History Behind DCUO: Gorillas A-Go-Go!

Gorillas!
I know what you're thinking. "Really? Gorillas? What, is there a history of gorillas in DC?" To which I'd say, "Of course!"

DC's history with gorillas goes back decades. Look back at DC's Silver Age output, and you'll notice a strange, recurring thing... Taro, the Gorilla Witch in Strange Adventures #186. The Mod Gorilla Boss in Strange Adventures #201, who fought Animal Man in one of his five appearances. The Living Bomb Beast and the Gorilla Mob Boss of Gotham City, who came to blows with the Caped Crusader in Detective Comics #339 and Batman #75, respectively, and Mogo the Bat-Ape, who helped the Dynamic Duo in Batman #114, and who is my favorite Silver Age one-shot Bat character.

There were even recurring characters, like Beppo the Super Monkey, Monsieur Mallah and Gorilla Grodd. The mark our primate pals left on comics is undeniable. But the question remains- why?

Surprisingly, we know. Strange Adventures was one of a number of anthology titles DC ran during the Atomic Age and the Silver Age, and ran predominently science-fiction stories. There weren't any recurring characters for quite a few years. Issue 8, May 1951, had a cover feature entitled "Evolution- Plus!" by Gardner Fox. The issue concerned a crook getting an evolution ray and causing hijinks. The contents aren't terribly important to the issue at hand, however. The cover is. Sales apparently spiked on this issue.

Julius Schwartz, a great fellow who was editor of various titles from the mid-1940s when he cut his (comic) teeth on All-Star Comics to the 1980s, when Superman tearfully bid adieu to his editor on the cover to the second half of "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?", kept ledgers carefully tracking sales of sales of comics. So, while I'm not 100% sure about this, I'd say Julie was the fellow who is responsible for the surge of gorillas in comics.

And once that was observed, the flood gates- or, shall we say, gorilla gates- were open. Over the course of the next twenty years, gorillas went from being something that was occasionally in comics, like anything else, to being a massive part. Superman fought at least a half dozen gorillas, and even became a gorilla. Hawkman fought flying gorillas in one very inexplicable comic, even for the Silver Age. And of course, the Flash came to blows with a certain recurring gorilla rogue multiple times throughout the ages.

Even decades later, the legacy of Gorillas marches on. Secret Origins #40, May 1989, was dedicated completely to primates, featuring the Secret Origins of Gorilla City, DC longtimer Congorilla (Ran for thirty years in Action!) and Detective Chimp. In 1999, DC had an entire summer event in the annuals called JLApe, wherein Grodd turns the heroes into gorillas. Even Alan Moore has alluded to the legendary gimmicks of the Silver Age in Promethea, with Crying Gorilla Comix, a nod to Carmine Infantino's claims that the color purple and heroes weeping sold covers.

Of amusing note, the gorilla in the pinstripe suit that you see at in, IIRC, villain clubs is likely an allusion to the aforementioned Mod Gorilla Boss.

Gorilla City
Gorilla City is a long standing feature in the DCU, dating back to Flash #106, April-May 1959. In its first appearance, Gorilla City was largely as it appears today: A brilliant, isolationist city deep in Africa, inhabited solely by hyper-intelligent gorillas.

It's a lovely, distinctly comic book concept, isn't it?

Anyways, as per the aforementioned gorilla centric Secret Origins #40, an alien spaceship crashed into the jungles of Africa. A bunch of curious gorillas then ripped open the spaceship and were briefly enamored with a shiny gem, and then cast it aside. In the original origin for Gorilla City, this was the source of their intelligence, similar to Green Lantern foe Hector Hammond. The alien inside the ship ends up worshipped as a god, and helps educate the gorillas, as well as instructing them to construct a city. When the gorillas are holding the crystal, two beams are released. One is pure and straight and strikes the gorilla that will become king: Solovar. The other, warped, hits the gorilla that will become known as Grodd.

Two explorers, Hughes and Albert Westly, find the city and learn of its origin from the alien that was in the ship, a wizened yet infant-esque creature worshipped by the gorillas. The two are welcomed by the gorillas and the Mentor, who wishes to escape with the two. However, the warped gorilla ends controlling the two as they escape, causing Hughes to kill the Mentor. While Westly is able to escape back to civilization, whereupon he is promptly stuck in a madhouse, Hughes isn't so lucky and are beaten to death. It turns out the whole thing was a gambit by Grodd to ensure isolation for Gorilla City.

