Hello everyone, and welcome to this week’s edition of Marvel Snapshot! This week I’ll be focusing on one of my favorite villains in Kang the conqueror! This time-traveling, technological wizard is front and center this week, so get ready for some crazy action.
OK, so, first off, there are a lot of names that are synonymous with Kang. Immortus, Rama-Tut, Scarlet Centurion, Fred (Flintstone), and so on. Honestly, if I tried to explain what I know and have read about the different versions of Kang to you, we’d be here for hours. Suffice to say that Kang is from the distant future, and lives only for conquest. He has traveled back and forth through time more than anybody, and at first, that was a problem. You see, initially when Kang (as well as others) started to time travel, he (and they) would create other versions of themselves that would populate other time-lines. Confusing, I know, but if you read a lot of Kang’s appearances, it gets pretty clear.
For the most part, Kang’s main enemy is The Avengers. He travels back and forth through time again and again, to try and conquer the Earth and subsequently the Avengers as well. Each time Kang is met with a flaw that somehow beats him. Usually he has the advantage in just about every aspect, but either bad luck or his own selfishness does him in. For me personally, the story line the Celestial Madonna is my favorite Kang story. In it, Kang returns to Earth to find out which woman will be the Celestial Madonna, so he can “mate” with her and create an heir. The women that Kang had narrowed it down to are as follows: The Scarlet Witch (nice), Mantis (I’d go there), and Agatha Harkness (ewww). Kang figured out that it was Mantis and tried to seduce her, but before he could, the Avengers who were aided by Rama-Tut and Hawkeye (no, he wasn’t an Avenger at this time) stopped him.
My other favorite Kang moment was in Kurt Busiek’s volume three run. Kang and his son Marcus decide to return to the 20th century with their giant sword shaped vessel, Damocles, to try and take over Earth. They actually succeed, but then Kang is beaten because of his son’s betrayal due to his love for Warbird (Ms. Marvel). After Captain America defeats Kang one on one, Kang is imprisoned. He is quickly rescued, though, by his son Marcus. Afterward, Kang explains to Marcus that he would have rather been executed, than be rescued by a son that had betrayed him. And then he murders his own son by stabbing him in the gut (nice guy, huh). One of the crowning achievements of that story in my opinion was issue #49. In it, there are no words. Nope, not a single word or thought bubble, just pictures of Kang seizing control of the world. Pretty amazing stuff right there. The Young Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, and others have recently faced Kang, and I hope we’ll see him even more in the future!
Make sure to check my recommended reading list and also some great pics of this villain from the far flung future!
Recommended Reading
Celestial Madonna – Tpb
Avengers: Kang Dynasty – Tpb
Avengers: Kang Time and Time Again – Tpb
Avengers Forever – Tpb
Avengers: Citizen Kang – Tpb
Billy Dunleavy
billy@comicattack.net
Kang’s history is a confusing one and probably that’s why I never fully “got” the character. I read somewhere the he was a different version of Dr. Doom, then I read that he was his own character who shared no relation to Doom, and basically there are more Kangs running around the time lines. Which always led to wonder how come he just didn’t conquer man before all of the heroes came into play and dominate the planet from then on?
@Speech- Its been hinted that he may be a distant relative of Dooms. The multiple Kangs running around was cleared up in Kang: Time and Time Again -Tpb, when he murdered all the other “Kang’s”, making him the “Prime Kang”. Why any time traveler doesn’t go to the dawn of man I’ll never know. 😀
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