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Captain Atom

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Template:Short description Template:About Template:Infobox comics character Captain Atom is the name of several superheroes appearing in American comic books, initially owned by Charlton Comics before being acquired in the 1980s by DC Comics.[1] All possess some form of energy-manipulating abilities.

Captain Atom has appeared in several animated television and film adaptations of Justice League and other DC storylines since the mid-2000s. Chris Cox, Michael T. Weiss, and Brian Bloom, among others, have voiced the character in animation.

Publication history

Captain Atom was created by writer Joe Gill and artist/co-writer Steve Ditko, and first appeared in Space Adventures #33 (March 1960).[2] Captain Atom was initially created for Charlton Comics, but was later acquired by DC Comics and revised for DC's post-Crisis continuity.[3] In 2011, DC Comics relaunched its superhero comics and rewrote the histories of some characters from scratch, including Captain Atom, giving him a new origin, appearance and slightly altered powers. Captain Atom was the character inspiration for Doctor Manhattan, who was featured in the miniseries (and later live-action film adaptation) Watchmen, which would be connected to the DC Universe in the miniseries Doomsday Clock.[4][5][6]

Throughout the years, the character has been featured in several moderate-to-short-lived eponymous series, and has been a member of several different versions of DC's flagship superhero team, the Justice League. In all incarnations, the character initially served for the military. In the Charlton Comics continuity, he was a scientist named Allen Adam and gained his abilities by accident when he was seemingly "atomized" and then reformed himself as an atomic-powered being. In both DC Comics incarnations, he is an Air Force pilot named Nathaniel Adam, who was a test subject in a scientific experiment who seemingly disintegrated in the process, only to reappear later as the super-powered Captain Atom.[7] Over the years, DC has attempted to reinvent the character several times. For a period, the character assumed the mantle of the supervillain Monarch, and in 2005 DC attempted to retell the Captain Atom story with an entirely new character, Breach, who was subsequently discarded. In the new continuity following DC's 2011 relaunch, Captain Atom has never been a member of the Justice League and the team views him with distrust; his character origin and abilities were also revised.

Fictional character biography

Charlton Comics (Silver Age)

File:StrangeSuspenseStories75.jpg
Strange Suspense Stories #75 (June 1965), a reprint issue of Captain Atom's debut, cover art by Steve Ditko.

The Charlton Comics version of Captain Atom was Allen Adam, a rocket technician who gains powers after his special experimental rocket explodes.[8]

Captain Atom was first published in a series of short stories in the anthology series Space Adventures #33–40 (March 1960 – June 1961) and #42 (October 1961). Charlton began reprinting his short adventures in the anthology Strange Suspense Stories beginning with issue #75 (June 1965), renaming the title Captain Atom with issue #78 (December 1965) and giving the hero full-length stories and supervillain antagonists such as Dr. Spectro (previous stories involved Cold War anti-Communist missions or dealing with aliens). Captain Atom later teamed with the superhero Nightshade, with whom he shared a mutual attraction. The superhero Blue Beetle starred in the initial back-up feature, later replaced by a Nightshade back-up series.

DC Comics acquired Captain Atom, among other characters, following the bankruptcy of Charlton Comics. In Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Charlton characters are revealed to originate from Earth-Four and are integrated into DC's continuity.

DC Comics (Post-Crisis)

A new Post-Crisis version of the character was introduced in March 1987 with the launch of a monthly comic written by Cary Bates (long-time writer of The Flash and Superman), co-written by Greg Weisman and drawn by Pat Broderick.[9]

This modern captain's name is established as Nathaniel Christopher Adam, a United States Air Force officer and Vietnam War veteran. Adam is framed for a crime and experimented on to avoid execution and receive a pardon. He gains metallic skin and vast nuclear powers, but is transported decades into the future and presumed dead.[7][10]

After Adam resurfaces, General Wade Eiling blackmails him into serving the government as the superhero Captain Atom. Atom separates from the government, joins the Justice League, and briefly marries Plastique.[11]

Captain Atom was intended to be the villain Monarch in the Armageddon 2001 event. However, after this information was leaked, DC changed Monarch's identity to Hank Hall last-minute.[12][13]

In the Superman/Batman story arc "Public Enemies", Captain Atom is seemingly killed while stopping a kryptonite meteor. He is transported to the WildStorm universe and presumed dead.

