Tabitha Smith
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Tabitha Smith | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
||||||||
|
||||||||
|
||||||||
Tabitha Smith is a comic book superhero appearing in the Marvel Comics universe. Created by Jim Shooter and Al Milgrom, the character first appeared in Secret Wars II #5 (November 1985). She later appeared as a member of the X-Force and, more recently, as a member of Nextwave. Since her first appearance, Tabitha has used a number of different codenames, including Time Bomb, Boom Boom, Boomer, and Meltdown.
Contents |
[edit] Fictional character biography
[edit] Origin
Tabitha Smith was born to Marty Louis Smith and Mandy Smith, in Roanoke, Virginia. Her parents divorced and her father later married Wanda Jo Bialowsky.
Tabitha Smith had not gotten along with her parents for most of her life. At thirteen Tabitha's Human Mutant power, to create balls of explosive concussive energy, emerged. Her parents discovered them and were appalled. Resentful towards her father, Tabitha put a small explosive ball of energy in his lasagna. In retaliation, her father beat her severely. Soon after, Tabitha ran away from home, to find Professor Charles Xavier's Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, in Westchester, NY.Tabitha started journeying there by train. She decided to give herself the alias "Time Bomb." This was the beginning of a whole new life for Tabitha.
[edit] The Beyonder
Near Washington, D.C. the train was wrecked on a whim by the cosmic entity calling itself the Beyonder. Thinking he was a mutant, Tabitha accompanied him.The Beyonder abandoned her but returned and took her to the secret school she had heard about – Xavier‘s mansion near Salem Center. Before she could really get the X-Men's attention, however, they noticed the Beyonder and flew right past her, ignoring Tabitha to try and stop the Beyonder's perceived threat. Tabitha was terrified when the teams of the X-Men and the New Mutants fought the Beyonder. Before that event, Tabitha had never seen so much power, nor so many people fighting, in one place. In the midst of that rejection, Boom-Boom ran off into the woods and was ready to commit suicide with a giant time bomb she created until the Beyonder arrived just in time to stop her.The Beyonder took her to a planet where the Celestials were located. There, threatening to destroy the universe, the Beyonder fought and seemingly defeated a number of Celestials. (It was eventually revealed that that planet was not truly the Celestials' headquarters, and the Celestials allowed the Beyonder to "defeat" them, presumably in order to observe him in action.) Fearful of the battle taking place between the Beyonder and the Celestials, Tabitha demanded to be returned to Earth. Back on Earth, Tabitha alerted the Avengers about the Beyonder. Summoning the Beyonder, Tabitha thereby led him into an ambush by the Avengers and other costumed champions. The Beyonder, who had regarded Tabitha as his only friend, allowed the Avengers to defeat him, but then left. Tabitha left during the battle.
Instead of going back to the X-Men or the Avengers, Boom-Boom made her way to New York City, where she stayed on the streets and did things she wasn't proud of. Though she's never elaborated much on this time of her life, it's been suggested she may have gotten involved in both drug use and prostitution. One incident we know of involved a man named Maurice "Tiger" Antonini, who was abusing the girls on the streets. He had already cut up Tabitha's friend, Gina, and was going after Tabitha herself when she got so scared she popped off a time bomb in his face, blowing his head off. This incident continues to haunt her to this day
[edit] Fallen Angels
Eventually, she was found by the teleporting criminal called the Vanisher. The Vanisher recruited her into the Fallen Angels, his gang of thieves, where she took up the codename Boom Boom. During her time with the gang, Tabitha learned many things from the Vanisher, including how to steal. Tabitha eventually became unsure of the Vanisher. She called Cyclops and the rest of X-Factor, who the world believed to be "mutant-hunters". Meeting with Beast and Iceman, Tabitha began to have second thoughts. After giving her situation more thought, Tabitha decided to leave and stay with X-Factor at their headquarters.
