One of the recent surprises of the Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania trailer was the reveal of MODOK. One of the comic’s wildest villains is finally making its way to live action. The giant floating head has a lot of history, and you may also be familiar with the actor behind it. Here’s everything you need to know.
MODOK Comic History
MODOK is a creation from AIM. It’s a gigantic mutated head with limbs sitting on a flying device. The reason for its head is its high intelligence, but it’s the mutation making MODOK unstable and unreliable. After his creation, he quickly killed his creators and began gaining control over AIM.
MODOK is an acronym, standing for Mental Organism Designed Only for Killing. Some comics changed the M to either mobile or mechanized.
His high intelligence means that MODOK has extremely good deduction and perception. It did come at the cost of his patience while also lowering his anger control. He uses a mental beam, a device that converts the energy from his brain into a powerful blast.
That’s not his only ability, as he is telepathic and can use forcefields. That makes it difficult for enemies to launch attacks on him. He can also mind control people who succumb to the power of his mental ability.
Connections in the MCU
There were rumors that Corey Stoll was returning to the MCU, but it wasn’t as Yellowjacket. Instead, he will be the face placed on MODOK, bringing the creature to movie theaters. In a short segment, we see his enlarged head alongside Ant-Man. There are two questions that the film needs to answer.
The first is, is this Yellowjacket who turned into MODOK? The second question is if this is a recast similar to how Marvel used Gemma Chan for Captain Marvel and the Eternals. Theories so far lean more into the first because
Yellowjacket did disappear and shrink too much into the quantum realm during the end of Ant-Man 1. His suit also crushed his limbs, hence the new look. The events from then may have led him to transform into MODOK.
The trailer also showed a different look from MODOK aside from the classic fleshy head look. We see MODOK bearing what looks like armor over his head and numerous technological attachments.
One of the Most Popular Villains in Marvel
Interestingly, MODOK has a lot of representation in popular media, mostly in video games. To date, he has roles in 20 video games. He was a playable character in Marvel vs. Capcom 3 and one of the villains in Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3. There was the canceled MODOK comedy show that went on to run for a season before Disney moved forward with their streaming service.
Fans are excited to see MODOK, but he looks to be a lackey or secondary villain in the film. We still have the threat of Kang and the creation of a new dynasty under him.
