A man by the name of Lawrence “Larry” Bolatinsky once worked as a special effects designer, but after creating a suit that allowed him to teleport and fire energy bolts, earning him the nickname “Bolt,” he turned to crime and became an assassin for hire. Larry Bolatinsky was created by Dan Mishkin, Gary Cohn, and Paris Cullins; he first appeared in Blue Devil #6.
The origins of this twisted villain
Larry Bolatinsky is an assassin who also creates special effects. He designed a special suit that gives him the ability to teleport and fire energy bolts. The superheroes Captain Atom, Blue Devil, and Starman, also known as Will Payton, have all faced off against Bolt, as he is now known. Bolt also appears in the first volume of the Suicide Squad, in the comic book issues 63–66 from March to June of 1992, as a member of a more evil-minded version of the Squad that is backing the dictatorship on the island of Diabloverde. Amanda Waller and the Squad kill him and his allies as they work to overthrow the ruler.
He joins the assassins’ division known as the Killer Elite. They face off against the merc group known as the Body Doubles in one of their many battles. Bolt is rushed to the hospital after a struggle off-panel. He joins the third iteration of the Suicide Squad, and along with Putty, Killer Frost, Lavanaut, and Eliza, he appears to die on his first mission. He fractures his leg after falling into a shaft and is attacked by killer ants. He is depicted as having died at the hands of the formidable Killer Frost. In the scenes of Identity Crisis issue 1, where he is severely injured by two street kids and has a punctured lung and two punctured kidneys, he later emerges and looks to be alive.
He is also a member of The Secret Society of Super Villains. Other characters have commented on his supposedly miraculous resurrections, most notably following his recuperation from his gunshot wounds. Bolt is a member of the Injustice League Unlimited, along with Lex Luthor, Cheetah, and the Joker, and is one of the antagonists featured in the Salvation Run comic series.
He is also one of the bad guys tasked with retrieving the Secret Six’s Get Out of Hell card for free. Bolt is subsequently slain by his son Dreadbolt, who sends him inside a brick wall using his own armor’s teleporting abilities. He’s been recognized as one of the people buried under the Hall of Justice. He was later brought back to life as a part of the Black Lantern Corps. Terry, Bolt’s son, transported Bolt halfway into a wall when Clock King demanded that he kill his dad as a rite of passage.
In the Identity Crisis plotline, Bolt initially appears inside the Post-Crisis New Earth. He struck a deal with two teenage gangsters, Travonn “Trey” Williams and Benny Addison, to buy a Lex Luthor Warsuit from of them, which is now held in a crate. Bolt, however, has no plans to reimburse them for the suit and instead wants to simply take it from them. He waits in a parked car near the meeting place, talking on his phone with the Calculator, bribing him for information on the thugs and any heroes who may be there.
Calculator notifies Bolt about their identities and estimates that they are ready and armed 18% of the time. Calculator also alerts him about the presence of Ralph Dibny aka the Elongated Man and Firehawk nearby. Bolt decides to go on the offensive and teleports himself to the alleyway right in front of the goons to take the war suit. When they see him, they become enraged and demand their money, and Bolt chooses to inform them openly that he intends to loot them. Bolt’s pompous overconfidence in showing his hand would prove fatal, as they were armed. They instantly take out their pistols and shoot him down.
Bolt is severely hurt with many bullet wounds, and Benny panics and escapes while pleading with Trey to do the very same thing, but Trey’s conscience wins as Bolt tearfully begs him to call an ambulance. Trey dials for one and tells Bolt that everything is alright. Trey and Bolt then escape the scene.
In the meantime, Dibny gets a distress call from his wife Sue, who is being assaulted at home, and as a result, he is unable to assist Bolt or catch the two goons as he gets Firehawk to transport him home. Bolt survives his gunshot wounds following treatment at Opal City’s St. John’s Hospital, although he is still gravely crippled and bedridden. After the Electrocutioner murders the medical workers outside, Bolt visits him and advises him where and how to find the goons who wounded him in order for the Electrocutioner to return Lex Luthor’s war suit.
A meaner version of Bolt in Suicide Squad
In the 1987 Suicide Squad comic volume 8, named “The Final Mission,” Bolt shows the reader the true extent of his cruel and evil nature. On the island of Diabloverde, which is on the edge of the Bermuda triangle, a man was being chased by a bunch of hooligans who are later revealed to be members of the Suicide Squad, who planned on eventually killing the man, who apparently, is a peon.
They decide that he belongs to whoever is able to get him first, as they continue to attack him. Deadline is bored of being the peons up, but Bolt takes over and tells them that the pay is good and their jail sentences are getting overturned, and they’re also getting their pending charges dropped. All they have to do for this to happen is to help prop up Guedhe’s government in order to prepare for a spell.
