Brainiac 5 essay final: reject

--Not to be Green with Envy--
----Written by NDCoggshall
--Edited by Joni Jensen

A descent of villains and a hero, who passed on 12 - level intellect to him, Brainiac 5, also known as Querl Dox of Colu, developed from a clinical case of Antisocial Personality Disorder [ASPD] to a fairly rounded individual during his time as part of the Legion of Super-Heroes [LSH]. The definition of ASPD is someone who lacks empathy. They tend to be callous, cynical and contemptuous of the feelings rights and suffering of others. They can be excessively opinionated, self-assured or cocky. They feel that ordinary work is beneath them and have no true concern for the future. This was Brainiac 5 of the post Zero-Hour continuity.

-Interactions: Brainy's Opinion of Others-

Querl would be known as Brainy whether he want to to be or not, did not like others. Brainy never held back his opinions of his teammates or anyone else in the beginning. If Brain thought you were an idiot, he would tell you, without a single regard to your feelings and this is a common trait of those with ASPD. Brainy considered most of his teammates to be idiots or one of many synonyms, at one time or another. The only time Brainy would keep his opinions to himself is if the individual would cause Brainy physical harm upon hearing his comments. Sometimes if Brainy got yelled at enough times he would stop his criticism, but it never lasted. Brainy usually just ignored his teammates, unless they were pounding on the lab door, demanding to be heard. Yet there was still a chance they would be ignored.
Brainy did have a few people he had a tolerance for, because they some how were a benefit to Brainy. One of these people was Bart Allen, also know as Impulse at the time. Very few people liked Bart because of his brash unthinking behavior which could be a danger. Brainy saw him the same way. That was until Bart became his last resort, after Koko, Brainy's newly acquired monkey, courteous of Bart, was of no use. With super-speed and his ability to almost follow orders without question, Bart helped Brainy fix their disaster. They were a good team. Brainy saw this and voted Bart into the LSH, but the rest of the team voted NO. None the less, Brainy opted to keep in contact with Bart during the LSH stay in the 20th century. He used Bart on another mission and Brainy treated Bart almost like a friend. As time passed Brainy's opinion of Bart shifted. During their last mission, Brainy was condescending toward Bart and called him "Koko" like his monkey. This was at the end of the timeline for the post Zero-Hour Brainy and he had grown as a person, so this sudden change back to his former self, seemed out of place. Maybe Brainy was telling Bart his true opinion of him or possibly his way of showing affection. The latter seems the most possible because of another event that happened during the Teen Titans / LSH: Universe a Blaze mini series. Wally West, the Flash, implied a bad opinion of Bart to another member of the LSH and Brainy looked genuinely annoyed, but did not say anything. Post Zero-Hour LSH ended before a truth could be reached.
If you were someone who could show Brainy up, you were an annoyance. The main being that fit into this category was Koko, the lab monkey. During a visit to S.T.A.R. Labs, Koko was released and became a permeant fixture on Brainy's shoulder for a large portion of the ZH continuity. Koko would never leave Brainy and Koko even sat on him as Brainy slept. Brainy would verbally express loudly, at all opportunities, that he detested Koko being around. The main thing that really bothered Brainy was that Koko would show him up in experiments. While Brainy mixed chemicals that would cause an explosion in his face, Koko had more luck and would get the results without the explosion.
Superboy was also an annoyance to Brainy. He made Brainy look like at idiot. While in the 20th century, Brainy's knowledge of the technology had some limitations. He did not realize things need to be plugged in to work and Superboy pointed it out. Superboy was not malicious, just gave Brainy some common knowledge. This embarrassed Brainy, highly. Brainy hated being shown up by anyone he considered beneath him.
Superboy also manhandled Brainy with his tactile-telekinesis when Brainy offended him. This event, like other encounters with other super-powered associates, is the root to why Brainy got annoyed with his teammates. Some of them had fantastic powers that could warp the very fabric of space-time, yet they did not understand the first thing about their powers. Brainy, being a scientist, was disgusted by this. Also the fact that some of them would use their powers on Brainy such as Saturn Girl giving him head aches, Cosmic Boy ripping the door off his lab and Gates teleporting him to a LSH meeting, that Brainy had chose to ignore. This really made Brainy angry and gave him a reason to despise his teammates. Even though most of the cases were his own fault for being difficult with super-powered beings, Brainy considered himself the victim of these cretans.
