Heartless (DC)

Latest revision as of 05:51, 8 February 2023

Heartless in Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1.

Heartless is a male comic supervillain who features in DC Comics.

Biography

Stalking Blüdhaven in Nightwing v4 #81.

Shelton Lyle was a male human born the only child of a wealthy Gotham City family with his parents being Charles Lyle and Jane Lyle. His father was a ruthless insurance executive who made his money by denying payments to those entitled to their claims. From a young age, Shelton showed signs of being a budding psychopath with him setting fires and torturing and murdering animals. A more apparent trait was that he showed no emotion and never spoke. His parents were unable to handle him and so gave responsibility for raising him to the family's butler Gerald Chamberlain. Unbeknownst to them, 'Gerald Chamberlain' was himself a sociopathic murderer who had killed the real Gerald Chamberlain and stolen his identity to infiltrate the household. Initially, 'Chamberlain' looked to murder the Lyle family to claim their fortune. However, Gerald recognised Shelton as a kindred spirit and decided to nurture his psychopathic tendencies, taking him to slaughterhouses and zoos where he could watch animals being eviscerated. One day, Gerald took Shelton to Haly's Circus, where they saw the Flying Graysons fall to their death. This finally provoked a reaction from Shelton, who was exhilarated at seeing the Graysons die, and by the misery that their deaths had caused to those around them, particularly their son Dick Grayson. (Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1)

The deaths of the Graysons brought Shelton out of his shell, and he became talkative and superficially personable. He learned to use his good looks and charm to manipulate people, became popular at school and even managed to fool his parents into believing he had outgrown his violent tendencies, although in reality, he was still the same cruel boy he had always been. He became a bully and lead other teenage boys in victimising weaker kids. When Barbara Gordon and Dick Grayson stood up to him, Shelton let his mask slip and mocked Dick over the death of his parents, resulting in Dick knocking out his teeth. When Shelton came of age, Gerald planned to murder his parents by sabotaging their helicopter so he would inherit their wealth. However, Shelton was also onboard the helicopter and was almost killed in the crash. Gerald forged an emergency transplant form to replace Shelton's damaged heart with his dying father's intact one, saving his life. When Shelton woke up, he was happy to know his parents were both dead. Shelton and Gerald further decided to replace all his damaged bodyparts with cybernetics, transforming him into Heartless. He stalked the streets at night, killing homeless people in front of their children to relive what he felt when he saw the Graysons die before Dick's eyes. His only weakness was that his enhancements placed a great strain on his heart, requiring him to regularly replace it with the ones he harvested from his victims. (Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1)

Two henchmen sent by Blockbuster came to the camp to terrorise the kids for stealing without Blockbuster's permission. Nightwing and Robin fought them off, but Heartless was waiting for them and set the camp on fire. (Nightwing v4 #80) Nightwing fought Heartless while Robin evacuated the children, and quickly found that, although Heartless possessed enhanced strength and speed, he did not actually know how to fight and Nightwing defeated him through superior skill. As Heartless had expected, the kids fled to the pier so he detonated a bomb which cut it off from the shore and set it on fire, allowing him to escape while Nightwing tried to save them. (Nightwing v4 #81) He later murdered an assassin who attempted to kill Dick on Blockbuster's orders, believing that only he should kill Dick Grayson. (Nightwing v4 #88) Nevertheless Blockbuster continued to try to have Dick killed, but he managed to escape all assassination attempts, to the point that no professional assassin would accept a contract on him. (Nightwing v4 #91) Afterwards, Heartless came to break into the offices of Blockbuster to confront the crime lord. (Nightwing v4 #92) He then offered to buy control of Bludhaven from him, saying he wanted to let Dick build the city up and give it hope, only for Heartless to kill him and take the hope away again. Blockbuster refused and threw Heartless out the window. (Nightwing v4 #93)

Overview

Personality and attributes

He had no issues with discarding parts of his body and replacing them with cybernetics. In fact, he was said to had been happy to discard anything that had held him back. (Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1)

As Heartless, he was regarded as a hunter who stalked his prey through alleys in the night. (Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1)

Shelton Lyle was the son of insurance executive Charles Lyle and his wife Jane Lyle. It was shown that he cared little for his parents and was overjoyed at finding out when they died. (Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1)

He was shown to had close ties to his family's butler who was a serial killer that had taken on the identity of 'Gerald Chamberlain'. In Gerald, he came to find a kindred spirit who understood him and Chamberlain had served as a father figure to Lyle. As a serial killer, Heartless would regularly tell Gerald of his kills and the joy he experienced in the murders he made of innocent people. 'Chamblerlain' meanwhile was said to had been proud of Shelton and watched in eagerness at his evolution as a killer. (Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1)

Powers and abilities

Lyle was born an ordinary human being with no inherent special abilities. (Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1)

When he was young, he survived a helicopter crash but was badly injured and was on the brink of dying. This was until he received an emergency transplant and gained his fathers heart which allowed him to live on from the incident. Though he survived, the rest of his body was also badly injured where he and his caretaker Gerald had decided to replace Shelton's entire body. Billions of dollars were spent on replacing bodyparts with cybernetics with the process taking over a decade to complete. In the end, Shelton came to be stronger and improved than his older self where he was able to punch holes through solid brick walls with his fists alone. (Nightwing 2022 Annual v4 #1)

Such was his durability that he was able to survive a fall from the top of a skyscraper with only moderate injuries, (Nightwing v4 #93)

The enhancements made to his body placed a great deal of strain on his heart. This required it to be regularly replaced with the hearts he harvests from his victims. (Nightwing v4 #93)

He made use of a special gun that fired a claw on a cable which could rip the heart out of a person's chest. (Nighting v4 #79)

Notes

• Heartless was created by Tom Taylor and Bruno Redondo where he made his first appearance in Nightwing v4 #78 (May, 2021).

Appearances

• Nightwing v4: (2021)
• Nightwing 2022 Annual v4:

External Links

• DC Database Entry

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