Mantis (Marvel Comics) facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Mantis |
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Mantis
Art by Tom Raney |
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| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Marvel Comics |
| First appearance | The Avengers #112 (June 1973) |
| Created by | Steve Englehart (writer) Don Heck (artist) |
| In-story information | |
| Species | Human mutate |
| Team affiliations | Guardians of the Galaxy Avengers Knowhere Corps |
| Partnerships | Swordsman Kang the Conqueror Vision |
| Notable aliases | Willow Lorelei Mandy Celestine Celestial Madonna |
| Abilities |
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Mantis is a character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer Steve Englehart and artist Don Heck, the character first appeared in The Avengers #112 (June 1973). Mantis has been depicted as a member of the Avengers and the Guardians of the Galaxy, as the bride of Kang the Conqueror, and as the mother of Sequoia.
Pom Klementieff portrays the character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe films Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Avengers: Endgame (2019), Thor: Love and Thunder (2022), The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special (2022), and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023).
Contents
Publication history
Mantis first appeared in The Avengers #112 (June 1973), drawn by Don Heck and created by writer Steve Englehart, beginning the "Celestial Madonna" saga. After leaving Marvel Comics, Englehart carried Mantis's tale through three other companies before returning to Marvel, moving from Marvel to DC to Eclipse to Image and finally back to Marvel again.
In DC Comics' Justice League of America #142, she appears as Willow. Asked where she came from, Willow replies, "This one has come from a place she must not name, to reach a place no man must know." (Mantis refers to herself in the third person as "this one") By the end of the issue, she leaves to go give birth.
In the Eclipse Comics series Scorpio Rose #2 (according to Englehart's website [1]), the character calls herself Lorelei. By this time, she has given birth to a son. What would have been issue #3, a "lost" Lorelei/Scorpio Rose story was later published in Coyote Collection #1 from Image Comics, the character's fourth company. Lorelei is later mentioned in Englehart's 2010 novel The Long Man (page 355, mass market paperback edition).
Characterization
Powers and abilities
Mantis has attained a mastery of meditational disciplines, giving her an unusual amount of control over her body, including autonomic functions like heartbeat, bleeding, and breathing, as well as awareness of pain, allowing her to more quickly heal injuries through sheer force of will and affording almost superhuman reflexes and reactions. She also had psychic empathy, a telepathic power that allowed her to sense the emotions of others.
Mantis gained additional abilities as a result of communion with the Prime Cotati. Her empathic ability enabled her to communicate with the plant-like Cotati and with plant life. She has the power of astral projection. To travel in space, Mantis had the ability to separate her physical and astral forms, projecting her consciousness from her body, allowing her to travel interplanetary distances. She also had the ability to transfer her astral form to any place where plant life exists. She could form and inhabit a plant like simulacrum of her human body for herself out of the destination planet's local vegetation. Her fighting skills remained intact, and her empathic abilities were heightened to a superhuman degree and extended to the planet's flora and biosphere. She could control the vegetation within her vicinity.
During her confrontations with a powerful Thanos clone, she displayed superhuman strength, a talent to simultaneously inhabit multiple simulacra, and the ability to project strong blasts of energy, but has not been seen using these powers since.
As of her appearance in Annihilation Conquest: Star-Lord, Mantis also appears to have gained telepathic and precognitive abilities, and apparently now labors under a constant awareness of future events. During the series, Mantis displayed pyrokinesis. She can remain invisible to the Phalanx and extend her power to cloak others.
Additionally, Mantis was trained by the Priests of Pama to become a grandmistress of the martial arts, demonstrated as capable of defeating opponents as skilled as Captain America (although he was distracted while fighting a dragon). She could also instinctively sense weak points in an opponent and with her skills in pressure points, knock out beings as powerful as the thunder god, Thor.
Personality
Mantis is assertive and confident in her powers, and while she appeared somewhat arrogant at first (as illustrated by her breakup with Swordsman when she chose Vision over him), she renounced her pride after Swordsman's tragic death. Mantis is highly intelligent, with her deductive skills rivaling those of Vision's; in Vision's own words, she has a "remarkable mind".
She almost always refers to herself in the third person as "this one", "she", and occasionally "Mantis", which has to do with her upbringing at the Temple of the Priests of Pama (her husband the Cotati Elder, who spent a significant part of his life at the Temple, also referred to himself as "this one" instead of "I"). This speech mannerism is of importance for her, for when the Silver Surfer asked her to stop speaking in the third person, she refused to comply.
Costumes
She wears a green-and-yellow dress, a hairstyle which mimics insectile antennae, and goes barefoot.
In other media
Television
- Mantis appears in the Guardians of the Galaxy animated series, voiced by Jennifer Hale.
- Mantis appears in Lego Marvel Super Heroes - Guardians of the Galaxy: The Thanos Threat, voiced again by Jennifer Hale.
Marvel Cinematic Universe
Pom Klementieff portrays Mantis in Marvel Cinematic Universe. Mantis appears in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, Thor: Love and Thunder, and The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special. Mantis will return in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. Alternate reality versions of Mantis appear in the Disney+ animated series What If...?. One version appears in the seventh episode "What If... Thor Were an Only Child?", as an attendee of Thor's party on Earth. She is shown reacting in panic when the aliens overhear that Frigga is coming.
Video games
- Mantis is a playable character in Guardians of the Galaxy: The Universal Weapon.
- Mantis is a playable character in Lego Marvel's Avengers, voiced by Ali Hillis.
- Mantis is a playable character in Marvel Future Fight.
- Mantis is a playable character in Marvel: Avengers Alliance.
- Mantis was a recruitable character in Marvel Avengers Academy, voiced by Mel Gorsha.
- Mantis appears in Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series, voiced by Sumalee Montano. She first appears in episode 3, when Star-Lord and Gamora free her from her casket on Emnios. Afterwards, she tells the Guardians of the Galaxy the truth about the Eternity Forge.
- Mantis is a playable character in Lego Marvel Superheroes 2, voiced by Arina Li.
- Mantis appears in Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, voiced by Emmanuelle Lussier-Martinez.
- Mantis appears in the digital collectible card game Marvel Snap.
Theme park
- Mantis appears in the Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission: Breakout! attraction at Disney California Adventure. Her picture can be seen on a wanted poster in the attraction line, and she is later seen aiding the Guardians in their escape from the Collector's fortress. Mantis is portrayed by Pom Klementieff, reprising her role from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
