Latest / Vigilante Vibes Podcast / Ep. 205. Who are the Great Lakes Avengers?

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Ep. 205. Who are the Great Lakes Avengers? · Vigilante Vibes Podcast

• 0:10
  Hi guys, it's Megan from Vigilante Vibes and I'm here
• 0:12
  with another character breakdown and it's more characters
• 0:15
  breakdown. It's a team breakdown.
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  We're going to talk about the Great Lake Avengers.
• 0:19
  If you don't know about the Great Lake Avengers, you are in
• 0:22
  for a ride because they are probably the goofiest group.
• 0:25
  Not the goofiest, but they're pretty goofy.
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  So they actually appeared in West Coast Avengers volume to
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  #46 Which reminds me, I will be making a video about the West
• 0:36
  Coast Avengers soon enough, so keep an eye out.
• 0:38
  I just had to figure out how to not make a video that's an hour
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  long. So that's been the struggle
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  here. But anyways, Craig Hollis
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  accidentally discovered he could not die.
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  So naturally he became a superhero and called himself Mr.
• 0:53
  Immortal. And Mr. Immortal is an
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  interesting character and he has the best hair of the entire
• 0:58
  team. After a bit of crime fighting,
• 1:00
  he figured things would go better with the team, so he put
• 1:02
  out an ad looking for other action oriented weirdos.
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  The group met up at a local YMCA where Mr. Immortal teamed up
• 1:10
  with Big Bertha. Dinosaur or dinosaur?
• 1:14
  I think it's dinosaur, but in my head I've always said dinosaur.
• 1:17
  We're going to say Dinosaur Doorman, which I do have an
• 1:21
  episode about him too, so just check my channel.
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  Flat Man and Leather Boy. Together they became the Great
• 1:28
  Lake Avengers, a smaller sister team to the main Avengers and
• 1:32
  the West Coast Avengers. They started fighting crime
• 1:35
  around Wisconsin and eventually caught the attention of Hawkeye
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  and Mockingbird. Mockingbird is Hawkeye's wife
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  who headed out to check on the supposed Avengers.
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  Once they realized the team was legitimate if but you know odd
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  but legitimate, they decided to train them.
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  Early on the team was mostly funded by Ashley Crawford AKA
• 1:56
  Big Bertha. You'll know who Big Bertha is
• 1:59
  and I cannot go into any more detail, who used her modeling
• 2:03
  income and private jet to support their headquarters.
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  Not long after training began, the Great Lake Avengers were
• 2:09
  called to Texas to help The Avengers, Captain America and
• 2:12
  She Hulk rescue Scarlet Witch and Vision.
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  They pulled it off and Captain America officially allowed them
• 2:18
  to use The Avengers name. They kept training with Hawkeye
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  and Mockingbird, and they were later called in to stall
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  Terminus in Saint Louis until reinforcements arrived.
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  Captain America also recruited them again to help investigate A
• 2:31
  mysterious distress call involving Rick Jones, who
• 2:35
  doesn't get talked about enough in my opinion.
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  After The Avengers were seemingly wiped out during
• 2:41
  Onslaught, the Thunderbolt stepped up as New York's new
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  heroes. Hoping to ride that wave of
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  popularity, Mr. Immortal rebranded the team as the
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  Lightning Rods. Around this time, they briefly
• 2:53
  crossed paths with Deadpool and Weasel, which is never good for
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  anyone. When it was exposed that the
• 3:00
  Thunderbolts were actually the masters of evil, the Lightning
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  Rods asked SHIELD for permission to take them down, but they were
• 3:06
  completely outmatched, which was humbling.
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  The team went back to being the Great Lake Avengers mostly spent
• 3:14
  their time hanging out and playing cards, though they still
• 3:17
  did heroic things like rescuing people from an Ohio tornado.
• 3:22
  When word came that The Avengers had officially disbanded, Mr.
• 3:26
  Immortal got motivated again and took the team back out.
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  On patrol, they ran into Maelstrom, stealing a chronal
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  accelerator, and during the fight, Dinosaur was killed.
• 3:36
  Her death sent Mr. Immortal into a deep psychological spiral.
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  He was in the trenches. Meanwhile, Doorman and Flatman
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  went to New York to recruit new members.
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  Most heroes turned them down, but Squirrel Girl and her
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  squirrel sidekick Monkey Joe joined up.
