Havok (character)

• 1. Introduction

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  Havok, the Marvel Comics hero whose real name is Alexander Summers, carries a power he has never fully tamed. The comics call the result "plasma blasts", and for years Alex needed a specially built suit to keep from harming the people around him. He first appeared in The X-Men #54, published in March 1969. Writer Arnold Drake and penciller Don Heck created him. He is the younger brother of Cyclops, the team's model leader, and much of his career is spent stepping out of that shadow. Over the decades Alex has led teams, lost his memory in a country that enslaved mutants, and woken up in a world where he had a son. Why does a man who resents the X-Men keep getting pulled back into them? And how does a hero who struggles to command his own body end up commanding armies?

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• 2. Creation Notes

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  Roy Thomas and artist Neal Adams are the creators who gave Alex a mutant identity. Under their run on The X-Men, he was revealed as a mutant and finally given the codename Havok. Before that he was only Alex Summers. Thomas has said that Drake never told him whether Alex was meant to be a mutant at all.

  Neal Adams also designed the original costume, which debuted in The X-Men #58 in July 1969. Adams did not treat it as a mere visual upgrade. He conceived it as a practical suit that siphons off energy. Thomas and Adams also began a romance between Havok and Polaris, who was then known only by her real name, Lorna Dane. Havok officially joined the X-Men in issue #65, in December 1969.

  The stint did not last. After only one more issue, the series switched to reprints. Giant-Size X-Men #1 arrived in 1975 and brought the team back with seven new members, and Alex was not among them. He quit the group in The X-Men #94, in May 1975.

  He and Polaris came back in The X-Men #97, in February 1976, as villains under the mental control of Erik the Red. They were restored to normal in The X-Men #119, in March 1979. After that they became regular fixtures in the X-Men's supporting cast.

  The next big commitment came in X-Factor #71, in October 1991. Havok stayed with that team until the series ended with issue #149 in September 1998. He then headlined his own book, Mutant X, which ran for 32 issues.

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• 3. The Crash Over Alaska

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  Alexander Summers was born in Honolulu, Hawaii. His father, Christopher Summers, was a United States Air Force Major and test pilot, and his mother was Katherine Anne. Alex was the second of the three known Summers sons. The family later lived in Anchorage, Alaska, and one day Christopher took them up in their airplane. A Shi'ar spaceship attacked it. As the plane went down, the parents strapped Alex and his older brother Scott into a parachute and pushed them out. Scott hit his head and spent a short time in a coma.

  An orphanage took in both boys. Alex was adopted fairly quickly, while Scott stayed behind for much of his childhood. The Blandings raised Alex. Their own son Todd had died in a car accident.

  The boy responsible for that accident later kidnapped Alex and his foster sister Haley. In that moment Alex's powers appeared for the first time, and he incinerated his captor. Mister Sinister, a geneticist obsessed with the Summers bloodline, arrived on the scene. He was eager but also surprised, because Alex's potential exceeded Scott's even though Alex seemed to have no control over it. Sinister placed psi-blocks on the minds of Alex and Haley so that both forgot the night.

  Alex went on to earn a degree in geophysics. At college he met the original X-Men and learned that Cyclops was his brother. Soon after, the Living Pharaoh kidnapped him. The Pharaoh declared Alex the only being who could rival him, because both absorbed cosmic energy, in opposite proportions.

  By locking Alex inside a shielded cell, the Pharaoh gathered enough energy to become the Living Monolith. The X-Men lost badly against him until Alex broke free and the Monolith reverted to the Living Pharaoh. In those early days, Alex's power seemed to surface only when he was close to death, and he feared how large it was.

  Larry Trask and his Sentinels, bent on controlling or wiping out mutants, captured him next. Trask built a costume to help Alex manage his power, and this is where the name Havok came from. Trask turned out to be a mutant himself, and the X-Men defeated the Sentinels. Alex lost control, and his excess energy was absorbed by Sauron. Only afterward did Havok gain control of his powers.

  Years later, he would learn that Corsair of the Starjammers was really his father.

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• 4. Plasma Without a Switch

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  Seventeen hours is roughly how long Havok needs to refill after he spends every bit of his stored energy. That number tells you how his body works. He absorbs ambient cosmic energy, processes it, and sends it out as waves that heat the air until it becomes plasma. The beam carries a telltale pattern of concentric circles.

  Left alone, those waves radiate in every direction. Havok has to deliberately channel them, usually along the length of his arms. He is immune to the harmful effects of most radiation and heat. In his earlier years, though, he could not rule his output. A containment suit with sensors for measuring and controlling his power kept him from endangering others.

