Helmut Zemo

"I have experience and patience. A man can do anything if he has those."

- Helmut Zemo to Vasily Karpov

Colonel Helmut Zemo is a Sokovian citizen and a terrorist who sought revenge against the Avengers after losing his family during the Battle of Sokovia, becoming obsessed with defeating and destroying them. He set about his plan to tear apart the Avengers by first framing the Winter Soldier for the assassination of T'Chaka, causing Captain America to defend his friend from the world. This action caused the Avengers Civil War in which Iron Man led a man-hunt for the Winter Soldier and Zemo allowed Iron Man to discover that the Winter Soldier was also responsible for the deaths of his parents. With the Avengers in ruins, Zemo attempted to commit suicide but was stopped by Black Panther and handed over to Everett Ross' custody.

Early Life
"Zemo ran EKO Scorpion, a Sokovian covert kill squad."

- F.R.I.D.A.Y.

Helmut Zemo is a former Sokovian intelligence officer and commander of EKO Scorpion, an elite Sokovian paramilitary tactical unit. Zemo and his family lived a happy life in Novi Grad, and maintained good relationships with his extended family in the Sokovian countryside. However, his happiness was cut short when Ultron destroyed Sokovia, which tragically cost the lives of Zemo's family. Though Ultron was defeated and destroyed by the Avengers, Zemo angrily blamed them for causing his family's death, and vowed to destroy the team at all costs. Knowing he could not hope to win by force, he sought to manipulate them into destroying each other instead.

Manipulating the Avengers
"HYDRA deserves its place on the ash heap, so your death would not bother me. But I'll have to use this book and other bloodier methods to get what I need."

- Helmut Zemo to Vasily Karpov

To that end, Zemo located Vasily Karpov, one of the former leaders of the Winter Soldier Program, who was in hiding with HYDRA having been wiped out. Zemo attacked and subdued Karpov before tying him upside down above a sink slowly filling with water. Zemo took the Winter Soldier Book from Karpov's HYDRA files and introduced himself, demanding information about Howard and Maria Stark's assassination, but Karpov refused to speak. Zemo left, taking his belongings while Karpov drowned.

Using the information he had obtained, Zemo framed the former Winter Soldier, Bucky Barnes, into taking the fall for a bombing which killed the Wakandan king T'Chaka. The timing of events coincided with the signing of the Sokovia Accords, a framework that would place enhanced people under government oversight, and a burgeoning cause of friction between Captain America, who refused the oversight, and Iron Man, who supported it.

Re-Activating the Winter Soldier
"Longing. Rusted. Seventeen. Daybreak. Furnace. Nine. Benign. Homecoming. One. Freight car. Soldier?" "Ready to comply."

- Helmut Zemo and Winter Soldier

Having been hunted across the world for his apparent involvement in T'Chaka's death, Bucky Barnes was eventually caught and subdued in part to the efforts of Everett Ross' men and War Machine and, into the custody of the Joint Counter Terrorist Centre. Barnes was locked in a contained cell with his robotic arm tightly fixed down as Zemo posed as the psychiatrist Theo Broussard who was supposed to evaluate his mental well-being. To begin, Zemo continued the evaluation until the power around the base were cut out, including the cameras. Zemo then reactivated Barnes' Winter Soldier Program training by using the HYDRA manual he procured from Barnes' former handler Vasily Karpov, which led to Barnes breaking free of his restraints to stop Zemo's plans, ripping his arms free and punching the glass to try and get away. Zemo was able to finish saying the codewords just as Barnes broke free and became his willing assassin. Zemo requested the mission report about the death of Howard Stark.

Having obtained the information he needed, Zemo ordered the Winter Soldier to fight and kill anyone who attempted to stop him before getting in a helicopter and escaping to seemingly prove his guilt for the bombing. As the Winter Soldier obeyed his orders, Zemo was confronted by Captain America and Falcon who attempted to save Barnes. Rogers demanded to know what Zemo wanted and was told that he wanted to see an empire fall.

Final Stages
"You're Sokovian, is that what this is about?" "Sokovia was a failed state long before you blew it to hell. No. I'm here because I made a promise." "You've lost someone." "I've lost everyone. And so will you."

- Captain America and Helmut Zemo

Once the Avengers' co-leaders had gathered forces for their factions and fought each other to a near-standstill, Zemo traveled to Siberia seemingly to reawaken from cryostasis the five remaining soldiers from the Winter Soldier Program. Before Rogers, Barnes, and Stark arrived, Zemo killed all five soldiers while they slept.

When the three arrived, he met with them through a window of a shielded room, revealing that he had lost everyone he loved in Sokovia and that he had orchestrated events for the Avengers to fight one another. He then played a video of surveillance footage from 1991 of Barnes, under the control of HYDRA, killing Tony Stark's parents. This revelation caused a brutal fight between Iron Man against Captain America and Winter Soldier, while Zemo took the opportunity to get away from the immediate area.

Success and Defeat
"Justice will come soon enough." "Tell that to the dead." "The living are not done with you yet."