The Squad was a group of criminals guided by government personnel into challenging circumstances and assignments. The option was simple: languish away in a prison cell for the remainder of their days or undertake black operations missions secretly for the federal government as employees of the covert Task Force X. They may not really make it back unscathed. But for the hardcore offenders spending time at Belle Reve Federal Prison, this represented a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
In difficult times, extreme measures must be taken, as Amanda Waller leads a hurriedly assembled Task Force X to take down a ruthless metahuman revolutionary, who has taken over the leadership of the fictitious Caribbean state of Diabloverde. The Squad is dispatched to Diabloverde, which is a stand-in for gangster-era Cuba, for the last task. As the intimidating force of a ruthless ruler, a gang of supervillains works there. Around the midway point of his run, Ostrander, the author of Suicide Squad, stepped back and reshuffled the deck. Bolt is a more important character in this installment of the Suicide Squad storyline.
In issue #65, Bolt goes through a forest, complaining about how dark the jungle is during the day and that he will be unable to see anything at night. Just then, a boomerang flies his way, surprising him and setting him off course. Due to this, he is able to pinpoint Captain Boomerang’s location. The captain also complains about visibility down on the ground, annoyed at Amanda Waller, as she didn’t make proper arrangements.
Suddenly, Count Vertigo appears out of the blue and tells Captain Boomerang that Amanda Waller foresaw his ineptitude, which is why she asked Count Vertigo to follow him privately. Count Vertigo attacks Bolt, due to which he falls to the ground, but just as Captain Boomerang is about to punch him square in his face, Bolt teleports himself to another location. Count Vertigo notices this and notes that this is not a good development while also saying that Waller will not be pleased.
Later towards the end of the book, we see all the villains gathered together, and Bolt tells them that he picked up Blockbuster and Sudden Death just like they asked him to and that Deadline and Shrapnel were out of it, which is why he left them behind.
In issue number 66, Poison Ivy and Bolt get into an altercation, and Poison Ivy manages to win using her extraordinary powers of seduction and turning one of Bolt’s allies against him.
Bolt’s fantastic adventure with Blue Devil
While Doctors Beeker, Neemish, and a third unidentified doctor bemoan the lack of a specific prototype to consult in Blue Devil Comic issue 9, Bolt follows down Blue Devil, Trickster, and Sharon Scott and strikes them from the air. Trickster fires a barrage of bubbles at him, but Bolt buzzes them away, causing the heroes’ car to tumble off a cliff. Blue Devil’s trident shoots off, heading right for Bolt, who escapes. Trickster lifts Sharon and Blue Devil into the air, only to discover that one of his special air walker shoes is gone. Trickster struggles to hold them aloft, but Blue Devil spins and leaps onto a neighboring ledge, allowing Trickster to touch down safely with Sharon. Blue Devil gets the trident back once more.
Bolt then teleports himself to the location of the three scientists and hands them Trickster’s lost shoe, which he discovered in the wrecked car’s shelter. He also discloses that he knew Dan Cassidy due to his reputation. The scientists dispatch Bolt as well as the special shoe to the testing location, and when he goes, they debate if Bolt is an even greater danger to them than the superheroes. They resolve that Bolt should never discover the truth.
Trickster and Blue Devil converse in a hotel as Sharon relaxes in the hotel pool. Blue Devil saves Sharon from the pool’s diving board during what appears to be an earthquake. “They must’ve been testing the apparatus,” says the Trickster. Following the rescue of Sharon, Blue Devil wants an explanation, and Trickster informs him that he was a member working for a super secret criminal enterprise, so new that it was yet to be named, that aims to separate California from the United States by splitting it from the rest of the country. They want to elevate the state by utilizing the tech in Trickster’s special air walker shoes. Trickster was hired to assist them, but he ran away with the money and never gave them his shoes.
Eddie Bloom gives Wayne Tarrant a threatening, rhyming message he was supposed to deliver from Annie and Gina at the Verner Brothers Studio. Eddie also possesses a diary left by several college instructors for Blue Devil on how to behave like a superhero. Eddie then declares that he will clean Blue Devil’s workshop. The scientists present their idea to Bolt during the Santa Veronica College workshop. According to studies, the rest of the nation has been dragging California down socioeconomically, and that if left alone, California could outpace all other countries. To solve that problem, they’ve created a fifty-foot special shoe with anti-gravity capabilities, which they plan to use to lift the state of California to independence.
Meanwhile, Blue Devil and Trickster have developed a system that can track the distinctive energies of the special air walker shoes, allowing them to pinpoint the stolen shoe. They storm the lab, but the scientists trigger an anti-gravity field, causing the two superheroes, as well as all the small items surrounding them, to float in mid-air. Blue Devil launches Trickster quite far away from the field, and he collides with Bolt. Trickster reclaims his other shoe and deactivates the mechanism that has Blue Devil trapped and unable to move. Bolt swipes at Trickster, but Blue Devil incapacitates him using his trident. Bolt recognizes that all of the three scientists are actually the entire organization and not just a portion of it. Bolt threatens them to make them talk and spill the beans.
The scientists explain that they intend to put their historical and socioeconomic ideas to the test. The Monitor was used to hire all of the sky riders and henchmen. Blue Devil has had enough and goes at it with Bolt. The scientists, unable to accomplish their ultimate aim, settled on elevating the Santa Veronica region. They get inside the flying shoe and lift the city off the ground, but it drops back to Earth. Trickster says that one of his two shoes regulates climb while the other controls descent and that the three scientists only confiscated the ascending one.
