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The Absorbing Man is the alias of supervillain Carl "Crusher" Creel, a fictional character in the Marvel Universe. He was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. He is mainly an antagonist of Thor and first appeared in the comic book Journey into Mystery #114.

Character biography

Carl "Crusher" Creel was serving time in prison for aggravated assault he committed while a member of an extortion racket when he was selected by Loki, the Asgardian god of mischief, as his unwitting agent in a scheme against his half-brother and Asgardian hero Thor. By adding an enchanted potion composed of rare Asgardian herbs to Creel's drinking water in the prison commissary, Loki granted the brutal convict a bizarre power Loki hoped would enable him to defeat Thor. Creel gained the power to absorb the physical properties of anything with which he came into contact. Creel used his newfound power to break free from prison and soon became engaged in battle with Thor. Due to his ability to absorb not only the properties of Thor's hammer but even the physical strength of Thor himself, Creel (now called the Absorbing Man) became one of the strongest mortal foes Thor had ever combated. Nevertheless, Creel was soundly bested and defeated by the Asgardian hero.

After his first defeat, the Absorbing Man returned to plague Thor again. Loki transported him to Asgard where the criminal could be used in his scheme to take over the Enchanted Realm. But when the Absorbing Man dared to challenge Odin, lord of the Asgardians, Odin summarily dispatched him into space. Creel eventually managed to return to Earth and soon encountered the Hulk. They battled, and Creel was defeated while in the process of absorbing the Hulk's power during his transformation to the human Bruce Banner.

The Absorbing Man then challenged Thor again and was defeated when he was tricked into turning into water. A short time later, Thor defeated him again by tricking him into absorbing the properties of a cardboard replica of Thor's hammer. Serving a prison sentence briefly, Creel managed to escape and was contacted by They Who Wield Power, a cabal of power seekers from El Dorado, who hired him to destroy the Hulk. He failed when he inadvertently absorbed the properties of glass while falling.

Eventually reassembling the shards of his body, the Absorbing Man decided that he was tired of fighting against and losing to superhuman champions. Seeking to flee the US, Creel foolishly took a hostage, thereby causing the Avengers to chase after him. To escape them, he jumped into the ocean and transformed himself into water. When he finally regained his natural form, his mind was addled from his prolonged intermingling with the ocean, and he was paranoically frightened of anyone with superhuman power. A chance battle with the Hulk cured him of his paranoia, however. Returning to America, he stalked the mutant Dazzler to acquire her light-powers to use against the Avengers. He was defeated, however, by the Dazzler and the Inhuman Black Bolt. He was abducted from prison by the Beyonder to fight in the Secret Wars. Following the wars, he was restored to Earth. In later years, he became romantically involved with fellow supervillain Titania (Mary "Skeeter" McPherran), and the two eventually married.

The Absorbing Man is highly addicted to narcotics, especially pain killers and cocaine and will work for whatever criminal can supply him with narcotics. Creel's addiction has impacted his behavior. While Creel was always a bonafide thug and villain, he was not wholly heartless and usually tried to avoid killing innocent bystanders (although he has never had qualms about threatening or even forcibly incapacitating them). However, when he is in need of a high, he has demonstrated no concern for the safety of others. Recently, he was tricked into transforming into cocaine. Minions operating powerful industrial fans then scattered his body in the room he was occupying. His body mass was then collected off of the surfaces and placed into several bags. This all under the direction of The Owl who sold this "Creel cocaine" as a drug all over New York City. Users of "Creel cocaine transformed into anything they came in contact with, just like Creel. Eventually, however, Creel managed to reassemble himself and was later defeated by Spider-Man.

At some point, his wife's obsession with destroying She-Hulk led to the end of their relationship. Whether they have been formally and legally divorced has not been stated.

Powers and abilities

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Creel has the power to absorb the physical properties of anything he touches. For example, if Creel were to touch and hold a piece of titanium, the tissues of his body would take on the appearance and properties of titanium. Creel also retains his intellect and capacity for speech and full physical movement regardless of the material he absorbs. The more dense or durable the material he absorbs, the stronger Creel becomes; were Creel to touch a high grade steel structure, his strength would be roughly equal to that of the Thing. The longer he remains in contact with the structure can also have a dramatic effect on his own size and strength (while holding onto a large construction like a skyscraper, he can become as large as one, while his physical strength will also increase. He can also mimic certain physical characteristics about the form he is touching, like the spikes of a mace or needles of a cactus. Creel's body can also absorb the properties of great amounts of energy in the same fashion it absorbs the properties of solid materials.

