Electro (comics)
Encyclopedia : E : EL : ELE : Electro (comics)
Electro is the name of several fictional characters in the Marvel Comics universe, including two from Marvel's predecessors, Timely Comics and Atlas Comics. The most prominent Electro is Maxwell Dillon, a comic book supervillain and an enemy of Spider-Man. (Electro should not be confused with Marvel's similarly named female assassin character, Elektra). He was created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko in The Amazing Spider-Man #9 (Feb. 1964).
Character history
Maxwell Dillon was born to Jonathan and Anita Dillon. Jonathan was an accountant, though he had trouble keeping a job. Because of this, Max and his family moved frequently when Max was young and he found it difficult to make friends. His hot-headed father abandoned his family when Max was eight years old. Anita subsequently became overprotective of Max, leading to his single greatest flaw as a super-villain: his inferiority complex. Years later, Max told his mother he wished to become an electrical engineer. Anita, not wanting him to be angry if he failed, convinced him he was not intelligent enough, and Max reluctantly took a job as a lineman for an electric company.
While he was repairing a power line, a freak lightning accident resulted in a mutagenic change in his nervous system, transforming Dillion into a living electrical capacitor. Taking the name Electro, he turned to a life of crime, his first victim being J. Jonah Jameson. Electro broke into the Daily Bugle Building and stole from Jameson's safe right in front of him. Jameson accused Spider-Man of being an alternate identity of Electro, prompting Spider-Man to prove the publisher wrong. During his confrontation with Electro, Spider-Man was nearly killed when he touched the electrically charged supervillain. Spider-Man eventually used a fire hose to short-circuit Electro.
Electro has fought Spider-Man countless times, either on his own or as part of a group such as the Sinister Six. He has also fought such other heroes as Daredevil and the Fantastic Four. Despite his immense power, he has almost always been defeated, usually as a result of his foes outsmarting him or taking advantage of his weakness to water while charged.
As a result of his frequent and often embarrassing defeats, Electro tried to take over New York City's power supply in an attempt at glory and respect. Spider-Man thwarted this plan, however, and convinced Electro to quit his criminal career. When the insane Spider-Man clone Kaine started killing enemies of Spider-Man, Electro began to fear for his life and temporarily joined Mysterio's Sinister Seven, which had been formed to combat Kaine. This group was quickly disbanded, and following Kaine's subsequent disappearance, Electro returned to retirement.
This changed when The Rose agreed to fund an experimental technique that would amplify Electro's abilities, in exchange for Electro's services as an enforcer. Seeing this as a chance to rise above the string of failures that had made up so much of his life, Electro underwent the procedure. After paying off his debt to the Rose by defeating several members of The True Believers (an offshoot of the famous ninja sect The Hand), a group of ninja assassins who had been interfering in the Rose's operations, Electro attempted to demonstrate his newly amplified powers to the world, once again attempting to take control of New York City's power supply. Wearing an insulated suit, Spider-Man stopped him. Electro, in an effort to make a final grand gesture, Electro threw himself into the Hudson River while his body was highly charged, seemingly killing himself in an explosion.
Somehow surviving, Electro resurfaced later as part of the re-formed Sinister Six. His powers had seemingly reverted to their pre-amplification level, and he wore a new blue-and-white costume. When Venom betrayed his fellow Sinister Six members, attempting to kill them one by one, he attacked Electro and left him for dead. Once again, Electro survived, and when he next appeared had returned to his yellow-and green-costume.
In the mid-2000s, Electro joined the Sinister Twelve, assembled by the Green Goblin, and later, separately, was hired by Brainchild to free Karl Lykos (also known as Sauron) from The Raft, a maximum-security prison for supervillians. After causing a riot, Electro tried to run away with his waitress girlfriend, but was captured by the Avengers. The former story also included the rare-for-comics suggestion that Dillon is bisexual.
Powers and abilities
Electro can generate massive quantities of electricity, theoretically up to approximately ten million volts. When his body is charged to such levels, he becomes superhumanly strong and fast as well, being able to lift several tons and move at speeds up to 125 miles per hour. He can also glide over power lines by using the electricity contained therein for propulsion, and has on occasion been shown to actually ride on lightning bolts.In recent issues of Spider-Man, Electro claims that while in prison, superpowered inmates discuss ways to use their powers more effectively, and Doctor Octopus gave him the ideas of ionizing metals and sparking the petroleum in the fuel tank of a vehicle to generate explosions.
He is extremely powerful but not particularly intelligent, and like the similarly strong but not smart Rhino is usually outwitted by his foes. In New Avengers, he was shown to fly, and manipulate large amounts of electricity and machinary, when he freed all the prisoners at Rikers.
