files#1 (April, 2009) - Jeff Christiansen, Ronald Byrd, Stuart Vandal, Eric J. Moreels, Chad Anderson, Michael Hoskin, Mike Fichera, Markus Raymond, Jeph York, Jacob Rougemont, Madison Carter (writers), Jeff Youngquist (editor)
Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A to Z HC#14 (June, 2010) - Chris Biggs, Ronald Byrd, Madison Carter, Jeff Christiansen, Mike Fichera, Kevin Garcia, Rich Green, Michael Hoskin, Rob London, Sean McQuaid, Markus Raymond, Jacob Rougemont, Gabriel Shechter, Stuart Vandal, Jeph York, Mike Gagnon (writers)
Love Unlimited Infinite Comic#23 (November, 2022) - Sean McKeever (writer), Diogenes Neves (pencils, inks), Mark Basso, Drew Baumgartner (editors)
First Posted: 09/28/2008
Last updated: 04/30/2023
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
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