OMAC (comics)
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| OMACs | |
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 An OMAC |
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| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics |
| First appearance | The OMAC Project #1 (June 2005) |
| Created by | Greg Rucka |
| In-story information | |
| Team affiliations | Brother Eye |
| Abilities | Cybernetic armor, access to extensive metahuman database. |
The OMACs (Omni Mind And Community) are a fictional type of powerful cyborg that exist in the DC Comics universe. Based on the Jack Kirby character of the same name, the OMACs were created by Greg Rucka and first appeared in The OMAC Project #1 (June 2005).
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[edit] Publication history
[edit] The OMAC Project
The OMACs are cyborgs who take over human bodies via a virus (created from Brainiac-13-derived nanotechnology acquired by the U.S. Department of Defense and Lexcorp, which was then secretly introduced into general vaccine supplies) in order to assassinate any and all beings with superpowers.[1] The OMACs are featured in the OMAC Project mini-series that leads up to Infinite Crisis.
The new OMACs (various meanings are given for the acronym: "Observational Meta-human Activity Construct", "One-Man Army Corps" and the current "Omni Mind And Community") are controlled by the Brother MK I satellite. Brother MK I was created by the Batman, and programmed by Pseudopersons, Inc. scientist Buddy Blank, in this retelling of the story a consociate of Wayne Industries ,[2] to keep an eye on all metahumans, both villain and hero, after he grew distrustful over the Justice League's mindwiping (see Identity Crisis). Alexander Luthor, Jr. later gave the satellite sentience as part of his plans, and Maxwell Lord subverted the original mission of the Brother MK I satellite by inculcating a fear and suspicion of all metahumans when he rose to the top rank of the government agency Checkmate. Ironically enough, the first test subject activated shared his name with his "father" and his alternate version, both being called "Buddy Blank." [3]
However, OMACs history may be more recent than Brother MK I's itself. Equus and Pilates, formerly featured in Superman: For Tomorrow are later denounced as supposed former iterations of the OMAC concept, and in JLA Classified an all mechanic OMAC is featured as an enemy for the Metal Men. Since then the design has improved to the current form, with none or little changes on the base model, aside for Sasha Bordeaux.
[edit] Sacrifice
When Maxwell Lord brainwashed Superman to kill Batman, Wonder Woman, and possibly the rest of the JLA, Wonder Woman broke Lord's neck to free Superman from his control.
Brother MK I, rechristening itself Brother Eye, initiated the "KingIsDead" protocol specifically designed to be used in the event of Lord's death, ordering all the OMACs (all 1,373,462 of them) to attack and kill all the metahumans on Earth. A group superhero effort stopped the attack, reducing the numbers of OMACs to roughly two hundred thousand by disabling the majority with an EMP blast as well as a "Shut Down" command given by Sasha Bordeaux, who had become a third generation cyborg linked to Brother Eye, designated "Blacknight 1". These measures effectively freed the OMAC hosts from their nanotech forms.
[edit] Infinite Crisis
[edit] "Truth and Justice"
In response, the satellite broadcast footage of Wonder Woman executing Maxwell Lord, preceded by the word MURDER, to media outlets all over the world, destroying her reputation. After this, Brother Eye initiated the final protocol "Truth and Justice", by having all the remaining OMACS invade and attack her homeland Themyscira to wipe out all of the Amazons.
It was revealed that Alexander Luthor was the one who wrested control of Brother Eye away from Batman. He used it to calculate the coordinates of where the multiverse Tower would concentrate its energy as part of his attempt to re-create Earth-Two. Brother Eye continues to aid Alex Luthor and helps guard the tower.
[edit] The downfall of Brother Eye
Batman leads a collection of superheroes to Earth's orbit, including: Hal Jordan, John Stewart, Green Arrow (Oliver Queen, only called because Batman is attempting to trust people again and contacted Queen to see if he'd come), Mister Terrific, Black Lightning, Black Canary, the new Blue Beetle, Metamorpho, Booster Gold and Sasha Bordeaux. Blue Beetle manages to reveal Brother Eye in orbit by negating its vibrational frequency. Brother Eye sends OMACs and the two groups clash.
