Characters from Warren Ellis' Supergod.
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Humans
Dr. Simon Reddin
A British scientist sitting with a stash of survival equipment, Dr. Reddin serves as the narrator of the story, telling How We Got Here to his American friend, Tommy.
- Action Survivor: Appears to be this, and admits he has horrible aim with a gun, hence why he uses an Uzi.
- Driven to Madness: It's evident throughout the story that the state of the world has not been very good for Reddin's mental health. The fact that he is on drugs during the story's narration is what makes him able to function with some efficiency, which says a lot about him.
- Driven to Suicide: After his story to Tommy is done, Reddin strips naked and goes for a swim toward his "god", Morrigan Lugus, to sacrifice himself.
- Mad Scientist: Even before he helps bring about the end of the world.
- Narrator: For the story.
- Sole Surviving Scientist: Appears this way. In the very least, the last in Britain.
- They Called Me Mad!: He was kicked out of his job for his insane reverence for Morrigan Lugus, something he admits to.
- Unreliable Narrator: At one point, he even forgets where he was in the story, ether skipping ahead to a later fight or talking about one that never happened, though he does come back around to what he thinks did happen. This doesn't make him sane, though.
Tommy
One of the last humans, Tommy is an American who is living in a bunker, in contact with Dr. Reddin and recording the story.
- The Ghost: The only evidence to his existence is Dr. Reddin sending his recording.
- Locked Out of the Loop: apparently, he didn't know about his government's creation of Dajjal.
- The Watson: Serves as the recorder to Dr. Reddin's story.
Supergods
Supergods in general
- Blue-and-Orange Morality: If the supergods show any morals, it's by this standpoint. They seem to be, by and large, self-centered, with some exceptions.
- Deity of Human Origin: With possible exception of Morrigan Lugus.
- Humanoid Abomination: Most of them, Maitreya, Krishna, Malak, and Dajjal in particular, though Malak pushes it a lot.
- It's All About Me: Some of the supergods just attack other ones because they are hypothetically a threat. This is the cause of most of the conflict with Krishna.
- Person of Mass Destruction: With the possible exception of Jerry Craven.
- Physical God: Some of them.
Morrigan Lugus
The first of the superhumans, this one was formed from space-born Festering Fungus that coalesced into a three-faced humanoid giant.
- The Bad Guy Wins: Ultimately, it is the last of the supergods, and, as far as can be seen, the last species on Earth.
- Botanical Abomination: A grotesque, three-face supergod made of alien mushrooms.
- Eldritch Abomination: Moreso than any other Supergod, as it wasn't even hypothetically of human origin outside of the humans inside it. Physically it's a three-faced giant composed of the bodies of a trio of unfortunate astronauts fused with a mass of alien mushrooms. Mentally it's an entity beyond human comprehension whose mere presence warps the human mind.
- Festering Fungus: Infiltrates basically anything so long as there aren't defenses against fungal influence. This includes commandeering people's organs or taking over entire continents by sporulation.
- Getting Smilies Painted on Your Soul: One of the creepiest aspects of Morrigan Lugus. In spite of being a huge fungal abomination, its presence biochemically forces human brains into a state of religious and sexual ecstasy, making the humans kneel before it in prayer and masturbation. Oh, and the same spores that have this effect on the brain also destroy the lungs – the first groups of scientists studying Morrigan Lugus died when their lungs literally started talking to them.
- Hive Mind: Reddin has the (probably foolish) hope that Morrigan Lugus absorbs mental aspects of the (now billions of) people it grows on. However, judging from its "The Reason You Suck" Speech listed in the quotes page of this comic, that is highly unlikely.
- "I Know You Are in There Somewhere" Fight: Subverted; Reddin thinks that the original consciousness of the astronauts is still within Morrigan Lugus, and so when it comes down to it they will protect their country. At the end of the series, he comes to the conclusion that they might want revenge instead on the people who used them For Science!.
- Magic Mushroom: Lugus is a massive humanoid covered in thousands of alien mushrooms that compels everyone around it to worship it. Before the scientists studying it began taking anti-fungal medications, several of them died because it began to spawn hundreds of fungal growths shaped like human heads inside their bodies.
