Villain Profile: Cyborg Superman

This next guy is another character many of you folks out there probably haven’t heard of. He’s Cyborg Superman, a sort of clone of the original Kryptonian. Despite his relative obscurity, he does have a rather interesting background and motivation that I think should be explored by somebody. Also, his backstory has a very strange likeness to the previous set of characters I’ve gone over, the Fantastic Four. But I’ll get to that in a second, on with the show.

Yeah, there was no way he could claim to
just be Superman. Metal face kind of makes
it impossible.

Hank Henshaw was introduced as the lead member of a NASA shuttle called Excalibur. The team is something of an imitation of the Fantastic Four, with the team consisting of Hank’s friends and his fiancée, Terri. They’re hired by LexCorp to perform a radiation experiment, which is bungled by an unusually powerful Solar Flare. Their shuttle crashes, and the members of the crew start exhibiting…unusual symptoms. The two members that weren’t Henshaw or his fiancée were vaporized. Their minds, somehow, survived and were able to construct homunculi bodies. One out of the vary radiation that destroyed him, and the other from the Earth and wreckage of the shuttle. Sound like the Human Torch and the Thing to anyone else? I thought so. Henshaw’s hair was turned white, but, considering the state of the others this little cosmetic change was kind of ignored. They traveled to Metropolis and break into a LexCorp lab in an attempt to cure their mutated friends. This of course attracts the attention of Superman, who tries to stop them. He’s able to overpower them, which causes the Not-Human Torch to lose it and commit suicide by flying into the sun. At this time, Henshaw’s body begins to rapidly decay and Terri starts to phase into a different dimension. Choosing to sacrifice himself, Henshaw teams up with Superman and use his last few hours to save Terri. Henshaw crumbles to dust, and the surviving crew men also commits suicide. He uses an MRI machine to rip the metal components from his body. Gruesome.

Henshaw’s mind survives this physical death, and he’s able to transfer his mind into the mainframe of LexCorp. He’s able to control technology in this new form, and tries to connect with Terri in a new mechanized body. She, unfortunately, can’t really take Henshaw’s…new look, and defenestrates herself. I’m using that word way more often than I ever thought I would, people apparently like to jump out of windows. Depressed at Terri’s death, and realizing that his new form was having an effect on Earth’s communication networks, he opts to leave. He constructs a vehicle for himself, and flies out into space, following the same interspace trail that lead an infant Kal-El to Earth. He travels through space, bonding with various lifeforms, but also comes to the conclusion that Superman is to blame for his current predicament. Sup’s had thrown a rogue Kryptonian AI into the sun, right around when Henshaw and his crew were flying near the sun. FYI, Superman had that concern, shared it with Terri, who dismissed it because the solar flares were triggered before he killed the AI. As time goes on, Henshaw grows more paranoid and delusional. He starts to blame Superman for everything; that he somehow plotted to destroy Henshaw and his crew and then drove him from Earth. Henshaw eventually comes across a longtime foe of Superman, Mongul, and his personal Deathstar, Warworld. He forcibly recruits Mongul as part of a plan to get payback against Superman.

After some upgrades he becomes pretty dang scary.

Around this time, Superman was apparently killed by the monster, Doomsday. Henshaw seizes the opportunity and portrays himself as Superman reborn. He uses information he gathered from Superman’s “birthing matrix” to build a semi-organic body that looks like Superman, which also gave him access to enough of Superman’s memories to help pull off the charade. The new body was about 40% organic, 60% machine. It helped that the parts that were cybernetic also corresponded to the places most severely damaged on the real Superman during his fight with Doomsday. Superman’s close friend, Professor Hamilton, even did a battery of tests on this new Cyborg Superman and even he was fooled. The metal was Kryptonian, and the organic bits matched Superman’s DNA. Using his fantastic powers he hurled Doomsday into space, kept a nuclear power plant from melting down, and even stopped an assassination attempt on the President. That last one above the rest got Cyborg Superman the White House seal of approval, effectively making himself the “true” Superman. Lois Lane eventually cornered him and started grilling him about his personal life. He claimed that he couldn’t remember things too clearly, but had a “blurry” memory of “a spaceship on a farm, and the name Kent.” It’s never elaborated on, but this kind of implies he might have an idea of Superman’s personal identity.

