Black Fox (comics)

Publication history

Black Fox is a villain whose primary appearances have been in Marvel Comics' Spider-Man titles. His first appearance was in The Amazing Spider-Man #255 (August 1984), and he was created by Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz. The inspiration for the character comes from safari cards bought by Tom DeFalco. The character subsequently appears in The Amazing Spider-Man #265 (June 1985), #304 (September 1988), #348-350 (June–August 1991), Web of Spider-Man Annual #10 (1994), and The Irredeemable Ant-Man #7-12 (June–November 2007). The Black Fox received an entry in the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Update '89 #1 and in the Official of the Marvel Universe A-Z Update #1.

Black Fox (Dr. Robert William Paine) is a superhero whose primary appearances have been in Marvel Comics' limited series, Marvel: The Lost Generation. He first appeared in Marvel: The Lost Generation #12 (March 2000).

Raul Chalmers

Black Fox is a jewel thief with a long international career. In his sixties, he yearns to pull off one last big heist so that he can retire for good to the French Riviera. However, his retirement plans continue to be deferred due to unfortunate encounters with super-beings. In each of his encounters the Fox, having no super-human powers of his own, is in way over his head. The thief's usual response when caught by a superhero is to surrender and negotiate release, which he accomplishes with fabricated stories about his poor wife and children or his poor deceased mother. However, in his last encounter with Spider-Man, the Fox was unable to pull the same trick and was carted off to jail.

In addition to coming into conflict with Spider-Man, Black Fox has been forced to lead the Red Ghost's super-apes on a robbery mission. He has also been pursued by Silver Sable and Doctor Doom, and had his fiancee murdered by the assassin Chance.

Recently, he was defeated by Ant-Man, who took the jewels Fox stole to a pawn shop and sold them himself. Black Fox, however, tracked down O'Grady and forced the Ant-Man to repay him for the botched heist. Ant-Man and Black Fox then returned to the pawn shop together and held up the place. Since then Ant-Man and Black Fox have become partners in crime of sorts. Black Fox can often be seen at O'Grady's apartment playing on a Wii console.

Dr. Robert William Paine

Dr. Robert William Paine was born in the fictional city of Foxwood Farms, Illinois presumably in the early decades of the Twentieth Century. During World War II, Paine worked as an American intelligence agent and was assigned to infiltrate Nazi Germany. After the War, he took to living the life of a swashbuckler. It was during this time that Paine was driven to create his Black Fox identity. After a conflict with the vampiric villain Nocturne, in which Paine's true love Miriam was slain, Paine declares, "Before, I was just a masked swashbuckler. After that...that was the day the Black Fox was truly born." After many years of fighting crime, The Black Fox eventually retired to teach history and law at Northwestern University in Chicago.

He later came out of retirement to help the superhero team First Line repel a Skrull invasion of Earth. During the final battle against the Skrulls, most of the First Line team, including Black Fox, were killed.

Powers and abilities

Black Fox II possesses no super powers but instead relies on his wealth, brilliant mind, and exceptional combat skills to fight crime. His secret hideout known as "The Foxhole" is located on his family farm near the city of his birth. The farm is called Foxwood Farms. Among the many devices at his disposal is a radar-invisible jet named The Flying Fox.