Real
Name: Fred J. Dukes
Occupation: (current) Professional criminal, (former)
Circus performer, federal government special operative
Legal Status: Citizen of the United States with a criminal
record, pardoned
Identity: Publicly known
Place of Birth: Lubbock, Texas
Marital Status: Single
Known Relatives: None
Group Affiliation: (current) X-Corps(former) Brotherhood
of Evil Mutants III, Brotherhood of Evil Mutants I and II, Factor
Three, Freedom Force, and a frequent partner of Unus
Base of Operations: (current) Unrevealed, (former) Freedom
Force headquarters, the Pentagon, Arlington, Virginia
First Appearance: X-MEN (first series) #3
History: The Blob is a mutant whose
latent superhuman powers manifested themselves when he
reached puberty. Thinking of himself as no more than,
in his own words, "an extra-strong freak," the
Blob used his superhuman powers as a performer in a carnival.
The original X-Men came to the carnival in their everyday
identities to invite him to meet with their mentor, Professor
Charles Xavier. Attracted to the beautiful young X-Man
Jean Grey, the Blob accepted, and went with the X-Men
to Xavier's mansion. There, Xavier asked the Blob to join
the X-Men, but the Blob arrogantly refused. Xavier then
knew he had to use his mental powers to erase the Blob's
knowledge of the X-Men's true identities. But the Blob
had no intention of letting this happen, and, after fighting
the X-Men, escaped back to the carnival.
The Blob had learned through meeting Xavier that
he himself was a superhumanly powerful mutant. Believing
himself to be superior to normal people, the Blob took
over the carnival. Knowing that the X-Men considered him
dangerous because he knew who they really were, the Blob
decided to strike out at them first. He led the other
members of the carnival on an attack on Xavier's mansion.
The Blob hoped to steal whatever scientific discoveries
and special weapons that the X-Men might possess and use
them against ordinary humans. However, the X-Men defeated
the Blob and his allies, and Xavier wiped out their memories
of the X-Men.
Later, Magneto attempted to recruit the
Blob for his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. A severe blow
to the head restored the Blob's memory of the X-Men, and
he joined Magneto's Brotherhood in an attack on them.
In the midst of battle Magneto launched a powerful torpedo
at the X-Men, not caring that the Blob was in the way.
Torpedoes struck the Blob but did not seriously injure
him. The Brotherhood escaped, and the Blob, feeling betrayed,
swore never to trust anyone again and returned to his
job with the carnival.
Months later, the Blob met another superhumanly
powerful mutant, Unus the Untouchable, and the two of
them attempted to frame their mutual enemies, the X-Men,
as thieves. This was the start of the Blob's long and
close friendship with Unus, which ended only with Unus's
apparent death several years later. The two mutants next
joined Factor Three, an organization of mutants that attempted
world conquest. Unus and the Blob teamed up with other
mutants, including Magneto, for other criminal activities,
although they were continually thwarted by superhumanly
powerful crimefighters.
Eventually, the Blob was recruited by Mystique
for her new Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. Although the
Blob continued to operate independently of Mystique's
organization since then, he remained a member of the group.
Mystique soon became aware of the United States government's
increasing anti-mutant activity, and offered the Brotherhood's
services to the government, renaming the group "Freedom
Force." The Blob participated in Freedom Force's
first official mission for the government: the capture
of Magneto, his former leader in the original Brotherhood.
As a member of Freedom Force, the Blob was
involved in missions that continued to bring him into
conflict with superhuman crimefighters, most notably the
X-Men, X-Factor, and the Avengers. The Blob enjoyed the
fact that he could continue indulging his violent tendencies
and fighting his old foes while drawing a government paycheck.
However, after a disastrous mission to the Middle East,
the government disbanded Freedom Force, and the Blob was
once again a free agent.
The Blob soon joined yet another version
of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, headed up by his old
teammate from the original Brotherhood, the Toad. This
team was defeated by the outlaw mutant strike team called
X-Force.
Recently the Blob has allied himself with another
mutant, the Mimic, and battled members of the current
version of X-Force under the orders of an as yet unknown
benefactor. The Blob and the Mimic remain at large.
Height: (formerly) 5 ft. 10 in., (after
recent further mutation) 8 ft.
Weight: (formerly) 510 lbs., (after recent further mutation)
976 lbs.
Eyes: Brown
Hair: Brown
Strength Level: Originally the Blob did
not possess superhuman strength in proportion to his size.
However, recently he has undergone further mutation, greatly
increasing his height and mass, and raising his strength
to superhuman levels. The Blob can lift (press) 5 tons,
possibly superhuman class 75.
Known Superhuman Powers: The Blob's mutant
powers relate to the mass, strength, resilience and indestructibility
of his obese body. His primary ability is to become virtually
immovable at will as long as he is in contact with the
ground. He does this by bonding himself to the earth beneath
him by force or will, which in effect creates a monodirectional
increase of gravity beneath him. This gravity field extends
about five feet in radius from his center of balance.
Thus if there is sufficient power to uproot him, it would
take the ground beneath his feet in an area corresponding
to the radius of the field. Through intense concentration,
the Blob is able to extend the gravity field beneath him
farther than five feet.
The Blob's body has several unusual properties
in itself. The first is its superhuman resistance to injury.
The fat tissues that comprise the Blob's epidermis are
able to absorb the impact of rifle bullets, cannonballs,
bazooka, and even torpedoes. The larger of these projectiles
recoil from his body at one half the force of impact.
The smaller one imbed themselves in his layers of fat
tissue, enabling him to eject them by merely flexing his
muscles. The Blob's nerve endings do not relay any tactile
perception to his brain which are near the threshold of
pain. The fat tissue of his epidermis is resilient enough
to revert to its normal shape within second after deformation
caused by impact. It is virtually impervious to physical
injury. The Blob's skin cannot be punctured, lacerated,
frostbitten, or ravaged by any skin disease, due in part
to the skin's greatest elasticity and toughness and in
part to the highly accelerated rate at which his skin
cells grow and replace themselves. His skin is somewhat
less resistant to burning.
It is not yet known if there is an upper limit
to the Blob's ability to absorb impact. While he could
easily survive a head-on collision with a bus traveling
at a hundred miles per hour, even a highly ferrous meteorite
fifty feet in diameter on top of him at terminal velocity,
it is not known whether he could survive a collision with
an object traveling at near light speed. Further, it is
not known whether his skin's imperviousness to heat could
survive the 11,000,000-degree heat at ground zero of a
multi-megaton atomic blast.
Special Limitations: Eyes, ears, nose,
and mouth are not as resistant to injury as the rest of
his body.
