One Below All
The One Below All is a comic entity who features in Marvel Comics.
Contents |
Biography
The One Below All was a dark cosmic counterpart to the One-Above-All. (Immortal Hulk v1 #12)
When the One Above All became angry as the Mother of Horrors defiled His creation and hid the Earth from Him, the One Below All manifested as the aspect of His anger towards Her and Her son Udru. (Incredible Hulk v4 #3)
Long ago, a green meteor came to crash in the region of Jordan with this occurring before 9,500 BCE where it came to be worshipped by primitive humans as the Good Green Eye that was believed to be a gift from their patron goddess. In that time long ago, the village elder believed that their home had become barren due to a lack of sacrifice and came to throw a young man named Tammuz into the pit to die. This act caused the Green Door to first open making Tammuz encounter the One Below All who transformed him into a gamma mutate. The now green-skinned giant then returned to his village only for its people to turn on him and seemingly kill him. They then consumed his flesh as they believed it to be a bounty but then the powers conferred on him allowed his body resurrect with this killing the people that had eaten him. He then briefly considered sharing his knowledge with the villagers but the influence of the One Below All caused him to kill them all instead. (Immortal Hulk: Time of Monsters v1 #1)
The One Below All manifested its absolute presence within the Below-Place, the deepest, most isolated layer of hell existing directly underneath the foundational structure of the multiverse. Years ago, a researcher by the name of Brian Banner came to research the nature of Gamma Radiation. Working late into the night, he fell into exhaustion from his research where he began to experience strange dreams. These were glimpses of the Green Door that was the way to the One Below All. When Brian's son Bruce Banner investigated gamma radiation on his own, he developed a powerful Gamma Bomb. The bomb's explosion opened the first Green Door, a metaphysical barrier into the Below-Place, and infused him with gamma radiation, turning him into the Hulk. Seeking to spread its unyielding malice and systematically unmake the creation above, the One Below All targeted the wandering, disembodied human soul of Brian Banner following his secondary death during the Chaos War. The One Below All completely enveloped and merged with Brian's lingering consciousness, seamlessly utilizing his deeply abusive personality, memories, and physical likeness as an active, localized mask to orchestrate its overarching plans. Operating through this familiar mental filter, the entity established absolute dominion over the Green Door. When the Absorbing Man was subsequently trapped and damned within this hellish dimension following a severe energy overload on Earth, the One Below All manipulated the localized space to directly confront the intruder. It weaponized the stolen form of Brian Banner to systematically fracture Carl Creel's mind, utilizing his internal trauma to siphon away his gathered energy reserves and expand its own reality-warping hold over the gateway. Through these multi-layered psychic and spiritual manipulations, the One Below All successfully outmaneu vered the initial defensive barriers of the material plane, ensuring that the Green Door remained wide open to let its corrupting, entropic influence slowly bleed into the world of the living.(Immortal Hulk v1 #12)
The One Below All then joined with Brian and used his personality as its own, now beginning its plan to destroy Bruce and silence the multiverse forever. Through a Green Door, Brian possessed the gamma mutate Jailbait, causing her powers to go out of control. Her boyfriend, Hotshot, then was forced to tie her to a chair, due to her power growing out of control. He went to a church during Sunday services and held the congregation hostage in order to force the priest to perform last rites on Jailbait. He was ranting that Jailbait was possessed by the devil and that he saw a green door. (Immortal Hulk v1 #3)
Overview
Personality and attributes