Monarch

File:Caultimatum.png
Captain Atom's ultimatum, art by Dan Jurgens.

In Infinite Crisis, Captain Atom returns when Superboy-Prime punctures Breach, who wields similar energy-manipulating abilities. The end of Armageddon has him reappear in the devastated Blüdhaven. A year later, Captain Atom is revealed to be contained inside Blüdhaven and used to administer radiation treatments to metahumans. He later escapes and kills Major Force.[14]

Countdown

In Countdown to Final Crisis, Captain Atom assumes the Monarch name and battles heroes throughout the multiverse.[7][15][16][17][18][19]

During a fight against Superman-Prime, Atom's suit is damaged, releasing a chain reaction that destroys Earth-51.[20] It is later revealed that the Monitor Solomon attacked Atom in Blüdhaven, rupturing his skin and facilitating his transformation into Monarch.[21]

Project 7734

During Jimmy Olsen's investigation about Project 7734, the secret black-op commanded by Sam Lane to fight extraterrestrial menaces on Earth (including Kryptonians), it is discovered that an amnesiac and brainwashed Captain Atom is now one of the prized possessions of Sam Lane.[22][23][24][25]

Generation Lost

In Justice League: Generation Lost, Captain Atom is among the heroes tasked with hunting down Maxwell Lord.[26][27][28]

The New 52

In The New 52 continuity reboot, Captain Atom is reintroduced with altered powers, appearance and origin. This version was never framed and participated in the experiment that gave him powers voluntarily.[29][30][31][32] During a fight with Dr. Megala, who has taken control of Firestorm's body, Atom is forced to absorb a massive amount of energy, which disperses his molecules across the timestream. One of these pieces becomes a separate entity named Nathaniel Adym and joins the Science Police in the 31st century.[33][34][35]

DC Rebirth: The Fall and Rise of Captain Atom

Template:More citations needed section Template:Expand section Captain Atom (Nathaniel Adam) lost control of his powers and caused a devastating accident in this six-issue series set in 2012. Needing to contain his unstable abilities, he went into Dr. Megala's Subterranean Suppression Dome but seemingly exploded.[36] The world believed Nathaniel Adam was killed in a blast; However, Adam took a subatomic trip through time and ended up without powers, 20 years in the past.[37] It is revealed that the quantum blowback sent him back in time to 1994 as a normal man. Adam's wound distorted after being shot during an attempted car robbery, and his body was encased in liquid metal.[38] As a result of the time stream correcting itself, he was thrown back to 2017.[38]

Powers and abilities

Powers

Captain Atom's body is coated in the alien metal Dilustel, which enables him to generate vast amounts of nuclear energy and makes him virtually immortal. Atom's skin is highly durable and can only be damaged by the X-Ionizer, a device designed to cut through it.[39][40] Cracking or rupturing his skin causes Atom to leak radiation at an uncontrollable rate, to which he runs the risk of atomic detonation.

In addition to his superhuman abilities, Nathaniel Adam is also an experienced United States Air Force pilot. He is especially skilled in combat piloting, is trained in military weaponry, strategy, and hand-to-hand combat, and speaks multiple languages, including Russian.[41][42] Adam also has strong survival instincts derived from his experiences during the Vietnam War.

Former powers

His former drastically altered New 52 powers are a being whose atoms are constantly splitting and then reforming just as quickly, releasing massive amounts of energy. This surplus of power can be manipulated in a number of ways such as flight and the ability to transmute physical matter. Captain Atom has been seen to transform lava into snow by willing it and has been able to remove cancer from a human being. He can also absorb massive amounts of energy.