With the two Green Lanterns fighting off the OMACs, the ship crashes into Brother Eye, Metamorpho providing an oxygen supply as Blue Beetle and Booster Gold remain behind on the ship to guard it. Batman goes to distract Brother Eye by attempting to shut down the central computer (Although Brother Eye tries to distract him by showing him Nightwing's confrontation with Superboy-Prime). Sasha, linked to Oracle, goes to upload every computer virus on Earth into Brother Eye's system as well as trying to prevent the artificial gravity from shutting down. Black Canary goes to the surveillance room to try using her sonic scream to blind the Eye. Black Lightning and Mr. Terrific go together so that Black Lightning fries as much circuitry as possible while Mr. Terrific, invisible to machines and electronics, delivers the fatal blow by knocking Brother Eye off orbit.
It works and Brother Eye is deactivated. All of the activated OMACS shut down, releasing their hosts. Brother Eye tries to take Batman down with him, asking Batman if he can ever trust the costumed heroes again after what they did to him. Batman, however, says that he'll take his chances, and accepts Hal Jordan's aid in getting him to safety.
After crashlanding in Saudi Arabia, Brother Eye tries to download his system into Sasha as a means of self preservation. However, Sasha manages to destroy the satellite, freeing her from the nanobots infecting her.
[edit] DCU: A Brave New World/OMAC
On June 28, 2006, DC released DCU: A Brave New World which was the prelude to the OMAC limited series.
Brother Eye has not been fully decommissioned, and it lies in a Norad facility. Michael Costner is the last OMAC unit, kept as emergency backup, and Brother Eye calls to him.
This Brother Eye has corrupted programming and now believes that all humans need to be subjugated and/or exterminated, whether metahuman or not. It has also recently begun to manifest disassociative behavior with at least two "personalities" now being heard in the OMAC's internal conversations. Trying to make Costner rebuild him, Brother Eye is forced to face his wrath when Michael regains control of both his forms, human and OMAC, and is subsequently destroyed again, but a tiny fraction of it is still active.
[edit] Countdown to Final Crisis
A portion of Brother Eye was later retrieved and rebuilt by Buddy Blank, a former scientist from Wayne Industries. This portion meets the time-traveling Karate Kid who is seeking a cure for the Morticoccus, a 31st-century illness evolved from the OMAC-virus. Announcing that "the Great Disaster has come to me," the Eye directs him to Blüdhaven. Soon after, it reactivates its offensive protocols and assimilates the hangar it is being held in, turning the people within the hangar into new OMAC cyborgs, and itself travels to the ruins of Blüdhaven and assimilates its infrastructure and the people within it, using the Atomic Knights and Firestorm as power sources.[4][5][6] Later, it activates a Boom Tube and travels to Apokolips, where it assimilates the entire planet and attempts to obtain the Morticoccus virus from Karate Kid, who has also been led there.[7] However, it is forced to flee Apokolips when attacked by the Pied Piper using the Anti-Life Equation.
Recently, Brother Eye transforms Buddy Blank into a modified OMAC resembling Kirby's version of the character. Buddy uses this power to save himself and his grandson from starvation in the Command-D bunker beneath Blüdhaven.[8] However, Brother Eye implies that it will contact Buddy again for a future need.
[edit] Batman and the Outsiders
A modified OMAC is shown as a part of the new Outsiders team in the Batman and the Outsiders 2008 series.
When a team from the Justice League attempts to seize a partially active OMAC, a leftover from The OMAC Project events, Batman takes the occasion for reclaiming it for himself, having Dr. Francine Langstrom (the long-suffering wife of Dr. Kirk Langstrom) create a clever forgery to leave in care of the Leaguers.
The OMAC, aptly renamed "ReMAC" appears to be "an iPod with its tracklist wiped". Francine Langstrom is unable to discern who was the ReMAC before being infected by the OMAC virus, and finds ReMAC a mere husk devoid of any personal identity. This complete lack of personality makes ReMAC the perfect infiltrator, using its advanced shapeshifting abilities and its unquestioning obedience for the Outsiders' sake.
Since its lack of personality allows villains to snatch control of ReMAC, turning it into an enemy, Batman rigs up a telepresence system, turning ReMAC into an advanced drone for Salah Miandad, Francine's chief assistant, operating from the Outsiders HQ, the Batcave or other secret locations.
