Kingpin's History
Very little is known about the Kingpin before he first took command of the East Coast mobs. He has described himself, however as having been "an unpopular, blubbery child" before he began his lifelong pursuit of bodybuilding. Wilson Fisk was impoverished as a child, and committed his first murder when he was twelve. From the start Fisk was determined to be the best in whatever he did, and he believed physical strength to be a major factor in building power in the underworld. Hence, he fanatically trained himself in various methods of bodybuilding and personal combat, finally concentrating on the Japanese art of sumo. His sumo training probably led to his interest in the Orient, which would manifest itself in other ways.
Fisk educated himself by stealing books from stores and libraries, and became particularly fascinated by political science. He decided that another key to success would be in using political techniques in organizing and directing groups of criminals. It was his adoption of these techniques that caused him to be thought of as a political "kingpin of crime," a description which became his nom de crime. Although Fisk has always taken pleasure in physical combat with his enemies, he has always recognized the necessity never to place himself in a situation in which the law can prove his responsibility for crimes. As a result, it is believed Fisk has never once been convicted. Even when he inexplicably broke his own rule and was jailed for personally stealing an ancient tablet from Empire State University, charges had to be dropped for lack of evidence.
Fisk thus never worked as any criminal's henchman, but formed his own small gang right from the start. Fisk's gang rapidly grew in size, influence, power and wealth, thanks to his organizational skills and, when necessary, his prowess in hand-to-hand combat. Fisk was careful to invest his illegal gains in legitimate businesses. The first company which he owned completely was one dealing in spices from the Far East. Today, even though Fisk has built a vast legitimate business empire in various fields, he still professes in public to being merely a "humble dealer in spices."
After about a decade of being a criminal leader, Fisk had also achieved enough success in legitimate business to become a prominent member of New York society. It is at this point that he met and soon married Vanessa (maiden name unknown), a beautiful woman not yet 20 years old, and whose love, the Kingpin has stated, gave him the peace he sought after his constant struggle for power. Whether or not Vanessa knew of his criminal activities when she married him is unclear; she did know afterwards. Their son, Richard, was born within a year after their marriage.
About two decades later, Fisk, now known as the Kingpin, had become one of the most powerful criminal leaders in both the New York and Las Vegas areas, and had won the respect of many of the other crime bosses. When the costumed crimefighter Spider-Man briefly retired, the Kingpin decided the time had come to fulfill his master plan. For years various major criminals dreamed of forming a coalition of criminal gangs in order to compete with the Maggia, which virtually monopolized organized crime throughout the country, The Big Man (the late Frederick Foswell) had only temporarily succeeded in uniting the independent gangs; others who have tried included the Crime-Master, Doctor Octopus, the first and third Green Goblins, the Mad Thinker, the Owl, Hammerhead, and Silvermane. With Spider-Man apparently gone, the Kingpin now proposed that such a coalition be formed under his leadership, and met with nearly unanimous acceptance. The Kingpin then directed a major crime wave in New York City which came to an end with his first confrontation with the again active Spider-Man. Moreover, the Kingpin's attempt to silence Daily Bugle publisher J. Jonah Jameson backfired when Spider-Man rescued Jameson, who then publicly exposed Fisk as the Kingpin, the crime coalition apparently then fell apart.
In the following years the Kingpin suffered a number of reversals. During this time he was offered an opportunity to fully achieve his ambitions for political power when he was recruited to serve as the behind the scenes leader of the Las Vegas area faction of the now fragmented HYDRA. His son, Richard, acted under him as Supreme Hydra of this group. Through HYDRA the Kingpin planned to overthrow the United States government and even achieve world domination, but he turned against HYDRA upon learning that the Las Vegas contingent was actually controlled not by him but by the infamous Nazi war criminal, the Red Skull. Ever since, the Kingpin has pursued more realistic goals than HYDRA's.
Eventually, Vanessa, sickened by the Kingpin's life of crime, demanded that Fisk abandon it or else she would desert him. Unwilling to lose Vanessa, Fisk agreed to her terms, and the two retired to Japan. Vanessa even persuaded the reluctant Fisk to turn over his files on the activities of other leaders of organized crime to American legal authorities. To prevent this, the new leaders of the Kingpin's crime syndicate kidnapped Vanessa, who was then apparently killed by a Kingpin aide who correctly saw her as the only obstacle preventing Fisk from returning to crime.
The enraged Fisk indeed made a comeback. Not only did he resume leadership of his former organization, but he also turned over his files on other criminal leaders to the law through the costumed crimefighter Daredevil, now with the motive of ridding himself of any rivals. The ploy worked: as a result of the evidence in the files, many criminal leaders, both inside and outside the Maggia, were convicted. In the ensuing power vacuum the Kingpin rebuilt his coalition, stronger than before. Today he controls the great majority of non-Maggia East Coast gangs dealing in conventional crimes. The Kingpin's organization is now stronger than any single Maggia "family" in the New York area.
The Kingpin again turned his attention to his political goals, and his puppet candidate Randolph Winston Cherryh actually won a New York mayoralty election. However, Daredevil, now the Kingpin's principal opponent among the city's costumed adventurers, found Vanessa alive, though suffering from severe mental problems. Daredevil told the Kingpin he would return Vanessa to him if the Kingpin ordered Cherryh to decline accepting the mayoralty. The Kingpin agreed, and the bargain was carried out. Vanessa was returned to the Kingpin's custody as promised. While the Kingpin attempted to get revenge for this disgrace by having Elektra assassinate Matt Murdock's legal partner Foggy Nelson, it ended in failure when Bullseye killed Elektra.
