More

    Cyttorak Origins – The Ancient God Of Juggernauts, Rare Omega Level Monstrosity That Can Shake MCU!

    When we think about why Stan Lee chose the name Juggernaut for his Big Red Wrecking Machine, we imagine him sitting in his office, a fat burger in one hand and vanilla shake in the other, silently sifting through the old Chinese tome Han Feizi. Cain Marko, after all, is the personification of the fabled “unstoppable force.”

    While Juggernaut’s abilities are influenced by philosophical debate, they are not the source of it. If you are new to comics, you might be startled to learn that despite being one of the X-main Men’s villains, The Juggernaut is not a mutant.

    Yes, he is been depicted as one in some versions, but that is no longer the case, and it certainly was not the case when the character first appeared in X-Men #12 in 1965. Because, as it turns out, his “powers” belong to Cyttorak, the Demon Lord of the Crimson Cosmos.

    No one knows how long he has lived or how long he will continue to live; all that is known is that his power is total and manifested via his human thrall’s deeds. This is Cyttorak’s Origins – Explored, a look at the Evil Elder God of Planet Earth.

    The Rumblings of Doom: Cyttorak’s First Mentions in Marvel History

    The Rumblings of Doom Cyttorak’s First Mentions in Marvel History

    The fact that we had to wait for The Lord of Oblivion to make his first proper appearance should tell you just how obscure a figure he is. But make no mistake, his powers are absolute. Don’t believe us? Why don’t you just ask The Sorcerer Supreme, instead? The first time Cyttorak’s name is uttered in Marvel continuity is when Dr. Strange invokes the use of the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak in Stranger Tales issue #124; a binding spell so powerful, that it remains one of Strange’s favorite spells till-date.

    The next time we’d see that name pop up would be in a non-mystical context. When Charles Xavier and his step-brother Cain Marko were enlisted in the US Military and shipped off to South Korea to fight in the war, the latter ended up deserting his forces. Xavier had no love for his violent bully of a step-brother, but he pursued him anyway and tracked him down to the mouth of a mysterious cave. He entered the cave, hoping to reason with his step-sibling bull-headed as he was, but he came across a rather strange scene.

    It appeared that they had stumbled onto an ancient temple, dedicated to some forgotten god who conveniently forgot his gemstone behind. Charles recognized it as the Temple of Cyttorak and warned his brother not to touch the gem, but it was too late. Mesmerized by its aura, Cain Marko read the mystical inscription engraved on it, which went like this; “Whosoever touches this gem shall possess the power of the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak! Henceforth, you who reads these words, shall become forevermore a human juggernaut!”.

    At that moment, the Communists caught up with them and began shelling the place. Charles was able to escape, but Cain was stuck underneath the rubble and presumed dead for nearly 10 years; before he resurfaced and attacked his half-brother’s lavish mansion in X-Men issue #12, with Xavier remarking that he had truly become a human Juggernaut. That would be the extent of our knowledge of the almighty Cyttorak for 27 years, before 1992’s Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme issue #44 finally gave us the big reveal.

    A Worship-Hungry God: Cyttorak’s First Appearance

    A Worship-Hungry God Cyttorak’s First Appearance

    It’s only fitting that Cyttorak would reveal himself in the story of the man who introduced him to Marvel readers, but this would not be the Master of the Raging Storm we have come to know in later decades. Issue #44 of Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme lies smack-dab in the middle of the Infinity War storyline; the original, comic book version, that is. The Sorcerer Supreme is on a mission to figure out just what happened to the cosmic being known as Eternity, who had fallen into a deep slumber, causing all sentient life not powerful enough to resist, to follow its lead.

    He teams up with an expert on cosmic powers, heat deaths, and “previous universes”; that’s right, Dr. Strange is cooperating with Galactus! They’re aboard the Devourer of Worlds’ spaceship, accompanied by his previous & current heralds: Silver Surfer & Nova.

    They’re bickering about the mission because Galactus is being a bit of a prick, as usual, when their ship is attacked by an alien being with suspiciously crimson tentacles. Strange theorizes that because they’re traveling across dimensions, some entity that ruled over one of them must not have appreciated trespassers; and he thought he knew which entity.

    Before he could react, both Strange & Nova were pulled out of the spaceship and into the dimension from whence the tendrils emerged, leaving Galactus & Silver Surfer to figure out how to locate Eternity for themselves. Meanwhile, Dr Strange puts 2 and 2 together, and realizes where he is; he’s in the Crimson Cosmos, the fabled realm of the owner of the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak.

