Crash Course in Villainy IX

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Omega Red

Depending on what story you read, Arkady has a different family name. Rossovich, Gregorivich, or Vasyliev…I suppose it doesn’t matter as long as you know the basics: Arkady is a Russian killer who was captured and then subjected to KGB experimentation. What they hoped would be a Captain America-like result ended in a monster creation, complete with tentacles. Omega has to drain the life force from people in order to keep these carbonadium tentacles from poisoning himself since Wolverine, Maverick and Sabretooth stole his Synthesizer (I’m kinda  feeling bad for the guy!). Due to this and ensuing mental instabilit,y he was  frozen and then revived by The Hand before falling under the control of the Soul Skinner who manipulated him into fighting the X-Men several times. After one last attempt at capturing Wolverine in order to find his Synthesizer, he is killed by a Muramasa blade through the heart. Currently, Omega Red is in hell.

Omega Red’s powers include superhuman strength, speed, stamina, durability, agility, and reflexes, a regenerative healing factor, carbonadium tentacles, pheromone secretion that causes sickness and death, life force absorption and is skilled in hand to hand combat and is an expert tactician.

A good story arc to read with Omega Red in it is Wolverine Origins (do NOT confuse this with movie).

Best quote IMO: “I have complete control over every aspect of my powers! I can dole out life or death at my leisure, so don’t dare to call me a loser, comrade!”

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Although there are several incarnations of the Red Skull, I’m gonna focus on the more famous of the three, Johann Schmidt. Not to be confused with his black, DC villain counterpart, or the Red Skull that killed Peter Parker’s parents, Johann is in a league of his own. Former Nazi and Hitler confidant, the Red Skull is an enemy of well, everyone due to his many schemes of world domination. Johann was orphaned as a small child and while employed by a Jew, tried to rape his boss’s daughter only to delight in murdering her. Sounds like a twisted guy, right? Anyway, he ended up working as a bellhop where he caught the eye Hitler who trained him personally as his right hand man and head of Nazi terrorist activity. Long and short of it, he had various schemes that were defused by Captain America and he ended up in suspended animation for a quite while before being revived by AIM. During this time he stole the cosmic cube, fought Captain America some more and finally, as the gas that had kept him in suspended animation began to wear off, Johan began to age quickly. He died cursing Captain America only to be resurrected into a cloned Captain America body. This also ended in death when a cosmic cube became unstable. The Red Skull was AGAIN resurrected, once while trapped in hell, once with only his mind inside of Soviet Aleksander Lukin who then brought the Superhero Registration Act into the public and set the events of Civil War into place, and then once more into a robot zapped with Pym Particles before being destroyed completely. Tired yet? I am.

Red Skull’s powers include having a cloned body of Captain America (infused with the Super-Soldier formula), is a skilled hand-to-hand combatant, a strategic genius, political mastermind, and also an expert marksman.

A good story to read involving the Red Skull is Old Man Logan. He’s not in it much but damn, that story is GOOD.

Best quote IMO: “You think you know evil, Viper? Feh. Not even you have the audacity to make the forces of good do your bidding. Not like ME.”

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Pyro

Pyro is one of my least favorite mutants, if only because poor guy can’t create fire but has to instead wait for a fire to be in range. Australian born Saint-John Allerdyce was recruited by Mystique and battled various X-Men during his tenure before becoming part of the Freedom Force. One of their missions included apprehending the X-Men for not complying with the Mutant Registration Act and he was present at their “demise” in Dallas. Unfortunately this stint didn’t last long and he ended up abandoned in Kuwait with Blob before being rescued by Toad. Pyro contracted the Legacy virus and died from it just after saving Senator Kelly and becoming the catalyst in changing the Senator’s opinion on mutants. As is the usual way of things, Pyro has currently been resurrected and was involved in an attack on Utopia.

Poor little Pyro’s only power is fire manipulation and he even has to SEE the fire in order to control it. Why is he a villain, again??

A good story arc to read involving Pyro is The Fall of the Mutants.

Best quote IMO: “Y’think Magneto would mind if we played with her a little before we killed her?”