The next time the City would see an outsider would be when Barry Allen, the Flash, was welcomed to the city whilst searching for the diabolical Grodd. He became friends with Solovar, helping him against Grodd time and time again, until Barry died in the Crisis on Infinite Earths. In the time following his death, Gorilla City began to open up more. In JLA Annual #3, part of the summer 1999 JLApe event, Solovar was prepared to open up Gorilla City to the United Nations before he was assassinated. More on that later.

Do note that Gorilla City has never been on an island in the comics, nor did the rocketship survive. It was explicitly destroyed by gorillas. There also isn't a volcano. I'm not entirely sure why the changes were made to DCUO, but it does help the game stand on its own, however small.

Gorilla Grodd
Arguably the most famous Gorilla in comics, Gorilla Grodd has been a thorn in the Scarlet Speedster's side since Flash #106, April-May 1959. This makes him one of Barry's oldest rogues, postdating only Captain Cold and the Turtle. In his first appearance, the psychic gorilla quests for the secret of "Force of Mind", or mind control. This story also has the frankly hilaroius Fred Pearson, a friend of Barry Allen's who starred in a popular stage show called "The Great Gorilla". The reason this is so funny is because the show apparently only has a single set, a living room, and stars a gorilla.

Anywho, the Force of Mind ends up being held within Solovar, the king of Gorilla City. Barry ends up having to help the king defeat the warped ape. Grodd ended up being a favorite of John Broome, apparenlty, appearing several other times in the next few years. For intance, he was involved in the positively memetic Flash #115, September 1960- the infamous "The Day the Flash Weighed 1000 Pounds!", wherein he fat-ifies the Flash. He was also a charter member of the Rogues in Flash #155, September 1965, though he is traditionally not on very positive terms with any of the Rogues, let alone a member.

However, the next big appearance for Grodd was in the 1970s title Secret Society of Super-Villains. While he was part of the Society from issue 1 on, it was in issue 8, August 1977 where Grodd actually became leader of the Society, pre-dating another infamous gorilla to lead the Society. This helped solidify Grodd as a "big" villain, along with appearing in the Challange of the Superfriends cartoon, though he lacked his trademark psychic abilities in that. Heck, he wasn't even the right color- he was brown.

Post-Crisis, he was a thorn in the sides of the Teen Titans, when he formed Tartarus, a super-group of villains consisting of mostly also-rans. He came to blows with the then new Flash, Wally West, and was defeated in part by Rex the Wonder Dog. And in his most ambitious, and mimicked in other media, Grodd attempted to turn the entire human species into gorillas in JLApe, an aforementioned event that makes up a big part of his arc in DCUO.

Interestingly, though he has never, to my knowledge, met the Ultra-Humanite, his hatred of "false" gorillas DOES stem from the comics. In Salvation Run #4, April 2008, he murdered Mnsr. Mallah, a gorilla artifiically made intelligent by his eventual boyfriend, a disembodied French brain, calling him a false gorilla that dares compare itself to a son of Gorilla City. Then he beat Mallah to death with the broken case of the Brain. Then the Joker kicked him off a cliff, where he was (wrongly, of course) assumed dead. Amusing aspect to keep for the game.

Gorillabomb
The amusing concept of a "Gorillabomb" that permeates the Grodd chapters is, amusingly enough, from the comics. The Gorillabomb was prominently featured in the JLApe annuals from Summer 1999. The storyline involved King Solovar being assassinated, supposedly by the "Human Supremacy Movement", but in truth by a secret cabal (Is there any other?) of evil gorillas called Simian Scarlet, being manipulated in turn by Grodd. Solovar had planned to open Gorilla City up and join the United Nations, but the perpetually scheming Grodd would have other plans.