Captain Atom's abilities are largely nuclear in nature and involve tapping into the strong nuclear force, the energy that binds protons and neutrons in the nucleus. Excessive or intense use of his abilities has resulted in Captain Atom temporarily losing his own molecular stability. It is not yet known if he will be able to conquer this weakness with practice.

As an energy-based life form, Captain Atom's senses operate on different levels than a normal person. He is able to sense and perceive radio signals, cell phone signals and other similar transmissions. He can also see the energy of certain molecules, such as when he notes the energy signature of the Flash and remarks that his molecules seem to be sparking with fire or lightning.[32] He also does not need air, food or water to survive.

Rogues gallery

Captain Atom has his own enemies:

  • Bolt (Larry Bolatinsky): An assassin and mercenary sporting an electrokinetic suit hired by General Eiling for a number of militia hero sales schemes. Often came in conflict with Captain Atom over the course of his military career while under contract in another of many government staged publicity stunts.
  • Doctor Spectro (Tom Emery): A scientist driven mad by his emotion-altering prisms, Dr. Spectro gained the ability to affect emotions directly. Post-Crisis, Spectro was a small-time crook General Wade Eiling used to create a cover story for Captain Atom. Very bright costumes were a characteristic of Dr. Spectro.[43]Template:Rp[44][45] Doctor Spectro first appeared in Captain Atom #79 as the first supervillain antagonist of the titular hero, and was created by Steve Ditko and Joe Gill.[43]Template:Rp[46] The character first appeared in Charlton Comics, later in DC Comics.[43]Template:Rp James Sandy counted Doctor Spectro among the many comic characters that were introduced in the Silver Age of Comic Books and disappeared again after a short run,[47] but authors of The Superhero Book found him a unique supervillain.[43]Template:Rp
  • Fiery-Icer: A mercenary with a suit that unleashes intense fire from his right gauntlet and frigid cold from the left, the mysterious Fiery-Icer fought Captain Atom on several occasions.
  • General Wade Eiling: Once his commanding officer in the military who even in his new identity Nathaniel Adam often butted heads with due to his unscrupulous means of promoting America's new military assets. Unknown to the Captain for the longest time, it was the corrupt general who had Adam framed for killing a senior officer which, in turn, subjected him to the Atom Project years ago.
  • The Ghost (Alec Rois): A physicist who developed a teleportation device that he used to become a millionaire, Alec Rois took on the persona of the Ghost and became Captain Atom and his partner Nightshade's Pre-Crisis nemesis. Post-Crisis, he was a cult leader nicknamed the Faceless One, a disgruntled weapons developer and a former CIA operative who sought revenge against an unscrupulous employer. Having been trapped in the Quantum Field by his own Stealthray tech, he is released as an energy being who controls teletranslocation through it and has connections to Atom's past conviction while enlisted five years ago.
  • Iron Arms: A mercenary that employs a backpack that powers powerful cybernetic arms.
  • The Cambodian (Rako): An arms dealer and personal enforcer of the Post-Crisis Ghost. A survivor of a U.S. bombing raid during the Vietnam War, this Cambodian refugee was taken into Rois' services while he was a government agent. Acting as the Green Elite's hitman, Rako framed Nathaniel Adam for treason under Rois' orders, resulting in his drafting into Project: Atom. As the Cambodian, he would clad himself in armor and weaponry tempered by the X-Ionizer, wielding a skein sharp enough to pierce Captain Atom's Dilustel armor.
  • Major Force (Clifford Zmeck): A rapist/murderer exposed to the same experiment that created Captain Atom, he would regularly betray the U.S. government or go back to work for their more clandestine, i.e., crooked, organizations, becoming a regular as Captain Atom's Post-Crisis nemesis.
  • Monarch (Hank Hall): In an alternate future, Hank Hall goes mad and kills Earth's heroes to conquer the world. When the hero Waverider comes back in time to prevent this, he instead creates the paradox that made his future possible. When Monarch goes back in time to retrieve his past self, it was Captain Atom that failed to stop him. Captain Atom battled the villain through time to quell the guilt of his failure to stop him earlier.
  • Plastique (Bette Sans Souci): A French-Canadian terrorist with explosive-based powers and intense separatist designs, first came in contact with Captain Atom during an assassination attempt at a Canadian/American peace delegation. The two frequently clash with one another, eventually falling in love and entering into a whirlwind marriage, albeit a short-lived one.
  • Punch and Jewelee: A husband and wife team of villains who work as thieves and mercenaries. Post-Crisis, they instead fought King Faraday and Nightshade.
  • Thirteen: In reality a federal agent from Earth's future, Thirteen travels back in time with his partner Faustus, a talking cat, to prevent the Ghost from stealing an experimental missile and end up facing Captain Atom. He appears to be a sorcerer but it is unknown if he employs true magic or just sufficiently advanced science.
  • Ultramax: Former assassin turned death row inmate in the early 2000s, when Atom had his meltdown and was catapulted into the Q-Field. Max Thrane, as he was facing the electric chair at the time, was bathed in the fallout during his execution. About a decade later, Captain Atom would return and undo his predicament, only for him to awake finding he had gained similar Quantum Powers due to the hero's blowback years ago, to which, now going by the name Ultramax, Thrane set out on a path of revenge against the one who slated him for his death sentence.