  The popular idea that his blasts hit like a hammer is wrong. The energy is not truly concussive. When hot plasma strikes an object, the sudden jump in temperature often makes the object shatter or disintegrate. Dialed down to its lowest setting, a blast aimed at a person gives the target a severe headache and nothing worse.

  Absorption is normally passive. Havok can also choose to take in and store other energies by force of will, such as starlight, x-rays and gamma radiation. When his body fills up, the surplus is released in negligible amounts. A circle on his chest works as a fuel gauge. Firing focused beams is exhausting, especially over a long stretch.

  He can also use stored energy for flight by pushing it downward as thrust, and he can wrap himself in a short-lived shield of plasma against projectiles. Cyclops and Havok are immune to each other's blasts.

  Outside the power itself, Havok is physically an ordinary man in good shape. He holds a master's degree in geophysical science and has completed some doctoral work. Wolverine trained him in hand-to-hand combat and martial arts, and he is an instinctive tactician.

  One stranger fact emerged in the Mutant X and Exiles books. His body and mind serve as a nexus for every other Alex Summers across realities, a sort of back door to all of them.

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• 5. Lost Years

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  Dallas is where the X-Men sacrificed themselves to defeat the Adversary, and Roma later resurrected them in the Australian Outback. Around then, Havok grew close to Madelyne Pryor. Both had been rejected by earlier lovers, since her husband Cyclops had left her for Jean Grey. N'astirh manipulated Madelyne into becoming the Goblin Queen, and she tried to use Havok to help turn the world into a demonic realm. He came to his senses. Madelyne killed herself after learning she was a clone of Jean Grey.

  A vacation in Mexico with Wolverine brought a terrorist cell after him. The group wanted to use his power to absorb dangerous radiation from a nuclear fallout.

  Then came the Siege Perilous. Havok went through it with several other X-Men who were fleeing the Reavers, and he came out an amnesiac in Genosha, a country that enslaved mutants. He rose to become a high-ranking Magistrate in its army. His friends found out during the X-Tinction Agenda, when Genosha kidnapped members of the X-Men, X-Factor and the New Mutants.

  In a fierce fight with Cyclops, his memory returned. Havok kept it hidden so he could catch Genoshan leader Cameron Hodge off guard. It worked, and he delivered the killing blow. He and Wolfsbane stayed behind to help rebuild the nation.

  Professor X and Cyclops soon brought them home so that Alex could lead the new government-sponsored X-Factor. He reunited with Polaris and led the group well for a long time. The job came with the unwilling and unwitting affections of Wolfsbane, the physical troubles of Strong Guy, and public relations disasters, including the destruction of the Washington Monument. Mister Sinister, his Nasty Boys and a mutant senator who could cause bad luck orchestrated much of the team's poor image. The team also took part in the Infinity War and the Infinity Crusade.

  Multiple Man contracted the Legacy Virus in Genosha and died. Havok took it hard and left for a honeymoon in Hawaii with Polaris. Malice, Mister Sinister and the Nasty Boys attacked, and reinforcements helped beat them. Soon after, Strong Guy suffered a heart attack and fell into a coma, and Wolfsbane left to be with her foster mother.

  After the Age of Apocalypse event, Havok accidentally destroyed a dam and had to go back into his old containment suit. New members Wild Child, Shard and Mystique joined. Havok fought Random and was captured by the Dark Beast, who brainwashed him into serving both the Beast and Onslaught. He broke free but used the chance to infiltrate the enemy, recreating a version of the Brotherhood of Mutants. He defeated the Dark Beast, then tried to mend things with Polaris and Multiple Man. The man who had died turned out to be a Madrox duplicate.

  While he tried to rebuild X-Factor, time-traveling teammate Greystone built an experimental device to send himself home. It exploded in midair, seemingly killing both men in front of their teammates.

  Havok had in fact landed in a parallel world as the leader of The Six, a drastically altered X-Factor. In that reality he led the original X-Men, because Cyclops and their parents had been abducted by the Shi'ar. He was married to Madelyne Pryor and had a son named Scotty, and every friend was a twisted version of the person he knew. He took on the father role willingly, though Scotty knew Alex was not his real dad. His adventures there ended in a disaster that left most of the superhumans dead. He saved the world itself and was then cast into black nothingness.

  Back in his original reality, he was found in a coma. The X-Men restored his psyche with help from Carter, the son of his nurse Annie Ghazikhanian. When Polaris asked him to marry her, he did not answer, because he felt he no longer loved her. Unknown to everyone, Carter had used telepathy to link Annie's dreams with Alex's while he lay comatose, and the two had fallen in love.

