Adam Warlock
Adam Warlock is a male genetically engineered character who features in Marvel Comics.
Contents |
Biography
Origin
Adam Warlock a synthetic being that was created at the Beehive facility by a cabal of scientists known as the Enclave. The purpose in his creation by the researchers was to develop a perfect human being who would be the pinnacle of human evolution. However, upon his creation, the creature known only as Him grew beyond the control of his creators. He immediately sensed that his creators had only sought to use Him for evil acts and thus lashed out against them. This act led to damaging the Beehive complex and injuring his 'fathers' whereupon he promptly escaped from their grasp. Despite his escape, he lacked any purpose as he had no life experience and had only recently been born. During his travels, he encountered Thor and would later attempt to abduct Lady Sif in order to mate with her. Thor would take offense to Him's actions in the kidnapping and would beat the young god-like creature to near death. In desperation, he would retreat into the safety of a regenerative cocoon in order to be reborn.
After his rebirth, he encountered the High Evolutionary who renamed Him as Warlock and became a guiding force in his life. The High Evolutionary would instill Warlock with purpose and direction as well as gifted him the vampiric Soul Gem. Sometime afterwards, Warlock travelled to the planet Counter-Earth that was the High Evolutionary's creation in creating a Utopian society. Once there, he met four teenagers named David Carter, Jason Grey, Eddie Reoberts and Ellie Roberts with her giving him the name Adam as she felt he needed two names. His arrival would be witnessed by Kohbra who informed the Man-Beast whose evil had affected Counter-Earth and who sent Rhodan after him. After battling Rhodan, he was returned to his original form and was tricked by the Man-Beast to travelling to the city holding his lair. Warlock would be captured by the Man-Beast who told him to join him or face death. This act only made Adam Warlock angry where he battled the Man-Beast and defeated him after being made to believe that his friends had betrayed him.
Infinity Watch
Guardians of the Galaxy
On the team's very first mission, Adam had them intercept one of the Universal Church of Truth's faith-ships, as it was headed for a soon to open fissure and certain disaster. He and the team teleported aboard the vessel, but found the believers on board to be incredibly hostile. A fight ensued, though the irony of fighting a group that once worshiped him was not lost on Adam. Realizing that they were running out of time, Adam took his former allies Drax and Gamora with him to advance forward and stop the ship. Fighting his way through the ship with Drax and Gamora at his side, Adam reached the front of the ship just as his worst fear was realized and a sub-fissure was opened. Though disheartened by the acolyte's abandonment of their fellows, Adam launched into action to contain the fissure. When a creature began to emerge, he used his new-found powers to begin forcing it back through. Not being able to do the job himself, he accepted help from Phyla-Vell in finishing the job. Together they used the expended energy to pilot the ship to a nearby planet, and drop it off. The team then returned to their base of operations at Knowhere. (Guardians of the Galaxy v2 #1)
After some distrust between the team on account of Skrulls being found on Knowhere, Star-Lord agreed for the team to remain in their quarters for questioning. This was unacceptable to Adam, who was assured when joining that the Guardians would answer to no one while they repaired the Universe. (Guardians of the Galaxy v2 #4) Adam sneaked off and went to the neural core of Knowhere, where remaining brain functions of the Celestial still remained. He was able to locate the Skrulls through this and soon found that Cosmo had been guarding them. (Guardians of the Galaxy v2 #5) Once the rest of the team arrived, they all soon learned that the Skrulls were trying to escape the Skrull Empire, as they were pacifist and wanted nothing to do with the Skrulls invasion of Earth. But the cat was out of the bag. Drax overheard Star-Lord and Mantis, and told the rest of the team that Mantis had used her mental powers to convince them all to join the team. Most of the team walked out, Adam leaving with Gamora to find the Universal Church of Truth. (Guardians of the Galaxy v2 #6)
He along with Gamora journeyed to a colony of the Universal Church of Truth where he defeated one of the Cardinals. Adam then told Cardinal Arokine to deliver a message to the Church as he requested a face-to-face meeting with their Holy Matriarch. (Guardians of the Galaxy v2 #8)
