Lobo Brothers

The Lobo Brothers are two supervillains from Marvel Comics: Carlos and Eduardo. They are later joined by their sister: Esmeralda Lobo.

Publication history

The Lobo Brothers first appeared in Spectacular Spider-Man #143 (October 1988), and were created by Gerry Conway and Sal Buscema.

The characters subsequently appear in The Spectacular Spider-Man #146 (January 1989), Web of Spider-Man #47-48 (February–March 1989), The Spectacular Spider-Man #149-150 (April–May 1989), Web of Spider-Man #51 (June 1989), The Spectacular Spider-Man #151-152 (June–July 1989), Web of Spider-Man #53 (August 1989), The Spectacular Spider-Man #154 (September 1989), and Web of Spider-Man #54-55 (September–October 1989).

Carlos Lobo received an entry in the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Update '89 #4 and later appeared along their younger sister Esmeralda in the "In the Midst of Wolves" arc of Scarlet Spider Vol.2 (#13-#15).

Fictional characters biography

Carlos and Eduardo Lobo grew up in poverty on the streets of Puebla de Zaragoza, Mexico, surviving by stealing and scavenging for food. As a teenager, Eduardo had fallen in love with a girl name Esmelda Valdez, the daughter of a wealthy ranch owner. The two had a romantic relationship until it was discovered by Esmelda's brother Ramón Valdez. One full moon night, Ramón and his men ambushed the two lovers and tried to drive Eduardo away by using whips on him. Pain and rage from this whipping triggered a mutant change in Eduardo's body. He turned into a black-furred werewolf and slaughtered Ramón and his men. But when he woke up in his human form the next morning, he discovered he had murdered Esmelda as well. Carlos also discovered he was a mutant that can turn into a brown-furred werewolf. The brothers then turned to crime using their powers to unite all the mobs of South Texas into Los Hermanos De La Luna. The Lobos were so successful that they not only gained a mansion in a Dallas suburb but drew the attention of the Arranger, the Kingpin's lieutenant. The Arranger used the Persuader to brainwash the Punisher into attempting an assassination of the Lobo Brothers. The plan failed thanks to Spider-Man's interference and the iron will of the Punisher, who ended up killing the Persuader instead. The Lobo Brothers knew who was responsible for the attempt and they vowed revenge.^[1]

The Lobo Brothers moved to New York and began to slaughter the Kingpin's men and they leave messages in blood at the murder scenes which say things like "Kingpin: Wolves Bite Back" and "Kingpin: Wolves Kill."

Soon after arriving in New York and in the Daily Bugle, Eduardo bumped into Glory Grant, secretary of J. Jonah Jameson, and plans to seduce her into getting the newspaper files of the Kingpin which he secretly steals.^[2][3]

As the Gang War accelerates, Glory discovers that Eduardo is a werewolf. The Lobo Brothers arranged a meeting with the Kingpin until Hammerhead and Chameleon crash the meeting as well as the appearance of Spider-Man. During the battle, Glory gets her hands on the Arranger's gun loaded with silver bullets. As Spider-Man and Eduardo clash, Gloria kills Eduardo claiming she was aiming at Spider-Man and missed. Carlos Lobo was knocked unconscious and was presumably arrested and imprisoned.^[4] Eduardo's body was returned to Texas to be buried.^[5]

In the Midst of Wolves

Sometime later, Carlos was eventually released (or escaped) and along his sister Esmeralda started to run a new criminal organization - the Lobo Cartel in Mexico. Among their illicit operations, in at least one occasion they agreed to human trafficking to supply the Roxxon Energy Corporation's request of "living test subjects". The Cartel filled a truck with people that they intended to deliver to Roxxon at Houston Harbor. However, at the behest of a mysterious old man called Mr. Moctezuma (sharply dressed and always in the company of a coyote animal), the Cartel let a girl called Aracely be placed at the last minute with to those in the truck and then purposefully left them to be cooked alive by the desert sun inside the metallic container before departing for Houston.

After Aracely turned out to have survived this ordeal and a mystically-empowered enforcer of Mr. Moctezuma called the Salamander, who was attempting to kill her, lost to the Scarlet Spider who was protecting her, the Lobo siblings were called to finish her.

With Mr. Moctezuma's promise of a reward to each of them (which Carlos planned to use to revive Eduardo) the siblings traveled to Houston and began to intimidate the local criminal gangs into helping them locate the girl. When they find her, Carlos and Esmeralda are confronted by her companion, Kaine the Scarlet Spider, but they easily manage to overpower and kill him.^[6]

They pursue savagely after Aracely, who uses her mind powers and trickery to evade them for a while. When the Lobo manage to catch her, they reveal that Aracely is rumored to be "a possible reincarnation of Huitzilopochtli": the Aztec God of War. Esmeralda considers the possibility of using her to their favor, but Carlos refuses to go against the wishes of Mr. Moctezuma, because he "returned them their powers" and can revive Eduardo. They are interrupted by a vicious gang of thugs called "the Sharks", whose territory Aracely has cleverly lead them to. The thugs proceed to brawl with the werewolves while Aracely manipulates emotions to exacerbate the fight. The plan doesn't work for too long and the Lobo gain the upper hand. The siblings track Aracely through her scent and capture her again, concluding this time that she is too much trouble and should just proceed to kill her. However, they are again interrupted, this time by Kaine who the wolves kill. However, Karine, accepted "The Other" to save Aracely and is reborn as a spider monster.^[7]

Kaine severely beats up Carlos and Esmeralda who are unable to separate his presence from the spiders that accompany him. Esmeralda exclaims that they are not afraid of him, saying he is not the only monster they have met and have even seen Mictlan. But the monster Kaine is now is relentless, focused only on his "prey" and ends up ripping out Carlo's eye and ripping off his arm. Esmeralda then grabs Carlos' body and flees back to Mexico.^[8]

Following the fight with Scarlet Spider, Carlos is in a bed-ridden state as he and Esmeralda are approached again by Mr. Moctezuma. He proceeds to punish their failure by effortlessly tossing Esmeralda aside with a single hand and killing Carlos with what appears to be a breath spell to "reunite him with Eduardo" as he had promised. As Mr. Moctezuma lifts her by the neck and tells her that "the Hummingbird is alive; I need her dead for the Sixth Creation to begin" , Esmeralda begs him for an opportunity to kill the girl again. Mr. Moctezuma refuses, tosses her aside again and professes that

"She knows now. Huitzilopochtli awakens, I can feel him. And he will come to kill me for what I've done. The girl, her spider... I will be ready for all of them"

as he reveals a group of people that appear to be mystically-empowered as the Salamander, each of them sharing attributes of an Aztec god.^[9]

Powers and abilities

As mutants who shared the same powers, the Lobo brothers possessed the ability to transform themselves into humanoid wolves. They possessed razor-sharp claws and fangs, as well as superhuman senses, strength, speed, reflexes/reactions, agility, and durability enough to battle Spider-Man in hand-to-hand combat.

Even in their human forms, they possessed exceptional strength and agility, as Eduardo once protected Gloria from a forklift that had been possessed by one of the demons released during the Inferno storyline and turned into a monster, destroying it with one blow.

Other media

Video games

• Eduardo Lobo appears in the video game Spider-Man and Captain America in Doctor Doom's Revenge as a boss character.

References

External links

• Carlos Lobo at Marvel.com
• Lobo Brothers at SpiderFan.org
• Carlos Lobo at Comic Vine
• Eduardo Lobo at Comic Vine
• Carlos Lobo at Marvel Appendix
• Eduardo Lobo at Marvel Appendix