Characters / Marvel Comics: Savage Land

aka: Shanna The She Devil

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Marvel Comics characters associated with the Savage Land, a hidden prehistoric land in Antarctica created by the aliens known as Nuwali for the Beyonders who wanted to observe the process of evolution under relatively controlled conditions.

Residents

Ka-Zar

Kevin Plunder

Nationality: British, Savage Lander

Species: Human

First Appearance: X-Men #10 (March, 1965)

Ka-Zar is the name of two fictional superheroes appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.

The first character to bear the Ka-Zar name is David Rand. He was created by writer Bob Byrd, and first appeared in the pulp magazine Ka-Zar #1 (October 1936). The story was continued in two further issues published in January and June 1937, and then the character was set aside.

The second character to bear the Ka-Zar name is Lord Kevin Plunder. He was created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby, and first appeared in The X-Men #10 (March 1965).

Ka-Zar is Kevin Reginald, Lord Plunder, born in Castle Plunder, Kentish Town, London, England. He is the eldest son of Lord Robert Plunder, the English nobleman who discovered the Savage Land. After his mother had died and his father was killed by the barbaric Man-Ape natives of the Savage Land, Plunder was found and raised by the sabertooth tiger Zabu, who possesses near-human intelligence thanks to a mutation caused by radioactive mists. "Ka-Zar" means "Son of the Tiger" in the language of the Man-Apes. Ka-Zar and Zabu are constant partners. Ka-Zar became an expert hunter, trapper, and fisherman, living off the wild land.

In the Savage Land, some territories are populated by several human or humanoid tribes, and while most of them are on friendly terms with Ka-Zar, some of them consider him an outlander and an enemy. He acts more like an unofficial general protector, preventing outside commercial exploitation, such as poaching and mining, as well as enforcing peace between tribes and serving as goodwill ambassador to friendly visitors.

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• Animalistic Abilities: Ka-Zar II can mimic the aspects of various Savage Land animals, usually by perfectly imitating their calls to command them but sometimes going further into outright superhuman feats.
• Asskicking Leads to Leadership: How he came to be known as the King of the Savage Land (not an official title, but one he does take seriously as the Savage Land's self-appointed steward).
• Badass Normal: Just a normal British man who Took a Level in Badass in order to survive the wild Savage Land.
• Battle Couple: with Shanna the She-Devil to whom he is married.
• Badass Family: With Shanna and Matthew.
• Cain and Abel: Ka-Zar II has a supervillain brother, the Plunderer a.k.a. Lord Panival Plunder. Hey, with a name like that you'd go supervillain too.
• Captain Ersatz: The Ka-Zar of the early comics is a shameless ripoff of Tarzan. His own name is just two letters shy of Tarzan's own name.
• Canon Discontinuity: The Ka-Zar stories featured in these early comics are considered non-canon to both the later Ka-Zar series, and the Marvel Universe as a whole. The Golden Age Ka-Zar was called "David Rand" and was active in Africa, while the Silver Age (and still appearing) Ka-Zar was called "Kevin Plunder" and was active in the Savage Land, a fictional region of Antarctica. Besides the shared code-name, they have little in common.
• Canon Immigrant: The Ka-Zar presented here actually started as a standalone pulp magazine character (which was also run by Martin Goodman, the head of Timely Comics) which predates this comic series by three years. The first five comic stories with Ka-Zar are directly adapted into comic form from that magazine.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: Apparently this is how he acquired his nebulous "connection to the Savage Land" that lets him use the Animalistic Abilities described above.
• Defector from Decadence: Kevin Plunder was born to prestigious British nobility but abandoned his lordly title and holdings to live in the Savage Land.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: The Ka-Zar presented in the early stories is not the same Ka-Zar that would appear in later Marvel stories, and they are set in a separate continuity from the Marvel universe.
• Elective Monarchy: Ka-Zar II is often called the "King of the Savage Land" and while not all the Savage Land's inhabitants acknowledge it, when the poop hits the fan he's usually the leader they all rally around.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Kevin's befriended a good chunk of the Marvel U's hero community this way, teaming up with everyone from Spider-Man to Daredevil to the Avengers and the X-Men.
• Going Native: Ka-Zar II maintains some token ties to his homeland for the sake of successfully advocating for his adopted one but in all other ways has completely abandoned his former life.
• Great White Hunter: The David Rand Ka-Zar once ran across a hunter named Steve Hardy who spent months capturing animals to bring to zoos or collections (but had no qualms about killing them if he had to). Ka-Zar judged him a good man and did not allow the animals to harm him, but he still foiled his attempts to take animals.
• Handsome Heroic Caveman: Justified. He wasn't born a Savage Land inhabitant, he became one and thus his build, bone structure and overall body type are actually more typical of a highly athletic modern day man.
• Legacy Character: Played straight from a narrative standpoint but averted in-universe: "Ka-Zar" is simply a Man-Ape name meaning 'Son of the Tiger' that was given to both characters. It's likely there are other Ka-Zars in the Savage Land as well.
• Modest Royalty: Ka-Zar II is of noble blood but no one would ever guess it by how he dresses in just a loincloth.
• Nature Hero: Ka-Zar is a bit of a Tarzan Captain Ersatz (born the son of nobleman Lord Robert Plunder, lost in the jungle and raised by animals) except he was raised by sabre-toothed tigers and is the resident Nature Hero of the Marvel Universe's Lost World, the Savage Land.
• Omniglot: Ka-Zar II can speak every language used in the Savage Land fluently, a number that is at least in the dozens.
• Panthera Awesome: Kevin is usually accompanied by his sabretooth tiger sidekick Zabu.
• Raised by Wolves: Kevin Plunder was found and raised by the sabertooth tiger Zabu, who possesses near-human intelligence thanks to a mutation caused by radioactive mists
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Of all the individuals who claim dominion over the Savage Land, Kevin's easily the most rational and capable.
• Spotlight-Stealing Squad: Kevin Plunder is the character just about everybody thinks of when they think of Ka-Zar and is the only Ka-Zar to be adapted into other mediums.
• Super-Strength: Like Captain America Kevin is officially "peak human" but in times of extreme stress has manifested the ability to lift 2-5 tons, allowing him to match superhuman mutants like Sabretooth.
• Tarzan Boy. He started as a short-lived cheap Tarzan knock-off in the '30s, described as an American kid who was raised by lions after his parents' plane crashed in the Congo jungle. Ka-Zar was revived decades later by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in an X-Men comic and given a more fleshed-out characterization. Surprisingly, they made him more similar to Tarzan. Now he was Kevin Plunder, son of a British nobleman who had discovered the tropical Lost World of Savage Land in the middle of the Antarctic. After his father got killed by a local Frazetta Man tribe, Kevin was raised by a mutant intelligent sabertooth tiger named Zabu. He eventually hooked up with Marvel's flagship Jungle Princess, Shanna the She-Devil.
• Weak, but Skilled: Although at the peak of ordinary human strength, Ka-Zar is much weaker than most of the heroes he teams up with and villains he fights. It's his superior skills and training that set him apart.
• We Used to Be Friends: Kevin had this relationship with Sauron's alter ego Karl Lykos, back before the latter had surrendered completely to the Sauron identity.

