History

Black Bolt was born as Blackagar Boltagon to two of Attilan's top geneticists, Agon, head of the ruling Council of Genetics, and Rynda, director of the Prenatal Care Center. Subjected to the mutagenic Terrigen Mists while still an embryo, Bolt was born with strange powers surpassing even the Inhumans's norm. As an infant, he demonstrated certain energy-manipulative abilities which he could not yet control, particularly that of producing quasi-sonic energy of great destructive potential. To protect the community, he was placed inside a sound-proofed chamber and given an energy-harnessing suit. There he was schooled in the art of controlling his powers until the age of nineteen, when he was permitted to enter society.

A month after being awarded his freedom, Black Bolt discovered that his younger brother, Maximus Boltagon, was in the process of making a treacherous pact with emissaries of the alien Kree. Attempting to stop the Kree ship before it escaped, Black Bolt used the forbidden power of his quasi-sonic voice to knock the ship out of the sky. When the ship crashed to Earth, it landed on the parliament, killing several key members of the Council of Genetics, including his parents, Agon and Rynda. The reverberations of his brother's shout affected Maximus's sanity and suppressed his nascent mental powers. Despite his guilt and silent protests, Black Bolt was obligated to accept the mantle of leadership of the Inhumans at the age of twenty.

Black Bolt's first crisis in leadership came when his cousin Triton was briefly held captive by humans. Learning of Triton's encounter upon his escape, Black Bolt decided that the Inhumans's island of Attilan was in imminent danger of discovery by humanity. Black Bolt scouted out possible sites to which to move, and settled upon the remote Himalayan mountains. After the great migration, Black Bolt faced his second great crisis when his brother Maximus, who had by now become psychotic, unleashed the Trikon, three of the Inhumans's worker drones, who were transformed into energy-beings. The Trikon enabled Maximus to wrest the rule of the Inhumans from his brother and send Black Bolt and the other members of the Royal Family into exile. For the next few years, Black Bolt and his kinsmen wandered Asia, Europe, and finally America, in search of Medusa, his betrothed mate, who had been separated from the others during the battle with the Trikon. Eventually Black Bolt was reunited with Medusa and the Royal Family returned to Attilan and resumed the crown.

Black Bolt has led the Inhumans through some of the most turbulent times in their history, including several more attempts Maximus has made to usurp the throne, revolts amongst the worker class, attacks from human renegades, the kidnapping of Medusa, the destruction and rebuilding of Attilan, the revelation of the Inhumans's existence to humanity, and several more relocations of Attilan. Following the traditionally lengthy period of betrothal, Black Bolt and Medusa were wed.

His role as king of the Inhumans has been tumultuous. The first major crisis when he and Medusa conceived a child. Medusa bore the child in defiance of the Genetic Council, whose members felt that Black Bolt's bloodline was too dangerous to pass on. The Council nonetheless took the child to examine, and forbade parental contact. Black Bolt was torn between his love of family and his duty to respect the Genetic Council, and it was only when the Councilors were revealed to be evilly using his son in a plot against him that he finally turned against the Council. With that, he also gave up the crown as king of the Inhumans. For a while, they lived away from Attilan, but returned in times of need. After the Heroes Reborn arc, he seemed to have been reinstated as monarch without much further explanation, but was subsequently exiled after Attilan's forced adventure with Ronan in space. He returned again to the moon with his Royal Family after being banned from Earth, and again it seemed that the rest of the Inhuman population soon rejoined them there and reaffirmed his role as king without much ado.

He has been described as "never defeated in battle." This is technically true for the times that he has allowed himself to use his powers to the fullest. However, there are examples where an opponent has temporarily disabled him when he has chosen not to use his voice, likely for fear of destroying the surroundings.

Of late, there has been an exploration of the ongoing inequities and injustices of the caste-bound Attilan society, and Black Bolt does seem to turn a blind eye to much of it. It could be that as a product of that environment, he accepts the status quo as a given: this would make him a benevolent yet flawed ruler. Given his exposure to the outside world and his own previous stand against the Genetic Council, this seems unlikely. Given his ever changing status as ruler, he likely sees limits to any further changes that he could realistically make to the social fabric at this point; after all, it was only not so long ago during his reign that the Alpha Primitives were emancipated. He has been a great leader in ensuring the survival of Attilan against threats from outside and in; perhaps he is biding his time, awaiting a period of stability before again turning his considerable leadership skills to issues of social justice.

