Off My Mind: Should Superhero Teams be Government Sponsored?

In a world full of supervillains and supervillain teams, you can never have too many teams of superheroes. We know that the bad guys don't always place nicely together but sometimes they will temporarily band together or there might be an extremely powerful menace out there that could be too much for the single hero. 

Many heroes fight for justice on their own without any fancy gadgets. You would think that these scrappy heroes could easily team up to fight the good fight together. There are advantages to be having a base of operations or some sort of monitoring technology to pinpoint where the big dangers are and where they are most needed. For that to happen, the team will need money. There's also the fact of having credibility with the local law enforcement.

Are teams better off organizing on their own or would things be better and easier if they were sponsored by the government? == TEASER ==

When it comes to government run teams, the first thing that comes to mind is red tape. If a government is paying the bills, they most likely have control over the team. They can determine where the team goes and possibly who gets to be on the team. That sounds like a bunch of crap. 

Teams need to be able to do what they feel is necessary. They should be able to choose who would best fight besides them. Personalities and power differences could easily play a factor in the outcome of supervillain battles.

It sounds like having a team form on their own with their own rules would be best. But there's that money factor. Unless one of the team members is independently wealthy, having a safe and secure base of operations will be difficult to maintain. If a team is independent, they won't have approval by the police and will be seen as a bunch of vigilantes. The last thing a team needs is to be hassled with threats of being arrested or gunfire from gung ho officers when they really need to be focusing on the villains and protecting the innocent.

Alpha Flight is a team run by the Canadian government. In one of the first missions we saw them on, they were ordered to go intercept the X-Men, who were heading to the United States, and bring back Wolverine, who had decided to join the American team. With their involvement during FEAR ITSELF, they will be branded traitors to their country and will be forced to be on the run. The Avengers also had to deal with government bearurocacy. When Henry Gyrich was appointed their government liason, he became a pain in the ass. At least things are a little better these days in dealing with Maria Hill or Victoria Hand.

While being approved by the government could make things easier by giving a team credibility and access to funding and technology, there will of course be a cost. Some teams like the Suicide Squad have very little choice in what they do. The Outsiders became agents of Markovia in order to receive funding. Somehow, the team needs to find an independent way to operate. It'd be great if one of the heroes was loaded or if they knew someone willing to throw some money their way. Having government clearance sounds great but having their hands tied doesn't seem to be worth it. Heroes can overcome big obstacles and finding money for a place to hang out is just a small price when it comes to fulfilling their desire to help the helpless.