It’s important to note that after Superman’s death there were four people fighting to claim the title of Superman. They were Henshaw, the Cyborg Superman; John Henry Irons aka Steel, an African American man who built himself an Iron-Man style Superman themed battle suit; the Eradicator, an alien device that had been tinkered with that transformed it into a Kryptonian weapon designed to preserve Kryptonian culture by destroying others; and Superboy, a teenage clone of Superman. The top contenders were Cyborg Superman and the Eradicator, whom developed literal cult followings. The two groups came to blows at one point, which pretty much foreshadowed the fight between Cyborg Superman and the Eradicator. Later, an alien warship, owned and operated by Mongul, attacked Coast City. The Eradicator tried to stop it, but Cyborg S got in the way and severely injured the other machine. He also personally murdered a vacationing family that tried to escape the carnage. Cyborg S put the blame on the Eradicator, and he and Mongul started phase two of their plan. They built an “Engine City” over the ashes of Coast City, a precursor to transforming the planet into a new Warworld. Cyborg S was able to defeat Superboy, and started setting up a missile to destroy Metropolis to set up another Engine City. Thankfully Superboy escaped, and warned Steel, Supergirl, and the resurrected but severely weakened Superman. They came up with a plan, Superman, Supergirl, and Steel fought Cyborg S and Mongul, while Superboy stopped the missile. Hal Jordan also flies in, and attempts to avenge the death of his home city. Hal took care of Mongul while Superman and the Eradicator tried to destroy the evil Cyborg. Cyborg Superman led the other two Supers into the heart of Engine City and attempted to kill Superman with the Kryptonite that powered the City. Superman was weakened but not killed by the Kryptonite. Cyborg S attempted to finish him off with a concentrated blast of Kryptonite radiation, but his attack is blocked by the Eradicator. This destroyed the Kryptonian machine, but his body purified the Kryptonite radiation which then reenergized Superman rather than weaken him. Cyborg Superman is destroyed, but his mind escapes. Eventually Superman learns that part of the reason Coast City was chosen was because Henshaw had lived there with Terri before their accident. He was trying to destroy his past by destroying his former home. So freaking messed up.

Later stories have him develop an obsession with
the various Lantern Corps, stealing as many rings
as possible. Like having all the power of Superman
isn't enough.

It’s revealed he had installed a detector onto Doomsday, so he could find the monster if he ever needed it. Henshaw transferred his mind into the detector. Doomsday found his way onto a spaceship, and then crashed it onto the side of Apokolips. Doomsday attacks the planet, which attracts the attention of Superman. Seeing his hated nemesis return, Cyborg Superman builds himself a new body using the armored corpse of a slain Apokoliptian trooper. The body greatly resembled his former body but with nicer tech. He and Doomsday battle Superman and continue to lay siege to Apokolips. Apparently the un-killable rampaging monster and a technology manipulating Kryptonian proved too much for Darkseid’s soldiers. He’s finally defeated by Darkseid’s Omega Beams. His reign of terror was ended, for a time. He’d eventually return to menace Superman again.

Hank Henshaw gained a number of powers after his body was irradiated and destroyed. He exists as a form of energy. He can interface with and even possess various electronics. He can control any number of machines and construct any sort of technology that he’s seen at least once. After interacting with Superman’s “birth matrix,” he developed extensive knowledge of Kryptonian tech and DNA. Said interaction is what later allowed him to construct a partially organic, partially cybernetic body that greatly resembled Superman. As Cyborg Superman, Henshaw possesses all the usual strengths and weakness of a Kryptonian; Super strength, flight, heat vision, etc. But, while weakened by Kryptonite, his metallic components give him a greater resistance to the radiation that any other Kryptonian.

Cyborg Superman hasn’t had a major presence in DC media. Not sure why, other than the story he’s so connected to is rather complicated, and that a lot of the things that make him a threat to Superman already exist in better known characters, like Metallo or Lex Luthor.

He doesn’t appear in Superman: Doomsday, the direct adaptation of “The Death of Superman” storyline of which he’s connected. Instead, after Superman is supposedly killed by Doomsday, we’re treated to a hodgepodge of three of the men that attempted to claim Superman’s legacy. Elements of Henshaw, mostly his unstable personality and lack of morality, are blended together with some bits of the Eradicator, and finally fused together with Superboy. The end result is a reasonable facsimile of Superman without any of those pesky morals getting in the way.

