PERSONAL DATA
Alter Ego: The unliving remains of Cyrus Gold, (briefly used the alias of Dick Cashmere)
Occupation: None
Known Relatives: None.
Group Affiliations: Injustice Society of the World (former member), Infinity, Inc. (former associate), Injustice, Unlimited (former associate)
Base of operations: Slaughter Swamp, outside Gotham City, otherwise mobile
Height: 7'5"
Weight: 517 lbs.
Eyes: White
Hair: White
Skin: Chalk white
First Appearance: All-American Comics #61 (October 1944)
Profile written by Ola Hellsten
"Born on Monday, Christened on Tuesday,
Married on Wednesday, Took ill on Thursday,
Worse on Friday, Died on Saturday,
Buried on Sunday, This is the end of Solomon Grundy"
Quote taken from an Old Nursery Rhyme
HISTORY
In 1894, the wealthy Cyrus Gold was attacked by a man named Jem, who wanted Gold's money. Jem's girlfriend Rachel Rykel, was a prostitute Gold had once bought services from, and the two had tried to blackmail Gold about it. When Gold refused to pay her, Jem severely injured him, took his money, and left the body to die in the murky heart of Gotham City's Slaughter Swamp. In the moment before sinking under the mud, Cyrus Gold cursed his murderers and swore to God, he would somehow be revenged. Since the event soon became a legend, there have been many other versions of this story, but the main content is the same: Gold was killed and his body sunk into the swamp.
Over the next fifty years, Gold's skeleton lay at the swamp's bottom, accumulating decaying leaves, rotting wood, and other debris, and gradually formed into a gigantic creature that somehow imitated a strange form of pseudo-life. It has been speculated that this creature was destined to become an Earth Elemental, but that the process failed because one of the important ingredients of it was missing: fire. (About ten years later, nature arranged a more successful transformation, when scientist Alex Olsen was transformed into the first Swamp Thing, becoming the Earth Elemental of this era.)
In 1944, this creature rose from the swamp, with tremendous strength and some dormant memories that for example allowed him to speak English, but not knowing what he was, and not remembering Cyrus Gold or his fate. Wandering throughout the swamp, he encountered two escaped criminals, killed them, and took their clothes. Shortly thereafter, he met a group of men in a hobo camp. When they asked him his name, he simply muttered that he had been born on Monday. Reminded of an old nursery rhyme about a man born on Monday, the thugs named the creature "Solomon Grundy", and impressed by his great strength, took him on a crime spree throughout Gotham City.
Eventually, Grundy and his allies were found by Green Lantern Alan Scott and his pal Doiby Dickles. They took care of the hobos, but Solomon Grundy's strength proved too much for even the combined might of them and the Gotham City Police. Grundy's body consisted mainly of wood, and was thus immune to Green Lantern's power ring, whose weakness was wooden materials. Over the next few days, the enraged Grundy killed eleven innocent victims across the city. When Green Lantern finally found him, he concluded that Grundy was not truly "alive", but rather a gross distortion of nature, so the hero felt no remorse about leading the creature into the path of an oncoming locomotive.
Buried by the train, Grundy was thought gone forever, but he was later resurrected by a gang of criminals, led by the sinister Professor. The Professor gave Grundy a shot of a strange chlorophyll serum, making Grundy more of a living plant, which enhanced Grundy's strength, but also made him more vulnerable to Green Lantern's power ring. After Grundy had strangled the Professor, Green Lantern finally managed to trap him into a power bubble.
Two years later, Grundy was empowered by a thunderstorm and broke free. He sought out the headquarters of Green Lantern's teammates, the Justice Society of America, and soon found himself battle the entire JSA. Since they could bring Grundy down, but not hold him for long, they had to find a place to hold him, and so they imprisoned him in a green bubble on the moon.
Of course, he managed to escape, and resurfaced on Earth, time and again. He took control of the body of an astronomer named Dick Cashmere, appearing human for a brief period, he was transported back through time by Per Degaton, battling the All-Star Squadron the day after Pearl Harbor, and he worked as a henchman for Vandal Savage. Finally, he was imprisoned on the moon once again, and this time, he stayed there for decades.
In the 1960s, however, a freak celestial accident catapulted Grundy to Earth, and broke the green power sphere. Burning with hatred for Green Lantern and his associates, Grundy forced Green Lantern out of retirement for a time. Only by joining forces with Doctor Fate and the Hourman, Green Lantern was able to reimprison him in a new stronger bubble made from a combination of the green energy and Dr. Fate's magic, and send it into space. (Only recently, Starman Jack Knight discovered that this incarnation of Grundy eventually ended up on a blue planet, where it gained some intelligence and enjoyed playing games of battle with plants in the shape of the JSA. This Grundy was destroyed by the Mother Box that accompanied Jack Knight during his recent journey through space.)
Years before this Grundy landed on the blue planet, however, a new incarnation of him rose on Earth once again. When the new heroic era kicked off some ten years ago, he came back, battling the JSA, the Justice League of America, Superman, Batman, and the Swamp Thing, on various occasions. For a brief time, he joined forces with other 1940s villains in the Injustice Society of the World. However, he appeared to change a lot between his appearances, sometimes more intelligent, sometimes a wild incoherent beast, sometimes having a strength that was on par with Superman's, sometimes he could be beaten by human beings. But one thing was consistent - his hatred for Alan Scott.