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  It was kind of funny because they went to like the biggest
• 3:55
  heroes and they're all like, no, like they went to Spider Man and
• 4:01
  Moon Knight and all them and it was just such a big no.
• 4:06
  I can't remember who it was, but they went to one hero and he
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  said, yeah, I'll join. I've been wanting to join the
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  GLA for so long and they're like, no way, uh, we can't wait
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  to have you on the Great Lakes Avengers.
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  And he's like Great Lakes Avengers.
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  I thought this was a group for gays and lesbians.
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  Never mind. So I don't know.
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  I thought it was really funny. Grasshopper also joined and died
• 4:29
  almost immediately, and there's something to think there There's
• 4:34
  been more than one Grasshopper in the Marvel Universe, and one
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  was killed like this one very, very immediately.
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  One was killed because Deadpool was getting you know what, we'll
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  get into it later, It's not whatever.
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  The team eventually tracked Maelstrom down and with the help
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  of Death Urge, barely managed to stop him from ending time
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  itself. Soon after, the team received a
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  cease and desist order from the Maria Stark Foundation, forcing
• 5:03
  yet another rebrand. Realizing that they were all
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  mutants, the remaining members became the Great Lakes X-Men,
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  the GLX. They ditched the Leather X-Men
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  style costumes not long after. Since they were designed by
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  their former teammate and enemy Leather Boy as the GLX, they
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  dealt with a spike of bizarre villain activity around
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  Wisconsin during the holidays, including evil pine trees
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  created by Doctor Tannenbaum, A Thanos plot involving the
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  Paramatrix, and trouble with Modoc and AIM.
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  They later attended the Things Superhero poker tournament at
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  Squirrel Girls invitation after being scolded by Marvel Girl and
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  Doctor Strange for misusing team names.
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  They made it to the final table where Flat Man beat the thing
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  triumphantly and finally settled on the Great Lake Champions GLC,
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  despite Hercules strongly objecting and having to be held
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  back. And it's like, there's already a
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  champions, you know? And you guys called yourself the
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  Champions because you, one of you won a poker tournament, you
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  know it. Who am I to?
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  Who am I to talk about about the hustle?
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  When the Superhuman Registration Act passed, the GLC immediately
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  signed up and became the official government sanctioned
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  protectors of Wisconsin under the Great Lakes Initiative.
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  The GLI. Almost immediately, Deadpool
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  attacked them with a misguided attempt to earn government
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  favor. Despite that, the team enjoyed
• 6:37
  the initiatives, legitimacy and funding.
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  They even teamed up with Deadpool to stop AIM from using
• 6:43
  an inebriation wave powered by Dionysus.
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  Deadpool was briefly given reserve membership, but he was
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  kicked out after becoming unbearable.
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  Which is so Deadpool. And on his way out, he snapped
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  the neck of an yet another new Grasshopper.
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  See, it came back, we talked about it.
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  So when he was walking out, Grasshopper was walking in and
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  then he just killed him. And it's like the name.
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  The mantle of Grasshopper does not have much good to it.
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  During the scroll invasion, the newest Grasshopper turned out to
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  be a scroll. Like I said, does not work out
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  for Grasshoppers and was killed on the spot.
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  Later, when Norman Osborne took over SHIELD, gravity was
• 7:27
  reassigned to the GLI. Around this time, Squirrel Girl
• 7:30
  decided she was holding the team back by casually defeating
• 7:33
  villains like Thanos, Doctor Doom, Modoc, Finn Fang, Fum,
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  Ego, and others, so she and Tippy Toe left for New York.
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  She was holding them back by taking down Doctor Doom UK.
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  During the Serpent's global attacks, the team was targeted
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  by angry mobs, and not long after, the group quietly
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  disbanded. They eventually reunited after
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  major shakeups at Stark Holdings caused The Avengers trademark to
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  be transferred to Flat Man. The only other applicant,
• 8:06
  Avengers lawyer Connie Ferrari, tried to buy it back, but Flat
• 8:09
  Man instead negotiated to have the Great Lake Avengers
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  officially reinstated as a permanent Avengers team.
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  He tried to get everyone back together and the only ones to
• 8:22
  show up was Big Bertha and Doorman.
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  Squirrel Girl was now way too famous, and Mr. Immortal's phone
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  had somehow ended up with a local girl named Pansy.