It’s my understanding that his civilian identity of Hank Hensaw will be appearing in the Supergirl TV show. This version is a CIA Agent in charge of the Department of Extra-Normal Operations. He’s very suspicious of the young Kryptonian and sets his team on High Alert in case she’s a threat. I’m not sure how much they’ll delve into the Cyborg Superman portion of his character. I guess we’ll wait and see.

Cyborg Superman is an interesting twist on the evil clone story. Obviously with his metal bits sticking out he can’t be a true clone of Superman, but he’s close enough to be a major threat to the Big Blue Boy Scout. The fact that he’s a former scientist that was driven insane after an experience that usually creates great heroes is also a little twist on the original formula. His design is the definition of the “uncanny,” something that seems familiar but is distinctly alien and unsettling. Given the trauma that he suffered while developing his powers, I can kind of understand how he’d transfer his anger and sorrow to the easiest target. It kind of makes you feel bad for the man that became a monster. He’s the metallic menace to the mighty Superman, Cyborg Superman. Next time, I’ll keep the ball rolling and talk about the other robotic Superman, the Eradicator. 

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 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hank_Henshaw#/media/File:Slimedborg.jpg

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyborg_Superman#/media/File:Hank_Henshaw,_as_he_appears_in_the_panel_of_a_comic_book.jpg

Villain Profile: Doctor Doom

So if the distance between the last couple weren’t enough an indicator, the Fantastic Four movie left me pretty burnt out. I even considered shelving The Silver Surfer and Doctor Doom for a later date and start working on something else. But, I said I was going to do it, so I am. Doctor Doom is one of the most powerful and dangerous villains of the Marvel Universe. He’s also perhaps the vainest villain I’ve ever heard, constantly referring to himself in the third person and thus implying that he is the personification of Doom itself. “There is only Doom,” and “Doom Demands,” that sort of thing. But I’m jumping ahead of myself again, let’s start from the beginning. On with the show.

The guy that can do this, can't defeat Four people.

Victor von Doom’s origins were humble. He was born to Cynthia and Werner von Doom, a pair of Romani living in Latveria. His father was the leader of their tribe, as well as their doctor, while his mother was a sorceress. And I don’t mean like she dabbled in the occult or just read tarot cards, she was summoning demons and casting curses. Cynthia attempted to make a deal with Mephisto, the arch-demon who specializes in Faustian bargains, to give her the power to help get her people out from under the oppressive boot of the local lord, a man simply known as the Baron. Mephisto gave her the power she sought, but also manipulated events to insure her death at the Baron’s hands. After his wife was killed, Werner did his best to keep his wife’s “hobby” from Victor, to protect the boy from the dangerous powers that claimed Cynthia. Not long after Cynthia’s death, Werner was called before the Baron. He was tasked with helping the Baron’s wife, who was dying of cancer. Werner did his best, but the Baron’s wife still succumbed to her illness. Werner, being a pretty smart cookie, fled with his son the night before the Baron’s wife died. Good thing too, as he was labeled a murder the next day. He died of exposure in the night, but Victor survived, partially thanks to his father giving him all of the warm clothes. Not knowing what else to do, he returned to the Romani Camp, and discovered his mother’s trunk, filled with all her magic stuff. Victor swore to use everything at his disposal to destroy the Baron and get his vengeance. He combined the science that his father loved and the magic that his mother loved to meet this end. The fantastic devices that he created to protect his people and get his revenge got the attention of some big wigs in the US. They traveled to Lateriva and offered him a chance to study at Empire State University. Victor jumped at the chance.

While at Empire State he met the only person with an intellect to match his own, Reed Richards. While Reed enjoyed having a rival of Victor’s skill, the young von Doom was infuriated by Reed. In order to prove his superiority over Reed, von Doom built a machine that he claimed would allow him to speak with his mother. Apparently, Werner is chopped liver. Reed looked over some of Victor’s calculations, and tried to stop him when Reed noticed that some of Victor’s calculations were a few decimals off. Victor, being a bull headed and vain individual, believed Reed was the one that miscalculated and continued with the experiment. Unfortunately for Victor, Reed was right. His machine exploded, slightly scarring Victor’s face in the process. He was expelled because of the accident, and swore everlasting vengeance against Reed, whom he blamed. Having nowhere else to go, Victor started traveling. He somehow ended up in the Tibetan mountain range, where he collapsed and was discovered by a group of monks. They took von Doom in and taught him their ways. Victor excelled at the monks disciplines, and eventually claimed leadership of them. He had his monks fashion a suit of armor for him. Want to know how stupid an incredibly smart man can be? Doom was so impatient to get his new armor on that he took the mask and put it on his face before the metal cooled. This severely scarred his face, worse than the explosion that started all of this in the first place. Wonder how he blames Reed for that? He totally does blame Reed for that, by the way. He takes up the relatively simple moniker of Doctor Doom, and gets to work trying to conquer the world.

