It the Living Colossus (Earth-616)

It, The Living Colossus
Name	Unrevealed
Current Alias	It, The Living Colossus
Aliases	Living Colossus
Affiliation and Relationships
Affiliation	Controlled by Robert O'Bryan, formerly Howling Commandos
Relatives	Boris Petrovski (creator)
Marital Status	Single
Physical Characteristics
Gender	Male
Height	30′ (9.14 m)
Weight	200000 lbs (90.72 ton)s
Eyes	Irises: White
Hair	No Hair At All
Unusual Features	Stone statue
Origin and Living Status
Origin	Statue animated by mind transferral of alien Kigor
Living Status	Alive
Reality	Earth-616
Place of Birth	Boris Petrovski's studio near Moscow, Russia
Personal Information
Identity	Secret
Occupation	Instrument of Destruction
Base of Operations	Los Angeles, California
Creators and Appearances
Creators	Stan Lee, Jack Kirby
First	Tales of Suspense #14 (September, 1960)
First	Tales of Suspense #14 (September, 1960)

History

The statue is sculpted; the Kigor animation

Boris Petrovsky, an artist near Moscow, sculpted the original Colossus under instructions from the Soviet Union to glorify the Communist state; Petrovsky, in mockery of his task, gave the Colossus a fearsome aspect that reflected his true feelings for his totalitarian rulers, which were feelings of hostility and contempt.

A crustacean-like alien Kigor who had crashed to Earth took over the hundred-foot statue and nearly destroyed Moscow. The alien's comrades rescued it, and the statue, quiet again, was used for its initial purpose, as a Soviet propaganda tool. The alien, however, had left its cybernetic circuitry behind in the statue.

It being controlled by the Kigor

The statue in America

The statue was shipped to Los Angeles, on loan from the Soviets, for an exhibition. Another Kigor took over the statue, and another rampage ensued. (One can only imagine the consternation in Moscow.) Robert O'Bryan, a special effects technician for Delazny Studios, set a trap for the Kigor: another, better statue mined with explosives. The Kigor transferred its consciousness into the new statue and blew up with it. Presumably, the Soviets declined to have the statue shipped home again, because it stayed in LA for several years. (One can only imagine the relief in Moscow.)

The Stonian attack; Bob O'Bryan controlling It

Then another threat arose: the Stonians planned to invade Earth. Magnor, a rebel sympathetic to humans, alerted O'Bryan to the danger. A Stonian force arrived, led by Granitor, ruler of Stonus V. They captured Magnor, as well as O'Bryan's girlfriend, actress Diane Cummings. An unsuspecting O'Bryan found that, like the Kigor, he could transfer his consciousness into the statue and make it move, meaning that It, the Living Colossus, lived again. While It fought Granitor, though, the army got away with Cummings and Magnor, and O'Bryan learned that his control of It had a time limit.

The other Stonian rebels, It, and Fin Fang Foom joined forces to stop Granitor. The battle swayed back and forth until the rebels gained the upper hand. The Stonians escaped in a transporter. In frustration, It smashed the device. By doing so, though, he had scattered their atoms across the galaxy. The rebels returned to Stonus.

The scientist who had controlled Fin Fang Foom during the battle was a certain Dr. Aloysius Vault. Suffering from a rare though unnamed neurological disease, he secretly wanted the power of It for himself, and sought to prevent his death by transferring his mind into the Colossus permanently. He never managed to gain control of It, though, as O'Bryan caused several attempts he (Vault) made to abscond with the Colossus to fail, so he used subterfuge. He offered to help O'Bryan recover the use of his legs (lost when an actor arranged an accident) and to store It in his secret laboratory. After months of therapy, O'Bryan could walk again. He married Cummings and put his time as the Living Colossus behind him.

Years later, Vault put another evil plan in motion. His new creation inadvertently demolished part of Grauman's Chinese Theatre. When O'Bryan learned of the attack, he realized that only It could counter the threat in time. Vault, seeing It in action, seized this long-sought opportunity. He used a psionic booster to transfer his own consciousness into It and drive O'Bryan's back to his own body.

Drunk with his newfound power, Vault sought out the mightiest being he could find as a test. He came across the Hulk, but It's obvious high strength level proved to be no match for the near-limitless rage and power of the Hulk, and within seconds, the enraged behemoth had quickly reduced the Living Colossus to dust. Vault's consciousness returned to his body. Discovering in horror, and too late, that the mind transfer, far from preventing his death, had actually accelerated the progress of his disease at an incredible rate, he could not stand the shock and died almost immediately.

From this incident, O'Bryan learned that his abilities gave him the responsibility to use them when needed. He set about designing and building a smaller robot version of the Living Colossus.

The next time It appeared, however, O'Bryan used it in a professional matter. Otto Ranetti, a rival, copied the plans and built his own robot: Karrg, "the mightiest robot of all." O'Bryan took It to the desert, where Ranetti was using the robot in a movie. It barely won the ensuing fight.

Most recently, Nick Fury recruited It for his Howling Commandos squad.

After the Civil War, he (and more specifically O'Bryan) was listed as a potential recruit for the Initiative.

It the Living Colossus later appeared on Monster Isle when Shadowcat and Magik appeared to look for a mutant girl named Bo. It the Living Colossus was among the monsters that attacked the three until Magik teleported herself, Shadowcat, and Bo to the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning.

Attributes

Power Grid

Powers

Flight: It possesses the ability to fly. Doing so is purely psionic in nature, and as such, it exerts a severe strain on It's command intelligence. Levitating and flying the Colossus thus not only takes considerable mental effort on O'Bryan's part, but also shortens the period in which he can control It. Because of the severe mental strain that levitating the Colossus entails, O'Bryan avoids flight whenever possible.

Limited Invulnerability: It can withstand impacts up to (but not including) 100 tons. The original Colossus was sculpted from ordinary granite; presumably the Kigor circuitry (or something else the Kigor did) gives it this property. It is not affected by electricity, heavy weapons fire, immersion in water, vacuum, heat, or cold. For some reason (perhaps another side effect of the Kigor episodes) It is vulnerable to certain types of gas, which immediately forces out O'Bryan's consciousness.

Presumably because of the Kigors's modifications to the Colossus, which was previously a solid stone statue with no jointed parts, it can move as if it had a skeleton and musculature without cracking the stone skin.

O'Bryan recently acquired a new stone Colossus. Without the Kigor element, it may or may not have the properties of the first stone Colossus.

Notes

• After only four appearances in Astonishing Tales, It was replaced by Deathlok in issue #25 (August 1974).
• In Fantastic Four: World’s Greatest Comic Magazine, #12, Reed Richards created a colossus with his Ionic Inanimate Matter Converter.
• In Nextwave: Agents of HATE #11, terrorists send two different colossi against the Nextwave team.

See Also

• 17 appearance(s) of It the Living Colossus (Earth-616)
• 7 appearance(s) in handbook(s) of It the Living Colossus (Earth-616)
• 1 minor appearance(s) of It the Living Colossus (Earth-616)
• 1 mention(s) of It the Living Colossus (Earth-616)
• 4 mention(s) in handbook(s) of It the Living Colossus (Earth-616)
• 19 image(s) of It the Living Colossus (Earth-616)