| Ares | |
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| Publication information | |
| Publisher | DC Comics |
| First appearance |
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| Created by | Charles Moulton; reinterpreted post-Crisis by George Pérez |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Ares |
| Team affiliations | Underworld Olympian Gods |
| Notable aliases | Mars, God of Conflict, God of the Dead, God of War, Ruler of the Underworld, Ari Buchanan, Ares Buchanan |
| Abilities | Superhuman strength, Virtually indestructible armor, Master of conflict and strategy, Complete command over any weapon, Healing factor, Energy Projection, Reality alteration, Immortality |
Ares is a fictional character appearing in DC Comics publications and related media. Based upon the Greek mythological figure of the same name, he is the God of War and the major adversary of Wonder Woman. He first appeared in Wonder Woman #1, volume 1, published in the summer of 1942, written by Wonder Woman creator William Moulton Marston. In the very next issue,[1] he reappeared under his Roman name, Mars. He would retain this name until February 1987,[2] when comics writer/artist George Pérez restored the Greek name Ares as part of his reboot of the Wonder Woman mythos. As the narrative continuity of the Wonder Woman comic has been adjusted by different writers throughout the years, various versions of Mars/Ares, with various personalities and physical appearances, have been presented. His current incarnation has, in recent years, appeared in one of two guises - either as a muscular blond man in contemporary clothing, with red eyes and a scarred torso; or as a demonic Greek warrior clad in black and blue battle armor, face hidden by a hoplite helmet.
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Fictional character biography
Pre-Crisis
During most of the Golden Age, Silver Age, and Bronze Age, Ares was called Mars and was one of the most recurrent enemies of Wonder Woman. He was depicted as a Greco-Roman warrior in orange armor. Unlike the contemporary version of the character, his face was visible.
Ares, who eventually became known as Mars, sought to realize his vision of eternal war and conflict in the world of man. He was chiefly opposed by Aphrodite, goddess of love, who sought to realize a contrary vision of loving civilization. When Ares taunted Aphrodite with the success of his plans, Aphrodites molded from clay and breathed life into a new race of women, the Amazons, who built a city-state called Amazonia in which they created a women-centered civilization for spreading the gospel of Aphrodite's Way. Hippolyte was granted a golden girdle which made her invincible.[3]
Enraged at the success of the Amazon nation, Ares, now known chiefly as Mars, called upon Hercules to steal the golden girdle and enslave the Amazons. Aphrodite answered the prayers of the contrite Amazons and allowed them to break free, then sent them to a new hidden home they would call Paradise Island.
During a period when the Amazons of Earth-One sent a champion, named Artemis, into Man's World as a champion for justice and peace, Mars manipulated circumstances so that Artemis would slowly drift from a path of trust and love, ultimately setting her up to appear to have betrayed the hidden location of the Amazons' interim hidden home called Themiscyra.
Mars eventually created a home base on the planet of Mars, with its superpowerful population enslaved to serve him and his chief deputies, the Duke of Deception, Lord Conquest, and the Earl of Greed. He used Mars as an interplanetary headquarters, supplementing the enslaved Martian population with the spirits of the dead he collected from war zones on multiple planets, including Saturn and Earth. Slave spirits became embodied after being ferried to the planet Mars, where they were subjected to strength tests to determine how they would best be used, whether as gladiators in slave games, personal slaves in the retinue of Mars himself, or employees in the War Factories, one of which included the Lie Factory run by the Duke of Deception. The very strongest would be trained and given new bodies to be sent to wage future wars on earth. He also set up the Injustice Court for humiliating slaves and meting out punishments.[1]
From this base, he sought to defeat the Allied cause in World War II, but he found himself repeatedly thwarted by the Amazon champion Wonder Woman.
Mars repeatedly tangled with Wonder Woman on Earth-One and Earth-Two. During a period when Diana abandoned her powers to live among the world of men as the Amazons retreated temporarily to another dimension, Mars (calling himself Ares this time) and his children Phobos, Deimos, and Eris battled the Amazons to secure from Hippolyta the secret to domination of all dimensions of existence. Later, he enlisted his descendant Helena Alexandros to become the Silver Swan.
His final scheme before the history-changing battle of the Crisis on Infinite Earths was to ally himself with Hades and the Anti-Monitor to subdue the Gods of Olympus. As Wonder Woman engaged him in final battle, Steve Trevor freed the gods and Hades' wife Kore appealed to her husband with a message of love, leaving Mars isolated.
Post-Crisis
Despite being Zeus' son, Ares never fit in with the other gods of Olympus and created his own realm, the Areopagus. Aphrodite, the patron of the Amazons, swore that her women would save the world with love from the hatred and warfare of Ares. Recently, through his deceit and manipulations, Ares deposed Hades and became ruler of the underworld.
Ares did his best to destroy the Amazons, using Hercules against them, but Diana was born and raised just in time to fight Ares as Steve Trevor's plane, driven by one of Ares's human puppets, crashed into Paradise Island. His plot was to fire the missiles between the United States and Russia at the same time, provoking World War III, but Diana managed to make him see, trapped in her magic lasso, how this chaos would lead to his own disappearing, with Ares having no one to worship him. He then tasks her with "saving mankind from themselves", promising to return if she fails, essentially acting as a continuous test of her success.
