Who's Who: Damaxites

 

Damaxites
by Russell & Siskoid

Planet of Origin: Daxam
Super-Power(s): Super-strength, super-speed, super-invulnerability, flight, heat vision and various super senses

Relationship to Legion: Species that spawned one or more Legionnaires.

Legion Log
Daxam is one of the rim worlds of the United Planets, well-known for centuries as a haven for advanced medical and scientific studies. In the later part of the 30th Century, it received more renown as the home of Legionnaire Mon-El, aka Lar Gand.

The Legion went on a mission to Daxam when Dr. Morlo and his Chemoids were spreading strife throughout the U.P. At this time, the Legion spent several days on Daxam and learned much about it. For example, that Daxam suffers from incredible weather conditions such as Balled Lightning, Alkali Rain, large Hailstones, and razor-sharp Sleet. The Daxamite Weather Control Towers are usually able to control these phenomena (or warn the populace of their impending arrival). We also learned that each major Daxam city is connected by Jet-Subway tunnels for ease of transportation.

Unfortunately, it was from Mon-El's mind that Darkseid learned of Daxam and decided to take it over as a new version of his home planet, Apokolips. Darkseid was able to mentally enslave the population of Daxam and have them re-form their planet into a huge portrait of himself.

Darkseid switched the locations of Daxam and Apokolips during the Great Darkness, but the Legion, with the help of the White Witch and other wizards from the Sorcerers' World, was able to return it to its rightful orbit. Daxam suffered no permanent ecological damage due to its temporary relocation.

After the defeat of Darkseid, Mon-El led several groups of Legionnaires in efforts to return Daxam to its native beauty, and after a year of intense terraforming, all traces of its resemblance to Darkseid have been erased.

Slowly but surely, the fear that other U.P. worlds had of Daxam gradually faded, and their biogenetic accomplishments have brought Daxamites back into the realm of respect.

All Daxamites gain super-powers under the radiation of a yellow sun. However, they also have a fatal allergy to the common metal lead. This is another reason that most Daxamites are content to stay on Daxam, where lead does not naturally exist, rather than risk accidental lead poisoning and death off-world.

Besides Mon-El, the other famous Daxamite of the Silver/Bronze Age was a teenager named Ol-Vir, who was mentally controlled by Darkseid, but took a liking to the dark god. He was happiest spreading fear and darkness, eventually joining the Legion of Super-Villains. He was eventually destroyed by Darkseid himself.

After the so-called Five-Year Gap, the temporal villain Glorith, fearing that the Dominators might gain control of Daxam, destroyed the planet and all its inhabitants to prevent this. Also revealed was the existence of Laurel Gand, another Daxamite and descendant of Lar Gand's brother, who, as a girl, saved her homeworld from a Khund invasion after her parents had been killed by Khund soldiers. Her cousin Eltro sent her to an orphanage on Earth to hide her from Khundish retaliation and after two lonely years as "Leala Linder", she was visited by three members of the Legion of Super-Heroes who offered her membership. During the try-out, she was digging towards the center of the Earth and hit a vein of lead, deathly poisonous to Daxamites. She was saved by a serum created by fellow applicant Brainiac 5, and after both joining, they struck up a long, but rocky, romantic relationship.

After the Reboot, Daxam is still the home of Legionnaire Andromeda (and a thousand years before, to Valor/M'Onel), but also to a xenophobic political group called the White Triangle, responsible for mayhem on Earth in the Legion's early days.

After the Threeboot, it was asserted that Daxam was wiped out 300 years earlier by natives of Trom using mass lead poisoning, and that Mon-El is the only surviving Daxamite. However, it is later revealed that this version of Daxam (and the Legion) inhabits the universe which contains Earth-Prime, the home of hero-turned-villain Superboy-Prime. The xenophobic version of Daxam from which Mon-El and Green Lantern Sodam Yat hail (in the 20th Century) is shown as still existing in the 30th Century (in the Earth-1 continuity).

