White Martian

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White Martian


White Martians attack the JLA,
art by Mike S. Miller
Publisher DC Comics Marvel Comics
First appearance JLA series 2 #1 (August 1995)
Created by Grant Morrison (writer)
Howard Porter (artist)
Characteristics
Homeworld Mars
Abilities Superhuman strength, speed, stamina and endurance, flight, telepathy, phase-shifting from invulnerable to immaterial, shapeshifting, invisibility, laser-like "Martian vision."

The white Martians are a fictional extraterrestrial race native to Mars in the DC Comics universe. A different fictional race of the same name appears in several novels by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Contents

[edit] Edgar Rice Burroughs

The white Martians are one of the principal Martian races in Edgar Rice Burroughs' Barsoom series of books featuring John Carter of Mars. They are described as being like humans in every way, except for being oviparous. They are a remnant people of the "Orovars", formerly one of the principal races of Mars, but only now found in out-of-the-way locations: they include the Holy Therns who live on both sides of the Otz Mountains at the South Pole; the illusionist philosophers of the City of Lothar, in the middle of the region controlled by the green horde of Torquas; and the Orovars of Horz. They are principally mentioned in The Gods of Mars, Thuvia, Maid of Mars, and Llana of Gathol.

[edit] DC Comics

White Martians feature in the comics of the DC Universe, chiefly JLA, Martian Manhunter, and Son of Vulcan.

[edit] Appearance and abilities

White Martians have configured their physiology to reflect their philosophy, becoming a separate race from the green Martians.[1] In their natural form they are angular, hairless humanoids with chalky white skin. Their bones often form ridges or plates, giving them the appearance of armor. They have sometimes been seen to have a gaping mouth on their thorax and a horn on the same level on each side (JLA series 2 #1-4, 33). Like the green Martians, white Martians have numerous superhuman powers, including great strength, flight, invisibility, telepathy, shape-changing, phase-shifting (sometimes called variable density) which allows them to be either invulnerably tough or completely immaterial, and "Martian vision", but they also share the green Martians' vulnerability to fire. In Teen Titans vol.3 #41, Miss Martian was shown quickly recovering from the effects of Bombshell's neural scrambling powers as well as reforming after (apparently) having her head shot off. Also in this appearance she was shown breaking a pair of handcuffs by waving her hand near them.

The phase-shifting ability is not depicted in their first appearance.[2]Also, their power of flight seems limited to within an atmosphere: Wonder Woman defeats a white Martian by taking her into outer space, where she succumbs to asphyxiation; however, the white Martians are later shown flying from Earth to the moon without technological assistance and fighting the JLA in a vacuum.[3]

[edit] Evolution

The white Martians did not evolve alongside the green Martians as was previously believed. In reality the green and white Martians were part of the same race, known as "The Burning". This race used fire to reproduce asexually and were belligerent to all. The Guardians of the Universe, fearing the ruthlessly and violently powerful Martians, genetically split the Martian race into two distinct species, white and green, preventing the asexual reproduction. They also gave these two new races an instinctive fear of fire to prevent either group from ever accessing their full potential. The timeframe for this genetic tampering was given as 20,000 years ago, contemporary with the early life of Vandal Savage on Earth, in JLA series 2 #86.

While the green Martians were peaceful philoshophers, the white Martians were savage warriors. A lengthy civil war between the two races ended when the few surviving white Martians were rounded up and exiled to the extra-dimensional "Still Zone" (apparently distinct from Superman's Phantom Zone, in which they were later imprisoned again).[4]

[edit] White Saturnians

White Saturnians are descended from an underclass of worker clones created by ancient white Martian explorers. Green Martians cloned Jemm, Son of Saturn's people, the original Red Saturnians from themselves, and the white Martians cloned the original white Saturnians from their own cells. The Reds were treated as equals by their creators, but the whites were treated as slaves by their masters. The enslavement of the white clones led to a the civil war on Mars.[5]

[edit] Hyperclan

The Hyperclan are a white Martian vanguard for an all-out takeover of Earth who masquerade as alien superheroes with the intent of displacing the JLA in the affections of the people of Earth. Their initial attack results in the destruction of the League's satellite and the death of Metamorpho and is preceded by a sickness that strikes all fire-based heroes and villains, such as Firehawk and Doctor Phosphorus. With the use of mind control and public relations, they nearly succeed, capturing all of the Justice League, except for Batman, uses fire to stop them. The invaders are captured, and each of them is telepathically brainwashed by J'onzz and Aquaman to believe themselves to be human. Given strong mental blocks to inhibit their powers, the Martians assume normal Earthly lives.[6]