  At the wedding, Alex called the ceremony off. Lorna, already shaken by the incident in Genosha, tried to kill Annie and Carter. Juggernaut and Havok stopped her. Alex told Annie that Carter had linked them out of loneliness, and that he loved her. Annie left with Carter after Exodus and his Brotherhood of Mutants attacked the X-Mansion, and Alex stayed with his team.

  During the "Decimation" storyline, Polaris lost her powers and left the X-Men, and Havok chose to go with her. He later helped stop Apocalypse and was infected with a meta-plague after giving Lorna CPR. Emma Frost cured him with a saved dose of antidote. Soon Professor X would call on him for a mission far from Earth.

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• 6. War Among the Stars

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  Professor X assembled a small crew for a space mission: Havok, Marvel Girl (Rachel Summers), Nightcrawler, Warpath, Darwin and Polaris. Their goal was to stop Vulcan, Alex's younger brother, from unleashing his powers on the Shi'ar empire. Havok had just reunited with Corsair, and his relationship with Polaris was improving.

  In the final battle, Corsair tried to reason with his son Vulcan, and Vulcan killed him. Enraged, Havok attacked and was easily beaten. Nightcrawler, Warpath and Hepzibah got the injured Professor X and Darwin back to the ship. Lilandra then sent the ship home to Earth, which left Havok and his teammates stranded.

  After Corsair's death, Havok, Polaris, Rachel, Korvus, Ch'od and Raza formed a new team of Starjammers. Their mission was to defeat Vulcan and put Lilandra back on the throne.

  The war dragged on. Led by Havok, Lilandra's forces gradually wore down Vulcan's, which suffered from defections. The Shi'ar were unhappy to be ruled by an outsider. Vulcan lost heart until Deathbird persuaded him that they would come around.

  Then Vulcan's fleet ambushed the Starjammers. The Scy'ar Tal appeared and routed Vulcan's forces. Marvel Girl made contact with the Eldest Scy'ar Tal and learned their true origin. They were the M'Kraan, a race the Shi'ar had massacred and displaced. The Shi'ar had taken the M'Kraan Crystal for themselves and passed down a legend of it as a sacred gift from their gods.

  The Scy'ar Tal destroyed Feather's Edge using Finality, a weapon capable of teleporting stars. Vulcan called a temporary ceasefire, and the Shi'ar and Starjammers agreed to take out Finality together. The Eldest Scy'ar tried to stop Vulcan and Havok, but Vulcan depowered him. The battle turned toward the Shi'ar, who attacked both the Scy'ar and the Starjammers. Vulcan blasted Havok into a sun.

  Vulcan planned to turn Finality on the Scy'ar. Alex returned and used the power he had absorbed from the sun against his brother. The Shi'ar Imperial Guard ended the fight by appearing with the Starjammers as captives and threatening to kill them. Before surrendering, Alex destroyed Finality.

  He and the other Starjammers went to prison, while Rachel Summers stayed free. Their cells lay 20 miles below a planet's surface, under water. They were tortured daily, and without sunlight Havok was powerless. He escaped with a little leftover energy, freed his teammates, and prepared for Vulcan's arrival.

  Havok, Polaris, Rachel and Korvus then left for Earth. Havok, Polaris and Rachel came back in X-Men Legacy #254, when Rogue launched a rescue after Rachel sent a telepathic distress call.

  During "Schism," Havok and Polaris sided with Wolverine, partly because Polaris wanted distance from her father Magneto. Wolverine pushed the pair to lead X-Factor Investigations after Jamie Madrox died. Madrox returned to life soon after. Havok left the team eventually, though Polaris stayed.

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• 7. Spokesman for a Species

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  Captain America's reasoning was blunt. With Xavier dead and Cyclops imprisoned, the mutant race needed a new spokesperson. So after Avengers vs. X-Men, Havok joined the final battle against Cyclops and was asked to lead the Avengers Unity Squad. He doubted he could fill that role. The 2012 relaunch of Marvel comics put him in charge of a team called the Uncanny Avengers, a blend of X-Men and Avengers.

  The Celestials destroyed Earth, and Eimin's machinations moved mutants to Planet X. In that timeline, Havok married the Wasp, Janet van Dyne, and they had a daughter named Katie. Kang the Conqueror captured Katie after he helped the team avert this timeline by projecting their minds into their past selves. Alex was left disfigured, but he and Janet stayed together. Immortus told them he could return their daughter if they acted at the right time and place to conceive her. He also warned of an imminent threat from the Red Skull.

