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In an effort to contain humanity and restrict them to Earth, Immortus turned the attention of a warlike spacefaring race toward Earth. They would use the planet Mars as a staging base for their invasion.[2]

These Martians invaded Earth in the early 20th century in what was known as the first War of the Worlds. The invaders later abandoned Earth after possessing no immunizations to Earth's diseases which wiped out the invaders. Following the invasion, the events were heavily fictionalized by H.G. Wells in his book The War of the Worlds.[3]

Earth-616[]

The Martians attacked first in 1917.[4]

Martians from another timeline launched an invasion using the mind of Maureen Raven.[5]

At some point the Martians attacked and destroyed the homeworld of the Lumlyans. One of the Lumlyan by the name of Civa set out to recruit powerful warriors to help her fight the invaders.[6]

Years later, in the 21st century, the Martians again turned their attention to Earth.[4]

Earth-691[]

War of the Worlds (II)[]

In this reality, the Martians returned in 2001. En route to Earth, the Martian forces intercepted a temporal anomaly described as "pure knowledge."[7] Unbeknownst to anyone at the time, the anomaly was Era, an immensely powerful cosmic being. For its own reasons, it greatly aided them in their assault on Earth, giving their tripods an aura of invincibility.[8]

Without warning, the Martians came out of the night skies in North America,[9] lighting them up and blinding out any view of the stars.[10]

By the next morning, Saturday, June 30,[10] weapon stockpiles across Earth were obliterated, without a single nuclear device being fired. Earth forces used biological warfare against the Martians, but it backfired, killing many.[11] The Martians tried to kill as few Humans as possible so that they can be used for food, labor, experimentation and sport.[12][13]

The Martians' 'second assault' lasted into 2006. Spider-Man was the last remaining superhero.[14] In admiration for his tenacity, the Martians preserved Spider-Man's body in a shrine on Mars.

Martian Master from Amazing Adventures Vol 2 19

Martian Master

The Martian Protectorate[]

Led by a powerful High Overlord, the Martian Masters enslaved most of the population, as labor in converting Terran edifices to new uses, guards for their fortresses, or even as simple cattle. Some were drafted as gladiators to fight for the Martian Masters' amusement, while others were trained as Exterminators to hunt down the last freemen threatening Martian rule. The Martians were particularly interested in co-opting scientists, many of whom became Keepers, collaborators responsible for overseeing their fellow humans. The Martians referred to their occupational government as "The Martian Protectorate".[15] They even formed their own law enforcers comprised of genetically engineered female psychics known as the Sirens.[16]

In 2014, the gladiator Killraven escaped from captivity, and soon became the leader of a particularly troublesome band of Freemen.

By 2019, many Martians born on Earth stood out as different from their predecessors. Having never been to Mars, they questioned Martian values such as hostility toward humans.[17]

In 2020, the Martians suffered a notable defeat by Killraven's forces at Cape Canaveral.[10]

A time-traveling Wolverine and the Black Cat assisted Killraven in battle against Overlord Omega.[18]

Withdrawal and Demise[]

Killraven defeated the Martians by poisoning their food supply with a zombie plague with the help of a time-traveling Howard the Duck.[19]

The Martians abandoned Earth by 2075, depleting its natural resources and returning to a glorious homecoming.[12][13] The High Overlord elevated the Martian who would become Ripjak to a Cabinet chair.[20]

In the 23rd century, the Martians began planning a 'Final Pillage' of Earth but were visited by Bubonicus, who infected them with a genocidal virus. Ripjak transfused himself with Spider-Man's blood and began a long mutation process. By the time it was complete, he was the sole survivor of his race.[20]

Ripjak studied the corpses of his fellow Martians for decades, eventually learning that the plague was not of Martian origin. He then constructed a ship to seek out its source. Ripjak continued his quest into the 31st century.[21]

Biology[]

The Martian Masters are a cephalopod-like species. The Martian Masters of Earth-2120 had three eyes, three long thick prehensile tentacles used for locomotion, a beak consisting of three mandibles, and multiple small tentacles around the beak mouth.[22] The Martian Masters of Earth-691 had two eyes, multiple prehensile tentacles and lacked tentacles around the two mandible beak mouth.[17]

Martian Masters are genderless lifeforms that reproduce asexually in which their infants grow like fruit on their bodies and are severed from the parent. When on Earth they fed on the flesh and blood of humans.[17]

Alternate Realities[]

Ideaverse[]

The Martians attacked Earth near the end of the 19th century, starting with Europe. They used missiles and black smoke to kill countless humans, causing great panic and chaos across Earth. However, the Martians would be affected by the earthly diseases and despite their technology they all perished. Their remains were first discovered by one of the human survivors who had encountered the Martians, George, who alongside the rest of humanity began rebuilding civilization.[23]

Earth-9507[]