He suspended further investigation into the Church due to the on-going conflict in the War of Kings between the Shi'ar and the Kree. The deadly nature of the conflict threatened to damage space-time even further and form further fissures in reality leading to Warlock re-joining the Guardians in order to end hostilities. Adam joined Rocket's team that were deployed on the Shi'ar front where they attempted to teleport onto Emperor Vulcan's flagship with Warlock being the only person accomplishing the task leading to him battling he mad Shi'ar ruler. (Guardians of the Galaxy 2 #13)
To slow down the Fault's expansion, Adam decided to craft the biggest spell he could and called upon the Universal Church of Truth to help supply the energy with their faith generators. He used his quantum magic to graft an inert timestream to the present in an effort to repair the damage with this succeeding. Warlock was then betrayed by Phyla-Vell who stabbed him and at that moment it was revealed that the quiescent future he had used was the one where he became the Magus. As a result, his mind transformed into the Magus and he seemingly killed Gamora before leaving with the Universal Church of Truth as they had accepted him as their prophesised messiah. (Guardians of the Galaxy v2 #17)
Infinity Wars
Waking up from a nightmare concerning the Infinity Stones coming together once more and a coming calamity ensuring, Adam found himself within the Soul World for reasons unknown. There he met an aspect of Gamora's soul that remained trapped within the Soul World since she had left long ago. Despite her pleas for him to release her from it, Adam denied being capable of doing so and claimed he did not even recognize her altogether. Escaping the Soul World, Warlock emerged from his cocoon in the world of the living, where he was greeted by Kang the Conqueror. (Guardians of the Galaxy v1 #150)
With the Requiem crisis stopped, Adam Warlock came to fear that the Infinity Stones would be abused again as people began to disagree on how to deal with them. To prevent conflict from spiralling, he decided to imbue a soul within each of the Stones thus giving them the power to make their own choices and forge their own destinies. (Infinity Wars v1 #6)
Overview
Personality and attributes
Powers and abilities
By this point, he was a quantum magician allowing him to craft spells with him able to absorb magic from others. (Guardians of the Galaxy v2 #14) He could compose spells that were able to transmute objects from one substance into another. (Guardians of the Galaxy 2 #13)
Other Versions
Magus
The Magus was actually a darker alternative version of Adam Warlock that embodied his worse aspects. Originally, he was an older and crueler Adam Warlock from an alternate future timeline where he was plucked from the timeline by Lord Chaos and Master Order who were seeking a champion of life to challenge Thanos who was the champion of death. They would bombard him with their 'truths' namely that there was no such thing as good or evil only purpose or non-purpose. Warlock would be driven mad by this information and entered into a cocoon where the two cosmic beings deposited him on Homeworld. Upon awakening, he was attacked by the inhabitants where he ruthlessly killed all opposition and leading to the inhabitants of the planet worshipping him. In time, he would forge a religious empire known as the Universal Church of Truth where he served as the ruler.. The Magus would interfere in the timeline in order to try and guide his younger self so that he could ensure Adam Warlock embarked on the path that would bring about his own creation. With the aid of Thanos, Warlock managed to avert this fate and alter the future whereby he destroyed the Magus's timeline thus erasing him from existence.
When Adam Warlock gained the Infinity Gauntlet, his subconscious desire to become a purely logical god not burdened by emotions that impaired his judgment led him to expel the good and evil from himself. His actions would unintentionally expel the evil within him would coalesce into a corporeal form which was the Magus who was thus reborn in the modern day. The Magus would seek the Infinity Gauntlet for himself but his attempt would fail whereupon Adam Warlock would imprison him within the Soul World of the Soul Gem. Within this realm, he was only a spirit and could interact with its other inhabitants leaving him to live as a phantom and unable to even fight the Goddess who became similarly trapped in Soul World. The Magus would, however, manage to escape the Soul Gem where he was an immaterial entity that had to absorb life energies to gain a corporeal body. He would eventually encounter and battle Genis-Vell but was defeated whereupon he was once more turned into an ethereal entity. Before being defeated, he would wound Moondragon who was a friend of Genis-Vell and claimed that she was destined to become his slave.
