Brainiac (comics)

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Appearances in other media

The standard pre-Crisis version of the character - the green-skinned robot with skull-diodes - was seen on the Super Friends cartoon. The mechanical version appeared in later iterations of the series, when Darkseid was the primary antagonist. In a famous Cartoon Network parody, Brainiac pleads with Luthor for a "decent pair of pants", prompting Solomon Grundy to utter the now-famous reply, "Solomon Grundy want pants too!"

Related Topics:
Super Friends - Cartoon - Darkseid - Cartoon Network - Solomon Grundy

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Brainiac was also seen in episodes of the Filmation animated series "The New Adventures of Superman". This was the green-skinned robot version as well, who was first seen using his shrinking ray to create a sort of "cosmic Noah's ark", by shrinking a male and female of each earth species to take back to his dying homeworld. He appeared in several episodes of this series which began in 1966.

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In ', Brainiac (voiced by Corey Burton, in the style of HAL 9000 and Vic Perrin's opening narration from The Outer Limits) was the supercomputer that ran most of the day-to-day operations on Krypton. It sensed the imminent destruction of the planet, but rather than warn others, it chose to save itself and the collected records of Krypton. In its mind, as long as the records of Krypton existed, the loss of the planet itself - and all its living inhabitants - was acceptable. It also knew that if word of Krypton's impeding doom got out, it would be forced to calculate a way to stop this, which Brainiac knew to be impossible and would only distract him from the more essential task of saving Krypton's records. Brainiac uploaded its core program and all of the collected data to an artificial satellite (which it altered into a spacecraft), and began exploring the galaxies. Each time it came to an inhabited world, it would upload all the knowledge it could from that world, then destroy it - decreasing the number of beings who have access to the knowledge makes it that much more valuable. Along with raw data, it also assimilated whatever useful technology it could find, improving itself with every world it visited (not unlike the Borg of Star Trek). It eventually made its way to Earth, under the pretense of a peaceful exchange of knowledge with Lex Luthor. Superman discovered Braniac's true intentions, and with the help of Lex Luthor defeated him. Braniac was seemingly destroyed, but later episodes revealed that the data that Braniac had downloaded into LexCorp's computers were not alien knowledge, but a copy of Braniac's programming. It tried several times to revive itself, first by capturing Luthor and forcing him to rebuild him, and another time by taking control of Bruce Wayne, prompting Superman to team up with Robin in order to find him.

Related Topics:
Corey Burton - HAL 9000 - The Outer Limits - Krypton - Borg - Star Trek - Bruce Wayne

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In the animated series Justice League, the lord of Apokolips, Darkseid, struck a deal with Brainiac to save his planet when Brainiac came to conquer it. When the League arrived to stop the attack (due to the pleads of Darkseid), many were taken hostage by the two villains. While Brainiac was attempting to deliver his mind into Superman, Darkseid betrayed him and hacked into his systems. After a battle between Brainiac (controlled by Darkseid) and the League, the ship they were on exploded, seemingly killing both Brainiac and Darkseid.

Related Topics:
Justice League - Apokolips

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In the animated series Static Shock, Brainiac, now reduced to a piece of alien metal kept in stasis, escaped confinement following a power failure at JL H.Q. Virgil Hawkins, aka "Static", was tapped to help recharge the generators, along with Richie, aka Gear. The rogue bit of data that was Braniac took over Gear's Backpack droid, and later turned Richie into a cyborg under his control. As Brainiac proceeded to use Richie's hands and technoskills to build a warship and to take over the League one by one with small implants inserted in the space where the skull joins the spinal column, Richie attempted to fight back and to tell his friend how to defeat the rogue program: Backpack's remote control has an off switch. Static eventually figured it out and was able to stop Brainiac's scheme at the source, saving Earth.

Related Topics:
Static Shock - Power failure - Cyborg - Skull - Spinal column

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However, Brainiac had delievered a portion of his consciousness inside Lex Luthor during a previous encounter years before. Brainiac started to subtly control Luthor into committing actions that resulted in a major story arc that occurred in the first two seasons of the new Justice League Unlimited. Brainiac assimilated nanotechnology from the alien "Dark Heart" machine and technology derived from the Amazo android. On Luthor's urging, he and Luthor combined into a single entity, with Brainiac's goals and approaches tempered by Luthor's ambition and cruelty. The traditional Brainiac starship and Brainiac controlling Lex Corp story-line was evident in the episode "Divided We Fall." This version of Brainiac was mostly grey and blue, and partially robotic. This Brainiac was beaten by the Justice League, the Flash in particular. After the defeat, all that was left of Brainiac was a part of his consciousness, still in Luthor, and a small piece of his body, now in the possession of Gorilla Grodd. Grodd is using the piece to enlist Luthor into his Legion of Doom; Brainiac tells Luthor that he can completely rebuild himself if they get the piece, and that he should work with Grodd, at least until they can get the piece.

Related Topics:
Justice League Unlimited - Nanotechnology - The Flash - Gorilla Grodd - Legion of Doom

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In the upcoming fifth season of Smallville, Brainiac will be a semi-regular character, played by James Marsters. So far, it is known that he will appear in episodes 1-Arrival, 3-Hidden, 4-Aqua, 5-Thirst, 7-Splinter, and 8-Solitude.

Related Topics:
Smallville - James Marsters

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