In this alternate reality of Earth-691, the Guardians of the Galaxy prevented the Martian Masters from attacking Earth in 2001 AD.[7]

Earth-9930[]

The Avengers, which Killraven was a member of, continued fighting against the Martian Masters to liberate Earth. This conflict resulted in only about 50,000 living humans left on Earth.[24]

Earth-2120[]

The Martian Masters are an ancient race, millions of years old, before life emerged on Earth.[22] They lived in an aquatic world, where both the water and their civilization was under ice, but it was a dying, and there was no hope for them in the near future.[25]

Some of the Martians found Earth and wanted to migrate to the newly discovered planet, but the majority refused to harm humanity and steal its future. As countless years passed and conditions on their own planet worsened, the Martians saw how Earth itself was being destroyed from pollution, and decided to rescue the valuable planet before mankind destroyed its potential, with it they began their relocation to Earth.[22]

The Martians disguised their atmosphere entry as a shower of meteors which contained tripods that were nearly invulnerable to conventional weapons, and soon entered a war against humanity that lasted for years. Prior to the invasion the Martians weren't a united race, though they joined forces in their conquest of Earth, and never attempted to communicate with the humans. Despite the Martians themselves being a dying race which were fewer when compared to humans and Earth's military deploying nuclear weapons, nukes, chemical and biological agents against them, Earth's population was decimated, and eventually all organized resistance was crushed by the Martians.[26]

Earth was successfully conquered, but afterwards the Martians broke up into independent groups, each with their own agenda. They began operate from multi-story mobile amphibious citadels and had almost no contact with each other.[27] Under their rule, humans became their slaves and those who evaded struggled to find shelter and/or food. The Martians deployed Hunter-Slaves, known as Keeper's Men, who were equipped with energy weapons, implanted tracking devices and breathing mask/helmets, and moved around in smaller versions of the armored tripods.[26] The Martians spoke to their Keepers through human intermediaries known as Speakers that communicated telepathically.[22]

The Martians punished transgressions and rewarded good behavior, maintaining law through their Sirens. To study mankind's warring nature, they created the Arena where Gladiatorial games were managed by the Keepers and the Martians watched from behind the safety of glass walls, submerged in water.[22] Children were raised and trained to become Gladiators to fight in the arena. Sirens rewarded champions with undreamed pleasures, but also bound the minds of those who resisted.[26]

The Martians had thus far maintained their power by limiting contact with humans, denying their science and language to even their most loyal Keepers, instead only permitting them to see them in the flesh. Weapons and technology given to the humans were sealed units which came with built-in status monitors and tracking devices. The Martians were also served by bounty hunters and mutates. The Martians experimented on humans and often discarded them on a whim, creating human hybrids with animal and/or plant DNA, and humans with super powers like telepathy and pyrokinesis.[27] The un-enslaved humans across the Earth formed bands and communities, struggling to survive and avoid the Martians and monsters. Spreading across the world is a red weed, of alien origin.[28]

The Freemen fought against the Martians, and as they grew the Martians and their Keepers struggled to capture and squash them. The Freedmen's leader, Killraven found the location of a Martian citadel, which could taken out with one well-placed bomb in the armory, but on the mission to destroy the citadel, Killraven was betrayed by Hawk, and Grok.[22]

Warp World[]

In the future, the Martian Masters attempted to invade Earth to a degree of success, establishing the Alchemars Corporation, and taking many humans as slaves which included Erik Killraven and M'Bakshulla. However, they faced opposition from the nation of Wakanda,[29] and the Defenders of 2099. Ghost Panther from the present arrived to the future and with the help of his spirit of vengeance companion Zarathos possessed Mars and used the echo of the tortured planet to deliver vengeance on its ungrateful children.[30]

Earth-21443[]

After Kang's Biomechanoids infected the Avengers Mountain, they used its powers to break time. This resulted in the Martian Masters to arrive to the present on Earth where they fought against the Avengers wearing Mech suits.[31]

Powers and Abilities

Powers

Telepathy[17]

Weaknesses

  • The Martians lacked the immunization to Earth's native bacterias which cost the loss of the invasion force during the First War of the Worlds. However, the Martians finally made themselves immune to Earth's diseases and returned in the second invasion of Earth.

Miscellaneous

Level of Technology

The Martian Masters had advanced technology which included the Martian Tripods they used to attack Earth.[11]

Notes

Trivia

  • The Martians Masters are based on the Martians created by H.G. Wells.
    • In The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Alan Moore showed Martians confronting the John Carter from The Warlord of Mars. The same occurs in the short story Mars: The Home Front by George Alec Effinger, published in 1996 in the anthology War of the Worlds: Global Dispatches. Given that they are part of the Ideaverse, such a confrontation could have happened there as well.[32][33]

See Also

Links and References

References

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