  During AXIS, the Red Skull and Scarlet Witch accidentally morally inverted a range of heroes and villains. Havok was one of them. He resigned from the Avengers Unity Division and reconciled with Cyclops. When the others returned to normal, Havok remained corrupted along with Sabretooth, shielded from the reversal by a field Iron Man had generated. He used the Wasp as a hostage to escape and joined Cyclops' team.

  In All-New, All-Different Marvel, Havok and Emma Frost watched the funeral of his brother Scott from a distance. Emma told him the truth. Scott had died in the Terrigen Mist clouds, and she had used a telepathic projection of him to rally mutants against a Terrigen cloud. She then faked his death in a final confrontation with Black Bolt.

  Once her actions came out at the end of the war with the Inhumans, the mutants and Inhumans turned on her. Medusa had destroyed the Terrigen cloud to save the mutants. Havok saved Emma, but he made clear that he acted out of respect for his brother and old feelings for her, not forgiveness for what she did to Cyclops' reputation.

  He then worked with the White Queen, Bastion and Miss Sinister to infect the world with the Mothervine virus, which would make mutants the dominant species. Emma Frost and Polaris eventually inverted him back to normal, and Elixir soon afterward cured his scars.

  After House of X and Powers of X, Professor X and Magneto invited all mutants to live on Krakoa. Havok spent time with family in the Summer House, the Summers family's new home on the Moon. He later joined the Hellions, a loose group of outcast mutants working under Mister Sinister, alongside Wild Child, Kwannon, Empath, John Greycrow, and Nanny and Orphan-Maker.

  During the Fall of X, Albert fatally wounded him. Madelyne Pryor, with whom he was in a relationship, saved him. She purposely kept him as an undead creature. He demanded to be returned to life, and after she agreed, he left her. In the From the Ashes relaunch, Havok leads a new government-sponsored X-Factor in X-Factor Volume 5.

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• 8. Other Versions and Screens

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  In 2014, Entertainment Weekly placed Havok 12th in its list ranking every X-Man ever. A year earlier, ComicsAlliance had put him at number 44 on its list of the 50 sexiest male characters in comics. Comicbook.com ranked him 10th among X-Men Batman could beat, and CBR named him the best X-Factor member.

  The comics have also imagined other Alexes. In Age of Apocalypse, he was never separated from Cyclops. Mister Sinister raised the brothers together, and they hold the rank of Prelate while overseeing Sinister's interests. In New Exiles, Alex is called Warshot and belongs to Lilandra Neramani's X-Men. In Ultimate X-Men, he serves in the Academy of Tomorrow, a peacekeeping squad led by Emma Frost.

  On television, X-Men: The Animated Series made him a member of X-Factor, romantically involved with Polaris, with no stated link to Cyclops. An uncredited actor voiced him. X-Men: Evolution, with Matt Hill voicing, adopted him into the Masters family and made him a surfer dude whose powers appear as red energy blasts. In the finale of the first season, he reunites with Cyclops, then gets recruited by Magneto into the Acolytes, who enhance his powers with the Gem of Cyttorak. Realizing he is being used, Havok joins the X-Men against Magneto and loses the enhancements. He turns down X-Men membership to pursue professional surfing, then helps the team beat Apocalypse in the series finale.

  Lucas Till played Alex Summers in three films. In X-Men: First Class, in 2011, Alex sits in solitary confinement in a government prison because of his powers until Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr recruit him to fight the Hellfire Club. He indirectly kills fellow recruit Darwin, then learns control with help from Xavier and Hank McCoy.

  In X-Men: Days of Future Past, in 2014, he has joined a special division of the U.S. Army and fought in the Vietnam War. William Stryker nearly captures Alex and his division on Bolivar Trask's behalf, but Mystique rescues them. In X-Men: Apocalypse, in 2016, he escorts his younger brother Scott to Xavier after Scott's powers manifest. He destroys Cerebro to keep Apocalypse from using it but inadvertently wrecks the X-Mansion, and he is later considered missing in action despite Peter Maximoff's efforts.

  Video games have featured him often, including X-Men: Mutant Academy 2, X-Men: Next Dimension, Marvel Heroes, Lego Marvel Super Heroes and Marvel Snap. In X-Men Legends, he starts in the Brotherhood of Mutants, gets jailed by the Blob for mutiny, and defects to the X-Men. In X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse, he serves as the team's pilot. In Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2, he is a boss who backs Captain America against the Superhuman Registration Act.

  Iron Studios released a figure of him in his original X-Factor costume. Marvel also collected a four-issue Havok and Wolverine miniseries, Meltdown, in July 2019.

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