Magik
- This page refers to the first Magik, Illyana Rasputin. For the second Magik, see Amanda Sefton.
| Magik | |
|---|---|
 Cover to Magik vol. 1, #4. Art by John Buscema. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Marvel Comics |
| First appearance | Giant-Size X-Men #1 |
| Created by | Chris Claremont Dave Cockrum |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Illyana Nikolaevna Rasputin |
| Team affiliations | (MU) New Mutants (alternate) Exiles |
| Notable aliases | Darkchylde, Lightchylde, Little Snowflake, Redflag #133 |
| Abilities | Teleportation discs allowing inter-dimensional transport and time travel, dominion over the dimension of Limbo, sorcery, mystic armor, and The Soulsword, which granted various powers |
Magik (Illyana Rasputin) was a Marvel Comics character, associated with the X-Men. Created by writer Chris Claremont and artist Dave Cockrum, she first appeared in Giant-Sized X-Men #1 (May 1975).
Originally, she was only the child sister of the Russian X-Men Colossus. In the 1983 limited series Magik (Illyana and Storm), she aged several years while in a paranormal dimension called Limbo, became a sorceress and developed the mutant ability to create "teleportation disks." She then became close to the young X-Man Shadowcat and joined the junior team The New Mutants. She died of the Legacy Virus, a great tragedy in the life of Colossus (which haunts him even to this day).
Biography
Illyana Rasputin was born in the Ust-Ordynski Collective farm, near Lake Baikal, Siberia, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union to Nikolai Rasputin and his wife Alexandra Natalya Rasputina. Illyana's two older brothers, Mikhail Nikolaievitch Rasputin and Piotr "Peter" Nikolaievitch Rasputin were both mutants. The X-Men suspected Illyana to be a mutant as well, but they figured that years would pass until her adolescence and the emergence of any possible powers. They were wrong.
When she was six years old, Illyana was abducted and brought to the United States by Arcade, who used her and several other hostages to coerce the X-Men to assist him in opposing Doctor Doom. She was rescued and brought back to the X-Mansion. Shortly thereafter, Illyana was kidnapped again, this time by the extra-dimensional demons Belasco and S'ym. She was raised and corrupted by Belasco, who taught her black magic and sought to claim her soul to be used as a key to bringforth the Elder Gods to rule earth. She was later tutored in the practice of good magic by that dimension's version of Storm (who turned to magic when her mutant powers waned) and eventually rebelled against Belasco. Similar to Illyana, both Storm and Kitty Pryde were both magically used by Belasco as potential gateways to freeing his Elder Gods by manipulating their souls with his evil. Both refused his magic before the process could be completed. Because of this Illyana formed a mystical bond between both Storm and Kitty once she too was used in the same manor. Using a portion of her own soul Illyana created the Soulsword and took over limbo as its new ruler. During her battle with Belasco she magically developed horns, a tail and fangs. She discovered that these new features only appear when she holds the Soulsword. She then managed to return to Earth several years older, although no time had passed on Earth between her kidnapping and return. She subsequently joined the New Mutants. Over time the appearance of a strange metal began to overtake her body which, much like her brother Colossus, gave her a form of invulnerability and increased strength. The demon N'astirh tricked Illyana, however, into opening up a colossal teleportation disc between earth and limbo which triggered the Inferno crossover. At the end of the Inferno storyline she was regressed back to childhood but still possessed the locket Belasco gave to her, inferring she still had ties to Limbo. Because of their mystic bond the Soulsword was passed on to her friend Kitty Pryde while in England. It embedded itself into a stone beside Excalibur's lighthouse headquarters awaiting Kitty to become its new weilder. She rejected it out of fear she would become a twisted dark image of herself, just as Illyana had. It would later eventually fall into the hands of Amanda Sefton, who would become the new Magik, ruler of Limbo and wielder of the Soulsword.
Illyana returned to Russia where she lived with her parents for some months until they were murdered by the Russian government in order to secure Illyana's abilities to defeat a psionic being known as Soulskinner. Illyana then returned to live with her brother Piotr and the other X-Men. Not long afterwards, she contracted the Legacy Virus and died.
Her spirit however contacted both Wolverine and Piotr from the afterlife. She came to Logan shortly after he had the adamantium pulled from his body, and urged him to return to the world of the living to save Jean Grey. She then visited her brother when he returned to the Xavier Institute, urging him to move on and be happy.
Alternate universes
During Excalibur's "Cross-Time Caper" storyline, the team encountered a fully demonic version of Illyana, who was very powerful, but not sufficiently so to withstand the assault of Phoenix.
An Illyana from yet another timeline (Earth-4210) was also a member of the team known as The Exiles. Illyana replaced Blink when the Timebroker apparently sent her home. She had been led to believe that had she not become an Exile, she would murder her family. This universe's Magik was much more temperamental and ruthless than the Earth-616 Magik and clashed with the team from the very beginning. Shortly after the Timebroker returned Blink to the team, the Timebroker decreed that half the members of the combined Exiles and Weapon X group had to die. Fearing for her life, Magik tried to join King Hyperion and told him of the mission Exiles and Weapon X had been given. In order to corroborate her claims, Hyperion snapped Magik's neck to see if a replacement Exile was sent. Magik's body was kept in the stasis gallery at the Panoptichron, until the Exiles took over the timeline fixing operation and sent the bodies of the fallen Exiles and Weapon Xers home. Magik was buried by Colossus and their parents.