Brainy was obsessed with tall powerful blondes. Every version of Brainy in the DCU has had an obsession with blonde females. Most of them dated or even married the powerful blonde females, except the Zero-Hour Brainy, he just obsessed.  The main blonde that the Zero-Hour Brainy obsessed over was Andromeda, Laural Grand, a Daxamites that had xenophobia.  Brainy would show he was obsessed by gawking at her, usually with his mouth hanging open. The root of Brainy's obsessions with blondes was the desire to find the mother that abandoned him as a baby, pursue her own interest. Brainy never knew the reasons why she left him.  All Brainy knew was that the Coluan government hated her and they erased all files that related to her. This obsession with his mother, caused Brainy to break laws. After Brainy met his mother, his obsessions with blondes diminished into a group of pretty girls in a holo collection. All blonde and a few choice females, that enter the LSH and did not annoy him much, would become part of the collection, along with one male. Brainy never obsessed or pursed any other blondes after Andromeda, just looked.
Coluans did not like the Brainiacs and this included Brainiac 5. This went back to the first Brainiac, Vril Dox I, who betrayed his people to the living technology called the Computer Tyrants. They rewarded Vril by raising his intellect 2-levels, to an unheard of 12 level. This mutation is passed on through the Dox bloodline to the 5th. The Brainiacs are a constant reminder to the Coluans of the danger of living technology and the betrayal of their own. The Brainiacs became the property of the Coluan government. This was also the government's way of protecting the normal members of their society. Brainiac 5 proved to be much more of a finical burden and danger to the government than was ever expected. They would have sold Brainy if the United Planets did not have a law against it. Brainy was shuffled around from place to place, no one could afford his destructive problem solving style. Then he was drafted into the LSH.
Annoyance. Boredom. Distraction. This is how Brainy saw the LSH in the beginning. These people were not importune to him. They were just things in the way of his life. The state-of-the-art lab provided by the LSH was the only thing that added any merit to his drafted life. While in the LSH, Brainy had a few one on one relationships that illustrate his personality.
Andromeda, Brainy obsessed over her and was the only one who mourned her death.  While in mourning, Brainy was depressed, reclusive, and quiet. He did not even have the energy to argue with people. When Andromeda returned, she heard of Brainy's reaction to her death. Invisible Kid set it up so she could confront Brainy alone to apologize and thank him for curing her lead poisoning. Even though Brainy had a genuine crush on Andromeda, he could not express himself. Brainy was cold and aloof, he turned his back on her.
Koko became the central annoyance in Brainy's life. All Brainy's opinions on the society he deals with, could be and would be directed toward Koko without repercussions. Brainy expressed numerous times how he wanted Koko to go away, that the monkey was nothing more than a pestilence. After Brainy's upgrade, Koko was seen as a pet that Brainy was not embarrassed to talk to. When Koko did finally abandon him for a female monkey, Brainy was lonely and missed the monkey. Even though Brainy was better at showing emotions by this point in the story, he still would not admit that he missed Koko to his teammates. After all, it is what he had wanted.
Invisible Kid, Lyle Norg, this person brought some of the best and some of the worse traits out of Brainy. Through out the whole series Brainy and Lyle had a love-hate relationship. Both being scientist within the LSH, Lyle was Brainy's biggest rival and his best friend. During their first mission together, Lyle insulted Brainy's name, then impress Brainy with his skills. This would be the continuous pattern in the series between these two, but Brainy no matter how impressed he was with Lyle or how much he wanted to be friends with Lyle, Brainy treated him as competition. He would never admit this though. This did not change when Brainy was upgraded or when his mother made him reevaluate his life. Lyle disappeared somewhat from Brainy's life during that time. Lyle had his own life going on. It was not until Brainy was lost for a year. Not having Lyle there to help him deal with, everything, really put a strain on Brainy, physically and mentally. This is when Brainy realized the true value of Lyle as his coworker and friend. In the past they had been apart, but it never affected Brainy to this extreme. Brainy was a different person when he went missing whether he wanted to admit it or not. When Brainy returned from the other galaxy, he no longer treated Lyle at a rival, but as an equal. This was something very new for Brainy to do. He never saw anyone else in the same respect. Lyle also got the interesting honor of being part of Brainy's holo-collection, which was formally reserved for powerful females he obsessed over. What Brainy wanted as their final relationship to be, is under speculation. Brainy might have just saw Lyle as his first best friend or as a brother type. They have had these types of relationships in other incarnations of themselves. There was also a chance Brainy wanted a deeper, possible romantic relationship with him. Lyle was gay. The final technicality of the relationship, was not revealed before the end of the continuity. All that matters is Brainy had a truly good friendship that there was mutual respect.