After her initial encounter with Iceman, Tabitha used a "time bomb" on him as a prank. This incident began a series of pranks between the two of them, over the years. During her stay with X-Factor few days later, Boom-Boom interrupted one of the Beast‘s experiments to try and get his and Iceman's attention. When Hank shrugged her off, Tabitha dropped a time bomb in his beaker set. As they chased her through the complex, her old friend,Ariel, from Vanisher's thieves’ gang opened up a door and used her unique teleportation power to pull Boom-Boom out of the building and to the Beat Street clubhouse in Manhattan. With the Fallen Angels back together, Ariel duped them into becoming captured by her planet's scientists to serve as experiments. Eventually, Ariel changed her mind and helped her teammates escape. After the ordeal, Tabitha and the team returned to Earth. The members of the Fallen Angels went their separate ways and Tabitha was kidnapped by the Right, an anti-mutant organization. Tabitha, X-Factor, and other mutants regained their freedom. Afterwards, Tabitha joined her fellow X-Factor trainees as the X-Terminators.
[edit] New Mutants
After the events of the Inferno saga, Tabitha and some members of the X-Terminators joined the New Mutants. During her time with the New Mutants, Tabitha fell in love with a teammate, Cannonball. She even stayed with the team when a man named Cable came along. With Cable and his training, Tabitha possessed greater control over her abilities. She even became no longer afraid over her abilities and the danger of using them.
During the "X-Tinction Agenda" crossover when the mutant-hating country of Genosha began attacking mutants in the United States in retaliation for an earlier fight with the X-Men, the Genoshan Magistrates kidnapped Boom-Boom and some of her teammates and transported them to the African island nation. The media took an interest in the international incident, and tracked down some relatives of the captured mutants. When they interviewed Tabitha’s father, he said that “the little tramp“ was getting what she deserved for running out on him. Fortunately, Boom-Boom didn’t learn of his harsh words, as she was busy fighting for her freedom in Genosha. Although stripped of their powers, she and Rictor had managed to escape, whereas Wolfsbane had been processed a mutate slave. In the streets, Rictor and Boom-Boom ran into some X-Men, and Jubilee, was given the task to safeguard the pair while the others tried to invade the Magistrates‘ citadel. Due to their somewhat similar attitudes, Jubilee and Boom-Boom didn’t go along that well, but the three youngsters managed to avoid capture several times and eventually made their own way into the Genoshan citadel to joined up with the other X-teams for the final showdown against Cameron Hodge, the villain behind Genosha’s recent attacks Boom Boom took Warlock ashes back to USA to be strewn over Doug Ramsey's grave as requested by Wolfsbane.
[edit] X-Force
Deciding that a hit-and-run strategy was best, Cable and Cannonball moved the team to a new base and renamed the New Mutants, X-Force. Their more aggressive methods put them at odds with the rest of the X-teams, however, making them outlaws from their former friends as well as law-enforcement agencies from all over the world. At that time, Boom-Boom and Sam started to get closer to each other and often questioned themselves why they stuck with the group that had so radically changed from its original purpose. Still thinking to be able to make a change and help people in need, they decided to stay and also to keep an eye on their mysterious leader. Meanwhile, with the new change in the team status, she changed her codename again to Boomer (previously a nickname used by her New Mutants and X-Force teammates).
After the X-Cutioner’s Song crossover and X-Force's arrest following this event, Boomer made herself a new costume with a Shi’ar clothing synthesizer, when Lila walked in and talked to her about Sam. Boomer attempted to avoid the discussion, but Lila was determined. If Boomer didn’t want to talk (she had a broken jaw after all), then she’d just have to listen. Boomer was a little perturbed because she thought Lila and Sam had a thing going, but Lila assured her that Sam and her were just friends. Lila told Boomer that Sam was too young for her and she was too busy to be in a relationship. They only had a short fling together. She told Boomer that Sam was all hers. Lila turned and walked away. Behind her Boomer did a little dance and cheer. But before Lila left the room she made a snide comment of her own. She reminded Boomer that it might be hard to have a relationship with Sam if they were both in jail. Lila left, satisfied. Later on Boomer equipped the rest of X-Force with their new costumes.
