Bizarro is the name of a fictional artificial being featured in comic books published by DC Comics. He is a super-villain character and is most often associated with the Superman line of comic titles. The character was first introduced in July, 1959 in the pages of Action Comics #254 in a story called "The Battle With Bizarro". He was created by writer Otto Binder and artist Al Plastino.
The character is the result of an experimental Duplicator Ray designed by a man named Professor Dalton and used by criminal scientist Lex Luthor in an effort to create a clone duplicate of Superman which would be subservient to Luthor's demands. The being that was created turned out to be an imperfect duplicate of Superman however with many characteristics that actually served in opposition to the character. Through the course of time, Bizarro duplicates of other characters were established, including Supergirl, Superboy, the staff of the Daily Planet, and the entire Justice League of America. Bizarros even established their own planet, which was a cube-shaped world called Htrae (which is Earth spelled backwards).
Bizarro and his various Bizarro comrades made frequent appearances in the pages of Action Comics during the 1960s, with the original Bizarro often referring to himself as Bizarro No. 1 to distinguish himself from other duplicates.
Biology & Personality[]
Bizarro's physicality, demeanor and behavior operate in stark contrast to human conventions. Even his power-set is different from that of Superman. The only points of commonality between the two in terms of ability is that they can both fly and are both superhuman strong and fast. Bizarro has an inhuman appearance characterized by chalk-white skin, with sharp multi-faceted angles. Whereas Superman is considered to be highly intelligent, Bizarro has an extremely low intellect and his motives run counter to basic human logic. Instead of heat vision, Bizarro has ice vision. Green kryptonite has no affect on a Bizarro, but he will lose his powers and ultimately his life in the presence of Blue kryptonite.
Bizarro's speech patterns are often confusing as they are the opposite of the way a normal human being speaks in thinks. For example, Bizarro will say "Goodbye" as a greeting, and "Hello" as a salutation. He would destroy a work of art in order to make it look pretty, or rumple his clothing up and muss up his hair in order to look clean-cut and professional. Because of this incongruous way of thinking, Bizarro is not actually a true villain, for his motives are often just ones, but his backwards logic causes him to commit acts that would invariably place innocents in danger, or at the very least, cause widespread property damage. In short, he is more of a nuisance than an actual threat.
Alternate media[]
Bizarro has made appearances in multiple forms of Superman-related media, including cartoons, animated movies and television programs. He was a regular member of the Legion of Doom on the 1978 series Challenge of the Super Friends. He is part of the greater DC Animated Universe and has appeared on episodes of Superman: The Animated Series and Justice League Unlimited. A version of Bizarro Superboy appeared on episodes of both the Superboy live-action television series as well as Smallville. A version of Bizarro Supergirl appeared on an episode of Supergirl during its first-season run on CBS.
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