-Science of Pure Theory-

Brainy was a scientist and to experiment was part of his nature. This could have been part of his genetic program. Unlike the other Brainy's, who experimented and created items for the better of the team, Zero-Hour Brainy did not. Even though Brainy created the alloy for the flight rings through an experiment caused to fail by an interruption by Lyle to include Brainy more in LSH activities. Lyle was the one who came up with the idea of the flight ring. Brainy started as an extremely selfish being. On the Coluan home world, they prized the collection of knowledge and experimentation was only used when absolutely necessary. Other scientist such as Lyle, believed in the practicality of tactile engineering. Brainy believed in the beauty of pure theory and his methodology for experimentation shown as much. His standard practice was to try it and see what happened. Brainy never showed evidence that he was trying to hurt others. It just did not register in his mind what he was doing could have adverse effects on everyone else. What mattered to Brainy is that he got the results he was looking for.  Brainy's form of methodology, tended to cause lots of explosions and was quite expensive. This was another concept Brainy could not grasp. The idea that the world was not free. The lack of funds, just annoyed him. This was something he felt was not his problem to worry about. Even though Brainy was shipped from lab to lab as each ran out of money, this did not concern Brainy. Those with ASPD have no real concern for their future, they just live day to day how they see fit.
Time travel was one area of science that Brainy pursued hardcore in the beginning. Brainy created a time platform. The platform was useful to the LSH in the retrieval of a Daxamite named Lar Gand also known as Valor and would take the name M'Onel. Brainy did not build the platform for this purpose, but he saw it as a prime opportunity to test it. The U.P. president thought Brainy would use it to undo all her plans to take over the U.P. Something else Brainy never planned on doing. Lyle figured Brainy built  it to reverse Andromeda's death but this was another event that did not warrant the creation of the time platform. Brainy created the time platform for one purpose, to go back to the moment he was happiest, a baby in his mother's arms. He wanted to see her face again, because with time he had forgotten it. The Coluan government had erased all files of her, so Brainy felt he had no other choice.  It was against the law to play in time and he was arrested because of it. The arrest was a positive experience for Brainy. He was alone to think.
Brainy never went out with the intention to kill others. There were some who died because of his experiments, but he never felt remorse over it. As far as Brainy was concerned, he warned them not to tamper. A form of life that Brainy grew to respect was artificial life-forms such as the Metal Men. Some believed that Brainy respected artificial life-forms more than organic ones. At first Brainy saw the Metal Men as tools to be used and took one's responsometer (computerized nervous system). Even though Brainy  does not participate in emotional interaction, his time with the LSH has taught him to recognize it. Brainy saw that the Metal Men were living, feeling creatures that only a barbarian would experiment on and he gave the responsometer back. Brainy shocked his teammates when he decided this. But when given the choice to be upgraded by Brainy, one of the Metal Men, Veridium, decided to go through with it. This became part of a cyber-cerebral overlapping multi-processor, universal transceiver operator, a living computer capable of reason, C.O.M.P.U.T.O., that was suppose to get them back to the 30th century. Instead COMPUTO was a rage filled being that thought the only reason that Brainy had created him, was to suffer and die. After Brainy's upgrade, these events would come back to haunt Brainy and the rest of the LSH, when COMPUTO raised a force of living technology up against the organic life of the universe. The Coluan government wanted to kill the artificial technology, most people did, except Brainy. He created COMPUTO and COMPUTO even called him father, in the way an estranged son would, but Brainy would not kill COMPUTO. This was a living creature to him and the Colu home world would forever turn their backs on him for this collaboration with artificial life, just as his ancestor did. COMPUTO wanted to kill everyone, but he also wanted to evolve, go to the next physical level and Brainy wanted to help him. Brainy saw the big picture, evolution does not only come in the form of a physical and intellectual change, but social and moral change. Brainy knew when COMPUTO became enlightened that he would move beyond such things as greed, hatred and spite, primitive emotions. Brainy is pleased and happy with this event, reflecting his own growth. Maybe with time, Brainy could have even grown to the level that COMPUTO achieved.