The team got settled into their new home of Camp Verde, Arizona when they left the mansion, feeling like they needed a vacation. Sam and Boomer left the team to visit his family farm in Kentucky, introducing her to his family showed that Sam was serious about Tabitha. While there, they were kidnapped by Siena Blaze, a member of the mutant-killing Upstarts. In their latest hunt, the Gamesmaster had sent the Upstarts to capture all remaining members of the old New Mutants and Hellions teams. In the course of this hunt, the Upstarts encountered both X-Force and their allies, the New Warriors. While Siena Blaze captured Cannonball, Boomer, Empath, Karma and Moonstar, Shinobi turned in Firestar and her boyfriend, Justice. In the final battle with the Gamesmaster himself, it was Cannonball’s sister, Paige, who saved them when all seemed lost. She manifested transitional body-morphing abilities and won in a battle of wills with the Gamesmaster, convincing him to free them all. After this was over, Sam and Boomer returned to the Guthrie farm, along with Paige, to continue their vacation.
Sam and Boomer then returned to the team in time to help battle the Phalanx. X-Force soon moved to another base in New York, the psychotic gamesman Arcade's former Murderworld, after their friend and ally, Prosh, cleaned out Camp Verde to facilitate a trip to the stars. Whatever, they didn't stay there longer as they were found by Arcade who detonated explosives in their base.
[edit] Tabitha and Sabretooth
With yet another of their headquarters being blown up, X-Force moved back into Xavier’s mansion. Tabitha‘s life with Sam was interrupted when he was graduated onto the X-Men team, and the two of them began seeing much less of one another, even though they lived in the same house. Feeling abandoned, Tabitha chose to reach out to the worst person in the mansion she could have: Sabretooth. Victor Creed had been a semi-willing prisoner in the mansion for months, subjecting himself to psychic therapy under Charles Xavier in order to cure his bloodlust and homicidal rages. A week or so before X-Force moved in, however, he had gotten loose and engaged Wolverine in a running fight throughout the mansion. Creed had pushed Logan too far, and the X-Man popped his claws straight through Creed's brain, rendering him brain-damaged and in an almost fugue state from then on. Boomer saw the childlike Creed as someone who needed her for once, instead of the other way around. She began bringing him a saucer of milk every night and even confided in him, though she believed he could barely understand what she was saying.
Her looking for attention began to make others in the house uneasy, especially once Creed started showing signs of improvement, and some began to suspect he was faking his condition. X-Force even staged an intervention and forced Tabitha to agree to stop seeing Sabretooth. In the end, the others were right - Creed had been faking his impairment for at least part of the time Boomer was coming to see him. After Xavier finally admitted defeat when it came to "saving" Sabretooth from himself, the wild man was locked down and heavy restraints and was set to be transported to federal confinement in the morning. Boomer came to see him one last time that night, to confront him over abusing her trust. After she said her peace and was about to leave, though, Sabretooth used the knowledge of her past that she herself had revealed to him in their talks to get under her skin, forcing Boomer into the rash act of launching her time bombs at him... and unfortunately freeing him from his restraints. Her actions led to the X-Man Psylocke being critically injured, and Creed escaping into the night.
[edit] Boomer to Meltdown
Boomer had an incredibly hard time dealing with the guilt over this incident and, for the first time in years, decided to go home and visit her father. He actually admitted he was sorry for running her off when she was younger, and revealed to Tabitha that her mother was actually still alive, and out there somewhere. The two of them were actually on their way to a reconciliation when Sebastian Shaw and Holocaust came to the door and leveled the entire trailer. Boomer and the rest of X-Force were temporarily brainwashed into pawns for Shaw to use against Cable, and her father was sent to the hospital in critical condition. Faced with these trials, Boomer began to crack: she saw that everyone had been letting her down her whole life, and hardened her heart against any further pain. After a short while of self-pitying, during which she couldn’t stand looking at her self in a mirror, she adopted a new brasher attitude and the codename, Meltdown. Forcibly training herself to improve her control over her powers, she learned how to pull back her time bombs into her body. In one mission soon after this change, Siryn, Domino and Meltdown returned to Camp Hayden, where they intended to follow up on their recent involvement there and the “Nimrod” project – they initially found nothing but an empty facility (and the word Onslaught scrawled across a wall), but the Blob then arrived and attacked - he also seemed to have enhanced his powers, easily knocking Siryn and Domino unconscious.Tabitha, facing him alone, reacted by creating a time-bomb and shoving it down his throat - showcasing her new, harsher attitude. Siryn and Domino regained consciousness just in time to witness the Blob backing down as the bomb counted down to detonation - convinced that Tabitha's threat was not a bluff. As Meltdown cancelled the bomb and walked away, the Blob declared that he could not believe he had been beaten by a bunch of women. Tabitha responded by bursting his eardrums with twin explosions. Not much later, during an encounter with the Externals, Tabitha learned from Selene that Cannonball was not an immortal High Lord, and as such her fears of growing old and dying while he would stay young and healthy were no longer unjustified.