Shanna the She-Devil

Shanna O'Hara

Nationality: American, Savage Lander

Species: Human

First Appearance: Shanna, The She-Devil #1 (December, 1972)

Shanna is a jungle adventuress and protector of the Savage Lands with her husband Ka-Zar and their pet Zabu. She grew up as a child in Africa. When she was younger, a pet leopard belonging to her mother had gone amok; in his haste to shoot it, her father accidentally shot and killed her mother instead. Moving to America, she became a veterinarian and ecologist specialising in big cats, until an event where a maniac with a high-powered sniper rifle sneaked into the zoo one night and shot all of the big cats in the African exhibit. The sole survivor, a female leopard whom Shanna had raised from a cub, was then shot by a panicking police officer, further disgusting Shanna with guns, men and human society. Given an opportunity to be part of a project run by the zoo aiming to return zoo-born leopards to the wild in the African Dahomey Reserve, Shanna eagerly joined, personally caring for the twin cubs, offspring of her own murdered pet, that had somehow survived the massacre.

Using her natural affinity for the animals of the African wilderness, and her Olympics-qualified skills in Karate and physical training, Shanna became a proud warrior woman, determined to protect the wilderness from those who would abuse it.

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• Action Mom: She has a son with Ka-Zar.
• Adaptation Dye-Job: She was originally a redhead when introduced in The 1970s, but was mistakenly colorized as a blonde several times in the comics and in her appearances on Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends and X-Men: The Animated Series. Ever since Frank Cho's mini-series, the blonde coloration seems to have stuck, despite Cho's comic being centered upon an entirely different Shanna.
  • She's a redhead in the Ultimate Marvel reality.
• Amazonian Beauty: She is tall and has a muscular yet voluptuous body. Having men going ga-ga over her looks is not unusual in the comics (and in the Frank Cho miniseries, said men don't even try to conceal their perverseness... until Shanna finally learns this is not supposed to be done to a woman and nearly kills one of them in retaliation).
• Badass Family: With Ka-Zar and Matthew.
• Badass Normal: Originally, Shanna had no powers. Instead, she relied on martial arts and having two leopards/a giant python as pets.
  • Empowered Badass Normal: After "Savage Wolverine," Shanna became this.
• Battle Couple: With Ka-Zar.
• Combat Stilettos: Believe it or not, Shanna occasionally has these when she's actually wearing shoes.
• Does Not Like Guns: Shanna despised guns, though later stories featuring her would have her use them herself when necessary.
• Expy: Was developed as Marvel's version of Sheena, Queen of the Jungle after Marvel was unable to buy the rights to the character.
• Fiery Redhead: In the original comics and in Ultimate Marvel.
• Flanderization: Originally Shanna simply preferred the jungle to the city, since she had a strong connection with animals and nature, though she didn't mind the occasional visit to the city and even had her own car. This was later changed so that Shanna had a hatred of technology and would only use it when the situation was desperate enough, even yelling at her husband for having a CD player.
• Fur Bikini: She wears one in most of her incarnations, even in the X-Men series from The '90s, though she wore a less stripperific outfit made of cloth in Skaar: King of the Savage Land and a more traditional bikini-esque outfit in the late 90s Ka-Zar series.
• Happily Married: To Ka-Zar.
• Heroic BSoD: Went through this after her father was murdered by Nekra and her leopard companions, Ina and Biri, were murdered. She later went through this again when Ka-Zar was seemingly killed. She got better in the former case via therapy and the latter through weird machinery. Yes, seriously.
• Heroic Willpower: This is what allowed Shanna to resist the Mandrill's pheromone based control over women.
• Jungle Princess: Shanna's the most famous one to come out of Marvel Comics — though there is a definite resemblance to Sheena, Queen of the Jungle.
• Kindly Vet: She's a well-trained veterinarian.
• Mama Bear: Not even her own husband is safe from this. Hurt Matthew and she'll hurt you.
• Most Common Super Power: She is very busty.
• Ms. Fanservice: Shanna is a tall, very beautiful blonde haired woman who wears revealing outfits that present her skin and highlight her muscular yet voluptuous body, large breasts, strong toned muscles, ripped broad shoulders, nice rear end, and long muscular legs.
• Named After Someone Famous: In the Frank Cho version, a soldier named her "after the comic book character".
• Nubile Savage: She lives in the Savage Land. The only reason for the existence of a tropical region in the middle of the Antarctic is so that residents can fit this trope.
• Prefers Going Barefoot: As per her Jungle Princess archetype, Shanna freely roams barefoot not only through the jungles, but also the arctic regions surrounding the Savage Land, where she'll put on a parka but no shoes. Yet her bare feet always look like she's just had a pedicure.
• Sex for Solace: When she thought that Ka-Zar was dead, she was still grieving for her loss and ended up kissing Peter Parker and wanted him to make her feel alive, but as much as he wanted to, he couldn’t take advantage of her loss. He still helps her through her mental breakdown at the same time still feeling a sexual attraction to her.
• Ship Tease: During her Heroic BSoD over the death of Ka-Zar, she ended up becoming pretty attached to Peter (unaware that he was Spider-Man.)
• Stripperific: Just look at the picture above.
• Super-Soldier: The result of a Nazi genetic experiment in the Frank Cho comics.
• Super-Speed: After being resurrected in "Savage Wolverine." She can run at least 50 miles per hour.
• Super-Strength: Her resurrection also caused Shanna to develop the strength of ten men.
• The Ageless: Being resurrected connected her to the Savage Land itself. So long as it survives, so will Shanna.
• The Beast Master: Shanna was quite capable of handling herself in a fight, but the fact that she was always followed by the fierce Ina and Biri, a leopard and a "black panther" (melanchromatic leopard), further aided her. After they were brutally killed, Shanna got a snake named Anata and she later had this going with her husband Ka-Zar's friend Zabu (a sabre-tooth tiger).
• Will They or Won't They?: Had this going with Ka-Zar for a while, since he tended to attract a lot of women. They eventually did, even having a son together.

Matthew Plunder

Matthew Plunder

Nationality: Savage Lander

Species: Human

First Appearance: X-Men Annual #12 (October, 1988)

The son of Ka-Zar and Shanna the She-Devil.

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• Strong Family Resemblance: He's the splitting image of his father Kevin Plunder/Ka-Zar.

Zabu

Zabu

Nationality: Savage Lander

Species: Sabertooth Tiger

First Appearance: X-Men #10 (March, 1965)

Zabu is a sabretooth, Ka Zar's mentor, raising him and teaching him the ways of the Savage Land.

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• Panthera Awesome: Is a Sabertooth Tiger.
• Right-Hand Cat: To Ka-Zar.

Sauron

Karl Lykos / Sauron

He could cure cancer, but he’d rather turn people into dinosaurs.

Nationality: Argentinian, Savage Lander

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: Uncanny X-Men #60 (1969)

Dead, mutant? I am evil incarnate — I cannot die! Behold, fools, the rebirth of Sauron!

A mutate that was originally supposed to be a vampire, that was a no-go with the comics code at the time, so instead he was reworked into an energy-sucking pterodactyl man with an... Odd fixation on prehistoric animals. Really. Lykos was on an expedition to Antarctica with his father when they stumbled upon some caves leading to the Savage Land, full of Pteranodons. Lykos was injured by a Pterodon scratch and gained the ability to drain energy from other humans, and later when he did so to a mutant, the ability to turn into a giant were-Pterodactyl with hypnotic powers. Going mad with evil, he names himself after the villain from his favorite books and decides to try to suck the life out of everyone. Joined Toad's Brotherhood in The '90s, despite not being a mutant.

