Cassandra Nova
Cassandra Nova is a female comic supervillain who features in Marvel Comics.
Contents |
Biography
Origin
Cassandra Nova was one of the Mummudrai that were a race of bodiless psychic parasites. (New X-Men v1 #125) She was born as the twin sister of Charles Xavier where within the womb he tried to kill her. (New X-Men v1 #121) After Charles was born, he had no memory of Cassandra who was created without a body of her own and had to improvise using her own brothers cells. (New X-Men v1 #122) Over the next few decades, Cassandra was a growing mass of cells in a sewer wall, building a new body for herself and planning her revenge on her brother. (New X-Men v1 #121)
E Is for Extinction
The first known act of Cassandra Nova was the recruitment of Donald Trask III, nephew and last known relative of Sentinel creator Bolivar Trask. Finding him in Albuquerque, running a dental practice, Cassandra introduced herself as the world’s foremost evolutionary biologist and explained her findings: an extinction gene would cause the extinction of human race within four generations. Such a discovery was similarly found by X-Men geneticist Hank McCoy, the Beast. (New X-Men v1 #114) Explaining humanity’s predicament, Cassandra took Trask to an abandoned Sentinel Master Mold factory in the hills of Ecuador. There, Cassandra demonstrated his purpose: the Wild Sentinels, which the Master Mold manufactured, would only respond to instructions from a Trask. Under the direction of Cassandra, Donald Trask ordered the construction of two immense Mega-Sentinels, which were immediately dispatched to the island nation of Genosha, off the coast of Africa. With the goal accomplished, Trask’s usefulness was at an end. With her ability to mimic genetic structure, Cassandra had spent the previous ten hours reading and copying the three billion base letters in Trask’s DNA sequence. Without a second thought, she eliminated him, then turning her attention to the next stage of her plan. Arriving, almost as if on cue, were Cyclops and Wolverine. At the Xavier Institute, Xavier had become aware of Cassandra’s presence through the recently completed Cerebra, and had sent the two X-Men to investigate. Arriving at the Master Mold factory, the two faced the facility’s Wild Sentinels and were easily captured. Waiting for her pawns to recover, Cassandra injected herself with a syringe of liquid, and then turned to Wolverine for his role. Moments later, Wolverine recovered and quickly broke free of his bonds, capturing the elderly woman. Though he had her at the mercy of his claws, Wolverine could not help but notice her smile, wondering what she thought was so funny. Half a world away, the Mega-Sentinels arrived at their destination. With the civil war in Genosha having recently been resolved, the nation had become a homeland of sorts for mutants, with a population of over sixteen million people. Within minutes, the attack was complete, and half the world’s mutant population was no more. (New X-Men v1 #115)
After beating off all crossed her path, Cassandra again visited Cerebra. She tried to use Cerebra to access the minds of all Earth's mutants, but Charles's mind was waiting for her and he forced her out of his body. Formless and with no life support, Cassandra flailed about until Emma came in with Cassandra's body. The entity entered, only to be trapped inside, as her real body was dead and this body was in fact the Imperial Superguardian shapeshifter Stuff. Her mind was blanked, and she began a mental process of re-education by psychic simulations of Professor X and Jean Grey while her body was put into a virtually impenetrable metal box. (New X-Men v1 #126)
Torn
Hate Machine
Using her powers, she took possession of the United Kingdom's ambassador to the United Nations with her being present during Jean Grey's attempt at unifying the Mutant race. The effort ruined Cassandra's plans leading to her killing the ambassador publicly and making it appear that Jean had done it in order to increase anti-Mutant hostility. (X-Men: Red v1 #1) She later arrived at the Xavier Institute where she cloaked her presence with her abilities though a young Mutant named Kyle was able to see her leading to Cassandra killing him. (X-Men: Red v1 #3)
She then decided to enact her plans by sending the mass Sentinite swarm across the world to infect everyone in order to kill all Mutants. In response, Jean Grey's team attempted to stop the microscopic machines which was when Nova decided to target Jean telepathically. The X-Men managed to learn that Cassandra was based at Genosha with Storm unleashing a storm to destroy Nova's underground facility on the abandoned island. Afterwards, the X-Men managed to shutdown the Sentinites thus ending the threat they posed. Nova managed to recover where she had Forge begin building more Sentinites whilst she herself decided to strike back by mentally taking control of Rachel Grey in order to use her against her mother. (X-Men: Red v1 #8) On Genosha, she turned Rachel against Jean who rather than allow her daughter to die decided to give herself to Cassandra Nova. Nova abandoned Rachel Grey who departed and then seemingly killed Jean Grey but it turned out to be a telepathic illusion with the real one being at Searebro and using its power to project her form in Genosha. An angry Cassandra vowed to form an army and destroyed Jean along with her allies. (X-Men: Red v1 #9) In response, Nova orchestrated a complex recording of Jean Grey that was broadcast the world where she threatened the human race with extinction and was forming a militant nation in Genosha. To combat this, Jean decided to inform her allies about the threat and even brought the Avengers where she provided them copies of Magneto's helmet to make them immune to Cassandra's telepathy. (X-Men: Red v1 #10) Nova sent wave of mind controlled people against her enemies whilst she triggered a Helicarrier's reactors to go critical so that the nuclear cores would destroy everyone. The X-Men managed to stop the explosion whilst Jean battled Cassandra with Honey Badger stabbing Nova with a reprogrammed Sentinite. The device was programmed to cause Nova to experience empathy for all the lives she had taken and she felt guilt as she was guided by Jean to atone for her past actions. (X-Men: Red v1 #11)
House of X