[edit] On the road
When X-Force split from Cable and went on the road, Tabitha and Sunspot became close and shared a kiss, though Meltdown was technically still dating Cannonball, who was a member of the X-Men at the time. When Sam came to visit X-Force and caught Tab and Bobby in another kiss, he was outraged and flew off. Later Sam reconciled with Tab (and Bobby) after rejoining X-Force. In the meantime, Tab split from Bobby after he regained his trust fund and started throwing money around.
At the time the High Evolutionary took it upon himself to shut off all mutant powers on Earth, Tabitha was out by the waterfront, watching Sam practice his flying. His power cut out in mid-air, and he crashed into the bay, unconscious. Tabitha had to jump off the cliff-side to save him, and they wouldn't have made it if it weren't for the harbor patrol. Sam was in the hospital for days, and this incident was enough of a trauma to push the two ex-lovers back into each other's orbit, with the hint of rekindling their relationship.
In the meantime, the sudden power loss really hit home for Cannonball, as to just how little they had been doing lately to help mutantkind. He got back in touch with Pete Wisdom, and together they devised a plan for reactivating X-Force as a covert strike team. Meltdown, along with Warpath and Bedlam, agreed to enter into this new arrangement, and they took up residence in an abandoned Nevada Hulkbuster base for extensive retraining for martial combat and the use of their powers. In particular, Tabitha learned how to direct the explosive force of her power into streams of guided energy, and was also heavily trained in computer hacking and manipulating digital information.
The revamped X-Force fought the shadow wars that other people couldn't even see, against the likes of meat-spore stormtroopers, mutagenic bioreactors and assassins who carried the mutant gene for murder. After she almost lost Sam to that last threat, Meltdown confessed she couldn't bear to see him die, and the two of them became lovers again. While most of their missions were successful, they weren't without their share of troubles - Wisdom was apparently killed on their first mission back in San Francisco since leaving, and on two separate occasions their enemies tried to kill them in massive explosions.Tabby and her teammates (except Domino) were presumed dead following the explosion they set off, leveling the alien tech base. However, they soon appeared at a press conference for the new team calling itself X-Force, and got into a fight with the other mutants over naming rights. During the battle, Tabitha was teleported by U-Go Girl, left high into the air above a busy freeway. Apparently, the original X-Force disbanded after this, retreating from their recent hardcore offensive stance on mutant issues. Sam and Tabitha also went their separate ways.
[edit] After "Death"... Underground
When Cable discovered hints as to the existence of a revamped Weapon X program, one designed to use mutants to hunt down and intern other mutants, Cable created an organization to investigate the program and the existence of its internment camp, Neverland. He dubbed the organization the Underground, and invited Meltdown to join his elite group. Ultimately, Cable's Underground group was joined by Weapon X agent Brent Jackson, who hoped to stage a coup against the Director and had formed his own resistance group with fellow agents Washout, Marrow, Wild Child, and Sauron.
With Washout's help and sacrifice, the Underground was able to infiltrate the Weapon X complex, ousting The Director and nearly crippling the program. However, before the final defeat, agent Jackson betrayed the Underground, turning Cable's psychic powers against his allies. Jackson captured the Underground members and altered their memories to erase everything they saw and learned about the program. Even so, Cable and the Underground escaped, aided by Weapon X's Marrow, and believed the program to be nothing more than a military cover story.
