Manchester Black

PRE-FLASHPOINT DEATH APPEARANCE: Action Comics #796 (December 2002)
FIRST POST-FLASHPOINT APPEARANCE: Teen Titans #1 (September 2014)

Very little is known about the Englishman's background; what little that is known include insinuations that he was abused both physically and sexually by his parents while growing up. Manchester later says that he used to love heroes, but when he grew up he realized that the only way to truly stop the villains was to kill them.

Black and The Elite gained worldwide popularity for viciously killing their foes and thus preventing them coming back to cause more problems, and came into conflict with Superman, who opposed their wanton violence, leading to a showdown on Jupiter's moon Io that was videotaped for the Earth's media. Black used his powers to give Superman a stroke, and his teammates (Coldcast, Menagerie and the Hat) apparently were able to destroy Superman in a giant explosion. While the Elite were gloating, however, Superman used his speed to seemingly kill all the team members, except for Black; Superman then disabled the Englishman by using his x-ray vision to locate an unusual growth on Black's brain. He identified the growth as the source of Black's powers, and then carefully fired a thin burst of heat vision through Black's retinas and told Black that he had cut out the growth (he had actually given Black a micro-concussion that left him temporarily powerless).

Faced with the apparent loss of his powers, Black actually wept, hypocritically appalled that Superman had seemingly adopted the lethal tactics he and the Elite had spent so much time advocating. Superman then revealed to the powerless Black that the rest of the Elite were only unconscious, he had not removed anything from Black's brain, and that murdering opponents makes a hero no better than his enemies. Furious, Black declared that by not killing him, Superman had guaranteed that as long as Black was alive, he would come after Superman again and again, but Superman calmly replied that he would not want it any other way, and that dreams like the ones he gave to Earth were what made life worth living.