One-Man Army Corps
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- This article is about the Jack Kirby character. For the cyborgs in Infinite Crisis, see OMAC (comics).
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One-Man Army Corps (OMAC) was a superhero comic book created by Jack Kirby and published by DC Comics. Set in the near future ("the world that's coming"), OMAC was a corporate nobody named Buddy Blank who was changed by an A.I. satellite called Brother Eye into the super-powered OMAC.
OMAC worked for the Global Peace Agency, a group of faceless people who policed the entire world using pacifistic weapons. The world balance was too dangerous for large armies, so OMAC was used as the muscle for the Global Peace Agency.
OMAC lasted for eight issues of his own comic, which was cancelled before the current storyline was completed. Later, toward the end of Kamandi (after Kirby had left that title), OMAC was tied into the backstory, and shown to be Kamandi's grandfather. An OMAC back-up feature by Jim Starlin was started in issue #59, but the title was cancelled after the first appearance. It would later finally see print in Warlord, and a new back-up series would also appear in that title (#37-39, 42-47). OMAC made appearances as a guest alongside Superman in DC Comics Presents #61.
In 1991 OMAC was featured in a four-issue prestige format limited series by comic artist and writer John Byrne that tied up loose ends left from previous stories. John Byrne would later reuse OMAC in his third Generations mini-series.
Kirby had kept his run on OMAC well attuned to future events.
[edit] OMACs
The character, along with the Brother Eye satellite, was rebooted for the Infinite Crisis story arc. Although OMACs are now cyborgs who take over human's bodies via a virus in order to assassinate any and all beings with superpowers, they still retain OMAC's familiar mohawk and Brother Eye symbol on their chest. The character is featured in the OMAC Project limited series which leads up to Infinite Crisis. The character has a new meaning behind the acronym: Observational Meta-human Activity Construct. However, in The OMAC Project #5, the acronym was changed to the original One-Man Army Corps. In The OMAC Project #6, the acronym was again changed to "Omni Mind And Community"
[edit] Trivia
- DC Comics', in its Tangent Comics imprint issue The Joker's Wild in 1998, self-parodied OMAC with a beta-version automated policeman called "Omegatech Mechanoid Armored Cop".
- DC would later make a nod to OMAC during the DC One Million event in 1998. In Superboy 1,000,000, one of the future Superboys is known as Superboy OMAC, or "One Millionth Actual Clone.", and the title of the story was "One Million And Counting", repeating the acronym. He appeared in the Superboy and Young Justice specials, as well as the DC One Million mini-series.
- In Kingdom Come, Alex Ross created a female version of OMAC named OWAC, (One-Woman Army Corps).
