Fan Casting Henry Peter Gyrich in George Nolfi's Captain America

Very little is known about Gyrich's early life. It can be inferred from hints made that he rose through the ranks of the FBI before being assigned to the superhuman division under Agent Jimmy Woo, eventually becoming Woo's second in command. When the superhuman division was branched off into its own agency, SHIELD, Gyrich was selected to head the new agency. Since becoming SHIELD's director, Gyrich has implemented several changes to fit his personal vision. One of the most controversial was phasing out SHIELD's own team of superhumans in favor of advanced technology, purchasing gear from Stark Industries and even from questionable sources such as AIM, citing the potential security and property damage risks of having superhuman operatives charged with opposing other superhumans. Most recently, he hired an engineer, Oliver Trask, to develop a series of robots called "Sentinels" intended to combat superhumans. At the unveiling of the Sentinels, an attempt on Gyrich's life was made by the shapeshifting criminal Mystique and her Mutant Liberation Front, only to be thwarted by SHIELD's Interpol liason, Teresa Cassidy, and the X-Men. This attack only seems to have strengthened Gyrich's anti-superhuman biases.