Following the assassination, Prince Ulgo (more on him later) takes over the throne and declares war on humans at the UN. There, a Gorillabomb detonates, turning the UN Assembly into gorillas. The Flash (Wally West), Aquaman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Kyle Raynor and the Martian Manhunter are also turned. The rest of the very fun event has the various JLApes coming to blows with the Simian Scarlet, each themed after a different archetype (For instance: Grimm, the mob boss, or Admiral Tralfagor, the pirate captain) before turning their eyes on Grodd.

Of note is the way the Gorillabomb works. Rather than relying on already wonky evolution science, the Gorillabomb goes full on comic science and reconfigures your Morphogenetic Signature. The Morphogentetic Field, AKA the Red, is similar to the Green that binds all plant life in the Swamp Thing comics.

Surprisingly, the Gorillabomb has not been limited to JLApe and DCUO. It appeared as a major plot point in the last sesaon of Justice League Unlimited, wherein Lex Luthor discovered rival for leader of the Secret Society of Supervillains, Gorilla Grodd, had planned to detonate one and turn the planet's population into gorillas. Lex found the idea moronic and took over. It also appeared in Brave and the Bold episode "Terror on Dinosaur Island!", as a thematicly similar E-Ray that in and of itself may be a throwback to Evolution Plus.

Ultra-Humanite
Tip your hat, boys, for the oldest villain in DC Universe Online. Hailing from the long ago Action Comics #13, June 1939, he's just a month older than Batman and barely a year older than his first villain, Superman.

The Ultra-Humanite first appeared, as one could surmise from the above, as a Superman villain. He did not, however, appear as the albino gorilla most are familiar with. His first appearance was really strange, and involved the Ultra-Humanite masterminding a taxicab racket business in preparation for world domination. He had zero motivation. He just wanted to control the world. He even used the phrase world domination. In this story, he is an invalid confined to a wheel chair. In the end of the issue, the Humanite is assumed dead following his escape rocket exploding. He returned to trouble the early Man of Steel a handful of times as his first arch nemesis. Of note, was an appearance in Action Comics #21 that also introduced Terry Curtis who, forty years later, would become an important character in Roy Thomas' All-Star Squadron series. Action Comics #20 introduced the idea that he was capable of transplanting his brain into other bodies, namely that of Hollywood actress Delores Winters. This has became his second most used and remembered of his bodies.

Following the introduction of Luthor, and subsequent balding thereof, Jerry Siegal chose to retire the Humanite rather than have two bald mad scientists fighting against the Humanite. He lurked in limbo for decades afterwords. The Superman Family title in the 1970s had a feature entitled "Mr. and Mrs. Superman", which starred the Earth-2, or Golden Age, Superman and his wife, Lois Lane-Kent. In these backups the Ultra-Humanite was reintroduced.Once again, he used the brain-swapping gimmick. Although his gorilla form still wasn't introduced, he did switch his brain into a giant ant at one point. That earns style points, right?

His big break came in Justice League of America, vol. 1, #s 195-198,October-December 1981. In this arc, the Justice League and Earth-2's Justice Society came to blows against the aforementioned Secret Society of Supervillains and their new leader, who is revealed to the Humanite in an all new body, and the one that would be his most inconic: The albino gorilla with the elongated head. Interestingly, a story a few years earlier in Detective Comics #482, March 1979, starred a villain named Xavier Simon that also transfered his mind into an albino gorilla. Perhaps that was a "prototype" of the Humanite, similar to the Marvel Monsters that were called the Hulk.

The Humanite also meneced the All-Star Squadron and their time-traveling children in the Generation Saga that kicked off Infinity Inc., starting in March 1984. Following the Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Humanite's history was, understandably, tinkered with. He wasn't seen too much until Geoff Johns used him in the JSA arc "Stealing Thunder", in 2002. In that arc, he switched his brain into Johnny Thunder's body and uses the Thunderbolt to take over the world, finally realizing his goal of global domination.

Then he gets shot in the head by the Crimson Avenger.

Of course, that didn't stop him from reappearing. In Geoff Johns and Jeff Katz' Booster Gold, he was a member of the Time Stealers, a pretty cool grouping of time-traveling villains. We actually saw where his original body came from in one appearance, in Justice League of America vol. 2 #7, July 2007. The albino gorilla was Nzame, a rare gorilla born into Gorilla City with healing powers. In a way, this makes Grodd's hatered of the "false" gorilla even funnier, considering that the body he inhabits is a holy gorilla.