- Mushroom Man: Morrigan Lugus is a very nightmarish example, a three-faced giant formed from the bodies of three astronauts and a mass of alien mushrooms. The mushrooms are the driving intelligence of the entity acting as a fungal supercomputer. Everything that happens in the series, culminating in the deaths of every living thing on Earth, was planned by Morrigan Lugus (its appearance is basically what kicked off the disastrous superhuman arms race). All so that its spores would have plenty of raw dead material.
- Organic Technology: It is identified by the narrator to possibly be a mycological computer on a meat substrate, essentially a fungal computer. To wit, when not deciding to use sound to speak, it sometimes would communicate by emitting radio signals, and other times would "eject spores, a 4-phosphorylated indole full of digital code".
- Parasites Are Evil: A mass of sentient parasitic fungi, Morrigan Lugus is the most malevolent of the gods appearing in this story. Along with his power to infest anyone in breathing range and make them worship it until they die of fungal growths in their lungs, Lugus actually gets a speech in which he gloats over the weaknesses of humanity, decrying its worthlessness for still obsessing over gods.
- Revenge: Reddin posits that Morrigan Lugus' cold attitude towards humans comes from the astronauts, fully aware of the way the British government betrayed them, and desiring to smite the species that destroyed them for the sake of a science experiment.
- Space Is Magic: Part of Morrigan Lugus' origin involves three astronauts with minimal radiation shielding encountering a mysterious space-born fungus.
- Token Heroic Orc: Subverted. Morrigan Lugus is initially presented as the only supergod who is, if not "good," then at least not a threat to the world at large. All it does is sit on a chair and let itself be worshiped by a mere handful of scientists, and Reddin says that the idea of sending it into battle seemed sacreligious. When it does get put to use, it's to negotiate a peace treaty with the other supergods instead of attacking them, seeming to further cement its status as the nice one. It may in fact be the most evil and dangerous supergod of all.
- Two-Faced: Has the faces of all of its incorporated astronauts.
Krishna
The cloned, biological Indian Supergod and focus of much of the conflict in the plot.
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Krishna is a fusion of super-genius AI, human DNA and molecular nanomachines. He's programmed to save India from its various domestic problems. He fulfils his mission...to apocalyptic effect.
- Amazing Technicolor Population: He's blue skinned. The scientists say this is a flaw in the cloning process, but Reddin thinks that's bullshit.
- Bee-Bee Gun: One of his primary attacks is to throw bees at people. It's surprisingly effective.
- Bullying a Dragon: Repeatedly targeted in this manner. The devastation caused by the death of Malak in particular could have been avoided if he hadn't gone out to attack.
- The Extremist Was Right: If Dajjal is to be believed and based on evidence toward the end Krishna truly was making the world a better place and solving all of its problems.
- Good Is Not Nice: Ultimately, he turns out to be this. Though he did kill 90% of Indians, his ultimate vision of India was better. It's just that the genocidal effect to which he operated was still likely unforgivable.
- Utopia Justifies the Means: How Krishna approaches India's problems.
- The Voiceless: Like most supergods, Krishna never says a word on-panel, although Reddin said he was quite talkative when he was first activated.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Krishna was programmed to solve India's problems and protect it. It truly seeks to carry out its orders in the most efficient way possible. Virtually every action of Krisha's has a reason behind it that in the long run is intended to improve it. If Dajjal's comments are any indication Krisha was right.
- Zeroth Law Rebellion: Krishna is, among other things, a super-advanced AI programmed to protect India. Naturally, he starts with protecting it from overpopulation.
Jerry Craven
The American supergod, Craven is a former U.S. pilot who died in an accident and was reconstructed as a Cyborg, and has delusions of having come from Heaven.
- Cybernetics Eat Your Soul: Despite being rebuilt as a cyborg he's convinced that he is dead (because they couldn't - or didn't - accurately model a human nervous system for him) and starts peeling his face off. The government has to build a Lotus-Eater Machine to convince him he's died and gone to Heaven.