A third version of the Magus would form when Adam Warlock sought to repair the damage done to the space-time continuum caused by the War of Kings. This leads to his rebirth as the Magus who begins to work for the evil Lord Mar-Vell of the Cancerverse but was killed for failing in his mission. (Thanos Imperative: Ignition) Despite his death, the Universal Church of Truth resurrected him as a child on Earth but he was imprisoned by the Annihilators. (Annihilators: Earthfall)
Goddess
Similar to the Magus, the Goddess was a part of Adam Warlock created when he was in brief possession of the Infinity Gauntlet. Warlock sought to become a logical god and not prone to the impairment of emotions on his judgment. As a result, he expelled both the good and evil aspects of his soul. Where the Magus was a male embodiment of his evil, the Goddess was a female incarnation of his goodness. During the Infinity War, she was shown as an unknown woman that stole the five Cosmic Containment Units from the Magus with Thanos suspecting her existence and believed her a threat to the cosmos. She would appear to various Earth heroes who were religious or spiritual where at this point she had gained control of 30 Cosmic Cubes that were gathered from various different realities. These she would be combined into a single form by her into becoming the enormous Cosmic Egg that afforded the wielder immense power though not as powerful as the Infinity Gauntlet. With these various heroes, she recruited them on her mission of bringing paradise to the universe and turned Counter Earth into her base of operations known as Paradise Omega. The Goddess declare a holy war against the sinful universe where her crusade sought to destroy all sinners whilst she claimed that she was serving the One-Above-All. Though being the good portion of Warlock, the Goddess embodied one extreme and concluded that the only way to purge the universe of sin was by destroying it. Through the Cosmic Egg, she began to influence the universe by removing crime, hate and war with only a small number being unaffected. Among her chief opponent was Thanos who battled her in the astral plane through the use of the Soul Gem where she managed to evade his attacks though this shown as a means of stalling her from accessing the Cosmic Egg. She would ultimately be defeated when her followers were shown her plan to destroy the universe and turned against her. The Goddess was then dragged into Soul World within the Soul Gem where she encountered her opposite the Magus and attempted to battle him but the two were found unable to touch one another thus leaving them trapped together.
Warlock Delta
On Earth, the Enclave would make a new attempt at recreating Adam Warlock as a force to change the world and make it a better place. Their actions of breeding a new Warlock attracted the original one who was in deep space leading him to return to Earth and adopting a human disguise called Mr. Smith who monitored their project. To better design their replacement Adam Warlock, the Enclave created a fake company known as Beehive Productions based at Costa Perdita in South America and hired a designer by the name of Janie Chin. They claimed that they were making a movie and wanted her to re-design the title character of Adam Warlock to make him appear as a savior. She completed the design but was unaware that her employers were actually the scientists of the Enclave who used her designs and bred a new Adam Warlock from a genetic soup. This specimen coded for aggression was named Warlock Delta was fed information directly into his mind of the various man-made disasters and atrocities around the world in order to indoctrinate him into the Enclave's ways as well as prevent another rebellion as the original Adam Warlock. A horrified Chin initially was held captive but managed to escape the facility where she took Warlock Delta outside the Enclave base in order to distance him from his creators. However, Warlock Delta intended to complete his mission of bringing righteous judgment on the world for its many sins committed by mankind. He would embark on killing anyone that threatened violence and killed civilians as well despite Janie's attempt at convincing him of a better way. Ultimately, she would leave him and conclude that Warlock Delta was too dangerous to live. However, she felt a responsibility to him for designing him and the arrival of her boyfriend Danny led her to try to convince Warlock Delta of a better path. At that time, Mr. Smith arrived offering her the option of killing Warlock Delta or having her mind uploaded into him to control his actions. Janie Chin decided to upload her mind and controlled his actions thus curtailing his destructive acts as well as defeating the Enclave who Warlock Delta spared. But a weapon exchange from them led to Danny dying and in anger Janie controlling Warlock Delta turned her wrath at Mr. Smith whose skin was peeled away to reveal the original Adam Warlock. He revealed that he had thought of destroying the gestating Warlock Delta when he first arrived but instead decided to let it live and become its guide. In anger, Warlock Delta attacked Adam Warlock and claimed that he had turned him into a killer. However, Adam Warlock simply explained that whether he judged or did not judge people still died regardless as the world was imperfect. Warlock Delta could not accept this world and simply ended it though Janie still lived whereupon she was offered the choice of dying or living to which she decided to live to make a difference. Afterwards, it was revealed that the entire sequence was simply in her mind as she was in fact Warlock Delta and was still within her incubation chamber. Upon being freed, she refused the orders of the Enclave and decided to make a difference in the world by being a force for good. (Warlock v6)
Notes
- The character was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby where he originally debuted in Fantastic Four v1 #66-67 as Him (September-October 1967) though it would be Roy Thomas and Gil Kane who named him as Adam Warlock in Marvel Premiere v1 #1 (April 1972).
