25 of Marvel’s best spacefaring characters

Warlock vs. Thanos (Image via Marvel)

7. Adam Warlock

You’d think, with a name like “Adam”, that Adam Warlock would be a pretty standard Marvel character, even for a spacefaring one. However, you’d be wrong.

Adam Warlock was created by an enclave of evil scientists known creatively as “The Enclave”. They seek to create an artificial and perfect living being. This being, who initially calls himself “Him” (again, with the creativity) eventually breaks free from the enclave. He gets into a fight with Thor and is thoroughly beaten by the Asgardian.

“Him” then flees into space. There, he encounters the High Evolutionary, a super-evolved human being. The High Evolutionary calls this new being “Warlock” and asks for his help saving a planet. Warlock obliges, and the High Evolutionary gives him the “Soul Stone”, one of the Infinity Gems that Thanos just goes gaga for. Warlock later hangs out on Earth, where a bunch of teenagers gives him the name “Adam”.

What follows in Adam Warlock’s story is a somewhat confusing mishmash of time travel, soul swapping, and various battles between good and evil. Warlock also meets Thanos, Gamora, a character called Pip the Troll, and the Marvel universe version of God, the One-Above-All.

Warlock possesses the standard superhuman traits of increased speed, agility, and stamina. He can also regenerate inside a kind of cocoon; when he emerged prematurely from his cocoon to help the High Evolutionary, he lost some of his powers. Luckily, he’s got that Soul Gem. Adam Warlock can also use “quantum magic” to manipulate time and space, not to mention visit an idyllic pocket dimension created by the Soul Gem.