Absorbing Man
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The Absorbing Man is a fictional character, a supervillain in the Marvel Universe. He was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in Journey into Mystery #114.
Character biography
Mainly an antagonist of Thor, The Absorbing Man was given herbs by the Norse god Loki which, once ingested, gave him the power to absorb the physical properties of anything he touched. (Thus, if he touched a steel wall, his whole body could become as hard as steel, while he could still move, think and speak; his strength also increased to the extent that he could battle such immensely strong heroes of the Marvel pantheon as Thor and the Hulk.) If his body is damaged or shattered while in a non-organic form, he can reconstitute his body, although this takes a great deal of time and effort.
He was in prison at the time of this power transfer, and the heavy ball and chain to which he was attached also magically gained the power. He therefore continued to carry the chain as a kind of mace.
His main weaknesses are his low intelligence, making him relatively easy to outwit, and his power can be turned against him if he is tricked or forced into physical contact with a substance with an undesirably low strength. For instance, when fighting the Hulk once, he made the mistake of breaking glass above him, causing shards to fall on him. When he made contact with a shard, his body turned to glass and the Hulk instantly took advantage of this by punching and shattering his foe.
Creel has absorbed the properties of a number of unusual or unique substances over the course of his criminal career, including adamantium, Captain America's shield, and Quasar's Quantum Bands. He also is known in the comics for transforming into water (One example is when he battled the Eric Masterson Thor in The Mighty Thor #436), and he even became an island one time!
Although Creel is a thug and a villain, he is not wholly heartless, and usually tries to avoid killing innocent bystanders (although he has no qualms about threatening or incapacitating them). In later years, he became romantically involved with fellow supervillain Titania (Mary "Skeeter" McPherran); they were recently divorced (She-Hulk Vol. 2. #10).
The Absorbing Man is highly addicted to narcotics, especially pain killers and cocaine. When he is need of a high he has demonstrated no concern for the safety of others and will work for whatever criminal can supply him with narcotics. Recently,he was tricked into transforming into cocaine and minions operating powerful industrial fans scattered his body in the room he was occupying. His body mass was then collected off of the surfaces and placed into several bags. This all was the doing of The Owl who plans to sell this "Creel cocaine",but after being used as a drug all over New York (all those who used the drug transformed into anything they came in contanct with, just like Creel), Creel managed to reform himself but was defeated by Spider-Man and The Avengers.
Powers and abilities
Creel has the power to absorb the physical properties of anything he touches. For example, if Creel were to touch and hold a piece of titanium steel, the tissues of his body would take on the appearance and properties of titanium. Creel also retains his intellect and capacity for speech reguardless of the material he absorbes. The more dense, or durable, the material he absorbs, the stronger Creel is; were Creel to touch a high grade steel structure his strength would be roughly equal to that of the Thing. Creel also has the ability to absorb the same level of physical strength as the character he is touching. This power requires Creel's deliberate concentration, although he has a tendency to accidentally absorb materials he did not intend to. Creel's body can also absorb the properties of great amounts of energy in the same fashion it absorbs the properties of solid materials. Creel has proven able to absorb the mystical energies of Thor's enchanted Uru hammer on multiple occassions.
The ball and chain that he carries is also mystically enchanted, and this power is extended to it. It is essentially an extension of his own body mass at this point. If the Absorbing Man's body is shattered, he has the ability to completely reconstitute his bodily mass without injury to himself, though it may take a great deal of time to do so.
The greatest limitation of the Absorbing Man's powers is his intellect; the Absorbing Man is noticeably unintelligent.
It was shown in a Hulk story that Creel developed the power of absorbing the mind of other people, and possessing their bodies. In that particular story, he was shown unusually smart and cunning. Whether this new power will be retconned or become a permanent addition is not certain yet.