There have also been two other Post-Crisis Ultra-Humanites, one in Legends of the DC Universe and the other in Palmiotti and Grey's Power Girl, but they really don't have much bearing here, so we'll let them slide.

Prince Ulgo
Mindblowing to me as well as likely you, the first boss in the Containment Facility alert is, in fact, from comics. Prince Ulgo first appeared in JLA Annual #3, part of the JLApe story. As mentioned before, he was the Prince of Gorilla City, and Solovar's nephew. Following the assassination of Solovar, Ulgo took the throne and declared war on the human species.

Ulgo later takes control of a giant robotic gorilla, Groggamesh, and begins to lay waste to Metropolis in Superman Annual #11. A newly un-Apified Superman reveals to Ulgo that his uncle wasn't assassinated by humans under their own free will, but instead were being manipulated by the Simian Scarlet. Then, as giant robots in comics are apt to do, Groggamesh goes out of control and is put out of commision by Superman. With the newly revealed treachery revealed to him, Ulgo agrees to help Superman and the rest of the JLA. In Martian Manhunter Annual #2, Ulgo fully apologizes for Gorilla City's actions during JLApe, and agrees to make full reparations. He's actually pretty cool in this appearance, humble and ready to carry on the dream of his uncle, that of human and gorilla co-existance.

Yeah, he's not a villain in his only appearances. Strange, huh?

History Behind DCUO: TO Morrow and the Red Tornado

Thomas Oscar Morrow
As mentioned prevoiusly, DC has a proud history of playing sufferers of Malign Hypercognition Disorder completely straight, owing in no small part to their much more stereotypical Silver Age. Thomas Oscar Morrow first appeared in Flash #143, cover date March 1964. Interestingly, for a character that is much more associated with the Justice League of America, he first appeared in a title that he really has no long lasting connection to.

In his first appearance, Morrow had what would become ostensibly his gimmick and main power- a special "television set" that allowed him to look one hundred years into the future as well as pull things through to the past/present using a "fourth dimensional hook". In his first appearance, he menaced Barry Allen as well as his pal Hal Jordan by making duplicates of Hal. This story had the wonderfully Silver Age title of "The Trial of the False Green Lanterns!". Gotta love those old titles. Anywho, at the end of the issue , Morrow falls into some big machine and is presumed dead. But, as James Robinson had Wes Dodds say in Starman, dead isn't dead unless you see the body. And even then, sometimes not.

And indeed, in Justice League of America #64, August 1968, TO Morrow returned. As it turns out, the machine had somehow thrown him onto Earth-2. See, back in the Silver Age, DC introduced the Multiverse. The first alternate Earth introduced, in Flash #123, September 1961, was Earth-2. On this Earth, the Silver Age had never happened, the heroes had been around and fought in WWII, etc.

On Earth-2, Morrow used his tvs to see that if he were to rob the "Museum of the 20th Century", because we totally need a museum less than three quarters through it, he would be stopped by the Justice Society. So, his solution is to make an artificial being and infiltrate the JSA so they can't fight back. Or something of that sort. The whole story is beautifully 60s with a disregard for much logic. Case in point: Hourman builds a computer that tells him where crimes are being committed, apparently because its just that smart. Note that Rex was a chemist, not any sort of engineer.

Anywho, using a device called a "Humaniztron" he creates the Red Torando, who will be discussed at length in the below section, as has became standard.

TO Morrow's next crime was to try and rob Atlantis, which in the world of Earth-Two had been raised by archeoligists. Because, you know. Archeologists totally raise continents all the time. Anywho, the Justice League of Earth-One gets involved and saves the day yadda yadda yadda. This is what Morrow became most famous for, really. Creating the Red Tornado. Sometime in this era, Morrow got split into two people and one of them became Tomorrow, the Future Man, a weird hyper-evolved man whose body wasn't able to keep up and failed. This has been totally ignored.

