Early Use[]

The Mutant Growth Hormone, or MGH, has been marketed and available even before the start of the super-hero age: Wilson Fisk had access to it before he became a powerful crime lord^[7] and it was also available before Dr. Stephen Strange studied magic^[8] in the 1960s.^[9]

After these events, biochemist Dr. Henry McCoy, while working for the Brand Corporation on Long Island, developed an experimental serum that purportedly acted as a catalyst to activate latent mutations, with effects similar to the MGH. This may have been either a re-discovery of the MGH, or alternatively a different chemical compound.^[10]

Dealers and Users[]

Years later, an unknown party provided a crowd with an experimental drug that gave them powers similar to some popular super-humans such as Thor, Cyclops, or Daredevil. The drug also made them extremely aggressive. Iron Man managed to control the situation. It is, however, unclear if this was exactly a release of MGH, or a similar drug.^[11]

Stephen Strange, the man who would later become the hero Doctor Strange, used MGH from street dealers to try and control the pain in his hands after disfiguring them in a car accident.^[8]

The MGH reached prominence when the mutate crime lord, Owl began refining his own genetic material to obtain a drug he could sell, trying to build a new criminal empire with the profits. Daredevil stopped him.^[12]

The Vanisher sold "designer genes" on the black market -- later confirmed in a Marvel handbook to be MGH^[13] -- until he was stopped by the X-Men.^[14][15]

At one point, Mattie Franklin, the third Spider-Woman, fell in with and was abducted by a man named Denny Haynes. For weeks, Haynes kept Mattie high and sedated while harvesting her blood and tissue from a wound on her back. While strung out, Mattie entered the apartment of Jessica Jones, but quickly fled before she could be questioned. After the encounter, Jones began investigating Mattie's disappearance. Jones was able to rescue and return Mattie to her foster parents, the Jamesons, after a team-up with Jessica Drew, the original Spider-Woman.^[16]

The Young Avenger, Patriot was a regular user of MGH. Having no superpowers, he lied to his friends and teammates, claiming to have inherited his grandfather's powers via a blood transfusion. When his secret was revealed, Patriot was ashamed and quit the team.^[17] (He later rejoined the team after receiving an actual blood transfusion from his grandfather that did give him the powers of a true Super Soldier).^[18]

The Runaways and the New Avengers found some evidence of the superhero, Cloak, beating his partner, Dagger, which landed her in the hospital. However, after chasing Cloak, they discovered that the attack had been performed by orderly Reginald Mantz who mimicked Cloak's power with MGH.^[19]

At some point, the TV documentary show 60 Minutes ran an episode about MGH.^[20]

Civil War[]

During the Civil War, Wolverine discovered that the super-villain Nitro used MGH to increase his power level, which allowed him to annihilate Stamford, Connecticut.^[5] It was revealed that his provider was none other than Walter Declun, the CEO of Damage Control,^[21] using Nitro to generate damages in order to create contracts for his business.^[20]

Post M-Day[]

While trying to reverse the effects of M-Day which robbed most of the world's mutants of their powers and X-Genes, Beast and Bishop shook down an MGH dealer, Charlie Hustle, to obtain active MGH samples. Unfortunately, they discovered like most mutants, most MGH lost its viability (Hustle possessed only viable samples of Whirlwind, which he sold for a fortune).^[22]

Utopia/Dark X-Men[]

To convince Weapon Omega to join the Dark X-Men, Norman Osborn affected a building site and a school with MGH gas, making all humans in those areas become temporary mutants, and possible targets for Omega's powers. According to a conversation between Dark Beast and Norman, they had many active MGH samples left, and the resources to make it again.^[23]

During the Fear, a few drug dealers used MGH on themselves to mimic the strength, size, and aura of Natives Americans devils to create a clash between the natives and their white neighbors. They were defeated by the American Eagle. The origin of this MGH is unknown.^[24]

Madripoor[]

Not long after Dazzler accepted a position as Mutant Liaison to S.H.I.E.L.D., she was abducted by Mystique. Mystique masquerade as Dazzler while keeping the real Dazzler comatose on Madripoor and harvesting MGH from her for months.^[25][26] She was eventually rescued by Magneto.^[27]

During a training session, Emma Frost took young Jean Grey to Madripoor to break up Blob's MGH smuggling ring.^[28]

American Kaiju[]

Todd Ziller was a volunteer in the new Super-Soldier process. They could not recreate the serum so they used existing transformative substances. The final result included Gamma enhancements, Mutant Growth Hormone, Pym Particles, and the Connors Formula. The resulting application of the serum in Ziller's body turned him into a giant reptile similar to Godzilla, for which he was given the alias of "American Kaiju."^[29]

Magneto[]

...^[30]

• On Earth-807128, Natalie X was enhanced using "Superhuman Growth Hormone".^[6]