After Infinite Crisis, the Daxamites' original history has more or less been restored, though Mon-El's original history has changed again. He is now a remote descendant of a male human and Bal Gand, a female Daxamite who visited Earth during the height of the Maya culture. She returned to Daxam, rather than let her child be born as an apparent demigod on Earth, but programmed her spaceship to return him to Earth if Daxamite xenophobia made it necessary. Generations later, her descendant Lar Gand gives in to his suppressed instinct to escape the increasingly isolated Daxam and travel the stars, and is taken to Earth in his ancestor's pre-programmed ship, where things take a familiar turn. At some point, the Dominators have plans to recreate Brainiac 5's lead serum so they can recruit Daxamite soldiers, but the Legion spoils their plans.

By the year, 85,271 A.D., Daxam has joined with Imsk to empower the diminutive Imskians and humanize the omni-powerful Daxamites. A contingent of this population joined Justice Legion L as the M'Onelves.

In the TV series Supergirl, Daxam was a planet close to Krypton rendered uninhabitable when Krypton exploded. A survivor, Mon-El, escaped to Earth using a Kryptonian pod.

Important Daxamite Stories:

Superboy (v1) #89
 (reprinted in Legion of Super-Heroes Archives Vol. 1
and Showcase Presents The Legion Vol. 1)

First appearance of Mon-El and first mention of his home planet, Daxam 

Adventure Comics (v1) #312
 (reprinted in Legion of Super-Heroes Archives Vol. 2
and Showcase Presents The Legion Vol. 1)

First mention of Daxam as being renowned for its scientific accomplishments

Adventure Comics (v1) #356
 (reprinted in Legion of Super-Heroes Archives Vol. 6
and Showcase Presents The Legion Vol. 3)

First mention of Mon-El's visits to his distant relatives on Daxam

Adventure Comics (v1) #363
 (reprinted in Legion of Super-Heroes Archives Vol. 7
and Showcase Presents The Legion Vol. 3)

 

The Legion fights the Chemoids on Daxam

Action Comics (v1) #384
 (reprinted in Legion of Super-Heroes Archives Vol. 9
and Showcase Presents The Legion Vol. 4)

 
First appearance of Mon-El's descendant, Eltro Gand, 
who bears a striking resemblance to the Legionnaire

Legion of Super-Heroes (v2) #292
 (reprinted in LSH: The Great Darkness Saga)

Darkseid learns of Daxam by reading Mon-El's mind

Legion of Super-Heroes (v2) #293
 (reprinted in LSH: The Great Darkness Saga)

 

Darkseid takes over the Daxamites, switches the planet with dead Apokolips, 
and has the Daxamites carve their planet into his image

Legion of Super-Heroes (v2) #294
 (reprinted in LSH: The Great Darkness Saga)

Ol-Vir attempts to kill Chameleon Boy

Legion of Super-Heroes (v2) #313
(reprinted in LSH: The Curse)

Mon-El leads a group of Legionnaires to return Daxam to its natural beauty

Legion of Super-Heroes (v3) #1-5
(reprinted in LSH: An Eye For An Eye)

Ol-Vir is a member of the Legion of Super-Villains

until his defeat at the hands of Element Lad

Legion of Super-Heroes Annual (v2) #2 (1986)

Ol-Vir tries to serve Darkseid one last time

Legion of Super-Heroes Annual (v4) #1

During the Five Year Gap, Glorith destroys Daxam, the home of Mon-El and Andromeda

Legionnaires #27

After the Reboot, a xenophobic Daxamite sect comes to Earth to dismantle the United Planets

Legionnaires Annual #2

The White Triangle attack Earth and is defeated by the Legion, but not before Apparition is

apparently killed

Legionnaires #56

The Khunds try to get a foothold on Daxam, but are rebuffed by M'Onel

Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes #25

In the Threeboot, 300 years after Daxam was destroyed, Mon-El comes out of the Phantom Zone
the last remaining Daxamite

Superman Annual (v2) #14

After Infinite Crisis, a new origin for Mon-El and Daxam is once again a xenophobic place

Booster Gold (v2) #32

Booster Gold visits Daxam during the Great Darkness Saga

Legion of Super-Heroes (v7) #3-7

The Legion visits Daxam after hearing rumors of the Dominators trying to radicalize and recruit Daxamites

Legionnaires #1,000,000

In the DC One Million event, Daxam's future is revealed.

Supergirl

Chris Wood portrays Mon-El of Daxam on the CW drama