Some time after Scott's retirement from his role as a super-hero (at least one of his retirements), Solomon Grundy learned about Scott's children, the superheroes Jade and Obsidian, and went on a killing rampage against them and their teammates of Infinity, Inc. Unable to permanently get rid of Grundy, the Infinitors imprisoned him and took him to the hidden civilization of Feithera in the Arctic Circle. The Feitherans studied Grundy until the long-dormant glacier surrounding Feithera shifted and threatened the city. Jade made a deal with Grundy that, if he held back the glacier long enough to save the Feitherans, she would free him and take him somewhere warm. But the glacier collapsed and buried Grundy before she could honor the terms of their bargain. Nonetheless, Grundy returned and now trusted Jade - only Jade - becoming an associate and a good help of Infinity, Inc.
Later, the villainous Harlequin used her power to impersonate Jade and take advantage of Grundy's trust in her, recruiting him into the villain team known as Injustice, Unlimited. Under the Harlequin's influence, Solomon Grundy killed Skyman, the leader of the Infinitors. When the heroes uncovered Harlequin's disguise, Grundy wandered off in disgust. Months later, Grundy was found by some farm workers at the countryside, and went on a rampage. Jade found him and tried to reason with him, but his trust in her was now gone. Her father (now back from retirement) came to assist her, and the combined might of their green powers managed to transform Grundy into a statue of petrified wood.
But Grundy's seemingly inexhaustible life force was once again drawn into the Slaughter Swamp. Grundy was born again, this time more of a raging beast than ever. Although beaten by the Batman, Grundy managed to kill at least five people, including a Karen Rykel, a direct descendant of the prostitute that was in on the murder of Cyrus Gold, thereby fulfilling the curse of Gold.
A year later, Grundy appeared in a sewer in Opal City. Since Jade was busy on a case with the Blood Pack, she contacted Jack Knight, the current Starman of Opal, and asked him to take care of the situation. Jack prepared for a big fight, and was surprised when this Grundy appeared to be a good-hearted, mellow, frightened creature, who was rather easy to reason with.
Grundy came into the care of Ted Knight, Jack's father and the original Starman, befriending him and Mikaal Tomas, another former Starman. When Jack's archenemy, the second Mist, attempted to bring havoc into Jack's life, her henchmen kidnapped both Mikaal and "Solly" (as Jack called him). Using strong plant toxins, they succeeded in weakening Grundy severely, and would perhaps have killed him, were it not for the interference of Mikaal. After this, Mikaal and Solly were taken care of in a hospital. While he thought Grundy unconscious, Ted Knight sat before him, talking to himself about how he had hated Grundy because of his past actions and his killing of Skyman. Grundy heard everything Ted said, and escaped the hospital soon after.
After coming back and saving Jack from a bomb attack in Opal, Grundy was injured and it seemed that he would die. Jack and Ted would do all they could to help the heroic creature, and so they enlisted the aid of Batman, Alan Scott (now called Sentinel) and the Floronic Man, to walk into Grundy's subconscious by scientific means. The five men did, and finally learned the whole truth about Solomon Grundy. Each version of Grundy that had appeared during the last fifty years, was a different part of the whole. Sometimes a good creature, sometimes bad, sometimes intelligent, sometimes stupid, sometimes weaker, sometimes stronger, the personalities of Grundy were all different representations of the soul of Cyrus Gold.
The heroes encountered Gold and an army of Grundys in Grundy's mind. They fought them all to release the good Grundy they had learned to know in recent times. When they thought they had succeeded, the good version of Grundy said that he could not fight the other aspects of himself, and declined the offer to return. When the heroes left Grundy's mind, he smiled and told them to remember that in the bad Grundy that would inevitably return some day, there would always be a little piece of himself, the good Grundy.
During the event known as the Day of Judgment, the rogue angel Asmodel awoke Grundy once again, having him battle the Marvel Family and Stars and S.T.R.I.P.E. This version of Grundy later joined Culp's army of villains during the latter's ravaging of Opal City. Ultimately, Solomon Grundy gave his life to save Mikaal from a sniper, although he would never admit that the "good Grundy" in him had sacrificed himself for his former friend. When and how, nobody knows, but some day, the threat of Solomon Grundy will inevitably return
POWERS, SKILLS, AND WEAPONS
Solomon Grundy possesses tremendous strength and stamina, the level of which varies with his different incarnations. Sometimes he can be held by a group of normal humans, on other occasions, even Superman has not been able to defeat him. The weird elemental energy that imbues his form with pseudo-life makes him virtually indestructible - he is impervious to bullets, fire, and extreme cold, and can survive indefinitely without food, water, or oxygen. The only thing that has ever been able to hurt him, was the Mist's special toxins, developed to take out Grundy's plant tissue body.
Even when he is destroyed, he has always been reborn sooner or later. The soul of Cyrus Gold enjoys his pseudo-life through Grundy, even though Gold's whole personality is never present in Grundy's "life". Grundy's personality differs from incarnation to incarnation, but he seems to retain some memories of his experiences from one time to the next.
Grundy has also proven to be able to absorb certain forms of energy and manipulate them at will. This ability has always been subconscious to the point of being accidental, though, but it would suggest that Grundy is even more powerful that he has the intelligence to realize.
The Grundy version that ended up on the blue planet gained normal human intelligence, and made contact with the Green, thereby being able to control the planet's plant life.
USELESS TRIVIA
Solomon Grundy is one of the few supervillains to be besung in a pop song. In the lyrics of the Crash Test Dummies: "Superman never made any money, for saving the world from Solomon Grundy."