    It’s where the X-Men banished The Juggernaut all the way back in X-Men issue #33, and it’s where he’d return now because Dr. Strange used the Crimson Cosmos’ connection to Cain Marko to summon him here for help. The best way to describe this version of the Crimson Cosmos would be to think of a cave filled with animated stalactites and stalagmites, and everything is made up of crystals. At least, for now, anyway. So, after somehow making Juggernaut agree to his terms, they venture deeper into enemy territory before they finally encounter the man himself; Cyttorak, resplendent in pink-purple battle armor with a powerful gem burning at his helm.

    Presently, he was occupied with torturing Nova into becoming his “priestess” with the elven creatures he’d created specifically to worship him; he planned to introduce Strange to the same fate. But the Sorcerer Supreme was able to use a combination of wit, charm, and cosmic ass-kissing to convince Cyttorak to let him and Nova go. He’d have succeeded, too, if Cain Marko hadn’t been so damn rebellious. The Juggernaut attacked Cyttorak and ripped his gem right off his helm, ostensibly killing him & taking his power.

    Dr. Strange curiously squares up to him for a fistfight, but somehow, even after taking a direct hit to the spine from the friggin’ Juggernaut, he’s able to stand. The reason is revealed a couple of seconds later, as the gem starts flying around the area like that housefly from Breaking Bad, and lands squarely within its former resting place, “reviving” Cyttorak.

    He wakes up, brushes off Cain Marko like an annoying gnat, and then teleports Strange & Nova back to their vessel in a crimson rage. Interestingly, though, he says something that hints at his real nature. After binding up Juggernaut, Cyttorak remarks that it was as if Marko thought he “truly was this overly humanoid form” he wore from “time to time”. This begs the question; who is the REAL Cyttorak? Or rather; what is he?

    Who is Cyttorak? The REAL Origins of the Lord of Oblivion

    Who is Cyttorak The REAL Origins of the Lord of Oblivion

    So, here’s the thing; everything we’ve just told you doesn’t exist in the Marvel Universe anymore. No, no, stop booing, there’s a good reason for that. What you saw was actually just the thing Cyttorak had described to Dr. Strange before meeting him out of his dimension; it was a form that he took now and again. But why? It’s simple; Cyttorak is neither a God nor a Demon, or maybe he’s both. Like Agamotto & Oshtur of the Vishanti, Cyttorak, too, is a mystical principality; unlike the Vishanti, however, he chooses to bestow his powers only upon those he believes to be worthy of inflicting “true destruction”.

    Cyttorak is basically a god hell-bent upon unleashing rage & Armageddon upon the world because the chaos created by them is what sustains his life force. Thousands of years ago, it is believed that he walked the Earth during the age of the Elder Gods, and survived on the planet well after their “departure”. Over time, he became a mythical figure to the denizens of Earth, who took to worshipping this demon as their God.

    But sooner or later, such an existence was bound to be put in check, and Cyttorak’s followers turned on him, imprisoning him in his own dimension which he called the Crimson Cosmos. You might be thinking of that rather pretty cave we described a few seconds ago, but the truth is, we lied; well, kind of, anyway. Cyttorak’s Crimson Cosmos is a dimension unto itself, which is the definition of ugly-beautiful in the most visceral sense of those terms: scarlet deserts and ruby volcanoes sprayed rust-colored ash into the air, towards a sky that was seemingly always caught in the middle of a breath-taking sunset, and thick with sulphuric emissions strong enough to likely choke a man to death.

    Time didn’t pass in this Cosmos, so whatever you did here was ultimately inconsequential. Basically, imagine Pompeii in different shades of Red, and make that the default setting of existence; that’s the Crimson Cosmos for you in a nutshell, and Cyttorak is omnipotent within its confines. The only way to traverse between Earth & the Crimson Cosmos is via the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak; a beautiful, ruby-like gem that seems “alive with power” according to Cain Marko.

    Its two purposes in life seem to be to open portals into Cyttorak’s domain and to empower already-angry people with its Lord’s Unholy Rage. But there used to be a third as well, which was the very reason for its existence. Over a millennia ago, 8 mystic principalities known as the Octessence, banded together for a wager to see just who was the strongest out of them all. Each entity would create a totem that would turn a human being into an Exemplar of the respective principality upon discovery.

    Once the 1st was found, the remaining 7 would also surface, starting an 8-way war between the Exemplars and their respective followers. Whoever survived, would prove that their master was the strongest. Cyttorak, as you might have guessed, created this gem as his totem. He tricked a few puny humans into building its “shrine”, and then tricked a few more into keeping it safe, all the way up until the day Cain Marko stumbled upon it. Another interesting side note; Cain isn’t Cyttorak’s “favorite Juggernaut”.