- In the 2005 ongoing, Greg Pak commented on his Warlock series that, '"The idea is to explore the rich premise of the character's origin, which is very much involved with life and death right here on Planet Earth. Our hero is born before our eyes in the Enclave's laboratory. Exactly how he relates to the character of old will be revealed a bit later down the line. I can say no more, but it'll be good!"
In other media
Television
- In Silver Surfer the animated series, the character made an appearance in the episode "The Forever War" where he was voiced by Oliver Becker. Within this continuity, he was shown as an alien genetically engineered by the inhabitants of the planet Karrides who were facing aggression from the Kree Empire. He was created to serve as the planets champion and dispatched to decimate the alien fleets where he was shown as enjoying the battle. A temporal anomaly affected this area of space where he was trapped within it and forced to constantly battle the Kree fleet in a constant loop. With him gone, Karrides was defenseless where it was destroyed and its people eliminated by the Kree. A Kree ship belonging to Admiral Ko-Val was trapped into the anomaly and forced to participate in the battle. The Silver Surfer encountered the anomaly when he was dispatched to find Ko-Val for the Kree and in exchange he was promised access to the Supreme Intelligence who would find Zenn-La for him. Upon entering, the Surfer met Adam Warlock and convinced him to depart the anomaly where he took him to the Kree homeworld. Once there, the Supreme Intelligence betrayed the pair as the Kree supercomputer intended for Warlock to be rescued all along so he could be studied by Kree science that would attempt to duplicate his origins to create an army of such beings. The Silver Surfer would prevent the Supreme Intelligence from succeeding in his plans and Adam Warlock would escape where he learnt that Karrides was long gone. However, he simply decided to re-enter the anomaly and continue the long battle he had fought in the past for all eternity.
- In Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, the character made an appearance in the episode ""Michael Korvac" where he was voiced by Kirk Thornton. He was shown as one of the members of the Guardians of the Galaxy where he was armed with a staff and utilized the Soul Gem with his abilities being used to track down dangers in the universe to combat. Among the threats he detected was the Kree transformed Michael Korvac who returned to Earth with his powers being deemed dangerous. As a result, the Guardians arrived at the Avengers Mansion to apprehend him but a misunderstanding led to a conflict with the Avengers who believed Korvac was an innocent. After the battle, both the Guardians and Avengers were pulled into Warlock's Soul Gem where he communicated to the Human superheroes in English.
Films
- In the direct-to-video Planet Hulk animated film, the character made a cameo appearance with a non-speaking role.
- In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Adam Warlock made a number of appearances in the shared continuity setting.
- In Thor: The Dark World, a reference was made to Adam Warlock in the live-action film in the end credit sequence where the Asgardians Sif and Volstagg travel to the Collectors museum to leave the Infinity Stone with one of the items in his collection being a green cocoon that was typically attributed to Warlock.
- In Guardians of the Galaxy, a reference was made to Adam Warlock in the live-action film in the Collectors museum was seen where it was shown to be based at Knowhere and had the cocoon present once again. When the Infinity Stone was activated, the power of it devastated the museum and shattered many of the enclosures containing the Collector's collection. The cocoon at this point was shown to had been opened meaning that the occupant within it had been freed. Director James Gunn commented in an interview that the cocoon did indeed contain Adam Warlock.
- In Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2, a reference was made to the character in the live-action film in the form of the gold-skinned Sovereign race that inhabited a world of the same name. They were genetically engineered to be perfect that emerged from pods and made for set roles. The High Priestess Ayesha had created a new pod that was developing a more perfect Sovereign specimen that she decided to name Adam.
- In Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Adam Warlock appeared in the setting of the live-action film where he was portrayed by actor Will Poulter.
Video games
- In Marvel Heroes, Adam Warlock appeared as a vendor in the MMORPG video game.
- In Marvel: Avengers Alliance, Adam Warlock appeared in the setting of the Facebook video game.
Appearances
- Fantastic Four v1: (1967)
- Warlock v6:
External Links
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