TRIATHLON (Delroy Garrett, aka 3-D Man II)
Created By: Kurt Busiek & George Perez
First Appearance: The Avengers (vol. 3) #8 (Sept. 1998)
Role: 3-D Man Rip-Off, The Unlikable Newbie
Group Affiliations: The Avengers, The Triune Understanding, The Skrull Kill Krew, The Agents of Atlas
Avengers Grade: D-Level
PL 9 (148)
STRENGTH 6
STAMINA 6
AGILITY 6
FIGHTING 8
DEXTERITY 0
INTELLIGENCE 2
AWARENESS 2
PRESENCE 1
Skills:
Acrobatics 6 (+12)
Athletics 6 (+12)
Close Combat (Unarmed) 3 (+11)
Deception 4 (+5)
Expertise (Current Events) 4 (+6)
Expertise (Religion) 4 (+6)
Insight 5 (+7)
Intimidation 4 (+5)
Investigation 5 (+7)
Perception 6 (+8)
Sleight of Hand 4 (+4)
Stealth 3 (+9)
Technology 2 (+4)
Treatment 2 (+4)
Vehicles 4 (+4)
Advantages:
Defensive Attack, Diehard, Evasion, Improved Critical (Unarmed), Improved Disarm, Great Endurance, Improved Initiative, Power Attack, Ranged Attack 8, Takedown 2, Uncanny Dodge
Powers:
"Three Times Peak-Human Physiology"
Speed 3 (16 mph) [3]
Leaping 2 (30 feet) [2]
Regeneration 4 [4]
Senses 3 (Extended Vision, Scent & Hearing) [3]
"3-D Man True Sight" Senses 6 (Counters Illusion 2, Detect Shapeshifting & Possessions- Ranged) [6]
Offense:
Unarmed +11 (+6 Damage, DC 21)
Initiative +9
Defenses:
Dodge +12 (DC 22), Parry +12 (DC 22), Toughness +6, Fortitude +10, Will +6
Complications:
Responsibility (Triune Understanding)- Triathlon was a member of the Triune Understanding, and was often torn between loyalty to them and to The Avengers. When they revealed themselves as a cult under an evil leader, it was up to him to stop them.
Total: Abilities: 62 / Skills: 62--31 / Advantages: 19 / Powers: 18 / Defenses: 18 (148)
Triathlon- Another Unpopular Avenger:
-Triathlon is what we'd call a "failed experiment". Kurt Busiek, while writing his awesome revamp of
The Avengers, ended up with a bit of a boring storyline with the whole Triune Understanding thing. They were your standard cult/religious group (very similar to $cientology) that did an "Oh, we're SO oppressed by the big mean heroes" vibe (basically exactly what Marv Wolfman did in
Teen Titans fifteen years prior with Brother Blood), and the fans kind of crapped on it. Poor Triathlon, the Understanding's toady, who got shunted onto the Avengers under advice from their government liaison, fared even worse, being a giant douche to the whole team right away, and acting like he was super awesome. So the fans HATED the character right out of the gate, considering him a lame 3-D Man rip-off, and kind of vanished into dis-use as soon as Busiek was gone.
-Delroy Garrett was an Olympian whose career was ruined when it was found out he'd used steroids. Dejected, he found the Triune Understanding, who restored his faith and even gave him super-powers- using abilities stolen from the 3-D Man, Delroy became the Understanding's pawn on the global stage- a spokesman for the movement. He publicly helped the Avengers against Moses Magnum & Lord Templar, while his boss Jonathan Tremont created a public and secret campaign to have the Avengers painted as intolerant of their religion, and racist against minorities. In order to combat bad publicity (especially after Tremont publicly "forgave" the Avengers), the Avengers begrudgingly added Triathlon to the roster. My main issue with the "Y No Minorities?" story arc is that the reasons for there being no minority Avengers is different in-universe from how it is out of universe- IN-universe, it's that the qualified heroes they liked didn't join- the "meta" reasons are because of the complex history of "Comics kinda sucks at giving minority characters prolonged enough pushes to make them a big deal" and "The writer didn't want to include any". So every "Affirmative Action" story kind of comes of blankly to me.
-Delroy of course acted like an ass, cracked wise when he shouldn't have, and criticized the team, but was finally put right by Warbird, who convinced him to drop the chip on his shoulder. Eventually, it turned out that Tremont had founded his religious group for the purpose of draining power from a "Triple Evil" Cosmic Being, and the power went out of control. Delroy correctly guessed that the power could only be controlled by one who strove for others and not themselves, and channelled the power himself before tossing it aside so that nobody else could use it. In the aftermath, the Avengers defeated Kang & the Scarlet Centurion in the "Kang War", and Kurt Busiek ended his run on the book. Triathlon was de-powered returning the powers to the 3-D Man.
Delroy Becomes the New 3-D Man:
-This of course led to Triathlon disappearing from comics for ages- Busiek & Perez were his creators, and without them, he was like dozens of OTHER forgotten Avengers. A man without a home. Like most guys, he later showed up in the
Initiative storyline (seriously, is there a B-through-D-level guy who HASN'T shown up in that?), but that's about it- he gained the 3-D Man's powers and name, helping out during
Secret Invasion, using his special goggles to see who was a Skrull. In a few issues of that book, he and assorted other heroes uncover ever Super-Skrull placed onto an Initiative team, killing all of them, though he himself kills the innocent Crusader, not realizing that he'd become an ally of humanity. This leads ot Crusader's friends disliking him, and he moves on, joining the Agents of Atlas- a band of 1950s-themed heroes. As the successor to the '50s 3-D Man, he fit. This was after the team had stopped being pushed, however, and so he largely disappeared save for a few background appearances here and there since then.
-Triathlon is thus an interesting look at one of those things- you introduce a character a certain way, and they kind of get "marked" by it, even if you develop them later. The same thing happened to DC's female Doctor Light, who had said development in her debut arc, yet people still saw her as a nasty bitch for decades. Triathlon was painted as a smug douche since his own arc started that way, even though he made good, and he remains one of the more unpopular Avengers. The feeling that he'd "ripped off" the 3-D Man didn't help, though I myself am unaware of any kind of major fandom for the friggin' *3-D MAN*. I think a key problem, too, is that the "Triune Understanding" arc was just not that great- by far the least interesting thing about Busiek & Perez's revamping of the "Avengers" name. Tremont was so clearly evil and hiding things, and the group so smug and disingenuous, that the fans just got annoyed over the years the story took to unfurl itself. And "He just wanted their power to form a pyramid to take a cosmic being's power" was... a let-down. Like, you could tell that story in three issues.
Triathlon's Powers:
-A standard PL 8.5 offense/PL 9 defense build, Triathlon is strong, fast and durable, but falls JUST short of those PL 10 benchmarks, and is also pretty light on the Skills and Advantages for an in-close fighter type guy. "Just above peak human" guys tend to have some movement powers added onto their basic stats (Speed, Leaping, etc.), so I stuck those on as well. He's also got a modified kind of "True Sight" that lets him watch for Skrulls easily.