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CYCLONE

Real Name: André Gerard

Identity/Class: Human technology user (French)

Occupation: Professional criminal;
    former weapons engineer

Group Membership: The Hood (Parker Robbins)'s army of resurrected Scourge victims aka. Deadly Dozen (Basilisk/Basil Elks, Bird-Man/Achille DiBacco, Black Abbott, Blue Streak/Don Thomas, Cheetah/Esteban Carracus, Death Adder/Roland Burroughs, Firebrand/Gary Gilbert, Hijacker/Howard Mitchell, Human Fly/Richard Deacon, Lascivious/Davida DeVito (formerly Titania), Letha/Helen Feliciano, Megatak/Gregory Nettles, Mind-Wave/Erik Gelden, Miracle Man/Joshua Ayers, Mirage/Desmond Charne, Turner D. Century/Clifford F. Michaels, Wraith/Brian DeWolff), Scourge victims;
    formerly Maggia (Masked Marauder (Frank Farnum), others), NATO

Affiliations: Black Abbot, Blue Streak (Don Thomas), Cheetah (Esteban Carracus), Hood (Parker Robbins), Microchip (Linus Lieberman), Mind-Wave (Erik Gelden), Turner D. Century (Clifford Michaels), Wraith (Brian DeWolff) His henchmen

Enemies: G.W. Bridge, J. Jonah Jameson, Moon Knight (Marc Spector), Punisher (Frank Castle), Joe Robertson, Scourge, Spider-Man (Peter Parker)

Known Relatives: None

Aliases: None

Place of Birth: Lyons, France

Base of Operations: The Hood's headquarters, New York City;
    formerly Notre Dame cathedral, Paris, France

First Appearance: Amazing Spider-Man I#143 (April, 1975)

Powers/Abilities: The Cyclone's costume contained miniature mechanisms that enabled him to accelerate air molecules within a radius of about 100 feet from his body, allowing him to generate 300 mile-per-hour tornado-force whirlwinds around himself; he could use these against opponents or structures as a weapon, or to propel himself into the air. He could also use it on a smaller scale to suck the air out of an opponent's lungs, killing him. His suit also protected him from his own winds and allowed him to breathe while generating them. Gerard was a brilliant mechanical engineer, and spoke fluent French and English.

Height: 5'11"
Weight: 195 lbs.
Eyes: Blue
Hair: Black or brown

History: (Amazing Spider-Man I#144 (fb) ) - NATO engineer André Gerard developed the Cyclone, a weapon capable of generating tornado-force winds; when he showed it to his superiors, they weren't interested in it, as they had arranged to purchase all their exotic weaponry from the United States.  Incensed, Gerard built his weapon into a costume and became the criminal Cyclone.

(Amazing Spider-Man I#143 (fb)  - BTS) - The Cyclone kidnapped newspaper publisher J. Jonah Jameson in Paris, and sent a telegram to the Daily Bugle demanding a ransom of one million dollars in negotiable stocks from its editor, Joe Robertson.

(Amazing Spider-Man I#143) - Cyclone called Robertson's Paris hotel room to arrange a meeting.  At the designated meeting place, on the left bank of the Seine, Cyclone's henchmen attacked Robertson, but they were soon stymied by Robertson's friend, Spider-Man.  Cyclone arrived on the scene, and blew Spider-Man into a wall.  As he introduced himself, and sucked his fallen henchmen and Robertson into a vortex, he demanded one million dollars for the safe return of both Jameson and Robertson. 

(Amazing Spider-Man I#144) - Cyclone took Jameson back to his hideout in the Notre Dame Cathedral, and sent one of his henchmen to visit Robertson's associate, Peter Parker, and arrange for the ransom.  He expounded on the superiorities of Europeans to Americans, then explained his origins to Jameson; when Jameson suggested he was crazy, Cyclone struck him.  Soon, however, instead of Parker showing up with the ransom, Spider-Man showed up instead!  He took out Cyclone's henchmen quickly, but Cyclone began to generate another whirlwind in the church.  This time, however, Spider-Man had come prepared.  He turned on the giant fan he'd set up, creating a vortex to counter Cyclone's.  Cyclone mocked the fan, only for it to negate the winds that had borne him aloft.  He spun off into a stone wall and was knocked senseless.

(Spectacular Spider-Man II#23 (fb) ) - Gerard spent some time in prison before the Maggia criminal syndicate freed him and returned his weaponry to him so he could work for them under the Masked Marauder (alias Big M).