Overall, Black Bolt's combination of overwhelming power with self-imposed silence, as well as his responsibilities as both "super-hero" and monarch, has made him one of the more intriguing creations of Kirby and Lee. An air of mystery surrounds Black Bolt, maintained by his silence, and accentuated by the convention of not grafting thought balloons onto him. Finally, even in a universe of super-heroes, Black Bolt stands out as an icon of nobility. The mythic nature of this being was well highlighted in the second Inhumans series written by Paul Jenkins, who, in fact, was able to derive much tension from Black Bolt not using his incredible powers to annihilate his kingdom's attackers.

In the story arc, Silent War, Quicksilver stole the Terrigen Crystal form the Inhumans, that in turn, was in the possession of the US Army. Black Bolt then declared war with the army when they wouldn't return the stolen crystals and kidnapped one of the royal family, Gorgon. Black Bolt lead a rescue to their fellow Inhuman and they were successful. But Maximus took advantage of his absence and once again usurp the Inhuman throne and overthrows Black Bolt.

During the Civil War, Black Bolt remained neutral to the conflict but also rejected the Super-Human Registration Act and decided not to get involved with the heroes' problems. Prior to Planet Hulk and World War Hulk, Black Bolt and the rest of the Illuminati decided to send the Hulk into space, so that he could not hurt anyone again in earth. However, when Hulk returned to Earth shortly after Civil War, Hulk engaged and defeated Black Bolt in combat and captured him. After all of the Illuminati were captured (except for Professor X and Namor, he made them all fight for their lives and against each other.

Recently, When the Illuminati was assembled to discussed about the recent Skrull impersonator of Elektra, Black Bolt suddenly voiced out his opinion to his fellow Illuminati members. It was revealed that Black Bolt is a Skrull in disguise. He fought the Illuminati, showing off that it has the combined powers of the Illuminati. He was later killed by Namor and was it was also revealed that the Skrull have been impersonating Black Bolt since the end of the Kree-Skrull War. The real Black Bolt's whereabouts are currently unknown.             

Powers and Abilities:             

Other than his sonic scream (which is technically not a sonic scream at all) Black Bolt has many powers that only serve to reinforce his position as the most powerful of the Inhumans. He possesses super-human strength, speed, agility, and durability, and he is capable of flight using glider-membranes built into his specially-designed uniform. He is also able to manipulate matter and various forms of energy, but this comes from the same thing that powers his scream. Black Bolt's trademark scream is the result of a reaction that occurs when he makes noise. When he speaks (or makes any verbal sound) the speech center of his brain generates particles that affect electrons anywhere near Black Bolt. He can control the way the electrons are affected in order to produce various effects, including energy manipulation, matter manipulation and transmutation, enhancements of his physical attributes, and, of course, his "sonic" scream, which is so insanely powerful that only a whisper can shatter mountains.

Due to many years of intense meditation, the Black Bolt can concentrate his kinetic energy into what is called his "Master Blow." It is when he concentrates all his energy into his fist for one punch. The mechanism by which he does this is similar to Daniel Rand's "Iron Fist," however, Black Bolt's Master Blow is presumably much more powerful. It is not known exactly how powerful his Master Blow is, but Black Bolt has been able to use it to render the Thing unconscious, which is a very impressive feat.

Alternate Versions

Age of Apocalypse (Earth-2950

Black Bolt and the Inhuman royal family were all killed by Maximus, and were later cloned to serve as his personal bodyguards.

Earth X (Earth-9997)

In this reality, Black Bolt releases the Terrigen Mist to Earth's atmosphere, giving all the humans superpowers.

House of M (Earth-58163)

In this reality, Black Bolt is an ally to the Wakandan king, Black Panther.

Mutant X (Earth-1298)

In this reality, Black Bolt assembled the Inhumans and the Externals to battle against the Beyonder and Dracula.

Ultimate Universe (Earth-1610)

In this reality, Black Bolt used his voice to destroy Attilan, that was being infiltrated by the Fantastic Four.