Despite being a cornerstone of both Marvel Comics and the Cinematic Universe, SHIELD's figurehead has found himself killed off more times than...well, anybody else who's been mentioned on this list, only to mysteriously come back to life. The reason Fury manages to keep cheating death is down to one of the worst creations from the dream team of Lee-Kirby, in that it's a frustrating deux ex machina that gets used again and again and never feels any less cheap. The ghost in the machine in question? The Life Model Decoy. First appearing way back in 1965 during Fury's first post-Howling Commandos comic, LMDs are robots that manage to perfectly duplicate all the outward appearances of anyone. They're usually controlled by the individual they're copying, which means they can get into all sorts of life-threatening scrapes without the real person putting themselves at any risk. And it means that writers can keep tricking us into thinking they've "killed" Fury, only for it to turn out it was an LMD of him all along. Fury has been shot dead by a hypnotised Punisher who believed the Sergeant killed his family, had his disappearance during the events of Secret War concealed, and murdered again my Norman Osborn during Dark Reign, only for it to have been a Life Model Decoy all along. Surprise! LMDs are Marvel's equivalent of the "it was all a dream" ending, and they're equally crappy.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