(Spectacular Spider-Man II#22) - A fleeing Maggia gunman, on the run from Spider-Man and Moon Knight, called Big M for assistance, and received it in the form of Cyclone, who arrived on the scene and bowled over both heroes.

(Spectacular Spider-Man II#23) - Wishing to make Spider-Man pay for his prior defeat, Cyclone attacked the wall-crawler, leaving him clinging to a wall for his life as Cyclone's winds buffeted him.  Moon Knight lunged at him, but Cyclone blew him out of sight; when Spider-Man tried to take advantage of Cyclone's momentary distraction, Cyclone caught him in a vortex and seemingly blew him to oblivion.  With the heroes gone, Cyclone turned his attention to the gunman, who had violated Big M's cardinal rule - never contact him by phone.  Cyclone used his powers to draw the air out of the gunman's lungs, killing him.  He then departed, unaware that both Spider-Man and Moon Knight had survived.  Later that night, he and his henchmen presided over a Maggia conference at Grant's Tomb, where he fended off questions about Big M's whereabouts - fully aware that the Marauder was there, hidden within Grant's sarcophagus.  Before he could make his presence known, Spider-Man and Moon Knight burst in through the skylight.  They made quick work of the Maggia members and Cyclone's henchmen, so Cyclone began generating a whirlwind - but in the confined tomb, only succeeded in pinning his own men to the walls.  Moon Knight then shattered a capsule of liquefied gases at Cyclone's feet, creating a zone of intense cold.  As his body started to freeze, Cyclone lost control of his winds and was slammed into the wall of the crypt and knocked out cold.

(Captain America I#319) - Cyclone travelled to Medina, Ohio's Bar With No Name for a summit of supervillains concerned about the recent depredations by the Scourge of the Underworld.  After surrending his weapons at the door and passing through the bar's elaborate scanning equipment, he ordered a Cheateau Lafite Rothschild '29.  He listened to the meeting's organizer, retired supervillain Gary Gilbert, outline the Scourge problem, and then ask for suggestions - unfortunately for the attendees, the bartender, who was Scourge in disguise, suggested that they "eat lead and die!"  Scourge shot and killed all of the villains in attendance, including Cyclone.

(Captain America I#320) - Captain America and the Water Wizard found Cyclone's corpse, along with the others, in the bar. Later, the police recovered the bodies.

(Deadpool III#0 - BTS) - Arnim Zola acquired a genetic sample from Gerard's corpse, which he used to create a Cyclone proto-husk.

(Punisher VII#5) - The Hood, seeking agents to kill the Punisher, exhumed a number of Scourge's victims, including Cyclone. He had brought them to a ceremonial altar in his headquarters, and called upon the power of Dormammu to resurrect them.

(Punisher VII#6) - The Hood threw the resurrected villains a banquet, and explained that he had resurrected them to kill the Punisher - who he falsely claimed had been the Scourge of the Underworld. He also told them that they had thirty days to do so, at which point the resurrection spell would run out. After the Hood departed, Mirage tried to rally the group under his command, prompting Death Adder and Basilisk to strike out on their own. When Mirage, angered, tried to go after them, Cyclone held him back. 

(Punisher VII#7) - Cyclone played cards at the Hood's HQ with Firebrand, Mirage, and Mind-Wave while the Hood's lackey, former Punisher ally Microchip, organized their strike on Castle. Cyclone watched as Lascivious used her new powers to humiliate the sexist Mirage, but when Mind-Wave turned on her, her partner Letha used her powers on Cyclone, filling him with bloodlust and siccing him on Mind-Wave. 

(Punisher VII#8) - When the Fly laid a trap for the Punisher at a hotel, Cyclone, along with Miracle Man, Mind-Wave, Black Abbot, Cheetah, Lascivious, and Letha, attacked him while disguised as the Avengers via Mirage's holograms. Castle defeated and evaded them, killing Black Abbott and Mind-Wave. Cyclone and Miracle Man fled, abandoning their teammates.

(Punisher VII#10) - Cyclone (bandaged up after his battle with the Punisher) and Firebrand guarded Castle when he was brought to the Hood's headquarters. The Hood demanded that the Punisher sacrifice captive SHIELD agent GW Bridge to resurrect Castle's dead wife and children. Instead, Castle took the ceremonal dagger and slashed Cyclone's throat with it, killing him. His body was presumably incinerated when Castle used Firebrand's weaponry to burn the building down.

Comments: Created by Gerry Conway, Ross Andru, Frank Giacoia, and Dave Hunt.

Gerard's technology was later duplicated to empower two subsequent Cyclones, Gregory Stevens and Pierre Fresson.