Other versions

  • An alternate universe variant of Captain Atom appears in Armageddon 2001.
  • An alternate universe variant of Captain Atom who was killed by Parasite appears in Kingdom Come.
  • Several alternate universe variants of Captain Atom appear in Countdown to Final Crisis: Quantum Storm from Earth-37, the leader of the Atomic Knights from Earth-38, Brigadier Atom from Earth-13, a Hulk-like variant named Attum, the robotic Quantum Mechanix, Captain Adamma, Quantum Boy, an anthropomorphic wolf version, a Soviet Atom from Earth-30, a Doctor Manhattan-lookalike, and a giant-sized anthropomorphic atom.
  • An alternate universe variant of Captain Atom from Earth-4, amalgamated with Doctor Manhattan and Marvel Comics character Reed Richards, appears in Final Crisis and The Multiversity.
  • An alternate universe variant of Nathaniel Adam who never became Captain Atom appears in Flashpoint.[48][49][50]

In other media

Television

Film

Video games

The Allen Adam and Nathaniel Adam incarnations of Captain Atom appear as character summons in Scribblenauts Unmasked: A DC Comics Adventure.[57]

Miscellaneous

Captain Atom appears in the Injustice: Gods Among Us prequel comic. He joins Batman's Insurgency to combat Superman's growing Regime before being mortally wounded by Wonder Woman while retrieving an enhancement pill from the Fortress of Solitude. Captain Atom then drags Superman to the atmosphere in an attempt to kill him, with the resulting explosion leaving the former dead and Wonder Woman comatose.

Collected editions

Title Material collected Published date ISBN
Action Heroes Archive Volume 1 Space Adventures (vol. 2) #33-42, Captain Atom (vol. 1) #78-82 November 2004 Template:ISBNT
Action Heroes Archive Volume 2 Captain Atom (vol. 1) #83–89, Charlton Bullseye #1–2, 5, Mysterious Suspense #1, Blue Beetle (vol. 5) #1-5 May 2007 Template:ISBNT
Captain Atom: Armageddon Captain Atom: Armageddon #1-9 November 2006 Template:ISBNT
Captain Atom Vol. 1: Evolution Captain Atom (vol. 4) #1–6 December 2012 Template:ISBNT
Captain Atom Vol. 2: Genesis Captain Atom (vol. 4) #0, 7-12 August 2013 Template:ISBNT
Captain Atom: The Rise and Fall of Captain Atom Captain Atom: The Rise and Fall of Captain Atom #1-6 January 2018 Template:ISBNT