Creel also has the ability to mimic the physical strengths or powers of someone with whom he comes into physical contact. This requires Creel's deliberate concentration. Creel has proven able to absorb the mystical energies of Thor's enchanted Uru hammer on multiple occasions. In Uru metal form, his strength exceeds Thor's. The Absorbing Man is also one of the few beings other than Thor who has been able to lift the hammer itself, although he is unable to prevent it from returning to Thor's hand.

There seems to be no limit to the length of time that Creel can retain the properties of a material he has absorbed. However, this rule varies. For example, during his first confrontation with the Hulk, he managed to absorb the monster's incredible strength. However, when the Hulk reverted to Bruce Banner, Creel's newfound strength began to decline and eventually left him. There are also undefined limits to the amount of power that Creel can absorb. He met one of his first defeats when he exploded while attempting to absorb the power of the entire planet Earth. If the Absorbing Man's body is shattered or dispersed, he has the ability to completely reconstitute his bodily mass without injury to himself, though it may take a great deal of time to do so. However, Creel must remain in whatever form he had assumed until after he has gathered all the pieces of himself. Otherwise, it could potentially kill him. He often has a tendency to accidentally or unintentionally absorb the properties of materials.

Perhaps the greatest limitation of the Absorbing Man's powers is his intellect; he is noticeably slow-witted and can often be fooled into transforming himself into substances that can easily lead to his defeat. For instance, when once fighting the Hulk, he shattered some glass. A shard fell on his body and he inadvertently turned into glass. The Hulk took advantage of this development and punched Creel, shattering him.

The ball and chain that the Absorbing Man carries is also mystically enchanted and linked to his absorbing power. It too can assimilate the properties and characteristics of whatever he is touching, so long as he is also holding onto the ball and chain while he is doing so (when he absorbed Thor's strength level, his weapon simultaneously imitated the hardness of Thor's hammer). The ball and chain essentially function more as an extension of his body rather than a weapon during combat. Creel also has the ability to throw his ball and propel himself through the air, thus simulating flight.

It was shown in a Hulk story that Creel developed the power of absorbing the minds of other people, and possessing their bodies. In that particular story, he was shown unusually intelligent and cunning. This story has since been retconned as a continuity "glitch" from the time when the insane cosmic super hero Captain Marvel remade the universe under his own power.

Appearances in other media

Absorbing Man made an appearance (voiced by Jim Cummings) in an episode of the 1996 Incredible Hulk animated TV series and faced the Grey Hulk ("Joe Fixit").

Absorbing Man also appears as a member of the Masters of Evil in the sixth episode of the short-lived animated series The Avengers: United They Stand.

Although the Creel character did not appear in the 2003 Hulk movie, the character David Banner (played by Nick Nolte) acquired powers almost identical to the Absorbing Man. He then attempted to absorb the Hulk's power for his own, but was defeated when the Hulk's unlimited power proved too much to absorb and David lost control. He was then destroyed by General Thunderbolt Ross, who used a gamma missile.

Alternate versions

Earth X

In the non-canon story Earth X, Creel is one of the most powerful beings in this alternate universe. He attempts to absorb something he never had before: knowledge. After absorbing the knowledge of the current Ultron, he is able to remember all of the things he absorbed and to turn into them at will. With this new power, he kills most of the Avengers in Washington D.C. (stabbing Goliath with the Washington Monument, turning into rubber to bounce Hawkeye's arrows back at him, smothering Quicksilver in tar, etc.). He is finally defeated when the Vision infects him with a computer virus, causing Creel to turn into stone to isolate it. The Vision shatters him, and his pieces are scattered around the world and guarded by the most trusted and powerful beings in this alternate universe.

The pieces of Creel are collected and reassembled by the Tong of Creel, a group of radicals led by Dr. Strange's servant Wong, and an epic battle is fought in New York City, during which he begins to absorb the entire city into himself. In one last heroic act, Creel turns himself into vibranium, saving the planet. (The vibranium of this earth had been extracted when Franklin Richards as Galactus consumed the Celestial inside the Earth, causing problems worldwide).

Age of Apocalypse

In the Age of Apocalypse, the Absorbing Man aligned himself with Apocalypse, who was not above recruiting altered humans such as Creel. Creel served as a warden in Apocalypse's prison camps in the Aztec ruins of Mexico alongside Diablo. Creel fought against Magneto and managed to injure him, yet Rogue killed Crusher by absorbing his powers.

External links

• Official Marvel Bio
• Absorbing Man at MarvelDirectory.com

• 1965 introductions
• Daredevil villains
• Hulk villains
• Marvel Comics mutates
• Masters of Evil members
• Spider-Man villains
• Thor villains
• Fictional immortals