As a result, the gigantic shoe will prevent them from landing. Blue Devil advises the scientists to attempt descending after reconciling with Sharon, who is now in a car that is also levitating, and they learn they can’t. They ask Blue Devil to bring them safely to the ground.
Blue Devil leads the automobile to the shoe with the trident, and the scientists clamber inside the car, leaving the shoe to float its way into space. The automobile exits the anti-gravity zone and falls into the water, but Blue Devil utilizes his mighty trident to level all of them out, so they land safely. Trickster brings out a rubber duck, which expands into a life-sized raft.
His son picked up the mantle
Terry Bolatinsky, Bolt’s son, makes an appearance in the Teen Titans series in #55. He first seeks to recruit Blue Devil’s old sidekick, Kid Devil, until he reveals that he is continuing in his dad’s footsteps as Dreadbolt. He attempts to encourage Kid Devil to become a part of his group, named the Terror Titans, but then when Kid Devil declines; he aids the rest of the evil Terror Titans in destroying him. Later, at the demands of the brand-new Clock King, he is dispatched to aid Ravager in his defeat of Copperhead and Persuader. He threatens Marvin and Wendy, but Ravager calls out his bluff and beats him all by himself.
He gathers his colleagues and tries to hunt Ravager down once again but is likely killed in the resulting explosion created by Ravager shattering a gas pipe. He is subsequently found to have utilized the teleportation mechanism in his suit to bring himself and his colleagues to safety. Dreadbolt is instructed by Clock King in the Terror Titans series to assassinate his father in order to prove himself worthy of leading the Terror Titans. When he complies, Clock King renames him Bolt. Disruptor attempted to lure Terry into murdering him after losing favor with Clock King for Ravager, but Terry wasn’t really fooled.
Ravager goes out to stop Clock King from destroying Los Angeles using an army of indoctrinated metahumans. Bolt, as well as the Terror Titans, fought him but were defeated. Miss Martian, who had pretended to be a part of the metahumans, liberated the rest of them from their indoctrination, and they set out to hunt down the Terror Titans. When Bolt and the rest retreat to Clock King’s stronghold for assistance, they are shocked to witness Clock King execute Disruptor for her incompetence and leave them all at the mercies of the incoming metahumans.
Bolt volunteers to hold them off while all of his friends flee, but they refuse and are eventually beaten, with Dreadbolt defeated by the electromagnetic-powered hero Static. Bolt and the surviving Terror Titans break out from captivity two weeks later, plotting vengeance on Clock King.
Terry demonstrated himself to be a strong-willed and stoic commander as the Terror Titans storyline progressed, but his colleagues swiftly exposed his facade after The Persuader III remarked that Terry hadn’t assassinated anyone. Clock King forces Terry to murder his father as a test of his ability to command the Terror Titans. Terry battled his dad and ended up murdering him, cutting him in two or forcing him against a wall. The comic was not entirely clear in terms of how Terry succeeded in murdering him, but he did, anyway. Terry has now taken over as the new Bolt.
Terry is a quiet person by nature. He takes commands very well, yet he may not appreciate the directives that are issued to him. He has proved to be a merciless murderer in Terror Titans number 3, much like the rest of the members of the squad. Terry and the members of his crew walk to the stadium to witness Ravager’s fight against Static. They are all astonished by his abilities, albeit Angelica, also known as Disruptor, distracts him during the match by talking about how the fight affected her. He and the other members of the squad departed the stadium after she was defeated, and Terry went back to his room.
Terry starts drinking, grieving the death of his dad, and questioning his behavior. Angelica, clothed in her lingerie, interrupts him and begins drinking along with him. They talk about their roles within the Terror Titans. Angelica then begins to woo Terry after drinking a couple more shots. They eventually use Clock King’s tech to teleport themselves to a beachfront where they would most likely sleep together. Following that, Angelica tries to persuade Terry that Ravager is actually preparing to assassinate Clock King and wants her removed from the picture. Terry gets mad at Disruptor, backing away from her and going back to base as soon as he realizes her intentions.
What makes Bolt such a powerful character?
Larry Bolatinsky is a superb assassin and special effects expert. He can teleport small distances instantly thanks to a unique outfit he invented. In addition, the suit has an explosive blaster that may be utilized as a weapon. Terry’s outfit has the same powers as his. He also possesses the power of Electrical Engineering, which is sometimes referred to as “electronic science.” This term refers to his ability to employ methodologies, theories, and a general understanding of devices such as resistors, semiconductors, inductors, capacitors, nanostructures, and vacuum tubes. He can use these devices to gain power or obtain new information.
Although Bolt is not as well-known as other popular D.C. characters, he still is undoubtedly one of the most compelling characters, with his life story being full of tragedy and drama due to his son’s betrayal. His intelligence makes him an extremely powerful and formidable foe, and he is certainly not someone you’d want to mess around with.
He is strong, intelligent, creative, inventive, and highly logical, which gives him an edge over quite a few superheroes as well as some of the other, more popular D.C. supervillains. It would be very interesting to see him play a few roles on the silver screen and fight a few more powerful heroes in future releases. We hope to see much more of this formidable character in the future.