And, yes, you heard right, he is indeed named after the Tolkien character. Both In-Universe and out, in fact, despite the fact that the Dark Lord of Mordor likely wasn't meant to be a vampire pterodactyl-man — the relevant thing, in Lykos' mind, was that he viewed Tolkien's villain as an ultimate embodiment of evil, and evil was what he sought to be.

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• Actually Not a Vampire: In his early appearances as a creepy private-practice physician whose patients experience anemic symptoms, the still human-seeming Karl Lykos gives off all the classical warning signs for some kind of vampire or other. Actually, he's a much more bizarre mutant monster. As the intro paragraph specifies, he is also an inverted meta-example, with the creators trying to make a villain who was as vampire-like as possible without upsetting the editors.
• Animal-Themed Superbeing: Pteranodons.
• Animorphism: A sort of Involuntary Shapeshifting, where Lykos transforms into Sauron whenever he absorbs mutant energy.
• Arch-Enemy: Forgotten in recent years, but back in the day he was one of these to Havok. As Karl Lykos, he even served a stint as Havok's psychiatrist. More frequent X-Men sparring partners include Angel and Iceman, occasionally Cyclops when he wants some of that sweet sweet Summers energy, and most frequently the X-Men ally Ka-Zar.
• Bad Future: In the miniseries Weapon X: Days of Future Past Sauron is a high-ranking collaborator with the Sentinels, having grown so fat off mutant energies he can no longer fly.
• Can't Stay Normal: Karl. Professor X even cured him of being Sauron in the 80s, but sooner or later, he'll be back.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Perhaps fitting for a Superpowered Evil Side, Sauron just can't shut up about how evil he is. In fact, upong first transforming, he immediately names himself Sauron after, in his own words, "Tolkien's ultimate evil!"
  "And, I choose — Evil! An evil so great... so monumental that only one name in all the annals of literature will contain it! The name of Tolkien's ultimate villain... that dark lord who personified evil... who was truly evil incarnate...! The name of Sauron!"
• Combo Platter Powers: Practically the poster child of this trope. He's a guy that can drain the life force of others, turns into a flying pterodactyl man when he drains the life force of a mutant, said pterodactyl man form also has Super-Strength, the power to hypnotize people and can breathe fire? Spider-Man even noted how ridiculous him being a vampiric pterodactyl man was without even making note of all his other powers.
• The Conqueror: Numerous times Sauron has attempted to raise an army from the disaffected residents of the Savage Land in order to seize control of it. These efforts are usually thwarted by Ka-Zar.
• Cumbersome Claws: He is unable to use conventional firearms due to his "weird dino-mitts." He has compensated by building a gun that responds to mental commands.
• Cut Lex Luthor a Check: See here◊. Spider-Man notes that he could be using his advanced tech to cure cancer, but being a Superpowered Evil Side Sauron has no interest in such Mundane Utility.
• Demoted to Extra: Karl Lykos almost never appears anymore, having more or less been completely subsumed by Sauron.
• Despair Event Horizon: After his love interest Tanya was murdered by Toad during the 90's, Karl lost all reason to try and live an ordinary life. He's since given into his evil side more or less completely.
• Dinosaurs Are Dragons: Later appearances saw him acquire the ability to breathe fire.
• The Dragon: Often serves this role to whatever Big Bad of the day is currently trying to take control of the Savage Land. Zaladane and Garrok have both employed his services; unfortunately for them, his Chronic Backstabbing Disorder leads him to invariably stick the knife in at inconvenient moments.
• Enemy Mine: During the Secret Invasion, Sauron allied with his longtime Savage Land enemies Ka-Zar and Shanna the She-Devil against the Skrull invaders.
• Enemy Within: Sauron is this to the fairly mild-mannered Lykos.
• From Bad to Worse: As if being tempted to drain the life-energy of your patients all the time isn't bad enough, you then discover that draining another mutant turns you into a dangerous monster beyond your control.
• Evil Overlord: He's usually trying to be this in the Savage Land.
• Evil Teacher: Wolverine and the X-Men saw him find employment as a science teacher for the Hellfire Academy. Definitely a showcasing moment of the character's Narm Charm.
  Sauron: (wearing glasses and a lab coat) I am Sauron, supreme ruler of this classroom, master of all second period!
• Evil Versus Oblivion: In Deadpool #10, he joins with Deadpool to prevent the world from being destroyed by black goo, reasoning that if the world is destroyed, he won't be able to turn people into dinosaurs anymore.
• Fantastic Racism: He hates birds, because "they could have become dinosaurs, but chose to become lesser".
• Flanderization: In a Secret Empire tie-in Sauron was reduced to a Shadow King-tier I Have You Now, My Pretty creeper who spent most of his on-panel slavering over various disgusted women. This wasn't completely out of nowhere, as a famous panel from one of Sauron's early appearances has him menacing a knocked-out Storm, but aside from this miniseries it's not really a big part of his character. Hell, he even went the other way completely once during the 90's.
• Frontier Doctor: As Lykos, he attempted to become one of these in the Savage Land. His efforts earned him the friendship of Ka-Zar, but eventually Status Quo Is God kicked in and Sauron returned.
• Giant Flyer: Not terribly gigantic, outside of that one time he fought Garrok, but still counts.
• Green and Mean: His skin is green and he's a dangerous pterodactyl man.
• Guilt by Association Gag: When Stryker started rounding up mutants for his Church of Human Potential, he went after Sauron. When Sauron pointed out that he was not a mutant, Stryker just shrugged and said that Sauron hung out with them so much that he was basically an honorary one.
• Happy Ending Override: His Marvel Fanfare quadrilogy ended with Professor X sitting him down and finally managing to cure him of being Sauron. It worked completely too, as he and Tanya went to New York and lived in peace for the rest of the 80's. But come the 90's Toad decided he wanted a heavy-hitter for his Brotherhood, so he abducted Karl and Tanya and hooked them up into machines that drained Tanya's life force into Karl, forcing him to become Sauron again.
• Hero Killer: Early in the first X-Force run he killed Sam Guthrie aka Cannonball. It... probably didn't take?
• I Just Want to Be Free: A noteworthy character trait of his. He might work with other villains when it serves his purposes, and surprisingly is even usually a good team player during those periods. But at his soul Sauron is an independent villain who doesn't want to be used by anyone and is always trying to be the top dog of wherever he is. During one storyline in X-Men: The Hidden Years, Magneto tried recruiting him to the Brotherhood, promising him untold riches and a place at his right-hand. But after realizing that would mean accepting subservience to Magneto, Sauron refused, telling the other villain he'd found a peace in the Savage Land and he would never give that up in exchanging for being someone else's lackey.
• Jekyll & Hyde: Lykos is an essentially decent and well-meaning person. His dark side, Sauron, is a vicious monster and a genocidal maniac.