From "Planet Doom," where Doom's armor was upgraded by
Stark Tech and Bruce Banner's Gama based tech. It's enough
to knock Thor on his butt.

He returned to Latveria, killed the Baron, and took over as supreme ruler of the small country. He enforced his rule using an army of lookalike robots which he humbly dubbed Doom-Bots. Most of us would call him a despot or a tyrant, but he refers to his style of government as an “Enforced Monarchy.” While his favorite targets have always been, and continue to be, the Fantastic Four, Doom has crossed paths with just about every superhero of the Marvel Universe. To go over all the various plots that he’s attached to conquer the world would take far too long, I’ll point out some of his long standing obsessions. He hates and continues to battle the Fantastic Four to prove that he’s superior to Reed Richards. He has menaced heroes like Thor, The Silver Surfer, and Scarlet Witch to get his hands on the cosmic powers that they hold. He’s ended up on the wrong side of heroes like Captain America and Nick Fury because he’s a freedom hating tyrant. And do you know what the most messed up thing about it is? Victor von Doom thinks he’s the hero. His vision of the future is one without war, hunger, or crime, a world united under Doom. And all you have to give up is personal freedom. Sounds like a sweet deal. Yes, that was sarcasm. He’s occasionally sided with Marvel’s heroes against greater threats like alien invasions like the Skrull, Shi’ar, or the Kree, and mystic forces like the demons Dormammu and Mephisto. He bears a particular grudge against Mephisto, you know, because of his hand in Cynthia von Doom’s death. But, one should never, ever trust Doctor Doom. If he ever helps anyone, it’s only because it somehow benefits him more.

Victor von Doom, whom doesn’t have an actual PhD degree, is one of the most dangerous villains in the Marvel Universe. He’s a polymath, which means that he’s a master of multiple scientific disciplines. He’s a genius in dozens of fields such as Robotics, Engineering, Computer Science, Biology, Physics, and Genetics. He’s also an incredibly accomplished sorcerer, his powers so great that he rivals Earth’s Sorcerer Supreme, Doctor Strange. He can create bolts of energy, teleport vast distances, transfer his consciousness into another’s body, and summon powerful entities from various magical dimensions. The suit of armor that he wears enhances his strength so that he’s on par with heroes like Captain America and Spider-Man. The suit is basically a self-sustaining system, recycling air, food, water and energy. It also be pressurized so Doom can survive under water or in space. He’s the supreme leader of Latveria, which gives him his greatest power, diplomatic immunity. Can’t be arrested outside of Latveria. Which is pretty awful considering all of his crimes are outside Latveria. He has an army of Doom-Bots to do his bidding. They range in intelligence from basically walking turrets to robots with AI so advanced that they can pass for Doom himself. He also has a remarkably strong will, being able to resist telepathy or the mind controlling powers of the Purple Man.

Doctor Doom has appeared in a number of Marvel series. He’s always portrayed as one of the most powerful and dangerous foes of the Marvel Universe.

Spooky as heck, if nothing else.

He appeared in several episodes of The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. He’s hinted at in one of the first episodes, “The Breakout,” when his minion Lucia von Bardas attempted to make a deal with a group of A.I.M scientists that were trying to hock Stark Technology. Iron-Man doesn’t attack her directly, but let’s her know that he’ll go after anyone who abuses his tech, “even him.” He physically appears in “The Private War of Doctor Doom,” where he kidnaps Invisible Woman of the Fantastic Four, and Wasp of the Avengers. He’s able to battle six Avengers and three of the FF to a standstill, and only lets them all leave after he’s gotten what he wants. It’s revealed in the final minutes that his machine was designed to scan lifeforms, and that the Invisible Woman was replaced by a Skrull. Later on, he gives Tony Stark a chip designed to detect and reveal Skrull imposters in the episode “Infiltration.” True to his nature, he doesn’t help in that battle against the Skrulls, leaving Tony and the Avengers to handle the bulk of the alien invasion.