An experimental procedure temporarily heightened his powers, allowing Electro to store and absorb a seemingly limitless amount of electricity. He also seemed to gain the power of magnetokinesis to a certain degree, allowing him to manipulate magnetic fields and move objects in a manner similar to that of Magneto, and could overcome his old weakness to water by using the electromagnetic fields around him to vaporize water before it could touch him. He was able to defeat Nate Grey by manipulating the bioelectric currents in the human brain to turn Nate's own psionic powers against him. Presumably, had he further explored the implications of this power, he would have been able to control people's entire bodies this way as well, and might have been able to control machines in a similar way. However, Electro somehow seems to have lost these new abilities after he threw himself into the Hudson River.
Ultimate Electro
As a result of experimentation by Justin Hammer, Max Dillon is given the power to control and create electricity. He is sold by Hammer to the Kingpin in exchange for some contracts for a building that Hammer wanted to create.
Spider-Man fights both Electro and the Enforcers when raiding the Kingpin's building for evidence to put the Kingpin away. Electro nearly kills Spider-Man, but Spider-Man manages to burst open a water pipe, shocking the villain and putting him into a coma. When Electro awakes, he tries to escape federal custody and is apprehended by the Ultimates, who place him in S.H.I.E.L.D. custody along with Sandman, Kraven the Hunter, Doctor Octopus and the Green Goblin. In the limited series Ultimate Six these five villains manage to escape and form the titular team, kidnapping Spider-Man and forcing him to join them. After a lengthy battle with the Ultimates on the White House lawn, Electro is defeated by Thor.
In the video game Ultimate Spider-Man, Electro is hired by Bolivar Trask to gauge Venom's power. Electro leads Venom on a chase throughout Manhattan when Spider-Man appears. Electro knocks Spider-Man out and tries to kill him, but Venom attacks Electro, trying to take Electro's opportunity to kill the fallen hero. Venom defeats Electro, but S.H.I.E.L.D. arrives. Venom flees, and Electro is once again brought into S.H.I.E.L.D. custody. Whether or not the game is in Ultimate continuity or not is debatable.
Timely/Atlas Comics' Electro
The first comics character of this name was the robot hero Electro, a backup-feature star in Marvel Mystery Comics, flagship title of Marvel's Golden Age predecessor, Timely Comics. Created by writer-artist Steve Dahlman, he appeared in Marvel Mystery #4–19 (Feb. 1940 – May 1941). The character's origin story described his invention by Professor Philo Zog, one of a group of twelve known as the Secret Operatives.
Marvel's next Electro was a Communist supervillain created during the unsuccessful attempt by Marvel's 1950s predecessor, Atlas Comics, to revive superheroes in that decade. This Electro, a Soviet citizen named Ivan Kronov, appeared on the cover and in the six-page story "His Touch is Death" in Captain America #78 (Sept. 1954), penciled and inked by John Romita Sr. and almost certainly if unconfirmably written by the more famous Electro's co-creator, Stan Lee. Many years later, this Electro reappeared in What If? Vol. 1, #9 (June 1978), "What If the Avengers had been Formed During the 1950s?"; and, in flashback, in Captain America Annual #13 (1994).
Other media
Electro made an appearance in the 1960s Spider-Man animated TV series.
A gecko who is Counter-Earth's version of Electro appeared in the Spider-Man Unlimited animated series.
In MTV's in 2003, Max Dillon was a nerdy college friend of Peter Parker. Bullied by members of a fraternity he was pledging, Dillon, after being humiliated at their party, goes out into the rain and is struck by lightning. He becomes Electro and plans revenge on the primary bully, Doug Reisman. He kills Doug by electrocuting him and is later defeated by Spider-Man in battle when the hero uses ground power, sinking him through and is presumed dead there. Electro returns several episodes later, attempting to make Sally, a girl with whom he became infatuated at the party, go through a similar transformation. Spider-Man defeats him again, this time by trapping Electro in an electric generator box provided by OsCorp from Harry Osborn. Electro was too powerful in the box that he would blow up, killing himself and everyone around him. However, Spider-Man quickly threw the box into the New York City river where he exploded there and died for good this time.
Video games
- Electro is the main antagonist on Spider-Man 2: Enter Electro. He steals a machine known as the Bio-Nexus device and becomes Hyper-Electro but is defeated when Spider-Man tricks him into zapping himself. He is sent to jail afterwards.
- Electro is also a boss in the Ultimate Spider-Man video game. Venom battles him, smashing neon signs to prevent him from recharging while flinging cars at him.
- In the 1991 Spider-Man vs. The Kingpin video game for the Sega Genesis/MegaDrive, Electro is the boss of the third stage, set is a power station.
- Electro also appears in the Spider-Man arcade game, Spider-Man: Return of the Sinister Six, and ''The Amazing Spider-Man 3: Invasion of the Spider-Slayers.
References
- [A profile of Ivan Kronov, the 1950s Electro]
- [The Grand Comic Book Database]
- [Gay League Profile]
- [Profile at Spiderfan.org]
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.