• Large Ham: As deadly as he can be, Sauron is by his nature not one of the X-Men's more serious villains, and frequently spends as much of his time chewing the panels as he does pecking at the heroes.
• Laughably Evil: Sauron is a Card-Carrying Villain who spends as much time Chewing the Scenery and engaging in bizarre plots as he does genuinely evil things. This line of dialogue probably sums him up best:
  Spider-Man: You can rewrite DNA on the fly, and you're using it to turn people into dinosaurs? But with tech like that, you could cure cancer!
  Sauron: But I don't want to cure cancer. I want to turn people into dinosaurs.
• Life Drinker: Due to the whole can't-be-a-vampire thing, Lykos ended up as one of these. He can drain the life force of anything he touches, but only mutant energy will turn him into Sauron. As his Superpowered Evil Side, Sauron's constantly nettling him when he's human to go drain the nearest handy mutant in his vicinity.
• Line-of-Sight Name: He named himself after The Lord of the Rings villain. He even says so himself on-panel during his origin story. The fact that he calls Sauron "Tolkien's ultimate villain" rather than Morgoth, though, would suggest that he (and possibly the writers) only has passing knowledge of the legendarium.
  Sauron: I choose... evil! An evil so great... so monumental that only one name in all the annals of literature will contain it! The name of Tolkien's ultimate villain... that dark lord who personified evil, who was truly evil incarnate! The name of — SAURON!
• Logical Weakness: Being a cold-blooded creature, Sauron is vulnerable to ice and cold, and superheroes with those powers. You can guess which X-Man gives him the most trouble.
• Meaningful Name: Lykos is Greek for 'wolf', an appropriate name for a character who so often plays the wolf in the fold.
• Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: For many years an irrelevant bit of plot trivia, this has actually helped him get legitimate work in recent years, first as an unlikely member of Weapon X and then, in an even more unlikely twist, as a teacher working for the Hellfire Academy.
• Morality Pet: Tanya Anderssen, his longtime love interest. She was murdered by Toad in the 90s as part of his scheme to reawaken and recruit Sauron for the Brotherhood.
• Mouth of Sauron: Has never had a character serve as this for himself, but amusingly was Garrok's Mouth for a time.
• Noble Demon: Lykos is this, as despite falling prey to the wiles of Sauron more often than not he's essentially a decent and well-meaning person. The whole reason he's in the Savage Land in the first place is because he exiled himself there, thinking there would be no mutants for Sauron to prey on.
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: You don't get much more Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot than a vampiric were-pterodactyl mutate.
• No-Nonsense Nemesis: At least as Karl Lykos, he's smart enough to not fell prey to the usual villain pitfall for Underestimating Badassery. When the Savage Land Mutates have the Avengers captured in New Avengers, he urges them to kill their heroic prisoners right away rather than experiment on them as Brainchild wants to do, telling him that he's just giving S.H.I.E.L.D. an excuse to attack them. And lo and behold, a few panels later, that's exactly what they do.
• Only Mostly Dead: When near-death Sauron can enter a state of "regenerative stasis". He fell into this after being shot up by X-Force, and recovered completely after a few weeks.
• Picky People Eater: Apparently people have their own distinct taste to Sauron, as he remarked upon the specific taste of Kid Omega's lifeforce during his stint with the Hellfire Academy.
• Pragmatic Villainy: He's shown himself willing to help save the world on occasion, but only so he can continue being evil and turning people into dinosaurs.
  Deadpool: I thought you just wanted to turn people into dinosaurs, not save the world?
  Sauron: Well, if the world is all black goo, I can't turn people into dinosaurs anymore.
  Deadpool: Good point. You're in.
• Primitive Clubs: One appearance had him carrying an actual prehistoric club. Of course, it was included with his action figure.
• Punny Name: The name of the famous villain was probably chosen to invoke how he is a pterosaur.
• The Quisling: Collaborates with the Sentinels in at least one Bad Future.
• Reptiles Are Abhorrent: Stan Lee must have figured an energy-sucking dinosaur man was the next-most abhorrent thing to an actual vampire.
• Rogues' Gallery Transplant: In recent years he's become more of a Spider-Man villain.
• Sanity Slippage: During the 90s, after Toad killed Tanya Anderssen, Sauron starting hallucinating his alter ego Lykos. These hallucinations eventually got to be so frequent that even the Savage Land mutates (who are hardwired to seek out a leader and obey them without question) started questioning his sanity.
• Sixth Ranger: Randomly recruited to Toad's Brotherhood during the 90s, despite not being a mutant himself.
• Superpowered Evil Side: Sauron is very much this.
• Then Let Me Be Evil: After years and years of fighting Sauron's influence, Karl Lykos gave into it completely as of New Avengers. In his human and form and apparently completely free of Sauron's influence, he still urged the Savage Land mutates to kill their Avenger prisoners ASAP, all while wearing a Smug Snake smirk. Of course, Karl was entirely in the right, as the Avengers broke free very shortly after.
• Token Evil Teammate: Played with in the third Weapon X volume, when he's recruited to Weapon X-Force — on any other team, Sauron would be this, but this is a team led by Sabretooth and filled out mostly by other Wolverine villains. On this team, Sauron isn't the token evil teammate — the whole team is evil!
• Token Human: Lykos is a normal man who was turned into a mutate after being attacked by the Savage Land's breed of pterodactyls and has never had any investment in mutants beyond their use in feeding his Superpowered Evil Side, yet he randomly joined up with the Brotherhood in the 90s.
• Took a Level in Badass: In the X-Men novel "Law of the Jungle", he becomes a much more calculating and dangerous enemy via the Savage Land mutate Brainchild cooking up a way to stabilize his Sauron personality.
• Unexplained Recovery: Being one of the longest-running X-villains, he's had his share of these. There was the time Cable shot him dead, for instance. Another time Lykos made a psychic Heroic Sacrifice supposedly destroying his and Sauron's personalities forever. Both times he recovered and returned without explanation.
• Villains Out Shopping: When Sabretooth threw a party to celebrate taking over the Japanese underworld Sauron made a cameo appearance as one of the guests in attendance.
• Villain Team-Up: Once he teamed up with fellow dinosaur rogue Stegron against Spider-Man and the X-Men
• Werewolf Theme Naming: Notable for being a werebeast but definitely not a werewolf, his last name Lykos is Greek for wolf.
• Yo Yo Plot Point: He gets cured at the end of most encounters only to get un-cured again at the beginning of the next. As ever, Status Quo Is God.
  • Trapped in Villainy: Lykos wants nothing more than to be rid of Sauron forever, but eventually his powers always wind up getting the better of him. Tragic Monster indeed.
• You Could Have Used Your Powers for Good!: Spider-Man points out he could have used his advanced tech to cure cancer.
  I don’t want to cure cancer. I want to turn people into dinosaurs.