On subsequent occasions, white Martians succeed in breaking free of this psychological imprisonment. The first time was a single white Martian that briefly believed itself to be Bruce Wayne due to the trauma of being caught in a flaming plane crash erasing its memory, before being defeated by a team consisting of Green Lantern, Steel, Big Barda, Orion and Plastic Man (selected because they didn't know Batman's identity and thus wouldn't 'tip' the Martian off to the fact that he was a fake). Later the whole race were revived after the battle with the wish-granting Id, J'onn's wish to be reunited with his human self having been subconsciously translated as a desire to cure his loneliness, thus prompting Id to awaken those on Earth most like J'onn. This time, the white Martians constructed chemical processing towers which would fireproof Earth's atmosphere by binding all the free oxygen - making themselves completely invulnerable, and conveniently asphyxiating mankind into extinction. The climactic battle required moving the Moon itself to expose the Martians to flame. J'onn was prepared to sacrifice his own life to defeat them, but was teleported out of danger at the last second by his teammates. After this second event, the JLA elected to leave them in trapped in the Phantom Zone, a common punishment for DC's most dangerous supervillians. [7]

Grant Morrison, the writer of JLA, deliberately designed the members of the Hyperclan to be as 'kiddy' as possible.

[edit] Sabotage of Evolution

In JLA series 2 #4, Hyperclan leader Protex tells Superman how his people first came to Earth "long before there was human life" - and performed genetic experiments on terrestrial animals which, "unfortunately," crippled the evolutionary potential of the human race. The result: "the creatures which could have been gods ended up just... humans." The implication is that we should have been, literally, a race of supermen, instead of such frail, limited creatures when compared to Martians. This was another reason for the war between the white Martians and the greens, who were outraged by such biological vandalism. However, it contradicts the later statement that the two races were only 20,000 years old, since human evolution stretches back millions of years - unless the Martians were capable of time travel (never hinted at otherwise).

[edit] Metavirus

The white Martians created a metavirus, a metagene that could be passed from host to host via touch. This metavirus was responsible for the empowerment of the very first Son of Vulcan. And from that time onwards the Sons of Vulcan passed the metavirus down in an unbroken line, sworn to hunt and kill white Martians. [8]

[edit] White Martian Hybrids

With the help of Funky Flashman, an oviparous white Martian named A'Monn A'Mokk' creates five Human-Martian hybrid children using superhuman DNA from unrevealed sources named Sapling, Buster, Silhouette, Quaker and Blur. The five hybrids all have a latent fear of fire. Funky Flashman never revealed whether or not Blur's human DNA came from Barry Allen or Professor Zoom. Sapling resembled Poison Ivy in powers and costume, and Buster seemed like a cross between Bizarro and Solomon Grundy. Silhouette seemed to be wearing a variant of Nightshade's old costume and had similar powers. Blur is an albino teenager wearing an altered form of the Reverse Flash's costume.[9]

[edit] The Burning

Main article: Martian Manhunter#Fernus

When the Martian Manhunter overcame his fear of fire, he broke the ancient genetic block and he took the name Fernus, a member of the primevial Martian race.[10]

[edit] Miss Martian

Miss Martian, the white Martian known as M'gann M'orzz, is a member of the Teen Titans during the year between the events depicted in Infinite Crisis and the "One Year Later" stories. In her Earth form, M'orzz has green skin shoulder-length red hair, dresses in a mini-skirt version of Martian Manhunter's outfit, and uses the Earth name "Megan Morse." In Teen Titans #39, M'orzz says she lives in the Tanami Desert in Australia because it reminds her of home. When the Teen Titans ask M'orzz to use her telepathy to discover who has betrayed the team, she refuses, saying that she is forbidden to use her powers to probe the minds of "good" people.

[edit] References

  1. ^  Joe Kelly (w),  Doug Mahnke (p),  Tom Nguyen (i). "Trial By Fire" JLA v1 Late Nov 2003 DC Comics (17/4).
  2. ^ JLA, #1-4 (1995)
  3. ^ JLA #55-58 (2001)
  4. ^ As seen in JLA series 2 #86-89 (1997).
  5. ^ As seen in Martian Manhunter series 2 #13-16 (1999).
  6. ^ JLA #1-4 (1995)
  7. ^ As seen in JLA series 2 #55-58 (2001)
  8. ^ As seen in Son of Vulcan series 2 #4-5 August (2005).
  9. ^ As seen in Son of Vulcan series 2 #3-6 August (2005).
  10. ^ As seen in JLA series 2 #84-89 (1997).

[edit] Resources

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