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Maltus
Image from Secret Origins, #23 (February 1988)
Maltus was a planet located somewhere in outer space. It was the homeworld of the Maltusian race. It was the center of a great civilization of humanoids.
Background History
Fifteen billion years ago (before the 20th century), the planet Maltus formed. Millions of years passed as the planet slowly cooled and life formed in the moist air of the new world. The air borne life spread across the globe while more complex forms took to land and sea. The 'Maltusian' race evolved, humanoid in appearance, one of the first intelligent life forms in the Universe. Their minds allowed them to create miracles as their lifetimes extended millions of years. Unfortunately, the power came at a price. This was the beginning of a new age of cultural and scientific advancement.
And so, as their population increased, the humanoids evolved into separate races, blue-skinned and white-skinned. These races began to wage war against each other.
Biological warfare resulted in the creation of a deadly disease virtually eliminating the possible of procreation, which almost wiped out the humanoids. Specifically, the white-skinned males. In order to survive, the blue-skinned male scientists of the polar city of Ap formed an alliance with an isolated society of white-skinned women who inhabited the Zamar area, and produced future generations of children by laboratory means. The males came to be called Aps, and the females Zamars. Those chosen to form a mediated group, raised the children, and called themselves Oans. As ages passed, the Oans evolved fantastic mental powers and increased lifespans, becoming virtually immortal.[1]
10 billion years ago,[2] Krona, an ancient scientist from the planet Maltus,[3] in a forbidden experiment looked back in time to the beginning of the universe. His interference with nature somehow retroactively became the spark to ignite the ‘flaw’, thus creating an anti-matter counterpart to the universe, as well as splintering the single universe into a multiverse consisting of an infinite number of parallel universes, each with duplicates of all stars and planets except for what would eventually be known as the planet Oa. This unique planet has no duplicate in the multiverse. It is only duplicated in the antimatter universe as the planet Qward.
The Oans, feeling responsible for renegade scientist Krona's creation of the Antimatter Universe and the mulitiverse, decided that a group of volunteers would colonize a planet near the center of the universe, which they named 'Oa'.[4] These Oans, were consumed by guilt. They had created Evil, so they must do something to constrain it. Their first attempt to do so was the construction of 'Manhunter robots', which later proved defective. Their second, and better, solution was the creation of the Green Lantern Corps. Still, there were dissenters among the Oans who maintained that evil must be destroyed, not contained. These dissidents eventually broke away, traveled to another universe and evolved into the Controller race. The group that remained on Oa became the Guardians of the Universe.[5] The females, however, saw no need to involve themselves and, since the Oans were by then immortal and had no more need to reproduce, left their mates and became settled on the planet Zamaron and became known as the Zamarons.[6]
The few Maltusians that remained behind began to continue to multiply in numbers on Maltus until the planet became overpopulated and incredibly crowded. Hal Jordan, the Green Lantern of Sector 2814 and the Guardians of the Universe helped them with the problem. Nevertheless, by the twentieth century the planet was still one of the most populated worlds in the cosmos.[7]
Indigenous species
- Maltusians
- Oans - an offshoot of the species after biological experiments and global war.
- Psions - The Psions originated on Maltus, the result of Maltusian experimentation on a local species of lizard. Left behind to fend for themselves as the Maltusians made their way to the stars, they evolved into an advanced society utilizing the abandoned technology of their creators. They began walking upright, and surgically removed their tails to better emulate their creators and separate themselves from the animals of Maltus. In turn, the Psions left Maltus in pursuit of their creators, believing they would take their place at their side. Not finding a refuge on Oa with their creators, they colonize another planet.[8]
Geography
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Ap and Zamar
Image from Secret Origins, #23 (February 1988)
Notes
- Maltus first appeared in Green Lantern, #81 (December 1970).[9]
External Links
- Maltus at the DC Database
- Maltus at Wikipedia
References
- ↑ As revealed in the post-crisis story: Secret Origins, #23 (February, 1988). In this story, the time given was Ten Billion years ago, not Fifteen Billion.
- ↑ The date of 10 billion years in the past is given in Crisis on Infinite Earths, #10 (January, 1986).
- ↑ Originally the planet was Oa, but was indicated to be Maltus in the post-crisis story: Secret Origins, #23 (February, 1988).
- ↑ As revealed in the post-crisis story: Secret Origins, #23 (February, 1988).
- ↑ As revealed in Crisis on Infinite Earths, #7 (October, 1985) and Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe, Vol. 1 #5 (July, 1985).
- ↑ This connection to the Oans and Maltus is made in the post-crisis stories: Secret Origins, #23 (February, 1988); Green Lantern, #45 (September 1993); and L.E.G.I.O.N. '93 #58 (September 1993).
- ↑ As seen in the Atlas of the DC Universe.
- ↑ The 'Psions' were first revealed in a non-credited appearance in The Witching Hour, #13 (March 1971). They were also seen in the Superman (TV series), episode: The Last Time I Saw Earth (1988).
- ↑ For more information about that DC comic book, click here.