Colossus, number one! The mighty metal man from Siberia! One of the Xavier School’s finest. Piotr Rasputin is a big man with an even bigger heart. How does a metal farm boy from Russia become a hero of the world that is also feared and hated? Let’s find out!
Piotr Nikolaievitch Rasputin is the son of Alexandra and Nikolai Rasputin and brother to Mikhail and Illyana Rasputin. Born and raised in a farming community near Lake Baikal in Siberia, Piotr was raised to be a sweet and good person. When he was 13 years old, his mutant powers manifested, converting him into an osmium metal version of himself, granted incredible strength and durability. He’d use his powers to help his fellow villagers.
Professor Charles Xavier would come a calling one day when Piotr was an adult, asking him to join a new generation of X-Men to help save the original team. Thus would begin Piotr’s life long relationship with the X-Men. He’d be considered the little brother to his teammates both for his comparitive age and youthful view of the world.
When he wasn’t off fighting strange creatures, like still-alive T-Rexes, or being brainwashed into being the supervillain The Proletarian, Piotr spent his time practicing his artistic skills. While he loved the new family he’d made with the X-Men he still missed his family in Russia, dearly. His sister, Illyana would come live with the X-Men after being rescued from the villain Arcade, the same villain who’d brainwashed Piotr. Living with the X-Men is reallynhazardous and soon Illyana is kidnapped and trapped in the dimension of Limbo, Colossus and the X-Men waste no time to get her back. The problem with Limbo is, it does not follow time the same way we are used to, so when Illyana is found, the once 6 year old Illyana was now 13.
After adventures against Dracula and the Brood, Piotr and Kitty Pride would start to date. Piotr is abducted along with many other heroes into a space battle that has heroes and villains face off for the amusement of a cosmic entity. Believing they were going to die soon, Piotr sleeps with an alien woman and upon surviving the Secret Wars, returns home to break up with Kitty due to his infidelity.
Piotr would learn that his sister’s time in Limbo had been spent learning sorcery so she was now an X-Men as well and the two would work together often. While on a mission to rescue the Morlock mutants, Piotr would kill a villain who left him temporarily paralysed and stuck in his metal form from their battle. This mission would turn into a massacre and Illyana would be terrified at her own power while attempting to go back in time and save everyone, Piotr would promise to her he would always be there for her.
It took months to recover but Piotr would return to fighting alongside the X-Men. He and his sister would have many adventures, together and apart, theyd even fight their own brother whod been transformed while in space as a cosmonaut. Then something happened that turned Illyana back to her Earth age and while taking her to live with their parents, they would learn they had been killed shortly before they got there. Soon the Legacy Virus, a disease killing all mutants, was ravaging the Earth, and it took Illyana’s life.
Shaken, and with no family left, Piotr would join Magneto and his Acolytes and turn against the against the X-Men and their way of life. This would prove temporary as Piotr would soon see just how different Magneto and his way we’re just too different for him. Returning to the X-Men, he’d learn that Beast may have found a cure for the Legacy Virus but that it would need a mutant to be sacrificed for it to take effect. Piotr would volunteer and in his last act alive, save the entirety of all mutantkind. Kitty Pride would take his ashes and spread them over his family’s old farmland.
Though, like many heroes, death was not the end for Piotr. He’d actually had his body stolen by an alien who believed Piotr would be responsible for destroying his home planet and would take his body, revive him and conduct experiments on his comatose body. Why revive the person you fear is going to destroy your planet seems backwards but I’m not from Breakworld, so who knows. Eventually the X-Men would rescue him and he and Kitty would begin dating once more. He would also find a world where Illyana had returned to life as well and that there brother Mikhail was still a villain.
Alive once more, Piotr would find himself experiencing all sorts of new powers such as becoming the Juggernaut by the power of the Cyttorak entity and then being possessed by the Phoenix Force along with Cyclops, Illyana, Emma Frost, and Namor MacKenzie (Yes, for real, his last name is Mackenzie) and he would do this while wielding both powers at the same time. He’d find the Juggernaut powers constantly telling him to destroy while the Phoenix Force had ideas of its own, Piotr would struggle with these destructive thoughts as he was often a good boy.
He and Illyana would struggle to remain kind to one another as their new powers ate away at them. They’d fight each other until they lost the Phoenix Force and then Illyana would take Piotr to Limbo where she’d sever his connection to the Cyttorak. Realizing she could have rescued him from the hellish prison of being the Juggernaut at any time she chose, this broke their bond and his spirit.
Much upheaval would happen with the X-Men but eventually Piotr would return to a more fully reformed X-Men. Soon he’d hear the siren song of the Cyttorak and warn Storm, the current leader of the team, of its return. While the X-Men battled to destroy the gem that empowered someone with the powers of the Juggernaut, others fought to reclaim it for their own power. Piotr would face off against one of the first wielder, Cain Marko, the two would battle with blows that knocked each other miles away. Instead of being able to destroy the gem, Piotr could only trap Marko like so many had before.
Eventually, Illyana and Piotr would mend their friendship somewhat and join the X-Men in a rescue mission but end up trapped themselves to be experimented on with Terrigen Mist. Though they’d escape relatively unharmed, they’d now be living in a world with Mpox, a new disease killing off mutants and stunting the existence of new mutants from existing. To help save a newly created set of mutants, Piotr would travel to a future where Apocalypse had won and Piotr would be captured and turned into his horseman, War. Though Illyana would rescue him he would still remain as War.
There you have it! Colossus is one of my favorite mutants and all around superheroes. He is a big metal man who wants to do good in a rough world. He recently was in theaters in Deadpool where he was very much a goody two shoes and hopefully will have more screen time in the sequels. See you next time!
Suggested Reading
Giant-Size X-Men #1
Uncanny X-Men
X-Men
Astonishing X-Men
Ultimate X-Men
Excalibur
Cable and X-Force
Extraordinary X-Men
Dr. Bustos
drbustos@comicattack.net
One of my favorite X-Men here! I still say one of the best issues of UXM was 183 where he was suffering from the Kitty break up & Logan and Kurt took him drinking and it ended up in a fight w/ Juggernaut!