-Development of Character-

Brainy showed the characteristics of someone with ASPD. He had a general lack of empathy, was callous and over confident. He considered regular work, the work he was there to do for the LSH,  beneath him. He was an anti-social person. Brainy did start to learn how to deal with people in the form of his teammates, but he still did not like dealing with people. They relied so much on emotions. Brainy did learn how to recognize emotional displays and how they were importune to others. He did not participate in emotional displays. He rather loathed them and if someone showed him affection, Brainy shied away. Supergirl gave him a kiss as a thank you. Brainy did not object, because she was a powerful blonde, but he was embarrassed by it. Brainy would claim that he not feel the need for the praise of his teammates and he thought depending on such praise could be a weakness. This claim never held to be true. Lyle got all the praise for the creation of the fight ring and in noway did he flaunt it to Brainy. Lyle even tried to get the team to realize there was a combined collaboration, be it unintentional, between him and Brainy. The team chose to ignore this. Brainy was highly jealous of Lyle's praises, though he would never admit it. Brainy always dreaded being bothered by his teammates for their petty needs. He just wanted to be left alone, but no on understood that. He would forget that technically that he had access to the state-of-the-art lab, to do a job. When Brainy finally go his wish to be completely left alone and essentially invisible, by way of the Emerald Eye, he enjoyed it for a short time. Then he tried to get the praise of his teammates for the gift he created for their leader, Violet, for how she effectively removed the pest from Brainy's life. He was quite proud of what he had made, but his teammates ignored him. Brainy did not exist to others and this really distressed him. No matter how much Brainy claimed he did not need others, the longer he was with the LSH, the more he needed them to be there. He would never admit this though.
Brainy was one of group members that entered the spacial anomaly that caused them to "evolve". There were the physical changes, such as the implants on his face. One function of the implants gave Brainy the ability to control his force field with his mind. This ability in it's self, changed his character. Brainy could fight and this was something he never really did before. In the past, he would just step off to the side to make snide remarks and let the super-powered ones take care of it. This never seemed to bother him, but now that Brainy could fight effectively himself, he enjoyed it. Brainy would never admit it though. The other implants were personality inhibitors to prevent Brainy from going crazy and keep the speed of his evolution in check. When the inhibitors were turned off Brainy almost broke. With help from Umbra to center his mind and lots of concentration on his part, he held back the madness for the short time he needed too.
The implants were not the only result of the anomaly. Brainy's emotional and social centers evolved, but the inhibitors held some of it back. Brainy had a complete change in personality. The change was so drastic, that he was almost a complete opposite of his former self. This new Brainy was friendly, he laughed, became friends with Gates, someone he only had contempt for, and treated Koko as a pet he loved. This was a very odd time in Brainy's emotional and social development. This change in personality seemed forced and very fake. Any evidence of ASPD disappeared. It was as though Brainy was compensating for his past bad behavior because he saw the true error of his ways and it was an excuse to change. Lyle disappeared from Brainy's main life and became a background character. Brainy also showed limited forms of physical affection to others in the form of a neck scratch for Koko or a head pat for Gates. Even though it may not seem like much, these were big changes for someone who loathed physical contact. During this strange time Brainy was known as "Brainiac 5.1". This was a Gates addition to Brainy's name. This would have never happened before the upgrade. Brainy was very sensitive about his name. He never wanted to be known as "Brainy", but his teammates gave him little choice. Then there was the time that Lyle insulted Brainy by asking him how he could use such a despised name like Brainiac, if Brainy even knew who it was. If Brainy was a violent person he would have slugged Lyle. Why Zero-Hour Brainy used the name is a mystery. The other Brainy's use the name as a way to remind themselves of why they join the LSH, to redeem themselves for what their ancestor did. Zero-Hour Brainy was not there to redeem anyone. He was there because he got drafted. Brainy to change his name to "Brainiac 5.1" was unusual and for him to think it was a fun idea, was just odd. But he was trying to fit in.
Brainy finally got his wish after the upgrade, to meet his mother. This was the event that had been driving him for such a long portion of the continuity that the truth cut deep. Brainy's mother was a woman that could not feel emotion and this annoyed her. Being a Brainiac, she did not believe she had limitations as a being, so she went on a quest to feel. Brainiac 4 tried everything. she had a child, that became Brainy, but she looked at him and felt nothing. She tried many life styles, from a famous star to the unknown beggar, form the spandex clad hero to the world dominating villain. Still Brainiac 4 felt nothing. She finally had a true sense of emotion when she sent a fleet of ships, with thousands of people, to their deaths. She felt exhilarated. This was the only reason she looked for her son. She thought, if sending complete strangers to their deaths could be so entertaining, then sending her own flesh and blood to his death could be spectacular. Brainy wanted to meet a mother that loved and cherished him. Praised his accomplishments and was proud to give birth to such a gifted boy. All the things he so deeply craved. What Brainy met after years of searching and obsessing was a psychotic woman who wanted to kill him for fun. Before the LSH and the anomaly, this reveal would have broke Brainy. There was no way Brainy could have gotten through it alone with his limited emotional ability. Even with all his social and emotional growth, surrounded by people who did care for him, though he did not believe it, Brainy fell back into himself. He would never be back up to the social level he was as Brainiac 5.1. After the encounter with his mother, he wanted to regress to his former self. Brainy thought it would be an easier way to deal with his emotional pain, it was how he had been dealing with it most of his life. He knew he could not do it. Brainy had worked to hard at his life to have this mother of his ruin him, though he would never admit it.
Brainy had another blow to his ego. He was part of the team that was lost in another galaxy. Even though meeting his mother made Brainy question his emotional and social growth as an individual, he was quite secure with his intellect. While lost, Brainy's intellect was challenged and his confidence to failed. Brainy is the scientist. Brainy has the 12-level intellect. Brainy can fix anything. This was how his teammates viewed him and after all, it was why he was drafted to the team. After years of fixing every issue that came across him in the LSH, Brainy was at a complete loss. The few times, when he did not see the solution right away, Lyle was there to help. Not this time. Brainy just did not know what to do with himself, science was all he knew and it was not working. Lyle was not there to point out the unconventional methods. Brainy became stressed and his boundaries broke down. He showed fear and admitted he hated the point 1 added to his name. This was the first time Brainy would use the phrase: "I don't know." on a regular basis. Brainy was lost. He still was searching out of pure habit and so the others did not know of his plight. In the end, when Brainy's mind accepted the unconventional, he got the team home. Brainy was very happy to see Lyle, first time in the whole continuity. Being apart from his teammate for so long made Brainy realize, how much he valued Lyle.