- Black Panther to Helmut Zemo

Zemo awaited the result of the ensuing battle in the snow, content that he had split the Avengers, and attempted suicide as he recounted his motivations to Black Panther, who had secretly trailed Stark to Siberia. The Black Panther stopped him in time, and turned him over to counter-terrorist agent Everett Ross. When Ross taunted Zemo that his plans failed, he hinted that despite his arrest, his plans did succeed and were still in function, responding with two words: "Did it?".

Personality
"You killed innocent people in Vienna just to bring us here?" "I've thought about nothing else for over a year. I studied you, followed you, and now that you are standing here, I just realized that there is a bit of green in the blue of your eyes. How nice to find a flaw."

- Captain America and Helmut Zemo

Helmut Zemo was a member of a death squad of the Sokovian Armed Forces that managed to build a happy family despite the nature of his job. However, the war between the Avengers and Ultron ended up with the death of his whole family, and he became filled with so much anger and hatred that he became a vengeful psychopath. Thus, Zemo only wished to destroy the Avengers from the inside, the same way he himself had been destroyed.

However, despite his relentless attempts at trying to destroy the Avengers, Zemo is ultimately not without a conscience. He first tried to interrogate a HYDRA officer, but stated that if he didn't get the mission report from the officer, then he would resort to more violent means though he doesn't enjoy using said means. Zemo also sincerely apologized to T'Challa for accidentally killing his father T'Chaka, and he even opened up to him about why he wanted the Avengers destroyed. This caused even T'Challa, a man who had wanted Zemo's death the most, to sympathize with his current situation, and even spare him, as he realized that revenge would have completely consumed and destroyed him, as it did with Zemo.

Zemo intended to kill himself after avenging his family, as he had little else to live for, and only T'Challa's timely intervention stopped him from shooting himself.

Zemo kept a voice message of his late wife on his phone as one of the last connections from his former life that he held onto, which he often played over. Yet after he was content with his revenge and was about to commit suicide, he deleted the message.

Abilities
"I knew I could not kill them. More powerful men than me have tried. But, if I could get them to kill each other..."

- Helmut Zemo


 * Master Tactician: Zemo, as the former intelligence officer and commander of the elite Sokovian paramilitary tactical unit EKO Scorpion, is a brilliant tactician, being able to mastermind a series of events in order to get his revenge against the Avengers for their role in the destruction of Sokovia and the death of his family. He was also smart enough to know that he has no hopes of killing the Avengers, even if he had raised an army. So then, Zemo decided that it would instead be better to manipulate them into destroying themselves, which he very nearly succeeds in doing, with Iron Man and Captain America starting the Avengers Civil War.
 * Multilingual: Zemo can speak his native Sokovian, as well as English, German, and Russian.
 * Master Hacker: After Black Widow released all of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s files on the Internet, Zemo was able to hack and decrypt the files pertaining to the Winter Soldier program.
 * Expert Engineer: Zemo was able to build an EMP bomb that was able to take out Berlin's power plant.

Weapons

 * : Zemo used this pistol in a suicide attempt after causing Iron Man and Captain America to brutally attack each other, believing that there was no reason to escape and live. However, T'Challa quickly snatched the firearm from Zemo's hands and apprehended him.

Other Equipment

 * Winter Soldier Book: Zemo stole this booklet from a house in Cleveland, Ohio after torturing and killing Vasily Karpov, the house's sole resident. The book contains several "trigger words" that Zemo used to activate the Winter Soldier's HYDRA-created thought patterns while the Winter Soldier was in custody in Berlin.

Family

 * Father †
 * Wife †
 * Son †

Enemies

 * Avengers
 * Steve Rogers/Captain America
 * Tony Stark/Iron Man
 * Sam Wilson/Falcon
 * James Rhodes/War Machine
 * Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch
 * Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow
 * Clint Barton/Hawkeye
 * Vision
 * Thor
 * Bruce Banner/Hulk
 * Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier - Former Thrall
 * T'Chaka † - Victim
 * T'Challa/Black Panther - Captor
 * Everett Ross
 * Theo Broussard † - Victim
 * HYDRA
 * Vasily Karpov † - Victim
 * Winter Soldiers † - Victims
 * Ultron † - Family Killer
 * Ultron Sentries †

Trivia

 * In the comics, Helmut Zemo is a German Baron and the son of Heinrich Zemo and Hilda Zemo, and by extension of this is a descendant of Harbin Zemo, Hademar Zemo, Heller Zemo, Hilliard Zemo and Herman Zemo and the thirteenth baron of the Zemo bloodline. Outside of having led HYDRA and some incarnations of the Masters of Evil, Helmut Zemo masqueraded himself as Citizen V when working as a member of the Thunderbolts. After have been severely disfigured, Zemo uses a purple mask to cover his scars.
 * Zemo and Loki are the only main villains whose plans were successful to any extent, as Zemo managed to manipulate Iron Man into a battle with Captain America and his friends, despite failing to ultimately have them kill each another.
 * Before Daniel Brühl got the role of Zemo, it was rumored actor Ewan McGregor was originally in talks for Zemo's role, but this rumor was denied, and Brühl took up the part of Zemo himself.
 * Zemo appears to have a taste for bacon and black coffee, ordering it every day while staying in a hotel.