Alpha

Origin

Andy Maguire was an extremely average teenager that attended Midtown High School and was rarely noticed by even his family. His life was changed after attending a school trip to Horizon Labs to watch a ground breaking experiment performed by Max Modell, Tiberius Stone and Peter Parker as he debuts his self-titled Parker Particles, a hyper-kinetic form of energy tied into the forces of universal expansion and his greatest discovery, for top scientists, policy makers, and the media. Suddenly the experiment goes wrong and large bursts of energy are released from the machine. Despite the attempts of Peter Parker and others to protect the class, Andy is forced to save a girl named Chrissy in the ensuing chaos, causing him to be struck by the energy himself. Instead of being fatally injured, he miraculously survived and gained amazing powers.

Feeling that Andy's great power is his responsibility, Peter Parker revealed his secret life as Spider-Man to Andy and offered him the chance to become his sidekick. Andy accepted Peter's offer and became Alpha, everything Peter wished he could have been in high school.

Creation

Andy was created by Dan Slott, his first appearance is in Amazing Spider-Man #692 (The 50th anniversary issue of Spider-Man). His name was created by mixing Andrew Garfield and Toby Maguire, two actors who have played Spider-Man on the big screen.

Major Story Arcs

Cloned By Jackal

In the days after gaining superpowers, Alpha continued fighting crime under the tutelage of his mentor, Spider-Man, as well as being the face of Horizon Labs. However, his methods led to him being unpopular among the citizens of New York. The Jackal then captured Alpha, and cloned him, hoping to build an army of meta-humans to take over the world. Fortunately, Alpha DNA wasn't altered when he gained superpowers, so as a result, the clones were powerless. Spider-Man eventually tracked Alpha down, and the Jackal escaped. Following these events, Alpha then emancipated himself from his parents.

Alpha was called up by Spider-Man to help the Avengers fight Terminus. However, his misuse of powers was even more reckless than usual and nearly destroyed numerous numbers of aircraft. It was also during this incident that Alpha discovered the ability to use more than one of his powers at a time. Thankfully, the Avengers managed to save those in danger, including Aunt May and J. J. Jameson Sr., who were flying in a private jet. After this incident, Spider-Man depowered Alpha, implying that Andrew would only get his powers back when he started to show more responsibility. Now normal, he returned back to school, his parents and normal life, but seemingly maintained low levels of super-strength.

Big Time

Six months later, Andy's parents divorced, Andy and his mother moving in with his grandmother in Pittsburgh. However, he returns every few weeks to Horizon Labs to be tested. On one of these occasions, in order to harness Parker Particles to make himself more powerful, the Superior Spider-Man returned 10% of Alpha's abilities back to him.

With his powers returned Alpha sets out to patrol the city. In an attempt to save a woman from a mugger, Alpha used too much of his powers and accidentally crushed the man's skull. Appalled at his actions Alpha flies the mugger to the Pittsburgh University Medical Center and plans to turn himself into the police. However since the guy was a scumbag the police don't really care, letting him go. Not satisfied Alpha decides to head to Horizon Labs so Peter Parker can take away his powers. However, on the way there he runs into, and destroys, a massive elemental demolishing a steel plant. Alpha has some second thoughts about giving his powers up, but continues on to Horizon anyway. While waiting for Peter, he spots a newspaper that says the mugger he had hit was going to make it. Deciding to keep his powers Alpha leaves.

Eventually, Alpha's powers fully return and after saving his friend Susan "Soupcan" Rice from a restaurant fire, he realizes his senses have been enhanced to the point that he can hear and see everything on Earth. During a visit to the mugger he almost killed, the man awakens and vows revenge. Some time later, the mugger mutates into some sort of tumorous monster. Calling himself Zeta, he begins rampaging through the city. Meanwhile, at the behest of "Boss" Cohen, Pittsburgh's top crime boss, some of his goons go to Alpha's home and torch it. After saving his mother from the fire, he enlists Spider-Man to help destroy Zeta, but fails to completely destroy all the cancerous tissue, allowing Zeta to escape. After an attempt on Soupcan's life by one of Cohen's hitmen, Alpha threatens to kill Cohen, but is deterred by the fact that Cohen knows about the mugger. The mobster then blackmails Andy to ignore any of Cohen's crime, or he'll release the information to the media. Andy then reveals his identity to his only other friend Duncan Kilgore and attempts to make a name for himself as protector of Pittsburgh.

Powers & Abilities

Due to his exposure to the Parker Particles, Andy is now capable of continually recharging massive amounts of cosmic energy, which he can release in the form of energy blasts, super strength, super speed, force fields, and flight. He was previously only able to manifest one of these abilities at a time, but overcame this limitation in a recent team up with The Avengers. Andrew lost the vast majority of his powers after Peter depowered him, but has since regained them all.