-Feelings of the Hidden-

Brainy is an extremely opinionated person. In the beginning he would express only the negative opinions about others without a care to their feelings. A common trait for those with ASPD. In the end he balanced his expressed opinions of others to what was importune, keeping their feelings in mind. The one thing that stayed consistent was Briany's unwillingness to express opinions on his own life or his true feelings on events, to others. Another constant in his personality was Brainy's problem with abandonment issues. If someone Brainy feels close to happened to leave his life, such as his mother, Andromeda, Koko, and COMPUTO, Brainy will become very driven, also known as displacement activity and during that time, Brainy hid his emotions more. If you tried to point it out to him, he would insult you, but as he learned socially acceptable norms, he would just brushing off the idea. Even though he really tried to get along with his teammates by the end, showing emotions to them still embarrassed him. There was the one time though, toward the end, Brainy let his emotions get the better of him, when he thought Lyle was lost. This shocked everyone: him, Lyle, his teammates, and the readers. This was when Brainy ran up to Lyle and kissed him on the cheek because he was so happy that Lyle was safe and he did not lose him again. Brainy never openly showed this much affection toward anyone, ever. Then he composed himself, being quite embarrassed. Lyle helped him play it off. This proved Brainy had abandonment issues. In the past, ASPD was his way of dealing with it, but now he had his friends.

Thus ends the journey of the Zero-Hour Brainiac 5. He encountered ups and downs in learning to deal with his emotions and the acceptable norms of society. Wether Brainy hid his emotions or expressed them, he learned how to interact better with the people around him, but he would never admit this.

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References-

- American Psychiatric Association: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders,
Forth Edition, Text Revision. Washington DC, American Psychiatric Association, 2000.
- Impulse #21, Jan. 1997
- Jimenez, Phil [et. al.]. The DC Comics Encyclopedia.
Great Britain: Dorling Kindersley Limited, 2004.
- The Legion #1–38, 2000 - 2004
- Legion Lost #1–12, 2000
- Legion of Super-Heroes (Vol. 4) #0, 62–125, Oct. 1994 - Mar. 2000
- Legionnaires #0, 19-81, Oct. 1994 - Mar.  2000
- Legionnaires Annual #2–3, 1995-1996
- Superboy #21, Nov. 1995
- Teen Titans/Legion Special #1, Nov. 2004
- Titans/Legion of Super-Heroes: Universe Ablaze #1 - 4

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N. D. Coggshall
Born in Minnesota.
Lives with two cats.
Watches animation.
Reads comics and manga.
Works on art.
sajinokami.blogspot.com/
Dislikes sunlight and hot weather.