Weapon Plus is a program that has long attempted to create the perfect soldier. Wolverine has been their most famous (or infamous) experiment of the program. But he is not the only one.
Captain America
Before the Weapon Plus program bared its fangs, it started out as the famous super soldier program called Project Rebirth. This is the same project that led to the creation of the world’s first and only true super soldier – Captain America. Under Abraham Erskine’s supervision, Steve Rogers was injected with the super soldier serum and exposed to vita rays. Captain America gained peak human physical attributes, a heightened metabolism, and increased longevity as a result of the experiment. He was the sole successful experiment of Project Rebirth aka Weapon-I. To this day, Weapon Plus considers Steve Rogers their most impressive test subject.
Man-Thing
Weapon-IV has a very controversial start. The project specifically targeted ethnic groups and minorities. The trials from those experiments led to the birth of Project Sulfur. Led by the talented Theodore Sallis, the experiment was sabotaged. Sallis would later stop saboteurs from taking away his prized SO-2 serum by using it upon himself. Days later, Sallis would come out of the swamp he was presumed dead in as an entity composed of pure vegetable matter and swamp mutagens. The Man-Thing is one of the most powerful superheroes of the Earth, capable of plant manipulation, teleportation, dimensional travel, and a variety of other mystical feats.
Deadpool
Deadpool was not always this crazy. Before he got scarred for life, Wade Wilson was a mere mercenary from Ohio. After being diagnosed with cancer, Wade had lost all hope. He would then meet a subset of Weapon X that had access to the original Weapon X data, the same experiment that created Wolverine. Wade was promised they could use Wolverine’s healing factor to stop Wade’s cancer from killing him. The experiment was successful but it came at a cost. Wade’s entire body was turned into a giant pile of cancer cells. Since cancer cells have a high regeneration factor, his healing abilities are even better than Wolverine’s. Wade also lost all his memories prior to the experiment and went virtually crazy.
Luke Cage
Weapon-VI was yet another attempt to adopt a different approach to create a super soldier worthy of the time and energy invested into creating it. The project was titled Project Power. Led by Doctor Noah Burstein, Weapon-VI gave Luke Cage his signature abilities, turning him into Power Man. With unbreakable skin and superhuman strength, Luke Cage became a force and freak of nature.
Nuke
During the Vietnam War, the American Government was in a desperate need for soldiers that are better than the ones already available. these super soldiers would go behind enemy lines and use guerilla warfare to single-handedly halt the enemy’s war efforts. Project Homegrown was a series of brutal experiments the United states of America conducted on its own soldiers. Sergeant Frank Simpson was the only one who survived the program. With cybernetic implants, intense mental conditioning and bio-chemical enhancements in the form of adrenaline pills, Nuke became a fanatic more than a soldier. He is now a well-known villain and is considered a failed experiment.
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Stepford Cuckoos
The Stepford Cuckoos are quintuplet sisters. Sophie, Phoebe, Mindee, Celeste, and Esme possess a hive mind. Their telepathic powers are extremely potent. But when they are together, they possess psychic abilities that could rival even that of Professor X. It is later revealed that the Stepford Cuckoos were clones of Emma Frost, created for one purpose. The objective of their creation was to entrap the Phoenix Force and help Weapon Plus use the entity’s powers to get rid of all mutants on Earth.
X-23
After finding success in Logan and his eventual escape, Weapon X branched off of Weapon Plus, becoming a rival organization. They tried to clone the original Wolverine to create a subject that would have unflinching loyalty towards them. After dozens of failures, they found success in a female clone – X-23. X-23 was designed to be genetically superior to Wolverine in literally all aspects. She was faster, smarter, healed faster, and was more ferocious than Logan in combat. Laura Kinney would follow on in her predecessor’s footsteps, slashing her way out of the Weapon X facility and joining the X-Men later.
Fantomex
The Weapon X program decided to focus on Wolverine. Weapon Plus on ther other hand focused solely on evolution. They used their Sentinel technology to create The world. Anything put inside The World could be induced into mutating even more. Weapon Plus put some mutants inside it and observed as the forces of evolution enhanced their already impressive feats. One of their most crowning achievements was Fantomex. having spent most of his childhood inside The World, Fantomex possesses a myriad of abilities. He had three brains, a healing factor that could rival even Deadpool’s, super-human strength, and a sentient nervous system he could eject out of his body and turn it into a flying saucer. Fantomex’s most impressive power is his ability of misdirection, using his illusion casting power to make his enemies see only what Fantomex wants them to see.
Ultimaton
Fantomex was not the only mutant super soldier to come out of The World. Their most powerful creation was Ultimaton, a mutant that was heavily modified within the Sentinel laboratory. Ultimaton would mutate so much he was tens of generations ahead of present day mutants. He was supposed to be a part of a Super Sentinel unit tasked with hunting down powerful mutants. After he escaped the facility, Ultimaton encountered Wolverine, Fantomex, and Cyclops. He defeated them very easily. He was later killed while in the middle of an existential crisis and resurrected by Fantomex, who tasked him with guarding Kid Apocalypse.
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Shiva
After years of encountering test subjects that would eventually rebel against their creators, Weapon X thought of a novel solution. They created a sentient robot hunter-predator, their very own Mutant Terminator. Shiva was a computer program that had a knack for learning from his past mistakes. Every time it was defeated, Shiva would create another robotic clone immune to the way in which it was beaten the last time. Wolverine had a tough time defeating Shiva, since its adamantium resistant skin, energy manipulation abilities and the power of teleportation made him a rather tough foe.
Weapon H
Literally every time Weapon X tried to play with Wolverine’s DNA, they were met with massive failure. So after decades, Weapon X gave up on Wolverine and focused on another unstoppable super soldier. The Hulk had the strength to shatter a planet with one punch. What if they could create a super soldier under their control that had the powers of both Wolverine and the Hulk? Clayton Cortez was a discharged soldier who was taken in by Weapon X and turned into the one and only Weapon H. But as fate would have it, Weapon X met failure here too when Weapon h made a break for it after coming to his senses. Clayton Cortez is now hell-bent on redeeming himself for his crimes.