However, while testing a new neural interface, less dependent from his stamina to control the former OMAC, Salah's body is knocked in a coma. His mind comes to reside into ReMAC, supplanting the missing personality of the drone for a while (one full issue), until, due to the machinations of the villainous Simon Hurt, ReMAC is fed a malicious self-destruct code that blows it to pieces, making impossible the restoration of Salah's consciousness.
[edit] Final Crisis
In Final Crisis, Darkseid and his prophets from Apokolips have taken new forms as humans on Earth after mass-distributing the Anti-Life Equation around the world. Batman has been captured, Superman is on a journey in the multiverse, and Wonder Woman has become a Female Fury. With most of the world's population under the influence of the equation, they are effectively under Darkseid's control seemingly making him the ruler of the Earth.
In the one-shot Final Crisis: Resist, Mister Terrific and the Checkmate organization are working to mount a resistance against Darkseid but seemingly don't have the means to do it. Sitting in despair in a Checkmate stronghold, Snapper Carr through his hopeless rantings gives Mister Terrific an ingenious idea. Using Sasha Bordeaux to make contact with Brother Eye, Terrific convinces the A.I. to help them, telling it that it will surely be destroyed if Darkseid indeed captures the world.
Realizing this, Brother Eye accepts Terrific's terms, and reveals that there are still millions of people infected with OMAC nanotech. These people, now mindless drones of Darkseid, are overwritten by Brother Eye and become OMAC soldiers under the command of Terrific. This gives Checkmate and him the means to forcefully resist Darkseid.
[edit] Powers and abilities
Brother Eye can activate the OMAC virus in any infected person, at any time, in planetary range. Once activated, the person is covered in cybernetic armor, and becomes a thrall to Brother Eye's commands.
An OMAC unit has archives on almost every metahuman on file, and can simulate the powers of a variety of superheroes and supervillains in order to target its opponent's weaknesses. Among the powers displayed were the ability to fly, shoot fire, needles of artificial cellulose (against Alan Scott), dispense flame-retarding foam, and fire various energy beams from its eyes and hands, with caustic, concussive, or blinding effects. In addition, the OMAC unit can morph its extremities into blades and pincers. It is also able to simulate Shazam's lightning and force Mary Marvel to revert to her human form. It can disable the Eradicator effortlessly.
OMACS are very vulnerable to Mr. Terrific, as he cannot be detected by technology.
The only weakness an OMAC has are that they are human, beneath their shells (which was meant as a deterrent for heroes from using lethal force against them). Other than that, the OMACs are dependent on their assessment of individual heroes. When fighting multiple opponents, they require a few seconds to adapt their countermeasures for each hero. Atom Smasher was able to stop an OMAC attacking the JSA, by stomping it before it could assess his threat level.
In "Superman/Batman", Brainiac temporarily occupied an OMAC body.
ReMAC, the OMAC fallen in Outsiders' possession, has the same powers and abilities of a regular OMAC. However, he greatly differs in his physical makeup, being redder in color and with a more human-like face even in his armored form.
Unable to contact Brother Eye, and unable to access his/her former personality, ReMAC is controlled for a period by Doctor Salah Miandad. This way, ReMAC retains his invulnerability and strength, but it's limited by Salah's personal stamina and attention span, not always enough for a fight. Salah's mind is later trapped into ReMAC body by a faulty mind interface, removing the limits from his less-than-average stamina.
[edit] Victims of OMAC
Among those killed by OMAC are:
- Fastball
- Firefly (turns up alive in later issues)
- Overthrow
- Parasite (Alex Allston)
- Ratcatcher
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[edit] Appearances In Other Media
- The OMAC project makes a cameo appearance in Batman's ending for the video game Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe. In the game, it is explained that Batman designed the OMACS as a way to defend New Earth from multiverse invaders following the destruction of the merged Darkseid/Shao Kahn. These OMACs have an armor pattern that is similar to Batman's own costume.
[edit] References
- ^ Greg Rucka on the OMACs' Mohawks; "The Mohawk isn't actually a Mohawk; don't mistake it for hair. What's the most vulnerable place on your body? Soft tissue in the brain. So the Mohawk serves as a defense for the head, protecting the process network."[citation needed]
- ^ Countdown, #30 (Oct 3, 2007) DC Comics
- ^ Countdown to Infinite Crisis
- ^ Countdown, #21
- ^ Countdown, #20
- ^ Countdown, #15
- ^ Countdown, #12-9
- ^ Countdown, #1