- Cyborg: With the most advanced super-technology from the 1970s. It's actually pretty powerful, even if he isn't in the league of a continent-mangling terror like Krishna or Malak.
- Fights Like a Normal: Compared to the other superhumans, he's actually pretty normal, being based on 1970s technology to make him stronger and faster, but otherwise largely obsolete.
- Lotus-Eater Machine: To preserve his sanity (because he's convinced he is dead) the US government has built an underground Stepford Suburbia, and told Craven that he is now in Heaven and new discoveries have enabled humanity to contact Heaven directly and loan him for assignments on Earth.
- Meaningful Name: His initials are the same as Jesus Christ.
- Military Superhero: He's the closest to a traditional superhero of the beings, and he works directly for the U.S. military.
- Ninja Zombie Pirate Robot: As Reddin admits, he's an undead cyborg astronaut.
- Only Sane by Comparison: Jerry Craven lives in a fantasy where he's in Heaven and goes back to Earth to help the government, when really they brought him back to life as a cyborg against his will after he died. Nonetheless, he's the only Supergod to treat humans with respect and compassion rather than apathetically killing them by the thousands. He's also the only one who recognizes that fighting Krishna will only cause massive civilian casualties and should be avoided at all costs.
- Sense Loss Sadness: A severe example. His accident and his new, neurally-deadened body convinced him that he'd died and was living inside a corpse. Which, to be fair, wasn't far from the truth.
- Token Heroic Orc: He's the only semi-moral superhuman.
Novaya Goraj
The first attempt by the Russians (or rather the Soviet Union) to make a superhuman, using an undead cosmonaut in Grenada.
- Bit Character: Is introduced and killed in the course of at best five or six pages, mostly to show Jerry Craven's abilities.
- Cyborg: A much larger one than Jerry Craven, but one nonetheless.
- Flat Character: We learn next to nothing about the individual, aside from that they are a cosmonaut cyborg from the Soviet Union.
- Ninja Zombie Pirate Robot: By Reddin's admission, he was an undead cosmonaut.
- Off with His Head!: Jerry Craven punches his head off.
Malak Al-Maut
An Iranian supergod forged to make an angel.
- Ambiguously Evil: Given the nature of his powers, it's difficult to tell if he's trying to cause all that nuclear destruction as he goes to fight Krishna, or if it just happens. Also, while Reddin speculates that he merely sees Krishna as a rival to face, it's not impossible that he genuinely did have altruistic motives in facing him.
- Angelic Abomination: Was created to be an angel by Iran, and even named for the Angel of Death. The destructive aura of his Walking Wasteland powers show that without any free will, his "connection to god" only leaves him more prone to lead to horrific destruction than without it.
- Bald of Evil: As far as can be seen, he's bald.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: He was created to be a conduit to God, and while he clearly isn't, Reddin notes that he is drawing energy from something.
- Our Angels Are Different: What he was intended to be, with no free will and a direct connection to God.
- Our Demons Are Different: What he actually turned out to be, owing to his destructive tendencies.
- Power Glows: His entire body is perpetually glowing.
- Sinister Nudity: A glowing, perpetually-nude being, albeit with no genitals... and just to make him even creepier, he ends up driving his creators to suicidal insanity and destroying most of Tehran in his escape from the lab.
- Talkative Loon: Apparently drove his team to 'atheism, despair, and suicide' through his constant mad babble, meaning that by the time he obliterated Tehran and went to face Krishna, he was effectively unsupervised.
- The Voiceless: His lack of on-panel speech is particularly striking given that Reddin describes him as a Talkative Loon upon activation.
- There Was a Door: When he chooses to leave his underground lab, he does so by annihilating it and most of Tehran and walking out. Reddin comments on how ridiculous it is that Iran's Angel of Death 'couldn't operate a bloody door handle'.
- Walking Wasteland: Disassembles atomic structures by looking at people, and leaves a trail of destruction, including a barrier of said disassembly, around his entire body perpetually.
- What Did You Expect When You Named It ____?: His name means Angel of Death in Arabic.
- Villainous Breakdown: Literally. Upon his defeat, he panics so much that he expands his destructive tendencies to their ultimate extent, tearing through and disassembling the moon as he tears through it, killing countless people on Earth.