In appearance, the One Below All was a colossal, non-humanoid cosmic manifestation who personified the absolute synthesis of hate, destruction, and spiritual vacancy. Within its native environment of the Below-Place, its true configuration completely lacked a traditional humanoid form, nor static biological organs, or a fixed humanoid build, presenting instead as a fluid, roiling expanse of absolute, living darkness and cloud-like green smoke. However, because the entity lacked a singular, static physical form of its own, it systematically interacted with lower three-dimensional intruders by wearing human souls like masks on a stage. In this specific confrontation, it manifested explicitly in the exact physical shape, height, and slender build of Brian Banner, featuring deeply lined facial features, a pale complexion, and wide, unblinking eyes that constantly radiated an intense internal green fire. The One Below All did not wear conventional woven garments or standard manufactured body armor; instead, its borrowed humanoid facade was completely wrapped within a fluid shroud of raw gamma energy that heavily distorted the local landscape and cast an ever-shifting, unpredictable pattern of light across the hellish boundaries of its domain. (Immortal Hulk v1 #12) Others had referenced it as being the Cosmic Satan. (Absolute Carnage: Immortal Hulk v1 #1)
It was regarded as creation's secret reflection who was vaster than could be perceived or understood. (Immortal Hulk v1 #12) Puck had theorized that of all the demons claiming to be Satan he has encountered, the One Below All may be the actual entity. (Immortal Hulk v1 #11)
As the dark alter-ego of The One Above All, The One Below All is a creature without a mind of its own, possessing only terrible desires, destroying all so that the One Above All can begin the cycle of creation anew. (Immortal Hulk v1 #50) In spite of this purpose, the One Below All still harbored its own goals, comparable to a 'Hulk' itself. The One Below All genuinely does hate and fear the Mystery, and it's ultimate goal is to destroy everything in the Multiverse and to become the one remaining presence in it, leaving no stories and no life left to ever exist. (Immortal Hulk v1 #35)
Powers and abilities
In spite of the One Below All's goals, it remained without a personality, incapable of acting beyond its role as a counterbalance. To do more, it required a host personality. (Immortal Hulk v1 #42)
It could only influence the mortal world and in order to intervene directly it needed a host personality or soul. Through them it was able to interact with the physical plane. (Immortal Hulk v1 #12) The One Below All can also manipulate, to an extent, the body of the vessel and give it supernatural abilities to those it possesses. When Brian Banner took possession of Crusher Creel he was able to tear open his upper body. (Immortal Hulk v1 #10)
The entity was heavily tied to the nature of Gamma Radiation that heaved unpredictably. It did not act as a wave of particle but rather in a previously unknown third form. (Immortal Hulk v1 #12) Thus, The One Below All was the source of the mutagenic form of Gamma energy that creates Gamma Mutates while being the cause of how Gamma energy can seemingly do almost anything and break the rules of science and nature. This also means that either directly or indirectly all Gamma Mutates are The One Below All's creations. (Immortal Hulk v1 #20)
It could spawn beings called Qlippoth that could take the appearance of other individuals from loved ones to enemies. They were used to torment those within its realm where they could regurgitate horde of demonic monsters. (Immortal Hulk v1 #11)
The One Below All resided within the Below-Place that was said to be a hell beneath all the others. (Immortal Hulk v1 #11) Access to this realm could be achieved through the Green Door that required intense levels of gamma radiation to open. (Immortal Hulk v1 #10)
Notes
- The One Below All was created by Al Ewing and Joe Bennett where he made his first appearance in Immortal Hulk v1 #5 (November, 2018).
- On CBR, writer Al Ewing commented in an interview that, "Every light casts a shadow, as Brian said. In every mirror, there is a reflection. I'd say you're definitely on the right track. The One Above All, for those who don't know, is the closest thing in the MU to capital-G God. It's almost never seen on the page, and barely ever referred to, but whatever it is, it started things in motion. So the idea that such a being could have an opposite number, or a dark side, is hopefully fairly terrifying."
In other media
Video games
- In Marvel Contest of Champions, the One Below All was referenced in the setting of the mobile video game. It was mentioned in the backstory for the new original champion named Chee'ilth who used her new spirit based powers to fight against the gamma mutates cursed by The One Below All.
Appearances
- Immortal Hulk v1: (2018)
- Immortal Hulk: Time of Monsters v1: (2021)
- Incredible Hulk v4:
External Links
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