| Valerie Cooper | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Marvel Comics |
| First appearance | The Uncanny X-Men No. 176 (Dec. 1983) |
| Created by | Chris Claremont (writer) John Romita Jr. (artist) |
| In-story information | |
| Species | Human |
| Team affiliations | Office of National Emergency Project Wideawake Commission on Superhuman Activities Freedom Force X-Factor NSA Secret Empire |
Valerie "Val"Cooper is a fictional character appearing inAmerican comic books published byMarvel Comics. The character works for theOffice of National Emergency as the liaison formutant affairs. She once claimed to have been inspired to government service by the interesting cases her brother, an FBI agent, encountered in his work.[1]
Valerie Cooper was created byChris Claremont andJohn Romita Jr., and first appeared inThe Uncanny X-Men No. 176 (Dec. 1983).[2]
The character received an entry inThe Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Update '89 No. 2.
She appeared sporadically as a secondary character, often an antagonist, in various Marvel series through the 1980s, primarilyUncanny X-Men written by Claremont andCaptain America written byMark Gruenwald. WriterPeter David and artistLarry Stroman took overX-Factor in 1991 to which Cooper is added as a major character and she was featured in the series' majority until its cancellation in 1998.
The character reached additional prominence in the mid-2000s, appearing in dozens of issues in 2006 at the height of Marvel's "Decimation" and "Civil War" events. David returned to write a relaunchedX-Factor in 2006 and eventually featured her character in the series during 2007-2009. She made few appearances in the 2010s.
Dr. Valerie Cooper was a specialNational Security Advisor on national security issues, which include metahuman affairs. Originally, she took a hard-line concern on the problem of the threat that superhumans and mutants posed to theUnited States.
This position changed slightly when Cooper oversawMystique's formerBrotherhood of Mutants, which operated as government agents as theFreedom Force. Around this time, Cooper was also involved in a project to create government sponsored superheroes which resulted inJulia Carpenter as the second Spider-Woman as well as three villains that would become her enemies Deathweb. Carpenter would subsequently be assigned by Cooper to join Freedom Force.
Meanwhile, Cooper and the Commission were directly involved in the events of the government demanding the Captain America identity under the argument of being their property;Steve Rogers gives up the Captain America identity, and Cooper supervises the recruitment of John Walker andBattlestar as the new Captain America and the new Bucky respectively. Cooper's next duty was to hireForge to create a machine to detect mutant powers.
The Freedom Force project was shut down when several members were killed while others were missing after being abandoned inKuwait. During theMuir Island Saga, Cooper's mind fell under theShadow King's control. The Shadow King ordered Cooper to shoot Mystique, but she refused and shot herself instead. She was critically injured but survived. Mystique, with the aid ofNick Fury andS.H.I.E.L.D. hypnotists, went undercover as Val in an attempt to foil the Shadow King. It wasn't until the Shadow King's defeat by theX-Men andX-Factor that Mystique and Cooper were able to return to their own lives.
After witnessing first-hand the deeds of mutants throughout the years, Valerie wanted to give the concept of a government sponsored team another shot. She was able to convince several X-Men members and their associates to form a new X-Factor team. This new team, composed ofHavok,Polaris,Wolfsbane,Multiple Man,Quicksilver andStrong Guy replaced Freedom Force, with Val acting as governmentliaison to the team. Val is assisted by the human employee Baldrick.[3] Soon after Val was once again mentally controlled, this time by theAcolytes. Val was freed from the Acolytes' control, but her relationship withX-Factor was damaged when it was revealed that she knew ofProject Wideawake, a newSentinel project being developed by the U.S. Government. Cooper later decided to hand leadership of the team directly to Forge. With the world getting more dangerous around her and the departure of some of the members, Cooper was forced by the government to allow Mystique andSabretooth to join. With Forge in command, the team went underground.
Cooper returned to the Commission on Superhuman Affairs. In her position, she found herself helping the X-Men out on several occasions. She was later responsible for takingCharles Xavier away to a government facility following theOnslaught incident. Valerie was instrumental in helping the oldThunderbolts defeatHenry Peter Gyrich and negotiated for the team their PresidentialPardon.
Cooper helps establish theOffice of National Emergency (or O*N*E), an official government branch dedicated to preparation and defense against superhuman threats; not much later, she becomes its deputy director. The O*N*E, with its first line of defense being the Sentinel Squad O*N*E, becomes responsible for the mutant refugee camp established at theX-Mansion after most of the world's mutants are depowered during theDecimation event. Many mutants join the camp willingly while some are secretly coerced into it.
With the destruction of the X-Mansion and the X-Men's subsequent move to San Francisco, O*N*E no longer watches over the X-Men's day-to-day activities nor does it guard them with Sentinels.
Valerie and Havok enter in a business relationship.[4]
Cooper is revealed to have been involved in an intimate relationship withU.S. Agent while working for the Office of National Emergency.[5]
An alternate universe variant of Valerie Cooper appears in theAge of Apocalypse tie-in seriesFactor-X. This version is a member of an underground resistance group that aids refugees in escaping from North America to Europe.[6]
A possible future variant of Valerie Cooper appears inGeNext. By this time, she has become the United Nations' liaison to the Xavier School.
An alternate universe variant of Valerie Cooper from Earth-1610 makes a minor appearance inUltimate Fallout #4. This version is a government official involved in discovering the mutant gene's origins.[7]
Val Cooper appears inX-Men '97,[8] voiced byCatherine Disher.[9]
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| Government Team | |
| X-Factor Investigations | |
| Serval | |
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