References

Template:Reflist

External links

Template:Golden Age of Comic Books Template:Captain Atom Template:Steve Ditko Template:The New 52 Template:Firestorm Template:Justice League characters

  1. ↑ Template:Cite book
  2. ↑ Template:Cite book
  3. ↑ Template:Cite web
  4. ↑ "Alan Moore Interview – Comic Book Artist #9" — An interview with Alan Moore. Retrieved 14 April 2006.
  5. ↑ "Watchmen – Introduction" Template:Webarchive — An overview of the plot and characters in Watchmen. Retrieved 12 March 2006.
  6. ↑ Template:Cite book
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 Template:Cite book
  8. ↑ Template:Cite book
  9. ↑ Manning, Matthew K. "1980s" in Dolan, p. 229: "March [1987] debuted the new Captain Atom in his first DC series, by writer Cary Bates and penciler Pat Broderick".
  10. ↑ Template:Cite comic
  11. ↑ Captain Atom vol. 3, #1 (1983)
  12. ↑ Zero Hour: Crisis in Time
  13. ↑ Template:Cite book
  14. ↑ Ion #10
  15. ↑ Template:Cite web
  16. ↑ Template:Cite web
  17. ↑ Countdown: Arena #1
  18. ↑ Countdown: Arena #4
  19. ↑ Countdown to Final Crisis #17
  20. ↑ Countdown to Final Crisis #13 (January 2008)
  21. ↑ Countdown to Final Crisis #8 (March 2008)
  22. ↑ Superman's Pal: Jimmy Olsen Special #2 (2009)
  23. ↑ Action Comics #883
  24. ↑ Action Comics #884
  25. ↑ As seen in Action Comics #885–886 (March–April 2010)
  26. ↑ Justice League: Generation Lost #1 - 2 (May 2010)
  27. ↑ Justice League: Generation Lost #12 - 14 (October - November 2010)
  28. ↑ Justice League: Generation Lost #24 (April 2011)
  29. ↑ Template:Cite web
  30. ↑ Captain Atom vol. 2 #1 (September 2011)
  31. ↑ Captain Atom vol. 2 #2 (October 2011)
  32. ↑ 32.0 32.1 Captain Atom vol. 2 #3 (November 2011)
  33. ↑ The Fury of Firestorm #15 (February 2013)
  34. ↑ Legion Lost vol. 2 #15 (February 2013)
  35. ↑ Legion Lost vol. 2 #16 (March 2013)
  36. ↑ Template:Cite web
  37. ↑ Template:Cite book
  38. ↑ 38.0 38.1 Template:Cite web
  39. ↑ Template:Cite web
  40. ↑ Template:Cite web
  41. ↑ Captain Atom vol. 2 #31 (July 1989)
  42. ↑ Captain Atom vol. 2 #33 (September 1989)
  43. ↑ 43.0 43.1 43.2 43.3 Template:Cite book
  44. ↑ Green Arrow #26
  45. ↑ Green Arrow #46
  46. ↑ Template:Cite book
  47. ↑ Template:Cite book
  48. ↑ Booster Gold vol. 2 #45 (June 2011)
  49. ↑ Booster Gold vol. 2 #46 (July 2011)
  50. ↑ Booster Gold vol. 2 #47 (August 2011)
  51. ↑ 51.0 51.1 51.2 51.3 51.4 51.5 51.6 Template:Cite web A green check mark indicates that a role has been confirmed using a screenshot (or collage of screenshots) of a title's list of voice actors and their respective characters found in its credits or other reliable sources of information.
  52. ↑ Template:Cite web
  53. ↑ Template:Cite web
  54. ↑ Template:Cite web
  55. ↑ Template:Cite web
  56. ↑ Template:Cite web
  57. ↑ Template:Cite web
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