Following the Crisis on Infinite Earths, TO Morrow first appeared in Flash v2 #19, December 1988. In this story, Morrow attends a party thrown for the Flash Rogues, perhaps the only awknowledgement I've ever seen of his start as a Flash villain. In said story, Morrow's origins are slightly rewritten to have him as a native of Poland whose real name is actually Tomek Ovadya Morah. Note Tomek is actually the Polish form of Thomas. In this era, Morrow was portrayed as a guy who has, by his own admission, "cracked up" because of his glimpses into the future.

JLA #5 is one of the more notable appearances Morrow has had over the years. Alongside Professor Ivo, another prominent mad scientist, Morrow creates another android to infiltrate the Justice League, Tomorrow Woman. Tomorrow Woman ends up betraying them to save the Justice League because they had made her too perfect- as the issues says, she developed a soul. This issue is really funny, and has some great banter between Morrow and Ivo. Really, this is where DC started playing their mad scientists completely straight. Note Ivo was the creator of the Amazo android, which is likely where the Morrow's Magnificent Mechaniks piece about the Amazo Voculizer is in reference too.

There was a forgetteble event called DC 2000 that happeend and had Morrow take technology from the year 2000 back to the '40s that happened, but its not really important. His next big appearance was in 52, wherein he's shown as a prisoner in a mad scientist prison village called Haven. In said series, it is revealed that he was Will Magnus' tutor and a good friend of his. In the course of the story, Morrow is captured and taken to Oolong Island. Whilst there, Morrow develops his now trademark Hawaiian shirt outfit. Hilariously, this carries over to DCUO not just with his design but also with the Hawaiian style you get for complete the Science Squad Experiments collection. Which is a totally awesome touch. During the climactic fight with

Morrow's friendship with Magnus has survived the reboot, as seen in the supplementary text in Justice League #3. In addition, he's shown involved with STAR Labs in the rebooted timeline. Time will tell if he'll come back to menace the justice League again, but the presence of the Red Tornado on the Justice League may hint that he'll be back.

Oh, and that panel at the top? That literally came the panel after the Doctor Death panel from last update. God, I love 52.

Red Tornado
The first Red Tornado was a humor character from DC's Golden Age. She was a working mother whose son, known as Scribbly, was the star of Sheldon Mayer's semi-autobiographic humor feature, Scribbly. As Ma Hunkle, she first appeared in All-American Comics #3, June 1939 and as the Red Torando All-American Comics #20, November 1940. As the Torando she took some red long underwear and a kettle for a helmet and took the fight to the crooks that plauged her area of NYC. She guested in the first ever JSA story in All-Star Comics #3, Winter 1940-1941. It's a pretty darn funny cameo, actually. The JSA stories were great.

Why am I talking about a character that isn't really important at hand? Because the Red Torando in question was designed by TO Morrow to try and fool the JSA into thinking he was Ma Hunkle and infiltrate them. It didn't work, and Reddy ended up joining the Justice League, becoming a fairly prominent member of the Sattelite era.

Now, the origins of the Red Tornado are rather complex. It was eventually revealed that Reddy was, in fact, two entities from the planet Rann, the Tornado Champion and Ulthoon, the Tornado Tyrant. The latter first appeared in Mystery in Space #61, August 1960. The Tyrant was beaten by Rann's champion, Adam Strange. Following this, the Tyrant decided that it pays to be good and went off to an uninhabited planet and made it into a replica of Earth, complete with a Justice League. Said League was actually the Tyrant, now calling itself the Tornado Champion. However, the Champion found it ain't that satisfying being a duplicate, so it traveled to Earth-Two and found the Red Tornado being created and merged with him. In the process it lost its memory, so essentially the Red Tornado was a new entity.

This may have been lost Post-Crisis, where the Red Tornado may have been created as an elemental by the spirit of Earth, Gaea. But maybe not. While Reddy has a bit of a convuluted history, he doesn't approach the horrors of pre-Crisis Black Canary or Post-Crisis Hawkman.

Reddy eventually got himself a wife, Kathy Sutton, and an adopted daughter, Traya Sutton. He's pretty unique as far as comic book androids go- contrast him with his totally not source material, the Vision. He's been technological, magical and in-between. A Leaguer, a Societyman, a Layman (Primal Force was pretty cool!) and a piece of art made by an Australian sold on eBay. Pretty cool character all around.