She was eventually moved to the mutant-only nation of Krakoa, where she resides in a hidden section that even the island itself forgot. Captain Pryde secretly found Cassandra which informed Kate that she will be needing Cassandra on her team, as Cassandra has some crucial information that she and the other Marauders will need to act on. (Marauders v2 #1)
Indeed, when Pryde, Bishop, Psylocke, Aurora, Tempo, Daken, Somnus and Nova travel 2 billion years into the past in an attempt to save the ancient mutant civilization of Threshold from destruction, the Marauders plan to save the past immediately went awry when they came up against the twin villains Sublime and Arkea and their army of "Unbreathing." The team was saved several times through the power of Cassandra Nova, much to everyone's chagrin. In the final battle against Arkea and Sublime, Cassandra Nova invited the two sentient bacterium to attach to her body as a host, only to use her incredibly telepathy to slaughter the trillions of hosts they had all connected to her, ending the Marauders battle against Sublime and Arkea. Yet, after being saved by Nova, Cassandra was struck down by a psychic attack from Somnus. As it turns out, Kate Pryde, Somnus, and Emma Frost had planned this betrayal of Nova from the very beginning, using Frost's considerable psychic talent to install an impenetrable crystal box in Pryde's mind that kept Nova, and the rest of the team, from discovering their plan. Emma Frost and Kate were two of the mutants most impacted by Cassandra Nova's horrific assault on Genosha, with all of Frost's young students dying in her arms and Pryde's human father being killed as well. And since Pryde knew that they would almost certainly not succeed in the past without the help of Cassandra, she devised a plan to use her while she was needed and then take her down. Kept alive but immobile and imprisoned in Threshold's 'zero cells', Cassandra was left stranded 2 billion years in the past, with a mass extinction event on the horizon. (Marauders v2 #10)
Overview
Personality and attributes
In her mind, there was no distinction between her mothers womb and that of the universe. Thus, she considered herself and Charles the only real things in existence. This influenced her motivations which were basic in that she felt that she needed to kill Charles for mastery of the universe as she saw it. (New X-Men v1 #122)
Due Charles actions in the womb, Cassandra came to hate all Mutants and believed that her life was in constant danger so long as their kind still existed. (X-Men: Red v1 #6)
Powers and abilities
Cassandra was living emotional energy that was formless yet immense and totally unique. Though bodiless, she was able to improvise cells in order to fashion herself a form. (New X-Men v1 #122) This gave her an amazing ability to recover from injuries as she was able to piece herself back together from almost nothing. It was this trait that made her claim that she could not be so easily killed. (X-Men: Red v1 #11)
Nova had all the powers of the 'average' Mummudrai which included astral manipulation, mental possession and genetic alternation. (Uncanny X-Force v2 #11)
She was able to copy the DNA of others after hours of contact allowing her to masquerade as them to fool genetic scanners. (New X-Men v1 #115)
Cassandra was able to access the full spectrum of latent Mutant functions in Xavier's genome, granting herself vast psionic powers. (New X-Men v1 #126)
She was able to block the considerable telepathic abilities of Charles Xavier, create psionic armor, disintegrate the complete tissue of Wolverine's arm, and make her body completely intangible to an extent that even allowed her to withstand a direct blast from Cyclops. (New X-Men v1 #116)
Notes
- Cassandra Nova was created by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely where she made her first appearance in New X-Men v1 #114 (July, 2001).
- During Chuck Austen's X-Men v2 run, it was heavily implied that Carter Ghazikhanian was possessed by Cassandra Nova.
- In an interview, writer Mike Carey said that a storyline he had considered involved Cassandra Nova and another Mummudrai that would arrive from space and impregnate Nova, creating a litter of "young mummudrai gestating in the minds of the X-Men". According to Carey, the storyline "...would have been fun to do, but Joss Whedon got to Cassandra before I did".
- In Uncanny X-Force v2, an alternate version of the character was introduced with writer Sam Humphries commenting, "Cassandra Nova is ambitious and immortal. Thousands of years in the future, she hijacks Bishop to come back to the present -- right at the moment when her brother is dead, and unable to stop her. She's an immensely powerful psychic with a huge axe to grind -- and an army of psychic demons to crush the world."
Alternate Versions
- In New X-Men v1 #151 (2004), a version of Cassandra Nova appeared in the alternate reality designated as Earth-15104 which was set 150 years in the future during the "Here Comes Tomorrow" story arc. She came to be rehabilitated and share Charles Xavier's creed for peaceful co-existence with her eventually taking the name of Cassandra Nova-Xavier. Cassandra eventually became Headmistress of the Xavier Institute and led the remnants of the X-Men in the battle against the Sublime-controlled Beast.
- In X-Men: The End v1 (2004), an alternate version of the character was shown who admitted that her and Charles Xavier were scared of one another. She was responsible for driving Lilandra Neramia insane and causing her to send the Shi'ar against the X-Men. She later took control over Lilandra and Xavier's son Xavi who was conceived in secret whereupon he had the royal heir kill his mother. In the process, Xavi was driven mad with Cassandra orchestrating these events in order to take control of Jean Grey and the Phoenix Force. Her ultimate goal was bonding with the Phoenix and using its power to wipe out all existence. However, Jean and Psylocke were able to subdue her where Grey intended to transcend reality. As a result, she brought back other slain X-Men as they formed a giant Phoenix to become part of the universe.
- In X-Men '92 v1 (2015), a version of Cassandra Nova was present on Battleworld in the Westchester realm. This version served as the Director of the Clear Mountain Institute that seemingly operated as a safe haven for Mutants.
In other media
Video games
- In X-Men: Battle of the Atom, Cassandra Nova appeared on a card in the iOS video card game.
Appearances
- New X-Men v1: (2001)
- Uncanny X-Force v2:
- X-Men: Red v1:
- Marauders v2: (2022)
External Links
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