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  She showed up to the meet up at an abandoned Stark facility in
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  Detroit, which became the team's new HQ and helped clear up the
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  confusion. Trouble started almost
• 8:43
  immediately when the team went to a bar late at night to
• 8:45
  complain about loud music. The owner, Nayne Rogge, insulted
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  them. A fight broke out, and Flat Man
• 8:52
  and Bertha were arrested. In jail, they met Goodness
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  Silva, a young girl who could turn into a wolf.
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  Things eventually worked out and they were released thanks to
• 9:02
  Connie Ferrari. Not long after, the team was hit
• 9:06
  with an injunction banning them from superhero activity.
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  Mr. Immortal returned and patrolled a flat man, while
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  Bertha Doorman and Goodness, now calling herself Good Boy,
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  investigated. Named Rouge's Bar.
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  They discovered he was actually Councilman Dick Snerd, which
• 9:23
  I'll never get over this name. Dick Snerd.
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  Dick Snerd I'll never like, I don't know why.
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  It's one of those things that just stick with you.
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  When Flat Man and Mr. Immortal returned, they found Snerd being
• 9:36
  held hostage badly injured by Good Boy with in a rage and the
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  team dropped him off of the hospital and dipped.
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  Later, Big Bertha was kidnapped by Doctor Nod, a scientist who
• 9:47
  stole her DNA to create weight altering pills.
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  Bertha escaped on our own but not overdosed on his creation
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  and turned into a massive mindless BLOB that began
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  wrecking the city. He was finally defeated when
• 10:02
  Doorman teleported Mr. Immortal inside him and had him punch his
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  heart. And those panels are weird.
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  Like if you're watching on YouTube, I'm showing you the
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  panels right now. And they just, that was just
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  such a weird issue. Even though the city cheered
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  them on, the celebration did not last.
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  Deadpool showed up yet again, and this time as a member of The
• 10:29
  Avengers Unity Division and informed them that they were all
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  fired. Their claim to The Avengers name
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  didn't hold up in court and according to Deadpool, people
• 10:37
  just did not like them. He did, however, reassure them
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  that they might get another shot in a couple years, which OK,
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  Eventually Good Boy left the team.
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  Later, the GLA traveled to Milwaukee where they were
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  attacked by a being called the Cormorant, who wanted the
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  Grasshopper legs now being used by someone new.
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  The team, along a Squirrel Girl, tried to protect him but failed
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  and the Cormorant severely injured the new Grasshopper to
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  get what he wanted. Which just Grasshopper.
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  Just if you're ever in the field of wanting to be a superhero, do
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  not call yourself Grasshopper. The name is cursed and I will
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  die on that hill. So yeah, that is the great Lake
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  Avengers story. Now, who exactly are the
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  members? I mentioned quite a few, but
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  they're just such a weird bunch. Big Bertha.
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  She's an original member. Dinosaur.
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  Original member. Doorman.
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  Flat Man Deadpool, who's made an honorary member and one of their
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  biggest problems because he just shows up and causes problems.
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  Good Boy who's made a temporary member.
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  And Great Lake Avengers #2 Grasshopper who multiple
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  grasshoppers who always keep dying.
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  Gravity who is assigned to the Great Lakes Initiative through
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  the 50 State initiative by Norman Osborne.
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  And Avengers initiative #25 I said the word initiative so many
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  times in one sentence. Hawkeye GLA was trained by
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  Hawkeye and his wife Mockingbird.
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  Mockingbird who I just mentioned.
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  Leather Boy who misread the original ad for Mr. Immortal's
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  recruitment. Dr. Monkey Joe who is Squirrel
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  Girl's pet. Tippy Toe who is also a pet of
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  Squirrel Girl, obviously Squirrel Girl.
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  Mr. Immortal and Pansy, who answered an invite?
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  Those actually meant for Mr. Immortal.
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  So that's a great Lake Avengers. They are.
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  Look, if you're looking for an Avengers group that matches the
• 12:49
  vibe of West Coast Avengers, the normal Avengers, this is not the
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  group for you. They are goofy, they are
• 12:57
  interesting, and they are certainly different, but they're
• 13:02
  fun. I mean, who doesn't love
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  Squirrel Girl? I don't really love Squirrel
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  Girl. Anyways, so that is my breakdown
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  of the Great Lake Avengers. I really hope you guys enjoy it
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  and thank you to the listeners who asked me to make this video.
• 13:21
  I'm always down to take requests because I just really love doing
• 13:24
  this. So with that being said, have a
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  marvelous day.