Sometime thereafter, Cable learned of another threat to mutantkind, the voracious creatures known as the Skornn,a creature that was going to threaten Earth, he gathered and reunited X-Force in order to deal with them. Meltdown was among the former members he recruited for the mission. While both Cannonball and Sunspot were also involved in the conflict, Tabitha’s feelings for either man weren’t brought up. However, she revealed to have learned a new trick with her mutant powers when she channeled one of her time bombs through Shatterstar’s blade straight into chest of a seemingly unbeatable opponent. After the Skornn was also defeated, some of X-Force remained together, assisting Cable on Providence, an island nation he created. Afterwards, she helped them attack the headquarters of the Black Box, though the occupant turned out to be a robot.
Tabitha is one of the mutants who retained their powers after M-Day.
[edit] Nextwave
Shortly afterwards, after an initial period of wild arrogance, Tabitha seemed to mellow out and settle back into her earlier, more bubbly personality. Tabitha grew her hair long and eschewed her codename, re-appeared as a founding member of Nextwave, a new off-beat and more than slightly satirical super-hero team featured in an eponymous comic book series created by Warren Ellis and Stuart Immonen. The Highest Anti-Terrorism Effort, or H.A.T.E. (a subsidiary of the Beyond Corporation©) formed the team. Tabitha Smith's new team included other 2nd-string characters rescued from Marvel limbo, including Monica Rambeau (formerly Captain Marvel, the leader of the Avengers), Elsa Bloodstone, Aaron Stack and The Captain.
Everything seemed on the up-and-up until Tabitha began snooping around, and discovered the marketing plan of the Beyond Corporation, H.A.T.E.'s financial backers. It turned out that Beyond Corp evolved out of the former terrorist cell known as S.I.L.E.N.T., and were planning to use H.A.T.E. and Nextwave to further their own sinister agendas. Tabitha brought the files she stole to the squad leader, Pulsar, and Nextwave hijacked a Shockwave Rider transport ship and defected from H.A.T.E. Tabitha and the others fought against their former employers, and defended the country from the unusual WMDs unleashed by the Beyond Corporation on the general populace,The first biological weapon was revealed to be Fin Fang Foom, a giant lizard which clambered from underground and proceeded to wreck the building site.
After putting an end to the threat of Fin Fang Foom in Abcess, North Dakota, Nextwave moved on to Illinois. Tabitha managed to subdue Mac Mangel, a corrupt police officer who had been taken as a host by the Ultra Samurai Seed, with a time bomb. The Ultra Samurai metallic shell disintegrated, leaving Mangel crushed on the ground. Upon learning that he was a police officer, Tabitha and Aaron began to beat Mangel before Rambeau intervened.
The team were later attacked by 'The New Paramounts', a team consisting of Not Brand Echh characters including Forbush Man, The Inedible Bulk and Charlie America. Forbush Man attempted to use his mind control powers on Tabitha, but was shocked to find they didn't work on her as she apparently has no mind. Tabitha subsequently killed Forbush Man, saving her teammates. When they awoke, she explained "The little guy did something to your heads. I gave him the explodo because I am clever." No long after they eventually exposed and destroyed the true mastermind behind S.I.L.E.N.T.
[edit] Avengers
Tabby and other Nextwave members appear on the solicited cover to Avengers: The Initiative. [1]
[edit] Powers and abilities
Tabitha has the mutant power to create balls of energy of an unknown kind, which she calls her "time bombs". These "bombs" explode with concussive force. She can produce marble-sized "bombs" which have little concussive impact and which she uses for playing pranks. She has produced "time bombs" ranging up to the size of beach balls, which, when they explode, can smash tree trunks and even metal objects. Tabitha can control the amount of time between the creation of one of her "bombs" and the time it detonates. She can mentally muffle the sound of the detonation. Under the direction of Pete Wisdom she learned to focus her power as beams of concussive force.
In Nextwave, her powers are summarized as "the mutant ability to blow things up and steal all your stuff."
[edit] Other versions of Tabitha
[edit] X-Men: The End
In X-Men: The End, a series set ten to fifteen years in the future, Meltdown is once again a member of X-Force along with Warpath, Domino, Shatterstar. Feral and Rictor, when the team meets their end. After their aircraft was shot out of the sky, which X-Force barely survived, Meltdown was absorbed by the strange entity called Divinity, who them used Tabitha’s powers against her teammates. Not much later, though, Divinity was killed by Apocalypse while Meltdown was still trapped inside him.