Stegron

Vincent Stegron / Stegron the Dinosaur Man

Nationality: American, Savage Lander

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: Marvel Team-Up #19 (March, 1974)

" Once, again, the time comesss for... dinosaurs to rule this Earth!"

A former assistant to Curt Connors, Vincent Stegron used stegosaurus DNA to augment his body.

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• Artistic License – Paleontology:
  • Due to being half dino hybrid, he is cold-blooded like a reptile... despite the fact that — as it's been discovered long time ago — most if not all dinosaurs were actually endothermic.
  • He is depicted with a beaked maw just like a real stegosaurus in most appearances, but some artists will draw him with more generic reptilian snout, similar to the one Lizard has.
• Beware My Stinger Tail: His tail has four thagomizers like a regular stegosaurus.
• Enemy Mine:
  • Makes a temporary alliance with Spider-Man and other superheroes against Roxxon Oil Corporation to stop their machinations in the Savage Land.
  • In Spider Island Alternate Universe, he agreed to cooperate with the Resistance in order to help them bring down Adriana Soria — the Spider-Queen — who was trying to take over Manhattan by spreading a virus which turned everyone into arachnoid abominations. After the heroes succeeded, Stegron joined the reformed Avengers, permanently becoming one of the good guys.
• Fantastic Racism: Ever since his mutation, he views humans as inferior and seeks to turn them into dinosaurs.
• Genius Bruiser: Even after being turned into a dinosaur-human hybrid, he retains his advanced scientific knowledge and high level of intelligence.
• Half-Human Hybrid: Half human, half stegosaurus.
• Immune to Bullets: Possessing a thick scaly hide, Stegron is bulletproof.
• Large Ham: Big time. He seems to be incapable of casual speech, and his dialogue consists mostly of cheesy lines, as if his character never left The Silver Age of Comic Books.
• Last-Name Basis: Since his last name is already similar-sounding to 'Stego', almost no one calls him by his first name.
• Life Drain: He inexplicably gets this ability during his team-up with Sauron. This is poorly handwaved in that his partner supposedly taught him how to do it — despite the fact that superpowers are normally inherent (or gained via mutation) and not something you can just learn.
• Lightning Bruiser: Stegron is stronger and faster than Spider-Man, capable of knocking him out cold with a single Tail Slap. In Thunderstrike issue #20 he is fighting both the eponymous superhero and Black Panther simultaneously — and actually is at the advantage during most the battle. The heroes cannot keep up and are able to defeat him only after exposing him to cold.
• Logical Weakness: Debatable. The idea at the time of creating the character was that as a human-dinosaur hybrid, Stegron is a reptile, so cold weather weakens him and can even force him to enter a hibernation state. However, today we know that most if not all dinosaurs were actually warm-blooded, which deprives that weakness of any logic. Strangely, it was never retconned, although comic writers of today should be aware that it no longer makes any sense.
• Patriotic Fervor: He's surprisingly loyal to his adopted homeland, once even going so far as to assault a series of SHIELD installations to rescue a captive Moon Boy because Devil Dinosaur was wasting away pining for his best friend.
• Secondary Color Nemesis: His body is dark orange and his eyes are green.
• Super-Strength: Stegron is superhumanly strong, capable of lifting 25 tons.
• Sssssnake Talk: Despite not being a snake, he speaks this way. This is most likely — after his cheesy speech pattern — another leftover from the Silver Age. Actually, at some point, Sauron openly mocks this during their brief team-up.
  Sauron: [assuming dramatic stance] I am the sssacred sssovereign of the sssavage land and asss sssuch ssspeak however I pleassse. Seriously, why do you talk like that?
  Stegron: I sssound the way everyone speaksss!
  Sauron: Ha! You sound like effeminate cartoon snake! Everybody hears it!
• Tail Slap: Naturally, Stegron is capable and quite fond of these. In fact, his tail attacks are so powerful that they proved to be a One-Hit KO for average superhero such as Spider-Man on more than one occasion.
• Unskilled, but Strong: He may be superior to Spidey in sheer strength and speed department, but he is still just a scientist by profession, with no combat training nor experience, which allows Parker to repeatedly beat him despite the advantage he has in above areas.
• Viler New Villain: He was this to the Lizard long before Carnage became this to Venom, being a reptilian supervillain to Spider-Man like the Lizard but possesses much less humanizing qualities, is seen much less in his human form, does not appear to have a family, and whatever small sympathetic traits he has are played up much less compared to Curt Connors' good qualities.
• Villain Team-Up: Once he teamed up with fellow saurian rogue Karl Lykos/Sauron against Spider-Man and the X-Men to turn the population of New York into dinosaurs.

Garokk

Garokk, the Petrified Man

Nationality: British

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: Astonishing Tales #2 (1970)

A god worshiped by the Sun Tribe of the Savage Land, Garokk was once a human explorer who stumbled on an altar to to their god, and drank a mysterious liquid, which turned him into a stone man. Thwarting the mad schemes of his high priestess Zaladane, Garokk supposedly died, only to be resurrected again. Garokk had crossed paths with the X-Men several times, and while he's often apparently perished, sooner or later the Petrified Man walks again.

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• Ambiguous Situation: It's unclear if Garokk is truly just a mutate who drank a weird drink and became the living image of a nonexistent god, or if Garokk is in fact a higher deity of some sort that simply possesses hosts as it sees fit. Zaladane believes the latter, Sauron was skeptical and no one else really knows one way or the other. Garokk doesn't seem terribly eager to set the record straight.
• Bald of Evil: He's got a few wisps of hair left, but not much.
• Body Horror: He survived his plummet into a bottomless pit, but one half was crystalized. The other, stone half, was melted.
• Death Is Cheap: He died in his first appearance. In his second, he plummeted down an apparently bottomless pit, and then again in his third. He even once discorporated himself, only to pop up again in time.
• Death Seeker: On his reappearance in the mid-80s, Garokk wasn't terribly happy with his condition as a half-melted stone man.
• Eye Beams: One of his powers, strong enough to engage in a beam-of-war with Cyclops.
• Heel–Face Revolving Door: In his origin story, Garokk sided with Ka-Zar against Zaladane. Afterwards, he's generally been an antagonistic force, whether because of his own intentions or outside circumstances, though in an appearance in Jonathan Hickman's Avengers, he helped them against the High Evolutionary.
• Light 'em Up: During his half-crystalline stage, he could project blinding light.
• Really 700 Years Old: He's at least "half a millennium" old and possibly much older.
• Reforged into a Minion: During the 80s, Magneto used him as a sort of butler / unwilling attack dog for his secret volcano lair outside the Savage Land.
• Superpower Lottery: Maybe because he's a god, or close as, but whoo, Garokk's got himself a whole set of goodies. Probably one of the few reasons he's not a bigger threat to the Marvel Universe is because he only really cares about the Savage Land.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: Like everyone else in the Savage Land, Garokk's only outerwear tends to be a loincloth, to conceal whatever it is a man made of stone has that is necessary to conceal.
• Was Once a Man:
  • There's an important lesson in Garokk's origins about not drinking mysterious liquids found in hidden civilizations, lest you turn into an immortal stone man.
  • His first resurrection came around when Zaladane grabbed some random guy, and daubed him with some of Garokk's ashes, turning him into a new Garokk.

The Savage Land Mutates

In General

• Only Known by Their Nickname: Their original names, if they had them, before being mutated, are unknown.
• Transhuman: As their name indicates, they're Savage Land natives mutated into more powerful forms.
• Slave Race: Magneto intentionally engineered them so that they'd be subservient and they have no initiative of their own. This was originally an ironclad rule, but as the years have gone on has gone more the way of an Informed Flaw, with Brainchild, Barbarus, and Worm all having stepped up to lead the group in the absence of any other leaders. Even one of Vertigo's clones was able to break the conditioning, for all the good it did her.
• Turned Against Their Masters: Ironically, despite having been created by Magneto to serve him, the Savage Land Mutates only did so during their introductory storyline and a single two-issue storyline in Avengers. Most of their appearances were spent following the leadership of either Zaladane, Sauron, or both at the same time. This even led to them actively fighting Magneto when he decided he could not let Zaladane live. Vertigo even went off and joined Mister Sinister's Marauders. This was homaged in the 1990s X-Men: The Animated Series cartoon, where the Mutates are introduced having betrayed Magneto and switched allegiance to Mister Sinister.
• Yo Yo Plot Point: They were cured of their mutations several times during the 70s, but always inexplicably reverted to their mutated selves in time for the next appearance. Even the official Marvel Wiki suggests that whatever was done to mutate them in the first place results in their mutated genes actively restoring themselves should the damage be undone.