He’s a recurring villain in Disney/Marvel’s animated Universe. He appears in a number of episodes, but I’ll focus on the Avengers Assemble episode “Planet Doom.” In it, Doctor Doom uses a time machine to go back in time and manipulate the Avengers. He saves Tony Stark and Bruce Banner from the accidence that gave them their powers and makes them his scientific help, recruited Black Widow as one of his top lieutenants, and recovered Captain America’s frozen body. Without the Avengers, he apparently easily conquers the world, and eliminated hunger, war, disease and happiness. Admittedly, eliminating that last one isn’t so great. He uses all the resources at his disposal to defeat Thor, and get his hands on Mjolnir. His plan was apparently to use the Hammer to travel to other worlds to spread the “wisdom” that is Doom’s world view. This series also had the best view into Doom’s psyche, since he claimed that having the entire world “is not enough.” Thankfully, Doom doesn’t count as a Worthy individual, so there’s no way he can raise Mjolnir. In the end, Tony, Bruce, and Natasha show their true colors as heroes, turning on their boss, and a freed Captain America knocks Doom out. Thor then uses Doom’s time machine to travel back in time to before Doom used his time machine. He hides out in Doom’s lab, and when Doom tries to power it up, he summons lightning to overload the machine. Doom, unwilling to accept that he could have miscalculated, and who didn’t see Thor, writes time travel off as impossible and leaves in a huff. Man’s ego is big enough for its own zip code.

Victor von Doom was portrayed by Julian McMahon in the 2005 version of Fantastic Four. In this universe, he’s a successful business man and philanthropist. He agrees to fund a bankrupt Reed Richard’s Cosmic Storm experiment and travels to his space station with the heroes that would become the Fantastic Four. He locks himself inside the station’s command center, but doesn’t get let off. Apparently the storm infected him in a similar way to the Thing, having him develop disfiguring “living metal” on his skin. He can also channel electricity now, because reasons. He uses his powers to murder a Doom Corp executive that tried to take his company from him. He manipulates the Thing into distrusting Reed, sups up a machine Reed was working on to cure Ben, cures Ben, and uses the simulated Cosmic Storm to further enhance his powers. He dons his armor and tries to destroy the Fantastic Four. They defeat him by superheating his armor, turning into a statue.

He returns in Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. His petrified form is revived by the Silver Surfer flying over Latveria. He follows the Surfer and attempts to make an alliance with him. The Surfer refuses, blasts him, and somehow heals his wounds. I think it was just an excuse to let Julian McMahon to not have to wear his Doom suit. He helps the US government and the Fantastic Four defeat The Surfer, but then steals The Surfer’s Board. He uses his tech to channel The Surfer’s energy to destroy stuff. Not a fan of this series, but it’s still better than what follows.

Well, at least he looked creepy.
For the final sixth of the movie.

A new Doom is portrayed in Fantastic Four portrayed by Toby Kebbell. In this series, he’s an anti-social programmer and scientist that is recruited by Dr. Franklin Storm to help with a dimensional transportation machine. He’s infuriated when he learns that he wouldn’t be one of the ones chosen to travel to the other dimension. While drunk, he, Reed, Johnny, and Ben travel through to the other dimension. While there, he attempts to get a sample of a mysterious green substance, but causes a catastrophic event. He is seemingly killed while the others escape. A year later, he’s rediscovered by a second team traveling to the other dimension. Victor’s environmental suit was fused to his skin, and he was apparently driven insane. He now uses telekinetic powers he developed in the Negative Zone to escape and return to the Negative Zone. He uses his power over the other world to force the trans-dimensional vortex open to destroy Earth. The ending is anti-climactic.

Doctor Doom is an insanely powerful character. His combination of science and magic makes him one of the most dangerous beings in fiction. Which is part of the reason that I’m not his biggest fan. It’s kind of hard to find a supervillain with so much power interesting, simply because he wins so easily most of the time. And, given his long, long, long history of backstabbing, I find it amazing that heroes still turn to him on occasion as a last resort. Never trust a sociopath folks. He’s the mystically brilliant, scientifically brilliant, and yet at times so incredibly stupid, Doctor Doom. Next time: Something DC related, I promise.

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