While Cyclone speaks in somewhat stilted English in his first appearance, in his second one, in the pages of Spectacular, he has a full-on Batroc the Leaper phonetic French accent.

The title page of calls Cyclone "possibly the most bizarre super-villain in the annals of Spidey-dom!"  I'm not going to say that a tornado-powered Frenchman with a Spirograph on his chest is something you see every day, but when the annals of Spidey-dom at that point included Stegron the Dinosaur Man, Mindworm, and Gog, you've got to be pretty damn bizarre to live up to that claim.

Cyclone's OHotMU entry casts some doubt on his origin, suggesting that NATO rejecting such a powerful weapon for such a trivial reason was unlikely, but c'mon, we're dealing with the aforementioned Spirograph-sporting Frenchman here. Are petty office politics that unlikely?

If Cyclone actually got that Chateau Lafite Rothschild at the Bar With No Name, it must have been awfully well stocked - it's one of the most expensive wines in the world.

Cyclone apparently retained the same henchmen between appearances, as they're consistently French guys.

A Skrull impersonating Gerard appeared in Captain Marvel#1, battling an amnesiac Skrull Mar-Vell impersonator.

Cyclone has profiles in the OHotMU Deluxe Edition's Book of the Dead and in the Master Edition. His real name was revealed in Fresson's All-New OHotMU A-Z entry.

Profile by Minor Irritant.

CLARIFICATIONS:
André Gerard, the original Cyclone, should be distinguished from:

...but has no known connection to:

Cyclone's henchmen

(Amazing Spider-Man I#143) - Three henchmen working for the Cyclone ambushed Joe Robertson beneath a bridge in Paris. They easily took him down, but Robertson's friend Spider-Man proved too much for them, and he quickly knocked them all out before the Cyclone arrived and flew off with his unconscious henchmen and Robertson.

(Amazing Spider-Man I#144) - Two of the henchmen came to Robertson's hotel room, where they found Peter Parker. After roughing him up a little, they told him to bring the ransom to Notre Dame tomorrow night. That evening, Spider-Man ambushed them in the church, making short work of them before defeating their boss.

(Spectacular Spider-Man II#23) - Four of Cyclone's henchmen accompanied their boss to a Maggia meeting at Grant's Tomb in Manhattan. Before long, Spider-Man and Moon Knight crashed the party, prompting Cyclone to whip up a tornado...which sucked up his own henchmen as well, battering them against the walls. Unable to escape due, as Spider-Man had webbed-up the doors, the henchmen promptly surrendered once Cyclone had been defeated.

Cyclone's henchmen are reasonably skilled in hand-to-hand combat.

--Amazing Spider-Man I#143 (Amazing Spider-Man I#143-144, Spectacular Spider-Man II#23





images: (without ads)
Amazing Spider-Man I#143, p17, pan1 (main image)
Amazing Spider-Man I#144, p10, pan5 (unmasked)
Amazing Spider-Man I#143, p17, pan2-3 (using powers)
Punisher VII#10, p9, pan1 (killed by the Punisher)
Amazing Spider-Man I#143, p12, pan7 (henchmen)

Appearances:
Amazing Spider-Man I#143-144 (April-May, 1975) - Gerry Conway (writer), Ross Andru (pencils), Frank Giacoia & Dave Hunt (inks), Len Wein (editor)
Spectacular Spider-Man II#22 (September, 1978) - Bill Mantlo (writer), Mike Zeck (pencils), Bruce D. Patterson (inks), Bob Hall (editor)
Spectacular Spider-Man II#23 (October, 1978) - Bill Mantlo (writer), Jim Mooney (pencils), Mike Esposito (inks), Bob Hall (editor)
Captain America I#319 (July, 1986) - Mark Gruenwald (writer), Paul Neary (pencils), Joe Sinnott (inks), Mike Carlin (editor)
Captain America I#320 (August, 1986) - Mark Gruenwald (writer), Paul Neary (pencils), Dennis Janke (inks), Mike Carlin (editor)
Deadpool III#0 (1998) - Joe Kelly (writer), Yancey Labat (pencils), Sean Parsons (inks), Matt Idelson (editor)
Punisher VII#5 (July, 2009) - Rick Remender (writer), Jerome Opena (art), Axel Alonso (editor)
Punisher VII#6-8 (August-October, 2009) - Rick Remender (writer), Tan Eng Huat (art), Axel Alonso (editor))
Punisher VII#10 (December, 2009) - Rick Remender (writer), Tan Eng Huat (art), Axel Alonso (editor)

First Posted: 02/10/2014
Last updated: 02/09/2014

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

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