In the Shattershot crossover, a reality was shown in which Illyana was regressed in the same way as in Earth-616, but never succumbed to the Legacy Virus. She grew up to master her mutant and mystical powers, called herself Darkchild and joined X-Force alongside New Mutants like Sunspot and Cannonball.
In another reality in which Illyana is an adult, her son is trapped in an incorporeal form. She makes a deal with Mephisto to provide him with a body, at the cost of all mutants' lives, but her son ultimately rejects the offer.
In Age of Apocalypse, Illyana was never kidnapped by Belasco at all. It was believed she had been killed during Apocalypse's attacks on Russia, but she was actually taken to the slave camp known as the Seattle Core, which provided energy for Apocalypse's empire. Colossus, Shadowcat and Generation NeXt rescued her, at the cost of the lives of every single member of Generation NeXt. Illyana then helped Bishop go back in time to prevent the Age of Apocalypse from occurring.
Magik was seen once again in the House of M reality. Not a true Alternate Earth as such, House of M was a temporary recreation of Earth-616 by Scarlet Witch, in which mutants were dominant on Earth. Magik was a member of a S.H.I.E.L.D. squadron of young mutants called the Hellions. Like most of the other Hellions, she eventually joined the side of the New Mutants; a team being groomed as future leaders; in fighting the establishment of the House of M in Japan, in a showdown against impossible odds. Almost ironically, given her track record, Magik appeared to be one of the few to survive. She teleported to Limbo right before Scarlet Witch altered reality yet again, leading to fan speculation that this version of Illyana is still alive.
In a 2006 issue of What If...?, Magik was a member of a soviet version of the Fantastic Four known as "The Ultimate Federalist Freedom Fighters".
Powers and abilities
Magik had the mutant ability to create "stepping discs", which allowed her to teleport by accessing an alternate dimension and returning to her home dimension in a different place. She traveled through one of the dimensions known as Limbo in the Marvel Universe, specifically the dimension known alternately as "Demonic Limbo", "Limbo-Belasco", or "Otherplace"; it is not known if she was genetically predetermined to travel through Limbo, or if she did so because, having been spirited there as a child, it was the alternate dimension she was instinctively aware of. Magik has succeeded in teleporting herself across continents, from one continent to another, and even interplanetary and intergalactic distances on occasion. Apparently she can mentally scan Limbo while on Earth in order to locate whoever she wishes to teleport from Limbo down to her on Earth.
Unlike most other teleporters in the Marvel Universe, Magik could teleport through time as well as space. She has teleported moments, days or centuries into the past or future. Especially early on, she had difficulty modulating this ability and would often inadvertently travel through time and space when intending to teleport only through space. Magik was told by Dr. Strange that she had potential for great feats of manipulating time on a wider scale.
Magik is the sorceress supreme of her limbo dimension. The extent of her powers there has yet to be defined, but powerful demons of Limbo did not dare challenge her. Magik can probably cast any magic spell that Belasco could, having had access to his store of sorcerous knowledge. Her sorcery was a unique mix of black magic that she learned from Belasco and white magic she was taught by an alternative-reality Ororo Munroe.
Magik's magical abilities are far more limited in Earth's dimension. On Earth she can perform astral projection, sense mystical presences, and cast simple spells. Her magical powers on Earth are primarily the use of her Soulsword, which is the ultimate embodiment of her mystical might. The Soulsword will generally have no physical effect on a non-supernatural creature; it will pass right through such a creature as if it were intangible. However, the Soulsword can disrupt magic, or release a non-supernatural being from any magical spell that it is under. Moreover, the Soulsword can physically injure and even kill a supernatural being such as a demon.
The more that Magik uses her magical power on any occasion, the more mystical armor appears on her body. It was revealed in Excalbur, by Doctor Doom, that the mystical armor is a natural power of whoever rules in Limbo. At one point Doom, coming in possession of the Soulsword, sheathed his whole body in the armor, indicating he held it back by will alone. If this is to believed, then Illyana was subconsiously holding back the armor somewhat until the Inferno caper, at which point she summoned the full suit of armor to encase her. Along with the armor, Magik's appearance would become more demon-like including horns, hooves or a tail.
Magik's Soulsword can physically injure Kitty Pryde, even when Pryde is using her phasing power to become intangible. Pryde is also the only known person other than Magik who can wield the Soulsword effectively. When Pryde does so, Magik's armor begins to appear on Pryde's body. Moreover, when the Beyonder once freed Illyana from the influence of her darksoul, Pryde gained the ability to produce and wield the Soulsword. Illyana later took the darksoul influence back into herself in order that she could again wield the Soulsword to save Pryde's life from a demon. The reason for the mystical connection between Illyana Rasputin and Kitty Pryde, each of whom is the other's best friend, is unknown. It is also mentioned that she has formidable psionic shields, most likely a result of the time she spent in Limbo and the effects of her partially demonic soul.
"Ilyana" is the feminine of the Russian masculine name "Ilya," neither of which has an English equivalent.
Appearances in other media
- In the 1992 animated television series X-Men, Illyana appeared the episode Red Dawn, voiced by Tara Strong. She also appeared in one of Cable's visions of the altered timestream in Time Fugitives, in which, without the antibodies developed to fight Apocalypse's techno-organic virus, many mutants, like Illyana, developed harmful mutations which killed them.
- Illyana appeared in the video game X-Men Legends as a non-playable character. She was (psychically)kidnapped by the Shadow King in order to lure Xavier onto the Astral Plane.
- Illyana was mentioned by Colossus in Ultimate X-Men, but has not been seen.