Zoom's History
Hunter Zolomon had a troubled relationship with his parents, who rarely spoke to each other or to him. On the day Hunter was to leave for college, he came home to find the police laying siege to his house. His father was a serial killer, and when his mother told the police, Hunter's father killed her. After refusing to give up, his father was killed by the police.
Hunter became obsessed with understanding the criminal mind, studying psychology and criminology in college, then joining the F.B.I. along with his girlfriend Ashley, whom he later married. One case resulted in Ashley's father being killed (Hunter had thought the criminal they were after would not use a gun). Ashley left him shortly thereafter, and the F.B.I. terminated his employment. Hunter was also left with a damaged knee due to the case, requiring a cane for walking.
After arriving in Keystone City, he got a job as a profiler, working with the police in their Department of Metahuman Hostilities. His work put him in constant contact with the current Flash, Wally West, and the two became good friends. His insight was critical in solving a number of cases, but he always resented being stuck behind a desk.
Transformation into Zoom
Hunter was severely injured in an attack by Gorilla Grodd in Iron Heights. The injuries left Hunter paralyzed from the waist down. He asked Wally West to use the time-traveling cosmic treadmill in the Flash Museum to prevent this from occurring. West refused, saying that he could not risk damaging the timestream. Zolomon then broke into the museum and attempted to use the treadmill himself. The resulting explosion destroyed the museum and shifted Hunter's connection to time. He could now alter his personal timeframe, giving the effect of super-speed.
Zolomon decided that West had refused to help because, unlike the previous Flash Barry Allen, West had never suffered personal tragedy. Zolomon decided that if he became the new Zoom and killed West's wife (Linda Park), this would help the Flash become a better hero. Flash succeeded in defeating Zoom, preventing Linda's death, but his attack caused a miscarriage of their twin children. Zolomon was forced into a temporal anomaly and ended up in a comatose state, continually watching the death of his father-in-law.
Zolomon's ex-wife, Ashley Zolomon, replaced him as profiler and spent a lot of time attempting to communicate with him. Due to a car accident, Ashley was hospitalized for some time. It was around this period that Zoom awoke from his coma, out of concern for Ashley. He cautiously chose to remain in his cell, however.
Rogue War
Zoom was driven out of his self-imposed imprisonment by Cheetah in an attempt to both harness super-speed and induct him into the growing Secret Society of Super Villains. The two shared a minor romance, but nothing serious happened as Zoom considered himself to still be married to Ashley.
Zoom later infiltrated the already-growing "Rogue War" between Captain Cold's Rogues, the Trickster's reformed Rogues, and the Top's brainwashed rogues. Quickly spiriting his estranged wife Ashley out of danger to the home of Linda Park, Zoom returned to the battlefront to dispatch Captain Cold, claiming that the "Man Who Mastered Absolute Zero" was wasting the Flash's time with his longstanding, self-aggrandizing methods of villainy.
Zoom was not done. As the Flash and Kid Flash (Bart Allen) attempt to contain the battle, Zoom throttled Kid Flash and threatened to snap his neck in a manner reminiscent of what Barry Allen had done to Eobard Thawne (Professor Zoom). Before Zoom could kill Kid Flash, however, Professor Zoom himself arrived on a cosmic treadmill, with Jay Garrick chained to the front end.
A battle ensued between the two Flashes and Kid Flash against the two Zooms, but in the end, the two Zooms accomplished what they intended. They grabbed the Flash and jumped onto the treadmill. Zoom then forced the Flash to watch their first fight, in which Linda was severely injured and miscarried. Zoom felt that Wally West should be made to focus on the feelings of sorrow and loss from this experience and told Professor Zoom to rewind it so that he could watch it again. But as the scene started to rewind, West's uncle and mentor Barry Allen appeared, riding his own cosmic treadmill and saying that he had been looking for Professor Zoom.
Barry Allen removed West from immediate danger, telling West that he was here to return Thawne to his proper place in time, and that no matter how bad it seemed, West could win this if he "just pushed himself a bit". He and Thawne then disappeared through time. Zoom, enraged, began to run around the world, building up speed, with which to kill Linda. Wally rushed to catch up, but he was a step or two behind. At the last minute, he realized what Barry's advice meant and put on a final burst of speed, pushing himself, and hitting Zoom in the back. Zoom fell forward and was caught in the sonic boom which he himself used to kill Linda's babies (this ended up creating a ?fissure in time? that restored Linda?s pregnancy, just in time for her to give birth). Zoom ran for the treadmill, but West forced them back to their mutual present. Along the way, they viewed scenes of Zoom's life. Zoom realized his mistreatment of Wally and briefly apologized before slipping into the timestream. He was later seen as a ghost-like figure apologizing to his wife.
Zoom returned during the Infinite Crisis event as the Secret Society of Super Villains's chief speedster, but with his recent epiphany, a phase of his life as a character has ended.
One Year Later
Zoom later appears at the sacking of Rome, being approached by Bart Allen's grandmother, to help her protect Bart from a great tragedy that the villain Inertia was setting up.[1] It is unknown whether Zoom traveled to this time period himself, or if he became stranded there after his last encounter with Wally West.
He was also pursued by the Justice League in an attempt to locate Sinestro after Batman (Bruce Wayne) and Green Lantern (Hal Jordan) learn of the existence of the Sinestro Corps.[2]
Zoom is pursued by the Justice Society of America into Atlanta. Damage is banned from the city, but enters anyway seeking revenge. During a scuffle, he ends up taking Zoom hostage until being talked down by Liberty Belle. Disappointed that Damage is not "improving", he throws a sharp pipe to kill him. Liberty Belle uses her superspeed to catch it and toss it back, knocking Zoom unconscious.[3]
Hunter was became a member of Libra's Secret Society of Super Villains.
Final Crisis
In Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge he frees Inertia from his paralysis, inflicted previously by Wally West, hoping to make him his apprentice as a new Kid Flash, teaching how to "improve" his own life and the ones of other by inflicting great tragedies. Inertia learns the lesson too well, and claiming himself to be "Kid Zoom", the new master of tragedies, turns over the Flash's Rogues and Zoom altogether. Employing the timestream manipulation powers Zoom granted him against his master, he reverts the body of Zoom to the crippled, broken body of Hunter Zolomon, stripping him of his powers.