[edit] X-Force: Shatterstar
In X-Force: Shatterstar miniseries, Tabitha is still known as Boomer and she is seen as a part of Cable's rebel forces against Spiral, in a alternate universe where she had conquered and ruled. On that Earth, Spiral had also killed most of that world's heroes and mutants.Together, they eventually defeated Spiral. Tabitha also seems to have developed telepathic powers in this timeline.
[edit] Tabitha Smith in other media
[edit] Television
Tabitha appears in the X-Men animated series as a young child, along with Rusty, Whiz-Kid, and Skids in the episode "No Mutant is an Island" . She was among the mutant children that Cyclops' old friend Sarah takes care of, and Scott has to rescue her and the other kids when Kilgrave, a mutant himself with telepathic abilities, wanted to use the children to make them his army to destroy all humans in the world so that mutants are accepted. Killgrave brainwashes the four and uses them to storm the governor's mansion so he can make the governor his mind controlled slave. Scott was able to snap Boom Boom and the others out of Kilgrave's hypnotic brainwashing in the end and saves the mutant children.
In the X-Men: Evolution animated TV series Boom Boom was voiced by Megan Leitch. Originally one of the New Mutants, Tabitha has a troubled past and a criminal father. Her father took advantage of her mutant abilities to commit crimes when she was younger. She eventually found a home at the Institute, although her stay was short-lived. While not evil or malicious, the lack of discipline and mischievousness made her a troublesome guest for anyone willing to take her in. She spent an episode flirting with Kurt Wagner, whom she saw as someone similar to her since they were kind of outcasts (him, because of his looks; her, because of her family life and her rebelliousness).
At the end of this episode, she felt that she didn't fit in and moved in with the Brotherhood of Mutants, who were more her style, saying that there were too many rules at the Institute. She often played practical jokes on the boys (such as shaving off Blob's Mohawk while he slept) and abused their hospitality, though they did little to stop her. Also, at times she'd aid them; she took the always rejected and laughed at Blob and Toad as her dates for the party in Shadow Dance. Tabitha never actually took up a villainous role, though, and she was evicted upon the return of Mystique. She even discovered some of Mystique's plans and, after blowing up her bedroom, she went to the X-Men manor and tried to tell them, but failed.
Her role in the series was significantly diminished afterward; she lived on her own and appeared mostly in the company of her best friend, Amara aka Magma from the New Mutants, appearing in several episodes of the series afterwards with no serious loyalties. Finally, according to the season finale, she took the decision of returning to the X-Men's side.
[edit] Trivia
- In Nextwave, Tabitha has been known to use leet speak terms when speaking out loud, such as "OMG," "ZOMG" and "OH NOES!"
- The codename Boomer was originally the nickname used by Boom-Boom's New Mutants/X-Force (and possibly Fallen Angels) teammates.
- Writer Warren Ellis said of his choice of Boom Boom to be in Nextwave that Boom Boom is his favorite super hero name in the history of comics from its sheer oddness and silliness, and he loved when she was in 'Uncanny X-Men' when Joe Mad was drawing it.
"I wanted a character who could blow things up" ..."I was also looking for a team structure where the women outnumbered the men. I liked her white-trash criminal background, which had uses in the plot set-up. But mostly I wanted a character who could blow things up. I mean, these are characters who no-one at Marvel had any use for, and I could have been stopped at any time, Jen. But a skinny-ass blonde mutant with a kleptomaniac streak had both plot and entertainment value to me. Especially when played against the others." [1] [2]
- The dance Boom Boom does in the X-Men: Evolution episode Walk On the Wild Side, seen as Rogue approaches the balcony railing, was mimicked from Jessica Alba's dance in Never Been Kissed.[3]
- In South America, Tabitha Smith have had only two codenames, she is better known with the codename Dynamite instead of Time Bomb, Boom Boom or Boomer and later changed her codename to Fusão (Fusion) instead of Meltdown.