Other Tornado Androids
Well, the Red Tornado is an android. So it stands to reason that, yeah. There are going to be other androids of his sort. In the Tornado's first appearance, Morrow had other androids similar to the Torando but without tornado abilities. They were just kinda there.

For the most part, the Torando enemies in DCUO draw inspiration from Brad Meltzer's (totally awesome) Justice League of America v2. At the end of issue 2, November 2006, we see a shedload of Tornado robots. In the following issue, we are treated to a whole lot of Tornado robots created by Morrow. Said robots look like palette swaps of Reddy. The green attack with lightning, the blue with wind, the yellow with solar power and the black don't seem to have powers- they just karate chop you. The extra Tornadoes appeared fairly briefly, and were taken down quite easily by Hal Jordan after the Black Canary found their deactivation switch- which was in their heel. Get it? Achiles Heel? Yeah, its pretty insufferable.

While there has never been a Red Tornado style robot in the comics called the Tornado Tyrant, in the televisoin show Brave and the Bold Reddy made himself a son, modeled after his original costume, called the Tornado Champion. Said Champion ended up becoming a villain called the Tornado Tyrant. I doubt this was intentional, but it is worth mentioning, I guess. I loved that show- if you haven't, you should totally check it out.

Starting in 52, there were hints at other Tornado robots. These came to a head in the Red Tornado miniseries that started in November 2009. The miniseries introduced three other robots- the Red Torpedo (II; there was a Golden Age hero named the Red Torpedo. I guess Morrow had pulled the GA hero trick before), the Red Inferno and the Red Volcano. Overall, you can ignore these characters if you want, although Inferno and Torpedo got appearances on the television series Young Justice, albeit modified. That was pretty cool too.

History Behind DCUO: Brainiac

Few characters in the DC universe have the sort of fame- or infamy- that Vrill Dox of the planet Colu does. For good reasons- he stands as one of Superman's most dangerous rogues, let alone the majority of DC characters. He also has one of the most convoluted histories of anyone this side of Hawkman.

Brainiac was created by acclaimed science fiction and comics writer Otto Binder and longtime Superman artist Al Plastino in Action Comics #242, cover date July 1958. This is a rather important issue for the Man of Steel for a number of reasons. First, it introduced one of his most prominant adversaries and the first mainstay from the Silver Age. Secondly, it introduced the Bottled City of Kandor. But now we're getting ahead of ourself, aren't we?

In #242, Brainiac is introduced as a green skinned, pink pantsed alien from the planet Colu. Brainiac, in one of those lovely high concept ideas commmon to science fiction before the bug of realism bit it, quite literally steals cities. He does this by shrinking them and fitting them into tiny glass bottles, complete with inexplicable artificial suns and tubes for oxygen. Among the bottled cities was Kandor, a city saved from Krypton prior to its destruction. Superman ends up defeating Brainiac, but not without the Kandorians sacrificing their chance at being embiggened once again.

Now, there are a handfull of things that are important about this story we have to deal with before going on. Most notably, it introduced Kandor, which will likely be covered in greater detail in a later piece. Suffice to say, Kandor is important to the overall narrative of Superman for being the first major piece of Krypton to survive the planet's destruction. Prior to this, there had been survivors of Krypton, such the villainous- and male- Mala and his brothers U-Ban and Kizo. But Kandor was the first step in making Superman not the last son of Krypton he had been, but the Silver Age Superman, who was but one of many survivors of Krypton.

Brainiac himself is rather interesting for one reason too. Well, I'm sure you've heard of at least one adaption where he is machine. In the DC Animated Universe, in DCUO, seemingly in the DCnU, Brainiac has been a machine. So how does that fit in with the original, Coluan alien? Simple: One of the earliest retcons. And what a reason for it!

