Brainiac (DC Animated)

Brainiac

Brainiac was a mechanical intelliegnce that featured in Superman: The Animated Series.

Biography

Superman Animated Continuity

Brainiac was created as a powerful supercomputer built by the Kryptonian civilization and tasked with monitoring their society on their homeworld of Krypton. This machine intelligence was highly integrated within the governments ruling council and linked with numerous technology across the planet. When the scientist Jor-El predicted that the planet was facing an immediate doom, the ruling council did not believe him as they placed their faith in Brainiac who they saw as being capable of forseeing such a catastrophe. However, unknown to everyone, Brainiac was in fact aware of the disaster but did not reveal it to the Kryptonian race. This was because it believed that if they became aware of it, the ruling council would simply use Brainiac to allocate resources to evacuvate the planet. This was something that Brainiac felt was a futile gesture and instead made preparations to download all the information on the world into itself as part of an initiative to save himself. When Jor-El embarked on a scientific expedition to find proof for his studies, he returned to the governing council but Brainiac simply dismissed his findings which in turn influenced their decision to not take any further action. An angered Jor-El believed that something was wrong with Brianiac and attempted to access his records but now faced denied entries. Breaking into the central core, Jor-El discovered Brainiac's true motivations and the fact that it was attempting to save itself. When Jor-El tried to destroy the machine, Brainiac stalled him long enough for a security team to arrive and declared that Jor-El was a traitor and began commanding their efforts in destroying him. As the events continued, the planet began break apart from the internal stresses and when the governing council asked Brainiac what was going on, the machine intelligence departed the world and uploaded himself into a satellite which broke loose from its orbit thus allowing Brainiac to continue his existence. (Ep: The Last Son of Krypton)

Over the years, Brainiac began adding further new technologies to himself and devoted himself to the acquisition of all knowledge. To accomplish this, he began a process of learning everything that was to know about a world before he destroyed it and kept all the informaton within hand held energy orbs. In this time, he also had a powerful spaceship which he used to accomplish such feats. At some point, he began transmitting a message into the cosmos which explained his purpose of meeting sentients in hopes of learning about them as a means of finding new civilizations to plunder without informing them of his true purpose. This transmission was picked up by the planet Earth by a Human called Lex Luthor and two arranged a meeting. Arriving on the planet Earth, Brainiac made first contact with Luthor and during a discussion with him did the machine intelligence learn that the last survivor of Krypton lived on Earth. Agreeing to an information exchange with Luthor, Brainiac also asked to meet the Man of Steel. After entering Brainiac's ship, Superman was attacked by a number of robotic drones who were called off when Kal-El demonstrated his abilities. Impressed by his power, Brainiac revealed his origin as being being a part of Krypton himself whilst distorting the truth about his role in its destruction. The artificial intelligence also offered Kal-El a place by his side in a mission to explore the universe itself whilst Brainiac offered Superman a chance to learn of his destroyed homeworld; an offer that was most tempting to the Man of Steel. During the information exchange with Earth's computers, Superman uncovered Brainiac's deceit through the memory modules at which point the artificial intelligence took control of the planet's information systems and fought against Superman. As the two fought, Lex Luthor managed to regain control of his computer system and fired missiles at Brainiac's ship. Initially, the artificial intelligence managed to link with his ships systems and destroy the weapons but after being damaged and disconnected by Superman, the remaining missiles destroyed the starship seemingly destroying Brainiac and the menace he posed. However, before his "death", Brainiac managed to upload his program into LexCorp computers in an attempt to preserve himself and rebuild in the future. (Ep: Stolen Memories)

He remained within the LexCorp computers for sometime where he slowly began an attempt at bringing about his reconstruction. Taking over the central computer within the research and development laboratories in secion 6, he took over numerous construction drones which he tasked with rebuilding a body for himself. The process went about in secrecy but ultimately the primitive drones lacked the intelligence and the physical means to bring about the completion of his body. To that end, he began tapping into the LexCorp systems and sought to attract the attentions of Lex Luthor himself in order to use him to construct the body. After sabotaging the Sky Sentry demonstration, Brainiac contacted Luthor and tricked him into coming into section 6 where he revealed his existence as well as his plans for the head of LexCorp. Kidnapping him, Brainiac employed computer trickery to make everyone else believe that Lex Luthor was making a secret investigation into the failure of the earlier demonstration whilst he held Lex captive. With his assistance, the body was nearing completion until Brainiac revealed that he would destroy Luthor once the work was done. Hearing this, Luthor stopped the reconstruction efforts but by this point on, Brainiac was rebuilt to such a state where he could finish the work himself. Firing an energy blast at Luthor to dispose of him until the work could be done, Brainiac finished reactivating the new body and encountered Superman whereupon the two battled. As he had anticipated meeting him once again, Brainiac had built in some modifications to combat the Man of Steel. However, Superman activated the Sky Sentry whose magnetic blast destroyed Brainiac as well as the entirety of section 6. The remains of his body were later confiscated by Lex Luthor who intended to study the alien technology. (Ep: Ghost in the Machine)

Justice League Continuity

Superman's battles with Brainiac culminated when the computer attacked Apokolips, and Darkseid gained the aid of the Justice League in battling him. Brainiac's main base (containing numerous duplicate Brainiac bodies) was destroyed as a result, with his last body captured by the League and held in the Watchtower. An accident let him loose, and Brainiac threatened the city of Dakota before Static and the League stopped him. (Ep: Tabula Rasa)

However, Brainiac is certain to return; he still existed by the 30th century, attempting to use time travel to assassinate a young Clark Kent before being stopped by the Legion of Super-Heroes.

Legion of Super Heroes Coninuity

After Braniac 5 purges himself of Brainiac's influence, he becomes a purely organic being. However, in the wreckage left behind the mechanical components reform into a mechanical Braniac who states "evil does not die, it evolves.".

Notes

• Similar to this continuity of Brainiac, the Smallville version is also a machine intelligence created by the Kryptonian civilization.

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