Jamie Braddock
Jamie Braddock | |
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Sat-Yr-9 | |
Abilities |
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James Braddock Jr. is a character appearing in
Publication history
Jamie Braddock first appeared in the UK title Captain Britain Weekly #9 (Dec. 1976), and was created by Chris Claremont, Herb Trimpe, and Fred Kida.[1]
Fictional character biography
Jamie is the oldest son of Dr. James and Elisabeth Braddock. Nearly a decade older than his siblings, the twins Brian and Elisabeth ("Betsy"), Jamie had a relatively isolated childhood.[2]
He made his name as a financial genius and was also a successful race car driver. He headed Braddock Industries, a company that flourished under his leadership. Eventually, Jamie discovered his brother's secret identity as
Jamie's treatment at the hands of Doctor Crocodile eventually fractured his mind, leading him to believe that the world around him was merely a dream. The torture and hallucinations forced upon him also awakened his latent mutant power; the ability to warp and restructure reality in his immediate environment.
Sat-Yr-9 used Jamie's reality warping powers to turn the London criminal known as Vixen into a fox. Moments afterward, he turned her assistant Nigel Frobisher (who had also been sent by Sat-Yr-9 to hire the Technet to free him in the first place) into a duplicate of Vixen. While Frosbisher had wanted to take over Vixen's criminal empire and had told Jamie as much, this was not how he had hoped to do so. After Frobisher got over the initial awkwardness of his situation, he and Jamie used their newly acquired resources to ambush
Jamie was briefly seen in Uncanny X-Men #462-465 in the tie-in story of House of M, in which Mad Jim Jaspers, another British villain with reality manipulation powers, also mysteriously reappeared. In Uncanny X-Men #472, he reveals that he was the one who resurrected his sister Betsy one year to the day after she was killed in Spain. In restoring her to life, Jamie also manipulated the quantum forces making up his sister, granting her complete immunity to psionics, magic, and reality-warping. Uatu the Watcher also appears inexplicably, implying that something of cosmic significance is about to happen. Jamie mentions a "cosmic threat" known as the Foursaken that has recently reappeared on Earth. He is pulled through a mysterious portal which the X-Men follow him through. Most of the team is captured, with the exception of Betsy, who was invisible to the Foursaken thanks to Jamie's alterations. During the conflict that follows, Jamie decides that he cannot allow his sister to be used as a pawn again, sacrificing himself instead to save the universe from the First Fallen, the Foursaken's master.
Jamie appears briefly in
Jamie appears alive once more, alongside his brother and the Captain Britain Corps defending Otherworld from the forces of a powerful sorcerer called The Goat. He offers to "cleanse" Betsy of the changes made to her mind and body over the course of her time with the X-Men, but she refuses. Though he initially appears to be reformed and cured of his insanity, it is eventually revealed that The Goat was in fact a corrupted future incarnation of Jamie who was intent on consuming the multiverse to achieve godhood. As his power grows, Betsy, left with no alternative, telepathically forces her twin, Brian, to kill Jamie by breaking his neck, erasing The Goat from existence and ending his threat to the multiverse.[3]
Jamie however was apparently resurrected by a group of magicians that became his followers, as he turned up alive and well searching for the Space Stone that was under Black Widow care. Using the dark arts he twisted two young boys to literally sniff the Infinity Stone, yet Black Widow was able to put a tracker in one of the magicians in order to find the boys and break Jamie's hold over them. When Black Widow confronted him in his hideout, he had an asp from the Sixth Dimension bite her and inject a venom that would slowly kill her. After Black Widow took out Jamie's followers, she stabbed him several times and severed his legs with a knife, yet this only caused the Sixth-dimensional asps that he had been suppressing, to emerge from his body. With help of the Wizard Merlin (however the Wizard never reveals his identity), Black Widow dealt with the asps which apparently killed Jamie and therefore was able to free the children under Jamie's control. Black Widow herself was saved from the asp venom by the Wizard.[4]
Dawn of X
Jamie was later
Ensured that Betsy will be resurrected if she loses, due to her refusal to kill Brian, the pair clash. At first it seems a stalemate, with Brian perfectly willing to kill Betsy, but Betsy outfighting him. But the tide suddenly turns as the pair grapple over Brian’s sword and Betsy unexpectedly and unintentionally stabs him in the chest, killing him. Perplexed, Betsy suddenly recognizes the presence of Jamie, who altered probability just enough for Betsy to strike a deathblow against Brian. With Brian dead, Apocalypse demands Morgan's surrender, promising her exile if she allows a new monarch of Otherworld to ascend – Jamie Braddock. Morgan surrenders with little option, and Jamie places her in a cage, saying she doesn’t get to choose her place of exile. He takes the throne, and Apocalypse crowns him King Jamie the First, uniquely poised to be ruler of Otherworld, which is now inextricably linked to the mutant island of Krakoa through the Otherworld gate that was created with Apocalypse’s ritual. Jamie resurrects Brian with his reality-bending powers, and sends everyone home. But all is not over as Jamie Braddock later calls upon a brusque Apocalypse who is secreted in a laboratory and appears to be experimenting on Morgan le Fay, a process the backmatter implies is meant to allow him to engineer an Otherworld/mutant hybrid.[6]
Powers and abilities
Jamie Braddock is an Omega-level
Jamie's reality-warping power is immense in scope, limited only by his imagination and fluctuating sanity. He can create portals out of ordinary objects that can transport him across the planet or into other dimensions instantaneously, transform living beings into entirely different forms, grant various superhuman abilities to others (though they tend to fade over time), and can even resurrect the dead, however this particularity apparently can only be used on his own bloodline, as he only demonstrated this ability with his family.
Power runs deep in our family. He got the full measure. The ability to pull the quantum strings that define causality.
He got himself so tangled, he'll never twist free.—Betsy Braddock, The Uncanny X-Men #464
Other versions
An alternate version of him appeared in Excalibur #18, where he killed his brother.[8] Another one is where he was on the side of Brian, facing the Chaos Commanders and the Ayranites.[9]
House of M
In the House of M reality, the Mutant-Human war broke out and he helped preserve the peace. Jamie apparently had manifested mutant powers, and he was proud of his brother having no ill will against mutants. After the Mutant-Human war had calmed, Jamie disappeared without a trace, and Magneto had asked that the oldest should take control of the United Kingdom: Betsy was appointed but refused; Brian accepted.[10]
Ultimate Marvel
In
References
- ISBN 978-1-4654-7890-0.
- ^ Captain Britain Weekly #9 (Dec. 1976)
- ^ Uncanny X-Force #20-23
- ^ Infinity Countdown: Black Widow #1
- ^ Excalibur #1
- ^ Excalibur #6
- ^ Infinity Countdown: Black Widow #1
- ^ Excalibur #18
- ^ Excalibur Annual #2
- ^ The Uncanny X-Men #464
- ^ Ultimate Fallout #5
- ^ Ultimate comics: Ultimates #2-8 (2011-2012)
External links
- Jamie Braddock's profile in the Unofficial Handbook of the Marvel Universe
- Jamie Braddock at the Comic Book DB (archived from the original)
- Jamie Braddock on Marvel Database, a Marvel Comics wiki