Members: Bedlam, Breakdown, Freakout, Janus
Bedlam
was a condemned killer who possessed latent superpowers. In order to escape a
life sentence, the prisoner volunteered for James Hudson’s (Guardian’s)
early experiments in superhuman development. If Guardian couldn’t find enough
superhumans for Department H (the original name for Alpha Flight), the Guardian
would have to develop them himself. Guardian had already had some success in
liberating the psionic powers that lay dormant in the prisoner’s mind.
He hadn’t realized how successful he’d been. Bedlam, as the being now called itself, had mutated in form and developed fearsome psionic powers. He ambushed Guardian and Wolverine and came close to killing them both. Only desperate action by Guardian drove Bedlam into unconsciousness. Guardian sealed Bedlam into a life-supporting cocoon and locked the lab’s door forever. In disgust over Hudson’s experiment, Wolverine left and eventually joined the X-Men.
Years later, Canadian intelligence agent Gary Cody stumbled across Bedlam’s existence. He thought the creature could be used to keep Alpha Flight in line; he was wrong. Bedlam destroyed Cody’s mind and fled.
The Derangers were originally assembled by Dr. Lionel Jeffries (a.k.a. Scramble and Omega), who intended to use them as unwilling donors for his body bank. Their number included Goblyn and Laura Dean. Aurora stumbled across their holding cells while wandering lost through Jeffries’ hospital complex. When Jeffries revealed his plans, the battle with Alpha Flight cut the complex’s power and plunged everything into darkness. In the ensuing chaos, his captives escaped.
Bedlam discovered their existence and decided they would fit his own distorted version of Guardian’s superhuman team. Bedlam tracked the escapees down and took them to a base hidden in the arctic wastes of northern Canada. There, he helped them develop their powers and become a savage fighting force.
Bedlam planned the Derangers, as he named them, to be the forebears of a new race of superhumans under his control. He ordered them to fight Alpha Flight.
In the battle that followed, the Derangers were exterminated. Breakdown was frozen into immobility by the Purple Girl and later slain by Bedlam’s psionic blast. Freakout rebelled against Bedlam and was impaled by a barrage of stalactites. Janus’s twin selves strangled each other, suicidal puppets under Bedlam’s control. Vindicator realized how Guardian had beaten Bedlam, and ordered her combat suit to act despite her own bedlam-ordered paralysis; she blew Bedlam’s head off with an energy blast. Goblyn was the only survivor. She eventually joined her former opponents as a Beta Flight trainee.