    That dubious honor goes to Colossus, who became Cyttorak’s avatar after Marko was “taken over” by Kurth and he needed a new host to get his fix of death & destruction. The Literal Man of Steel volunteered himself, and the utter decimation he left in his path delighted Cyttorak so much he refused to relieve Colossus of his duties, grimly remarking that this hero business had given him a “feast unlike he had ever had before”. Yikes.

    What Makes Cyttorak An Immensely Powerful Magical Deity

    What Makes Cyttorak An Immensely Powerful Magical Deity

    If you guys hadn’t figured it out already, Cyttorak is kinda overpowered. He’s both a god & a demon and can choose the form he wishes to exist in. Cyttorak’s godly form looks like a cross between Dr. Strange & Galactus’ uniforms, but it is his demonic form that is much more iconic. He’s essentially a gigantic version of the Juggernaut suit, revealing that Cain Marko’s armor design is basically a replica of its creator’s.

    There are 2 key differences, though; 1) Cyttorak’s head seems to be in the shape of the Juggernaut helm, & 2) he has horns sticking out of them like a demonic stag king who went bowling but got his head stuck in the aisles and came out rather disoriented. But as we all know, looks aren’t what matters in the world of comics; power does. And that, Cyttorak has a practically limitless quantity of. He’s one of the oldest mystical forces to have ever existed, so old that even the Vishanti are aware of him; and wary of him at the same time, for they warn Dr. Strange to never make him angry.

    Likewise, the demon Mephisto thinks that Cyttorak is one of the only demons closest to being the true Satan of Hell. The Lord of Oblivion uses the Crimson Gem to bestow his avatar’s powers unto mortals, but that isn’t his only “weapon”: Dr. Strange frequently employs the use of the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak, even doing so in a mutant-free MCU. He also has assorted shields & cages that go with the whole “unbreakable restriction” deal.

    It turns out that the Juggernaut’s armor is fashioned from the same material, especially the helmet, which is designed specifically to block telepaths. And he doesn’t just turn people into unstoppable forces of malice & destruction; he’s quite adept at spreading it himself as well. When the villainous Trion tapped into Cain Marko’s conscience and accessed the reserves of Cyttorak’s “true energies”, he gained the strength to literally re-shape reality with his fists; with every punch of his tying together more and more dimensions into a single Universe, reminiscent of Superboy-Prime’s Source Wall shenanigans.

    He was able to exert control over Cain Marko even when he was trapped within the innate domain of another cosmic entity, demonstrating just how much control he truly retained over his thralls. He constantly toys with his avatars by switching their operational power levels on a whim: when Colossus & Cain Marko went to attack Cyttorak, he gave the former unprecedented access to his own energies; enough to turn him completely against the X-Men yet again, and transform into a Bane-like entity, with pipes sprouting out of his back and his entire skin turning a ghastly shade of crimson.

    With this power boost, he sent Colossus hurtling across an entire forest with a single punch; you can imagine what would’ve happened were it something/someone else. And perhaps his biggest flex in life came moments before he pulled off this treachery when a Phoenix Force-ladden Colossus showed up in the Crimson Cosmos to “deal judgment” to his creator and was promptly relieved of his cosmic energies with the flick of a wrist by Cyttorak.

    That’s right. Cyttorak dispelled the power of the friggin’ Phoenix Force, the most-powerful entity comprised of pure cosmic energy like it was a kindergarten student on timeout. He doesn’t want to rule, he doesn’t have any ulterior motives for the plays that he makes; he simply wants to watch the world burn, and call out his name in fervent ecstasy as it turns into ashes.

    Why Cyttorak is such an interesting character

    Why Cyttorak is such an interesting character

    For the longest time, Cyttorak was a rather loaded bullet in the Chekhov’s Gun that was Marvel. For nearly 30 years, he went without an appearance, and yet his name was mentioned in almost every Dr. Strange issue. He wasn’t the Juggernaut himself, but his true form heavily inspired Cain Marko’s Exemplar aspect. In many ways, Cyttorak is like the Madara Uchiha of the Marvel Universe; impeccably well-built, irrationally open about his goals & desires, and yet practically a living ghost, who isn’t seen until the Great Wars erupt.

    Unlike Masashi Kishimoto, however, Marvel has managed to keep his mystique intact; and that is where Cyttorak surpasses the hype of one of the most-hype manga creations of all time. Even when he is revealed to you, you don’t get the sense of immediate hopelessness that Madara brings with him; it’s subtle, gradual, all-consuming, and it makes your insides boil with frustration, and rage, and drive you to do something you normally wouldn’t. Cyttorak is Destructive Magic incarnate, his will the manifestation of the phrase, “Might is Right”; and that should scare you to your very core.

    Latest articles