Red Skull

Revision as of 07:13, 2 June 2019

The Red Skull in Captain America: Steve Rogers v1 #15.

Red Skull is a male comic supervillain that features in Marvel Comics.

Biography

Origin

The Red Skull in Captain America v1 #103.

Johann Shmidt was a male human who was born in the early part of the 20th century. There were multiple varying accounts about his origins that had been said over the years.

The true account was that he was born in 1914 with his mother having died during the child birth. He grew up at the Munich Home for Wayward Boys during the Weimar Republic in one of the greatest depressions in Germany history. Around this time, there was great social strife as Adolf Hitler arose to power at the head of the Nazi Party. On November 1923, Shmidt was 9 years old when he was regularly disciplined and suffered brutal punishment at the hands of the orphanage's headmaster. During this time, his only friend was a boy named Dieter Lehmann with Johann helping protect a stray puppy he had found from a dog catcher with the headmaster allowing the boys to keep the pet. One day, Johann went outside to attend a march that was being made by the Nazi Party that was being held by the city hall. (Red Skull v1 #1)

Around 1942, he came to suspect that Nazi Germany could potentially lose World War II and had Arnim Zola create a clone of himself that was to activate in the future if ever the Red Skull was slain. (Uncanny Avengers v1 #2)

In 1944, agents of his were dispatched to Tibet to find a mystical weapon for use by Nazi Germany. They discovered the Amulet of Agamotto that was in the care of the Ancient One. The powerful master of the mystical arts were betrayed by his disciple Baron Mordo allowing the Nazi's to drug him and his servant Hamir allowing the pair to be captured. They were brought to the Red Skull to harness the power when this moment was interrupted by the arrival of Captain America and Bucky. At that point, the Red Skull was transported into the Dark Dimension by Dormammu who sought the Amulet of Agamotto. (Captain America - Nick Fury The Otherworld War v1 #1)

Red Onslaught

In a fortified bunker, the clone of the Red Skull awakened from his 70 year slumber and awoke to continue his plans for the world. He went through media reports and came to determine that dying Mutant race were the greatest danger to mankind which needed to be eliminated. Thus, he embarked on a plan to exterminate the Mutant race leading to him creating his S-Men and also stealing the deceased of Professor X to remove his brain which was the fused to his own making him among the world's most powerful telepaths. (Uncanny Avengers v1 #2)

Overview

Personality and attributes

Powers and abilities

A deadly weapon in his arsenal was the Dust of Death that when exposed to others caused their skin to tighten around the victims face and shrivel whilst it taking a red discolouration with all hair falling out leaving the person's resultant corpse resembling a red skull. (Captain America v1 #184)

The clone of the Red Skull once dissected the dead body of Charles Xavier and removed his brain which he fused with his own giving him the Mutant's powerful telepathic abilities. This allowed him to not only communicate with telepathy but also control the minds of others. (Uncanny Avengers v1 #2)

At one time, he had a castle in Berchtesgaden which was where he and the Fuehrer conspired to rule mankind. (Captain America v1 #119) He also maintained an old ramshackle manor known as Skull-House. (Captain America v1 #293)

He once formed a secretive criminal cabal known as the New World Order. (Incredible Hulk v1 #404) Another team that followed him were the S-Men that were a band of super-powered humans who sought the extermination of all Mutants. (Uncanny Avengers v1 #2)

Notes

• The Red Skull was created by Joe Simon, Jack Kirby and France Herron where he made his first appearance in Captain America Comics v1 #7 (October, 1941).

Alternate Versions

• In Wolverine v3 #66 (2008), an alternate version of the Red Skull was shown to exist on the world designated as Earth-807128. This version was responsible for organising a supervillain uprising that saw the murder of various superheroes on the planet. This led to all the villains dividing the territories amongst themselves as the Red Skull declared himself the President of Amerika who ruled his domain in a time set 50 years in the future.
• In Red Skull v2 #1 (2015), an alternate version of the Red Skull was shown to reside on Battleworld Earth-15513.

In other media

Television

• In The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, the Red Skull appeared as an antagonist in the animated television series where he was voiced by actor Steven Blum.
• In Avengers Assemble, the Red Skull appeared as an antagonist in the animated television series where he voiced by actor Liam O'Brien.
• In Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H., the Red Skull appeared as an antagonist in the animated television series in the episode "Days of Future Smash: Year of the Hydra" where he was voiced by actor Liam O'Brien.

Films

• In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the Red Skull made multiple appearances in the shared continuity setting:
  • In Captain America: The First Avenger, the Red Skull appeared as an antagonist in the live-action film where he was portrayed by actor Hugo Weaving.
  • In Avengers: Infinity War, the Red Skull made an appearance in the live-action film where he was portrayed by actor Ross Marquand. It was shown that the Tesseract had transported him to the planet Vormir where the Soul Stone resided with the Skull being transformed into a ghostly guide of that Infinity Stone. He had made multiple attempts at acquiring its power but failed and instead being a guardian of the stone where he came to be referred to as the Stonekeeper.

Video games

• In Marvel Heroes, the Red Skull appeared as antagonist in the setting of the MMORPG video game. The story mode setting adapted the AXIS storyline with the Red Skull acquiring the brain of Charles Xavier and merging it with his own to give him powerful telepathic abilities which he used to wage a genocidal war against Mutants. At the height of the conflict, he was able to unlock the darker nature in Xavier to become the Red Onslaught but was defeated though not before unleashing a telepathic attack that inverted the personalities of various individuals.
• In Marvel: Future Fight, the Red Skull appeared as a playable character in the iOS video game.

Appearances

• Captain America Comics v1:
• Captain America:
• Red Skull v1:
• Uncanny Avengers v1:
• Captain America:

External Links

• Wikipedia Entry

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