Dajjal
An artificial god built by the American military during the Iraq War, and named after the Islamic devil. Dajjal was created "without sanity", possessing the ability to see all possible timelines and outcomes to every event history would ever hold.
- Bizarre Alien Senses: He claims he can "see time," whereas most humans only move through it.
- Driven to Suicide: Detonates his power source after seeing Jerry Craven and Krishna make peace, not wanting to live to a better place in reality, as it would bore him.
- Fourth-Wall Observer: His introductory scenes have him address the fourth wall, but this is in-universe and he's talking to potential futures where humans are observing him with Chronoscope technology.
- Humanoid Abomination: More than many other superhumans, as he is only mostly formed, made of purple bits of matter but not an actually fully formed being.
- Medium Awareness: During his introduction, he hears Reddin's narration from the past and corrects it.
- The Omniscient: Dajjal can see emergent timelines and the new timelines born from every action. To the point where he actually responds to and corrects the narration because he can "see" Reddin talking about him in the future.Dajjal: No, I can't see you. But I know you're there. Listening. I can see time. I can see it all around me, rushing off ahead and branching into a tangle of futures. In a few of those futures, there are enough remaining sentients in an environment rich enough for the development of backchannel remote viewing. Humans cannot perceive time, really. They simply move through it. I can see time. All around me. I am perpetually aware of existing in its current. I have been designed to withstand time. I have been designed to withstand you.
- Sanity Has Advantages: Subverted. Dajjal was created without sanity, but not insane. Instead, he judges reality on entirely different structures, which allow him to survive as long as he wants to.
- Talkative Loon: Out of context, a creature without sanity babbling incessantly to itself in an empty building would fit the bill pretty firmly. In context, he's still rambling on to people listening and people who aren't listening, like Reddin talking in the future whom he corrects.
- What Did You Expect When You Named It ____?: Lampshaded by Reddin; the Americans just had to name their creation after the Islamic Antichrist.Reddin: Dajjal, honestly... building one of the things in Iraq and naming it after the Islamic antichrist. Where were your brains?
Maitreya
The Chinese superhuman, Maitreya was formed by "scanning tunneling microscopes wired into his visual cortex", then "forced to meditate upon his own atomic structure until he could perceive the quantum foam of every particle of his being birthing and annihilating under the uncertainty principle".
- Bald of Evil: Though he did kill the people who wanted to hurt political prisoners first, he quickly became this instead.
- Body Horror: A big fan of this, from forming his first victims into a cannon and a biological space probe to turning truly insane amounts of people into a giant Cthulhu-esque monstrosity for him to ride into battle against Krishna. This also becomes of him, when upon his defeat, he is transformed into nothing more than a robe for Krishna.
- Enlightenment Superpower: As his profile describes he was forced to contemplate his own body down to the quantum level. This granted him the ability to restructure matter at his will, and might explain his affinity for using flesh as a medium.
- Pet the Dog: He allows the political prisoners he was supposed to destroy to escape, even opening the doors for them, and turns his powers instead on the people ordering him to do the killing.
- Posthuman Nudism: Having been naked at the time of the experiment that gave him his powers, he remains naked for the rest of the story, and is easily distinguished by his hairless Barbie Doll Anatomy.
- Sinister Nudity: Always naked - and unlike many of the other deities, he wasn't manufactured from scratch but Was Once a Man. As such, it's made abundantly clear that he's still anatomically correct, though his groin is kept in shadow... and he's also one of the most disturbingly organic of the gods, using his powers of biomanipulation for numerous displays of Body Horror.
Perun
The second attempt at a Russian superhuman, this one in the new Russia instead of the first from the Soviet Union.
- Cyborg: With mechanical parts in many places, but a human brain.
- Human Resources: The brain of the Soviet superhuman was cloned several times to give him highly specialized reflexes and capabilities in mobility.
- Hyperspace Arsenal: His cyborg body opens up to reveal a truly amazing arsenal of weaponry.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: His death, at the hands of a spear from the ground made by Krishna.
- Spontaneous Weapon Creation: How he makes his axe.