The Kingpin was angered by Daredevil's various successful attempts at subverting his plans. Finally, Karen Page, Daredevil's former lover who had become a heroin addict, sold the information that Daredevil was lawyer Matthew Murdock to a drug dealer. The information came into the Kingpin's hands, and he seized the opportunity for vengeance. He arranged for Murdock to be rendered virtually penniless and had him framed for bribing a witness to perjure himself. Murdock lost his license to practice law. Already psychologically troubled, Murdock sank into severe paranoia. He confronted the Kingpin, who savagely beat him and had him trapped, unconscious, within a car at the bottom of a New York river so Murdock's death would seem an accident. But Murdock managed to escape.
Kingpin continued to send super-thugs, such as Typhoid Mary, on attacks against Daredevil, but Murdock, after a long while, got back at Fisk. Exposing the Kingpin for who he was, rendering him penniless and taking the recovering Vanessa into hiding in Europe was the ultimate revenge on him. The broken Fisk seemed to have come full circle from his squalid upbringing.
Under circumstances to be fully revealed, Fisk became a part of the Stark-Fujikawa corporate empire, surfacing in an East Asian branch, and wielding power and influence as he had before, although not quite on the same scale/geography. He eventually came up against the X-Men and their erstwhile companion, Shang-Chi. The heroes were hot on the trail of the Elixir Vitae which they thought could be used as a cure for the Legacy Virus. Unfortunately, the information about the Elixir was in the hands of the Kingpin, who wanted to give it up only for its ultimate monetary value. Storm ended up destroying the Elixir rather than to let Fisk get rich off it.
Fisk used his position at Stark-Fujikawa to re-establish his empire in New York.
Wilson Fisk eventually lost his criminal empire to one of his employees, Samuel Silke, who was working with his son Richard, in a bloody Caesar-like assassination bid. In the aftermath, Vanessa killed Richard and fled the country with Fisk's remaining wealth while the Kingpin recuperated in an unnamed eastern-European country, broken and alone.
He returned, and after getting revenge on Silke by crushing his head, almost managed to regain his empire through sheer will, but was defeated by Daredevil, who declared himself the new Kingpin. Fisk was put in jail.
He hatched a scheme to be freed and regain his wealth by giving the F.B.I. proof in the form of the nonexistent "Murdock Papers" that Matt Murdock is Daredevil. Having made so many enemies who were in prison, Fisk was constantly under attack from the Hand, HYDRA, or any number of criminal organizations with which he had had intimate contact. The U.S. Government was hard pressed to get rid of this expensive, dangerous, legally clean master criminal, and Fisk succeeded in manipulating the F.B.I. into gravely wounding Daredevil and directing them to his D.N.A. He told Ben Urich to give the feds the location of the Night Nurse, the only medic for injured superheroes, or go to jail.
He succeeded in getting Matt Murdock finally arrested, but the F.B.I. betrayed him at the last minute and arrested him as well, placing him in the same jail as Murdock with hopes that the two would kill each other. While in jail he also managed to arrange the near-fatal stabbing of Foggy Nelson, Daredevil's longtime friend and fellow lawyer. Ironically, the enemies were forced to team up in order to survive a prison riot which was directed at them. Finally, Murdock sacrificed the deal, refusing to let Bullseye, who was also incarcerated, leave the prison as Kingpin had planned. The fight ended with the Kingpin shot point-blank in the knee by gunfire from Bullseye intended for Murdock, while Murdock escaped.
During the Civil War he offered a deal to Iron Man ? consideration on his sentence in exchange for information about Captain America's Resistance base. However, as his status in prison was threatened for collaborating with Stark, he betrayed him. He first set up Iron Man by revealing a gathering of supervillians by Hammerhead to create a new criminal empire, claiming it was a base of Captain America's, and gave information to the Secret Avengers instead.
He also put out a hit on Spider-Man and his loved ones. A sniper attempted to hit Spider-Man, only to hit one of the "secondary targets", Aunt May.
At some point later, after Matt Murdock returned to America with his name cleared, he completed Vanessa Fisk's last wish and took on Fisk's case, getting all charges dropped in exchange for Fisk leaving the country. Fisk visited his wife's grave.
However, Fisk returned to New York to settle some "old business" and met with the Runaways, who were on the run from SHIELD. He offered them protection from the government if they promised to steal a special artifact for him. After the teens ran into a winged monster and the Punisher, they decided not to give the artifact to Fisk, but were attacked by his army of ninjas. They escaped by using the artifact, which took them back in time.
Shadowland
During the time when Daredevil got control over The Hand, Fisk decided to meet with former Heroes for Hire, Luke Cage and Iron Fist, to discuss how they were going to deal with Daredevil. When they refused, Fisk used a scroll in order to summon the Ghost Rider.
Leader of the Hand
After Daredevil's fallout, Kingpin became the new leader of the Hand, with Lady Bullseye, Thyphoid Mary, Montana and Hobgoblin as his henchmen, using the group for his criminal purposes.
Big Time
With the new Hobgoblin as his most recent incorporation to his organization, Fisk stole the experimental metal called Reverbium from Horizon Labs. The Reverbium was destroyed because of its instability by Spider-Man and Black Cat, leading to the destruction of the Fisk Tower and the death of Montana.
