D'Ken
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please discuss this issue on the talk page or replace this tag with a more specific message. This article has been tagged since June 2006. |
| D'Ken Neramani | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
||||||
|
||||||
|
||||||
D'Ken Neramani is a fictional character in the Marvel Comics universe. He is best known for being the evil brother to both Lilandra and Cal'syee (the villain Deathbird), two important characters in the X-Men franchise. He first appeared in X-Men v1 #97 (February 1976)
[edit] History
D'Ken was the first known ruler of the outerspace "Shi'ar Empire". He was responsible for the kidnapping of Corsair and Katherine Anne Summers, the parents to X-Men members Cyclops, Havok and as later revealed, Vulcan. When he had first kidnapped Corsair and Katherine, D'Ken disposed of Corsair and tried to rape Katherine. As Corsair made an unsuccessful attempt to escape from his holding pen, D'Ken punished him by making Corsair witness the murder his wife and the ripping of the unborn third child (Vulcan) from the dead mother's womb. Little did D'Ken know that Corsair had two surviving sons back on Earth (note that even Corsair himself believed his sons to be all dead at the time). As Corsair was made a slave, D'Ken kept Vulcan alive with the Shi'ar technology in order to make a slave out of the boy. Eventually, as Vulcan grew older, he escaped from his master's clutches and made it back to his homeplanet Earth, where he was welcomed by Professor X and Moira MacTaggart.
D'Ken didn't care about Vulcan, however, and sought out to gain more power in the M'Kraan Crystal. Regardless of his family's concerns, he eventually located the Crystal, placed on an abandoned planet, known only as The World (the Crystal was considered sacred by the Shi'ar, a symbol of their faith). D'Ken wanted to use its legendary power for his own ends, and so D'Ken's sister Lilandra Neramani allied herself with the X-Men to stop her brother's mad quest, knowing that the Crystal was nicknamed "The End of All That Is". The Phoenix Force, still weakened and unexperienced in using the new host body of Jean Grey, flew to the crystal to try and stop D'Ken, but was sucked into it, with everyone else. Inside the crystal, they found a large endless city, at the center of which was the heart of the Crystal - a sphere which contained a Neutron Galaxy. The X-Men, along with D'Ken, were rendered immobile by a ray coming out of the orb, which caused everyone to live out their greatest nightmares. Only Phoenix was unaffected. Using her empathic link she had with the crystal, Phoenix discovered an energy field in the form of a latticework, which acted as a living shield - for the Neutron Galaxy was deteriorating and due to its intense gravity, would cause all of creation to be sucked into it. Phoenix used her powers to try and repair the latticework but found she wasn’t strong enough, so she reached out telepathically to her fellow X-Men for aid, and with their combined power Phoenix was able to repair the Crystal and thus save the universe from ultimate destruction. But the crystal's immense power rendered the D'Ken comatose and he remained in a coma for a very long time. With D'Ken out of the picture, his younger sister Lilandra became the queen of the Shi'ar.
Recently, however, Vulcan, reawakened after barely surviving the failed rescue the original X-Men from Krakoa and aware of his horrible past, swore revenge on D'Ken and heading back into outer space (also in search of his father Corsair). When told of D'Ken's coma, Vulcan just swore revenge on the entire Shi'ar empire and continued his journey into space.
In Uncanny X-Men # 483 (Part 9 of 12 of the Rise and Fall Arc), it is shown that Vulcan had been involved in D'Ken's revival. At the end of the issue D'Ken observes that Deathbird and Vulcan are romantically involved, and invokes an ancient Shi'Ar law allowing Vulcan to marry Deathbird and become part of the Shi'Ar royalty.
[edit] Trivia
D'Ken is also believed to have some connection to the mysterious Adam X, a human-Shi'ar hybrid whom, according to Davan Shakari, was fathered by D'Ken, which led fans to believe he was the so-called Third Summers Brother.
[edit] In other media
D'Ken was seen in the third season of the X-Men (1992 Animated Series), in the episode Phoenix Saga five parter, where his history was very much alike as it was in the comics. He was also responsible for the abduction of Cyclops' parents and him becoming an orphan on Earth. He also killed Cyclops' mother and imprisoned his father. D'Ken gained control over the M'Kraan Crystal though, which gave him powers. But, those powers drove him completely insane. When he was fighting his sister Lilandra, the X-Men, and the Imperial Guard, D'Ken was eventually killed by the M'Kraan itself which didn't like the idea of its powers being abused.