Zaladane

Zala Dane / Zaladane

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: Astonishing Tales #3 (1970)

I think you'll find a full measure of respect, and not a little fear... for the woman responsible for the ultimate destruction of Magneto.

An ambitious Savage Land priestess who attempted several times to take over the region. Notable for her alliance with Sauron and for having stripped Polaris from her magnetic powers not long after the Inferno (1988) arc, to the point of being on par with Magneto in terms of mastery over magnetism. She was eventually killed by Magneto himself for claiming his own title.

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• Aborted Arc: Under Chris Claremont's original plan Zaladane was going to come Back from the Dead and join new villain group the Wild Boys (yes, named after the Duran Duran song). This group was retooled into the Upstarts after Claremont left and Zaladane remained dead, her place in the new group taken by new villain Siena Blaze instead.
• Ambiguously Lesbian: Her interactions with Shanna the She-Devil in the X-Men's late 80s "Savage Land" story arc were ambiguous, to say the least. Uncanny X-Men #250, especially, which had her all but going I Have You Now, My Pretty on the captured jungle heroine. (The story was written, naturally, by Chris Claremont.)
• Antagonistic Offspring: Towards Magneto, assuming she was in fact his daughter.
• Arch-Enemy: To Ka-Zar and later Polaris.
• Big Bad: Only used for this in a single issue, Uncanny X-Men #275, but in that issue she successfully supplanted Magneto himself in threat level.
• Brought to You by the Letter "S": As the High Evolutionary's assistant Zaladane wore an outfit featuring a prominent stylized Z, predating Lord Zedd by a handy decade or so.
• Cain and Abel: She's the Cain, Polaris is the Abel.
• Conflict Killer: She was a big enough threat in UXM #275 to necessitate an alliance between S.H.I.E.L.D, the Russian government, the X-Men (via Rogue) and Magneto.
• Continuity Snarl: Is she Magneto's daughter? Is she Polaris's sister? We know Lorna definitely is Erik's kid, but nothing definite's been given about Zaladane.
• The Dragon: To Garrok and later the High Evolutionary before striking out on her own.
• Fluffy Fashion Feathers: Her last costume incorporated these, presumably as a riff on her first (which featured a headdress that looked remarkably like a rooster comb).
• God Save Us from the Queen!: Introduced as the queen of the Sun People, one of the Savage Land's multiple indigenous tribes.
• High Priest: For Garrok's cult.
• Kick the Dog: She once kidnapped an innocent man and subjected him to a ritual that overwrote his mind and body with that of Garrok, essentially condemning the poor sucker to a Fate Worse than Death.
• Kill It with Fire: Alongside Garrok, she attempted to have Colossus executed via burning at a stake.
• Killed Off for Real: In Uncanny X-Men #275, courtesy of Magneto.
• Lady Macbeth: Played this role to both Garrok and the High Evolutionary, actively egging on and encouraging their villainy (not that Garrok needed much encouraging).
• Long Lost Sibling: Revealed/retconned into being one for Polaris.
• Manipulative Bitch: Deconstructed during her time as the High Evolutionary's assistant, when she all but broke her back trying to manipulate the latter only for him to reveal to the heroes that he knew her true goals all along, but didn't care enough about politics to go to the trouble of stopping her. As long as Zaladane helped him preserve and restore the Savage Land's environment, the High Evolutionary didn't care at all what she did in her off time.
• Meaningless Villain Victory: In her sole What If? appearance Zaladane was able to successfully consolidate her rule over the Savage Land, only for it to become moot when a fleet of Sentinels slaughtered her and nearly every other mutant on Earth.
• More Deadly Than the Male: She is heavily implied in her last appearance to have grown stronger than Magneto, so much so that Mags declares her Too Powerful to Live and kills her. Few heroes or villains can said to have made Magneto feel fear, but Zaladane is one of them.
• Most Common Super Power: She’s quite busty.
• Mouth of Sauron: Served this role to Garrok in her first few appearances.
• Mutant: Averted, at least if we accept her word for it. Zaladane claims at one point to be a mutate, an ordinary human empowered with mutant-level abilities via technology, and while she never proves this it should be noted that the Savage Land features a heavy mutate population. Though if she is truly Polaris's sister then she was either lying and actually a mutant or she had latent mutant potential that was activated by mutate technology.
• Near-Villain Victory: In part due to a Russian colonel's grudge against Magneto, but Zaladane came this close to having the Savage Land under her leadership declared a sovereign state by the United Nations, in exchange for her agreement to leave the rest of the world in peace. Zaladane was smart enough to realize the U.N. would probably not leave things at that, but her fledgling statecraft went no further as the good guys kicked in her door not too long after.
• Person of Mass Destruction: At the height of her power Zaladane was powerful enough to threaten every nation on Earth with devastating earthquakes.
• Power Parasite: Not naturally, but she used the High Evolutionary's technology to siphon Polaris's powers into herself. As a Chris Claremont plot, this event stuck for some time, with Zaladane retaining Polaris's powers right up to her death and Polaris manifesting a secondary Flying Brick mutation that lasted until the inevitable Status Quo Is God reset button.
• Stronger Sibling: To Polaris, if she is in fact her sister.
• Superpowerful Genetics: A debatable case with her debatable lineage, but it does bear noting that she uses magical powers very similar in nature to those of her possible half-sister the Scarlet Witch.
• There Can Be Only One: Literally the words used by Magneto himself as he killed her: "There can be only one Master of Magnetism."
• Took a Level in Badass: Took several levels in her final appearance, to the point where Magneto himself decided she was Too Powerful to Live.
• Ungrateful Bitch: In their first fight Ka-Zar saved Zaladane's life by cushioning her fall when they both fell off a pterodactyl. Zaladane's way of saying thanks was to lure Ka-Zar into a cavern guarded by a demonic beast. Amusingly, this led to some Laser-Guided Karma when an out-of-control Garrok chased her right back into said cavern.
• Vain Sorceress: Mildly vain. Zaladane's not above a good gloat, but fighting for power in the Savage Land also taught her the necessities of being a Combat Pragmatist.
• Would Hurt a Child: In one issue she used her sorcery to control Colossus and ordered him to kill Ka-Zar's infant son out of spite.
• Zeerust: Presumably the reason she has not been revived; like the Marauders, Zaladane's design was heavily influenced by the era she was created in and consequently she comes off as rather dated today.

Amphibius

Amphibius

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Men #62 (November, 1969)

One of the first generation of mutates created from the Swamp Men tribe of the Savage Land by Magneto, Amphibius is one of the most visibly mutated of his team members.