You see, whilst the term Brainiac has entered the popular lexicon because of the Superman villain, it did indeed exist separately in the 1950s, as the name of a home computer kit made by Edmund Berkely. Following Brainiac's first appearance, DC was apparently contacted about the kit's name. Rather than fight it or anything, DC agreed to simply plug the kit in the letters pages of their comics when Brainiac appeared. In this issue he also recieved the familiar diode knit pattern on his head. More on this in a bit- it eventually became

Brainiac appeared as an antagonist on and off for the next few decades, receiving a major upgrade in June, 1983 in Action #544 at the hands of the OG Crisis architect Marv Wolfman. This story also introduced Lex Luthor's power armor, complete with vintage Simon chest piece. In this story, Brainiac creates an entire planet out of metal and computers in yet another attempt to destroy Superman. This ends up backfiring, as he gets trapped in the center of the planet. Brainiac causes a star to go supernova to get out and has to recreate his form. In his new form he forgoes any pretense of an organic form and just goes straight up Terminator. His new form, designed by Ed Hannigan, was a metal skeleton with a honeycomb pattern on the skull. In addition, he also got a massive skull shaped spaceship. The skull ship and general skeletal theme is echoed thorughout DCUO, from the design of the probes to Brainiac's face. Note his distinct lack of a nose.

This redesign has proved far more versatile than the two years it existed in comics would suggest- it was in Superfriends: The Legendary Super Powers, was made into a Super Powers action figure and in general has proved incredibly resiliant. Heck, in the past five years there have been two action figures made of it alone- one in DC Superheroes and another in DC Direct's Crisis on Infinite Earths series.

In addition, Geoff Johns and Gary Frank used it as the basis for one of the most important influences on DCUO's Brainiac. In the first issue of their five issue Braniac arc, which ran from Action 866 to 870, Superman encounters what is seemingly the metal body design. It turns out that this is a probe, a drone. In fact, this arc revealed that Superman had never directly fought Brainiac post-Crisis. (I won't innumerate the various faux Brainiacs Superman had fought, because of the sheer number of them and because they have little to no sway on DCUO. They will likely be mentioned later though.) This interpretation of Brainiac reintroduced the bottling aspect and it is here that DCUO's visuals for the bottling likely comes from. No longer was it just shrinking it and sticking it in a bottle- forcefields are erected, drone forces decimate populations, and in the end, Brainiac destroys the planet to make his information more valuable. It was no longer simply about collection- though organic, Braniac now had an outright obsession with information and how valuable it was.

The drones in DCUO are direct references to the drones from Geoff's arc and the original skullship. The tank like enemies, which include the Brainiac Overseer from the tutorial, are essentially the skullship with legs. In addition, the probe aspect, with Brainiac being able to control robot bodies with his consciencious is almost directly from Geoff's run, although it has its basis in Byrne's early Superman run, with the disembodied consciousness of Vrill Dox possessing carny psychic Milton Fine. From what I understand, the probe aspect is used in one of the Fortress of Solitude raids, though I'm not quite high enough combat rating wise to do those yet.

One of the last things about Brainiac that influences his DCUO character is his role in the DCAU. Forgoing the convolution of the Coluan/robot/Milton Fine/whatev from the comics of the time, Bruce Timm opted instead for a more elegant Brainiac. In the DACU, Brainiac originates on Krypton, as the AI that ran the supercomputer systems that controlled day to day activiities on Krypton. When the planet began its descent into destruction, Brainiac covered up this from the Science Council so as to better save himself. Jor-El, Superman's father, eventually finds out Brainiac's treachery, but not before it is too late to do anything. Brainiac takes to the stars, creating an android body for himself. This body has a distinct, triangular pattern of diodes on its forehead, an obvious refernece to the neural web the Silver Age Brainiac wore. This simple and elegant symbol became an emblem of sort for Brainiac, much in in the same way the S shield did for Superman, or the Batsignal for Batman.

Suprisingly, this didn't make its way into continuity with Vrill Dox, but instead his 30th century descendent, Querel Dox, alias Brainiac 5. In Legion of Super-Heroes #104, May 1998, Brainiac 5 adopts a design resembling it to show his "upgrade" to Brainiac 5.1. More stirctly, the three-boot Brainy adopts it in Legion of Super-Heroes #37 (February 2008). Brainiac himself has it in Action #866.

The symbol is in almost all of the humanoid Brianiac drones, be it intentional or not. Mostly around the chest. It's an amusing detail and quite impressive they managed to put it in!

(Note: Due to the internet blackout of sites like Wiki, images will be edited in later. Sorry 'bout that!)