Although Ares abandoned his plans that time, he managed to possess an unimportant criminal, Ari Buchanan. Possessing his body, he changed his name to Ares Buchanan.[4] He began climbing the business ladder by providing hi-tech weapons for gang wars. As Buchanan, he had a relationship with his lawyer Donna Milton (who was Circe in disguise, although not even she knew it then), conceiving a daughter named Lyta. Lyta has been shown to possess a great amount of magic, which she is still practicing. However, Ares didn't care much about Donna, shooting her while she was pregnant. Circe, as Donna, later tried to help Diana out of a trap he laid. She used the last of her forces to shoot a gun, which produced a sort of mini-black hole and absorbed Ares into it. She, Diana, and the child survived.
As opposed to ancient times, the role of various gods were shown to have altered somewhat according to modern practices and beliefs. Because of this, the actual faith-based power Ares' father Zeus received proved to be very much diminished. On the other hand, other gods such as Athena, Aphrodite, and Ares began to gain more power due to the appearance of the computer age, love never diminishing, and conflict remaining consistent. Thus the three godly siblings eventually took over Olympus as the godly home's new masters.
Realizing that conflict proved to maintain his strength over the output of war, Ares changed his title to the God of Conflict. To celebrate this change he altered his appearance to a more approachable visage. His rule under this name proved to be short-lived though as the god Hades was also overthrown and Ares was all too eager to take up the mantle of God of the Dead.
Family reunited
Realizing that a crossroads for the gods of Olympus was at hand, Ares confided in his half sister Cassie Sandsmark about a future war. In exchange for additional powers, the only wish he requested in return from his sister was her love. He then traveled to Themyscira and kidnapped his daughter Lyta who was under the protection of the Amazons. Discovering this fact, Circe confronted Ares and was surprised to learn of his new godly title. She agreed to remain as his consort and to raise their daughter Lyta in the Underworld.
During Ares' family bonding with Cassie, he blessed her with a powerful lasso able to expel Zeus's lightning in times of anger for her to use in her persona as Wonder Girl. Ares has since appeared to Cassie repeatedly in order to warn her about "the coming war." In one story the Teen Titans were thrown ten years into the future, where Cassie had inherited the mantle of Wonder Woman after Diana's death.[5] She was also referred to as "Ares' champion."
Ares later appeared to Cassie informing her that the gods were leaving this plane and Zeus was taking the power he had granted Cassie as well.[6] In exchange for acknowledging their siblinghood and becoming his champion, he offered her some of his power, saying only that she would be "more powerful than [she's] ever been." The full extent of Cassie's powers has not been revealed, though there is some indication that she has retained all of her former powers at this point.[7]
During the events of Amazons Attack! it is discovered that Ares left Circe and kidnapped their daughter to raise on his own. As he and Lyta were only spoken of during the storyline, their presence is yet unknown.
Cassie is confronted by Ares' son, Lord Lycus, whom Ares has sent to interfere with Cassie's powers.[8]
Death
Shifting himself into the future, Ares stole the dead body of Wonder Woman and brought it back into the present. He then manipulated several villains to use the body to create his bride and chief agent Genocide. He then embued this new creature with his own magical dominance, causing the new being's persona to be more deadly but also completely obedient to him. Ares' plans to destroy the present day Wonder Woman went awry when Diana was able to destroy Genocide, leaving the monster's dead body to drown in the ocean. Angered, Ares commanded a son of Poseidon to cause a swarm of deadly sea creatures to attack Themyscira and the new island nation of Thalarion. During this battle Diana deduced that Ares was the grand manipulator and confronted him. Not allowing Ares much time to gloat in his latest masterpiece of war, Diana took a battle axe and used it to strike Ares' head, splitting his helmet in two. The then dead Ares falls to the floor uttering in his last breath, "Amazon what have you done?" Where this leaves his daughter Lyta and his soon to be reborn creation Genocide remains unclear.
After Death
Ares has since appeared to Diana, now sans helmet, his head crudely stitched together, to reveal he has gone to some level of the afterlife reserved for the gods, where he is being tortured by all those who have died in all the worlds wars.
Despite being gone from the mortal world he reveals he is still manipulating events to lead to the end of the Amazons and that an agent of his (So far unrevealed) is working towards that very goal.
Powers and abilities
As do all the Olympian gods, Ares possesses tremendous strength, though he is now perhaps the physically strongest of them[citation needed]. Moreover, he is a master of conflict and strategy, and has complete command over any weapon. Pertaining to his being a war god, violence and bloodshed make him stronger. His armor is virtually indestructible. He can regenerate his physical being into any form he wishes and can teleport himself and others, as well as alter reality to whatever he desires. He is now also recognized as the Death god of the Greek Pantheon and thus has control over the dead.
Being a god, he is also immortal and cannot be harmed by mortal weapons, only magical ones.
In other media
Television
Ares made an appearance in the Justice League Unlimited episode "Hawk and Dove", voiced by Michael York. In the episode, Ares commissions Hephaestus to forge the Annihilator, a living suit of armor fueled by violence. He uses it to incite conflict between North and South Kasnia, hoping to destabilize the entire region and create more conflict. Wonder Woman and Hawk and Dove intervene, forcing Ares to back down after discovering the Annihilator's weakness. The suit is confiscated by the Justice League. He appeared by the name of Tom Sera in the episode (Sera spelled backwards is Ares).
Film
Ares was featured in the direct-to-video animated movie, Wonder Woman as the main villain of the film. He is voiced by actor Alfred Molina.[9] He differed slightly in this incarnation in that he had long platinum hair, although he wears a variation of his classic armor early in the film.
Games
Ares is set to appear in the upcoming video game DC Universe Online.
Toys
DC Direct released an Ares action figure in 2001 as part of their Amazons and Adversaries line of Wonder Woman action figures. Mattel released an Ares action figure in 2008 as part of their DC Universe Classics line of toys.
See also
References
External links
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