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• The Beastmaster: Amphibius can telepathically control any creature that lives in water.
• Expy Coexistence: He's basically the Savage Land's answer to Toad, and for obvious reasons the two never cross paths. Amphibius is apparently the superior toad-man though, at least if Marvel Super Heroes is to be believed.
• Frog Men: Amphibius appears as a man-sized humanoid frog.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: A couple of 2000s era appearance featured him with these.
• In a Single Bound: Like the frog he resembles, Amphibius can leap incredible heights and distances, as well as having superhuman reflexes and agility.
• Multipurpose Tongue: Amphibius' tongue is both prehensile and long enough that he can use it as a weapon in combat by ensnaring or grappling his victims.
• Speech Impediment: Spoke with a rasping lisp in the 1992 animated series.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: Unsurprisingly has the ability to stay underwater for hours, again just like the frog he resembles.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Since he's a frog man, he needs to stay moist to breathe and fire of any kind will completely ruin his day.
• Wolverine Claws: His most iconic weapon is a left-hand glove outfitted with razor sharp talons.

Barbarus

Barbarus

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Men #62 (November, 1969)

One of the first generation of mutates created from the Swamp Men tribe of the Savage Land by Magneto.

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• Amazing Technicolor Population: Mostly depicted as Caucasian but in a few appearances he's had grey skin for some reason.
• Boisterous Weakling: He's got a warrior's boisterous personality and while he isn't exactly weak, he's always either overpowered by someone stronger or his lack of smarts is used to beat him.
• Dumb Muscle: He's superhumanly strong, but his smarts are lacking.
• Expy Coexistence: Rob Liefeld would later introduce a mutant named Forearm who was basically Barbarus but not IN THE JUNGLE. Canonically Barbarus is the stronger of the two four-armed men.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Has four fully functional arms.
• Reluctant Ruler: Once assumed command of the group while every other leader including Brainchild was away, but he's afflicted with the same subservience the rest of them are.
• Super-Strength: Can lift up to 30 tons if he can bring all four arms to bear on the object.
• Super-Toughness: He's much more resistant to injury and fatigue than the regular human.
• Super-Speed: Downplayed; despite his size, he's much faster than the average human, though not a true super-speedster.
• Unskilled, but Strong: An annotation from Luke Cage in "New Avengers Most Wanted Files #1" summarizes Cage's opinion on Barbarus thusly: as strong as Luke Cage, but low on skill. Cage is confident he could take the mutate any day of the week.

Brainchild

Brainchild

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Men #62 (November, 1969)

One of Magneto's first Savage Land Mutates, Brainchild often fills the role of their leader.

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• Beast of Battle: In what was probably the coolest thing he's ever done, Brainchild was once able to wrangle Devil Dinosaur away from Moon Boy and ride him into battle.
• Chessmaster Sidekick: In the X-Men novel "Law of the Jungle" he alters Sauron's personality to make him a more effective leader. It works.
• Depraved Dwarf: He's the smallest of the Mutates, but no less wicked or villainous.
• Evil Brit: Nightcrawler once noted he spoke with a British accent, seemingly for no other reason than to evoke this trope (he's definitely not from Britain, nor has he spent any time there). Averted in the 1992 animated series, which gave him a high-pitched keening voice that was not even remotely British.
• Evil Genius: One look at him and you already know what role he fills for the group.
• The Greys: His appearance calls to mind a stereotypical Grey alien, with a scrawny, child-sized body contrasted by an oversized, rounded head.
• I Have You Now, My Pretty: He's got some very creepy intentions towards Storm. Not exactly unusual for villains when written by Claremont, but Brainchild doesn't even have the Affable part of Affably Evil to compensate.
• My Brain Is Big: Has an enlarged cranium to make his Super-Intelligence more obvious.
• Psychopathic Manchild: His nom du guerre itself evokes the trope, and he more than lives up to it with his childish temper tantrums. His first appearance even describes him as having "the emotions of an infant".
• Reluctant Ruler: He leads the Mutates whenever there's no one else around to do it but he suffers from the same subservience the rest of them do and happily gives up command whenever a stronger leader (usually Sauron) comes back.
• Super-Intelligence: Is said to have a a brain like a computer.

Equilibrius

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Men #62 (November, 1969)

One of the first generation of mutates created from the Swamp Men tribe of the Savage Land by Magneto. Equilibrius only appeared five times during the team's early exploits, and then faded into the woodwork. This may be because he's basically just a male counterpart to Vertigo.

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• Charm Person: Downplayed. He has the ability to psionically influence others to look him in the eye, setting them up for his vertigo attack.
• Deadly Gaze: Whereas Vertigo unleashes waves of psionic energy that affect whatever they touch, Equilibrius' powers only work on those who meet his gaze.
• Sensory Abuse: Those who meet the gaze of Equilibrius are overwhelmed by crippling vertigo.
• Spear Counterpart: He's literally just a male Vertigo, which probably explains why he was dropped.

Gaza

Gaza

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Men #62 (November, 1969)

Gaza was one of Magneto's first Savage Land Mutates.

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• Beast of Battle: Once rode a T-Rex into battle.
• The Big Guy: At 6'9", Gaza is officially the tallest member of the group, towering over even Barbarus.
• Disability Super Power: Gaza's mutant power is basically "he's blind, but not really".
• Handicapped Badass: Although technically blind, Gaza possessed psionic abilities which provided him with the equivalent of normal eyesight.
• Heroic Build: If Brainchild is the brains of the team, Gaza is definitely the team Hunk.
• Noble Demon: He's occasionally been depicted as having a sense of honor mostly lacking from the group's other members.
• No-Sell: He is immune to purely visual (as opposed to psionic) illusions, blinding attacks, and any attacks that require eye contact.
• Weak, but Skilled: He's not as strong physically as Barbarus but is a much better fighter, even besting Ka-Zar in a few encounters.
• You Don't Look Like You: At one point in the nineties he ditched the loincloth and harness in favor of some very... nineties◊ looking threads. Fortunately this Totally Radical phase did not last long.

Leash

Leash

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Treme X-Men: Savage Land #2 (December, 2001)

Leash is a third-generation Savage Land Mutate, having been created after the death of Zaladane.

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• Collared by Fashion: Wears a spiked collar.
• Dressed Like a Dominatrix: Red leather, uses a whip and her outfit is full of spikes. Even if she doesn't know what a Dominatrix is, she dresses like one.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: She's defeated when Sage turns her own powers against her, and becomes Sage's thrall.
• More than Mind Control: Leash's power lets her generate a leash-like coil of telepathic energy. If she can wrap this around a victim's neck, she can render them her obedient pet, helpless but to obey her every command. She can even attack astral forms with this ability.
• Mysterious Past: As one of just two Savage Land Mutates who debuted after Zaladane's defeat, it's not clear who created her or if she is even actually one of the mutates at well. In both appearance and attitude, she acts much more like an "outlander" who just found the group appealing for whatever reason and joined up.
• Red and Black and Evil All Over: Black hair, dresses in red leather and she's an enforcer of the Savage Land Mutates.
• The Rival: She seems to have a rivalry with Lupa, as they both compete for Brainchild's favor and go out of their way to insult each other.
• The Runt at the End: Leash stands out from the rest of the team like a sore thumb, with everyone else wearing loincloths and sandals while she struts around in a leather bondage getup and looks like Fetish Fuel incarnate. No points for guessing who created her.
• Statuesque Stunner: Stands at 6'1"/185cm tall and she's a striking woman who dresses pretty provocatively.
• Whip of Dominance: She has a Dominatrix motif and not only carries a bullwhip as a weapon, but also uses a psychic leash to bind the psyches and souls of other people to her will, allowing her to control them like People Puppets. She's also mentioned to be the overseer of Brainchild's slaves.

