Hank Hall
| Monarch | |
|---|---|
| File:Monarchdc.jpg Foreground: detail from the cover of Armageddon 2001 #2 by Dan Jurgens. Background: cover of Hawk and Dove (Vol. 2) #2. Art by Rob Liefeld. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics |
| First appearance | Armageddon 2001 #1 (1991) |
| Created by | Archie Goodwin Dan Jurgens |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Hank Hall |
| Team affiliations | Teen Titans |
| Notable aliases | Hawk, Extant |
| Abilities | Super-strength and speed, enhanced durability through armor, time travel. |
Monarch is a fictional character in DC Comics who first appeared in the crossover/event miniseries Armageddon 2001. He later became known as Extant, and appeared in the Zero Hour miniseries (as well as some related tie-ins).
Character history
Armageddon 2001 - As Monarch
Monarch was an opressive tyrant from a bleak, dystopian Earth fifty years in the future. The people were unhappy with his rule, particularly a scientist named Matthew Ryder, an expert on temporal studies, who was convinced he could use his technology to travel back in time and prevent the manical ruler from ever coming to power. He learned that forty years ago, one of Earth's heroes would eventually turn evil and become Monarch, and ten years from that he would conquer the world.
Chosen by Monarch to take part in a time-travel experiment, Ryder traveled back to the DC Universe equivalent of 1991; Ryder was determined to find out who the Monarch really was and, if possible, sanction him before he could rise to power. As he travelled through the rift, his body mutated into a form of living temporal energy, and upon arriving at his destination, he took the name Waverider.
Waverider used his abilities to peer into several possible futures of different members of the Justice League (along with several other characters), but was unable to pinpoint exactly who would eventually suffer enough trauma to warrant becoming the Monarch. After several attempts, he began to rethink his approach; however, Waverider accidently came in physical contact with Captain Atom, unleashing a storm of temporal energy that opened a gate to the future which Monarch emerged from. Monarch, it seems, had been monitoring Waverider's every move in the past every since he left the future, and merely waited for the perfect time to travel back and stop him for erasing his existance.
In a subsiquent battle with the Justice League, the Monarch retreated, taking Dawn Granger, the current Dove, with him. Hank Hall, Hawk, followed, and caught up to him just as he killed Dawn in front of his own eyes. Being created as two beings whose natures were supposed to be in balance, Hank became enraged when his partner's pacifist nature could no longer contain his warlike spirit. He beat the Monarch to death, only to learn the horrible truth: he was the one who would be the Monarch of the future. Upon seeing Monarch's dead body and the device he was building to enslave humanity, he mused that the Earth would need someone to keep the balance, so he put on Monarch's armor and continued building his machine.
Eventually, the Justice League found him, and Captain Atom, feeling guilty he let Monarch slip through the timestream in the firstplace, decided to fight him one-on-one. The battle caused Atom's suit and Monarch's energy to clash, creating a portal that sent both of them back in time to the age of the dinosaurs. Forming an uneasy alliance, the two teamed up against a group of aliens who meant to take Earth's energy for their own (as seen in the follow-up miniseries Armageddon: the Alien Agenda). After defeating them, they devised a way to return home to the present.
Zero Hour - As Extant
Shortly after returning to the present, Monarch confronted Waverider and absorbed most of his time-warping abilities, giving him the power to travel through time as he pleased. Calling himself Extant, he joined forces with renegade Green Lantern Hal Jordan, now known as Parallax, in a plan to alter time as they saw fit (as seen in Zero Hour).
His first act was to alter the future so that he could have a meta-human army at his disposal, mostly comprised of members of the Team Titans; his plan was to amass an army so powerful that no one could interfere with his plans to control time itself. Several heroes banded together in stopping his plans before they began in the 30th century, and altered history so that his followers never came to exist in his future.
Down, but not out, Extant began to strike back at the heroes at Ground Zero, the beginning of time. Parallax had warped several meta-humans from various time periods together for the ultimate assault, and Extant hit the Atom with a chronal blast, de-aging him into a teenager. Sensing defeat was imminent, he escaped the fight, only to engage the Justice Society on a later date where, following another setback, he again attempted to escape. Instead, Extant was teleported (by Hourman and Metron of the New Gods at Atom-Smasher's behest) into the seat of an airplane whose crash Extant had caused earlier (in his relative timestream). He is believed to have died as a result.
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Powers
Whether he is Monarch or Extant, Hank Hall possesses the same superpowers: enhanced strength and speed. Without his partner Dove to suppress his violent nature, his rage is boundless. His armor, crafted using advanced technology, is highly durable. After becoming Extant, he absorbed the powers of Waverider, giving him the ability to travel through time.