‘Karshon The Shark’ was developed by Gil Kane and John Broome for Green Lantern issue 24 in 1963. Despite the fact that Karshon has remained a relatively obscure character since his inception, the mutant shark has made its way into the mainstream DC Universe and will be a significant enemy in the future film “Aquaman and The Lost World.
” Karshon started out as an ordinary tiger shark, but after being exposed to high quantities of radiation, it evolved at an exponential rate, evolving thousands of times in a matter of minutes. Karshon developed a variety of talents, including mind and matter manipulation, fear sensing, and a limitless capacity to learn new information, among others. Green Lantern and then Aquaman were the first targets of the supervillain.
Before confronting Aquaman, it adopted the persona of Karshon and plotted to depose the deep’s defender. Karshon will be played by transgender model and actress Indya Moore, according to the newest reports.
Karshon, like Suicide Squad’s King Shark, may emerge from the depths as a new favorite in the DC Universe. The two shark-based animals, on the other hand, are not the same. In this video, we will look at Karshon’s origins, powers, and story arcs, as well as compare him to King Shark. So, without further ado, let us get right to it.
Karshon’s First Appearance
Karshon first appeared in Volume 2 of the Green Lantern issue 24. Karshon used to be just another shark swimming in the blue waters, hunting prey, and living the regular shark life. But then a nuclear mishap occurred, and the full force of the radiation hit the Shark leading to its mutation into a humanoid beast with various powers, including telepathy.
The Shark turned into the deadly supervillain Karshon and communicated telepathically with Green Lantern, challenging him to battle. Hal was on his way with Pieface to meet Carol and Terga for a double date. Speaking of Pie Face, he appeared in the comics and was the first person to know about Hal’s real identity.
In fact, he was also one of the New Guardians who had the power of bringing out the best in people, but more on that another day. Hal immediately got out of the car after the telepathic communication with Karshon, changed into his Green Lantern avatar, and headed to face the shark humanoid. Yes yes, he definitely defeats Karshon using his ring and all, but that’s not what we are here for. And by the way, after defeating Karshon, Green Lantern does catch up with the others for the double date, just in case you were wondering.
Karshon Origin
As mentioned earlier, Karshon resulted from a mutated shark, but we did not get into the details, did we? Well, when a large chunk of nuclear material went out of the hand of the personnel from an experimental atomic station, the stuff exploded, releasing a hefty amount of radiation.
The larger part of the radiation found its way to a tiger shark that was swimming ashore. It wasn’t before long that the Shark started to mutate and rapidly became more and more humanoid in body and mind, and it even gained enhanced psionic powers. Basically, the massive levels of radiation had led to millions of years of evolution in a matter of a few minutes. It absorbed knowledge from human minds and learned several things, including the ability to speak.
However, despite the human-level intelligence, it couldn’t let go of its basic instincts of hunting and devouring its prey. But the Shark wouldn’t hunt just about anybody; it felt that it was to hunt worthy and extraordinary individuals because of its superior hunting skills and higher intelligence.
So, you see, the Shark had gained unusual levels of powers, but its primary agenda was primordial and crude; it only wanted to hunt and kill and didn’t have any sinister plans like world domination, etc., at least not for now. The first prey that the Shark sought was Green Lantern.
Although Green Lantern managed to return the Shark to its original state and had it put inside an aquarium, that was only temporary. A few questions that arise here are how did the Shark become Karshon? Are they the same? If yes, why does the Shark have two different names? Well, as we mentioned earlier, the tiger shark couldn’t remain in its natural state for long despite Green Lantern’s efforts.
According to a 1976 story arc, the Shark took on the name and guise of an Atlantean named Karshon and went on to battle Aquaman, the Protector of the Deep. This time around, Karshon had more sinister and elaborate plans against his chosen enemy, Aquaman. So, Karshon worked in tandem with the likes of the Fisherman, Ocean Master, and Black Manta to strip Aquaman of everything he held dear, including his people and family.
By spreading a rumor that Aquaman was stealing a substance called Serum X and selling it to evil corporations on the surface for money and power, Karshon managed to alienate everyone from the deep-sea Justice Leaguer.
Later, Karshon not only seized Aquaman’s throne but also abducted his family. It was only towards the end that Karshon revealed his true identity of The Shark. When Karshon assumed his ‘The Shark’ state, Aquaman exposed him to more radiations which ultimately transformed The Shark from a mutagenic monster to a regular tiger shark.
In the 2019 Suicide Squad comics written by Tom Taylor, ‘The Shark’ was introduced but killed soon as an expendable character. In the comics, the Shark attacked and devoured an Atlantean named Scale, whose twin brother Fin avenged Scale by stabbing the Shark with its tooth. The spilled blood attracted other sharks in the vicinity, which devoured The Shark.
Powers and Abilities
The powers and abilities that the original ‘The Shark’ possessed were menacingly vast and dangerous. As was seen in the comics, The Shark could manipulate matter simply by looking at it or thinking about it. For instance, he melted rocks with relative ease and killed an unnamed heavyweight champion just by looking at the dude.
Furthermore, he could manipulate the immediate environment, achieving feats like creating tornadoes. As far as his psionic powers are concerned, he could manipulate and infiltrate the minds of just about anybody, even if the person was at a large distance from the Shark. This way, he could learn new information and use it to instill fear among the masses.
His primordial bloodlust was fed this way, and he would continually become a more sapient and intelligent beast. After the exponential evolutionary growth due to exposure to radiation, he got yet another menacing power of sensing fear in the people around him.
But that’s not it; when he senses enough fear he grows more powerful. This gave him the capacity to change his own dimensions; he could either grow large enough to dwarf even smaller islands or shrink to the size of small fishes. Finally, he can also fire beams of concentrated and pure energy from his head.
So, it is evident that Karshon would be the second character after Suicide Squad’s hilarious but dangerous King Shark to be based on a shark. But there are tonnes of differences between the two characters. King Shark is a demigod with limited intelligence and probably the most difficult member of the team to keep in check.
He has a child-like violent form of innocence and just wants to eat others. Can’t a shark get hungry? But yeah, when he makes friends with you, he tries his best not to eat you anymore. Karshon, on the other hand, is nothing like King Shark. He’s a genius but sinister mutagenic monster who possesses an unlimited capacity of gaining more intelligence; he could very well be the shark version of Marvel’s Professor X in this regard.
While King Shark relies on sheer brute force and razor-sharp teeth, Karshon has other superpowers at his behest. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that in a battle of King Shark and Karshon, the former would inevitably lose. From what we have seen in the comics, Karshon was beaten by the use of brute force and a bit of tactic. So, figuring out the winner in this shark vs. shark fight would be like sailing in a storm.
Who Is Playing Karshon In The DCEU?
While there is no information as to how Karshon will enter ‘Aquaman and The Lost Kingdom’, it is evident from the name Karshon that the filmmakers will rely on the Adventure Comics arc in which The Shark assumes the identity of the Atlantean Karshon.
According to the latest news, Indya Moore will be playing Karshon in the highly awaited film. They have starred in the famous television show ‘Pose’ and ‘Escape Room: Tournament of Champions. We are eagerly waiting for a trailer of the new Aquaman film, and only then can we learn more about Indya’s Karshon.