Lorelei

Lani Ubanu / Lorelei

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Men #63 (December, 1969)

Known initially as Lorelei, Lani Ubanu is a Savage Land native who was mutated in order to become a terrorist in Magneto's service. She later served the High Technician.

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• Compelling Voice: Lorelei possesses mutant/mutate hypnotic powers, she is able to mesmerize any or all males within hearing range by singing.
• One-Steve Limit: Shares her codename with the Asgardian sister of the Enchantress and the mutant Lorelei Travis.

Lupa

Lupa

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Treme X-Men: Savage Land #2 (December, 2001)

Lupa is a third-generation Savage Land Mutate, having been created after the death of Zaladane.

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• Animal Themed Super Being: Lupa has a generic "bestial" appearance and power-set, including Super-Strength, Super-Speed, Super-Speed, Super-Toughness, enhanced reflexes, heightened sense of hearing and night vision. She can also emit pheromones that allow her to control bestial creatures, although the stronger their will, the harder it is to cow them into submission.
• The Beastmaster: She can emit pheromones that puts bestial creatures under her thrall. She has some difficulty controlling more intelligent ones with strong wills.
• Berserk Button: She's furious that Brainchild and Leash treat her like Dumb Muscle.
• Cute Monster Girl: Lupa has furry forearms, pointed elf-like ears, yellow-on-black bestial eyes, and pronounced claws on her hands, but she's still otherwise a very buxom young woman who runs around in a ragged bikini.
• Distaff Counterpart: She's just Lupo with breasts. Naturally, she's the more popular of the two.
• The Rival: She seems to have a rivalry with Leash, as they both compete for Brainchild's favor and go out of their way to insult each other.
• The Starscream: She briefly usurped Sauron as the Savage Land's ruler by using a Cosmic Cube fragment to increase her powers.
• Statuesque Stunner: Stands at 5'11"/180cm tall and she's not bad looking.
• Wolverine Claws: Lupa sports enlarged, claw-like nails that are sharp enough to be used as weapons, similarly to Wolverine's Arch-Enemy Marvel Comics: Sabretooth.

Lupo

Lupo

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Men #62 (November, 1969)

One of the first generation of mutates created from the Swamp Men tribe of the Savage Land by Magneto, Lupo is the only other Mutate of his generation to be as deformed as Amphibius.

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• Beast Man: Courtesy of his mutation, Lupo appears as a bestial humanoid with traits that could be considered either canine or feline, including a body covered in fur, claw-like nails, fangs, and glowing eyes.
• The Beastmaster: Lupo can use a psionic command carried by high-pitched cries to compel any mammalian carnivore within 1 mile to obey him.
• Freudian Excuse: Gets one in the "Law of the Jungle" novel where it's revealed that he used to be a boy cruelly called Rat-Tail and was abused by his stepfather.
• Little Bit Beastly: Originally he was just a somewhat hairy guy with big ears, but as time has gone on he's become more and more overtly lupine in appearance.
• Savage Wolves: He's a wolf-themed villain who can control actual wolves to do his bidding.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: In one of his more recent appearance he tried to do this, not caring when Amphibius found Magneto's Asteroid M in the ocean and not wanting to go look for him but being forced to do so anyway by Worm.

Piper

Piper

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: X-Men #62 (November, 1969)

One of the first generation of mutates created from the Swamp Men tribe of the Savage Land by Magneto, Piper is known to have left the team for a prolonged period before ultimately returning to it. What he did during his absence and where he went are mysteries.

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• The Beastmaster: Piper can control animals, mindless monsters, and "primitive" creatures, but only if he has access to a wind instrument such as panpipes or flutes to observe as a focus for his powers.
• Expy Coexistence: A character with an identical name and identical powers debuted later as a member of the Morlocks. It's never been clarified in any of the Marvel Handbooks if they are different characters, but according to Marvel Super Heroes they are in fact two separate characters.
• Support Party Member: Unlike many of the Mutates he has no hand-to-hand combat ability and is easily dealt with whenever he shows up.

Vertigo

Vertigo

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: Marvel Fanfare #1 (1982)

One of the first generation of mutates created from the Swamp Men tribe of the Savage Land by Magneto, Vertigo is like Piper above in having left the team, though she found much more prominence in the world as a member of Mr. Sinister's Marauders.

See The Marauders for more on her.

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Whiteout

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: Uncanny X-Men #249 (October, 1989)

One of two second-generation Mutates, created by Brainchild at Zaladane's order to expand her forces after she took over as leader of the Mutates. After the death of Zaladane, she left the Savage Land and joined Superia's Femizons, but ultimately she left them too and made her way back to the Savage Land.

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• Albinos Are Freaks: She's the only albino mutate, though whether she was always albino or transformed by the mutate procedure into one is not known.
• Blinded by the Light: She can emit a pulse from her body that blinds anyone she chooses for a period of 1 minute. When doing so, she appears to emite a blinding white flash of light from her body. Her ability to selectively target who is or isn't affected by the flash, as well as affect beings who should logically be able to No-Sell her powers, such as the blind or those with bionic eyes that can normally counter intense light, suggests her powers are psionic in nature and the "light" isn't actually real.
• Straw Feminist: Almost certainly not intended to be one, but when looking at her character history she gives a strong impression of this, firstly working for the villainess Zaladane, then signing up with Superia's Femizons and then supporting Lupa when she briefly usurped Sauron and instituted a Matriarchy rulership.
• Support Party Member: Whether it was design or happy coincidence, Whiteout is practically tailor-made to work as this to her fellow mutate Gaza, as her "blind the enemies" power works wand in hand with his "can't be blinded by non-psionic means" power.

Worm

Worm

Nationality: Savage Land

Species: Human mutate

First Appearance: Uncanny X-Men #250 (October, 1989)

One of two second-generation Mutates, created by Brainchild at Zaladane's order to expand her forces after she took over as leader of the Mutates. After the death of Zaladane, he fell into line as one of Sauron's enforcers but has been seen only very infrequently since.

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• Covered in Gunge: His mind controlling power comes with the interesting twist that he must first coat the victim in a slime he secretes from his hands. Fortunately for him the slime is effective enough for him to paralyze prey with just a touch, allowing him to finish up on them unimpeded.
• Gonk: Worm is visibly mutated, with green skin and solid purple eyes.
• More than Mind Control: Worm's power is to secrete a psi-receptive chemicle from suction cup-like pores in his hands; when smeared on the skin, this chemical penetrates the victim's bloodstream and migrates to their brain tissue. It takes time to take effect, but once it does so, Worm gains the ability to control the victim's thoughts and body indefinitely, unless the victim has a strong enough will to break free.
• Motive Decay: In the fourth volume of New Mutants he decides to try and convince Magneto, a man he's never before met, to lead the Mutates again, even going so far as to use his power to force non-complaint members of the group (Barbarus, Lupo, and Sauron) to go along with his plan.
• My Friends... and Zoidberg: As one of the latecomers to the group, Worm never appeared in the 1992 animated series and most writers forget he exists.
• Snake People: Well, worm person, but he still fits the general theme of "half human, half serpentine".
• Sycophantic Servant: An unusual trait for a mind-controlling villain, but outside of a single attempt Worm has never tried to lead the group and has always been at his happiest brainwashing heroes for a boss.
• Yellow Eyes of Sneakiness: Has these to emphasize his devious nature.

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