Titanium Man Armor

Boris Bullski

First Appearance as Titanium Man: Tales of Suspense #69

Boris Bullski was a KGB-member. While working as an administrator of a Siberian labor camp, he commissioned the imprisoned scientists at the camp to build a suit of armor using the lab of Anton Vanko, the creator of the original Crimson Dynamo armor. Using the resources available, he was able to build a suit of armor that rivalled Iron Man 's, through it was far larger and taller, standing at a titanic 9 foot 3 inches. Bullski, already a mountain of a man, had to undertake biological treatment in order to have the mass and strength to pilot the suit properly. Eager to prove his superiority, Bullski issued a public challenge to Iron Man to face him in combat, and through he gave Tony a tremendous challenge, he was eventually defeated by Stark's far superior intelligence and technology.

Exile

After failing multiple times in his missions, Bullski was exiled by the USSR and forced to move to Vietnam, where he met Radioactive Man and the Crimson Dynamo . They formed the Titanic Three, a short lived team that crashed with the Avengers , but ultimately failed to defeat them and quietly disbanded afterwards.

Green Liberation Front

While still outside of the USSR, Boris was able to find a ex-USSR scientist called Sergei, who had developed a experimental new compact armor that was stored inside special credit cards, and could be activated via a radio signal. Boris blackmailed Sergei into designing a fleet of armours for his use, as well as improving upon the Titanium Man suit at the same time. Boris threatened Sergei that if he didn't do what he commanded, he would kill his family as he knew where they were (this would eventually be discovered as a cruel ruse- Boris had already killed them beforehand)

Finding a group of Vietnam war veterans, Boris (under the disguise of "the Commander") persuaded them to use the credit card armours under the title of the Green Liberation Front (GLF) to rob multiple banks including the Federal Reserve, which while they thought was a political protest against the government, it was actually a attempt by Boris to try and use a computer virus to wipe out the American stock market. Beta Ray Bill was eventually able to hold Boris and the GLF off. After Sergei discovered the truth about his family, he managed to expose Boris by turning his armour into its regular form, also showing the GLF his true identity. Boris attempted to teleport using the credit card, but he was trapped and then ripped in half while in the credit card by Sergei in the process.

Return

Crimson Dynamo was later assigned to recover Boris as apart of the Soviet Super Solders. After being able to recover the pieces of the card left, he was successful in bringing Boris back from his card form. However, years of being imprisoned within it and the unsuccessful restoration of his leg led Boris into a mad rage, attacking Dynamo and destroying the building around them. The resulting disaster resulted in both Boris and Bukharin being disgraced, and Bukharin was forced to retire as the Dynamo. Valentin Shatalov offered Boris a position within his Stalinist Remont 4 group, and he accepted, even through the team would be unsuccessful and disband shortly afterward.

Death

As Russia become more and more influenced by Western fashions and culture, Boris became more and more enraged by what he perceived as the loss of his motherland, with the thing tipping him over the edge being a opening of a Stark Enterprises building in the heart of Moscow. Donning his suit, he attacked the centre, with Iron Man and Black Widow holding the man off. Shatlov as the Crimson Dynamo was deployed to take Boris in by any means necessary, but was overpowered in the process of doing so and Boris was able to escape capture.

With Shatlov unable to don the suit and the political risk of a Iron Man suit deploying in Russia and violently defeating a Russian enemy too great, Stark agreed to pilot the Dynamo suit with Shatlov providing a method of speaking to Boris as well as remotely controlling the suit (as Tony had to maintain his secret identity) and Widow translating in the hopes of disarming the situation without violence, as Boris was at a abandoned space station with active and unused rockets still in storage. They were unsuccessful, and after Tony was put at great risk of being killed by Boris's unrelenting rampage, Shatlov hit Bullski with a full power blast that sent him flying into rockets, which exploded and left Boris dead. After seeing Boris die in front of him, Tony was enraged by Shatlov's lethal actions as it was his hands that physically killed Boris, even if Shatlov was in charge of controlling the suit. Afterwards, Shatlov was removed from his post by his superiors and demoted for his actions.

Rebirth

Under unknown conditions, Bullski was revived (the implication being that he was kept in status by the Russian government as a asset to be used when needed) and was outfitted with a new, sleeker armor as well, fighting Iron Man in space and while not being able to defeat him, was able to damage his armor badly.

Bullski afterwards was forced to work as a freelance mercenary due to the collapse of the USSR and disbanding of the Soviet teams, which forced many of them to find other ways of making a profit. Being hired by a unseen individual, he was assigned to assassinate Tony Stark, who was on his way to Congress to argue against the newly drawn up draft of the Super Hero Registration Act, which if enacted, would force all superheroes and vigilantes to register with the government, forcing them to give their secret identity away to them as well as working under a governmental system for any action committed by them as well. Spider-Man, having been given a new armoured variant of his suit from Tony Stark, battled with Bullski.

Despite being physically outmatched by him, Peter was able to smash the sensors in his helmet, which was enough to cause Bullski to panic and retreat. After the proceedings, it was revealed that Tony himself hired Titanium Man not to kill him, but to showcase how dangerous someone like him could be if superheroes were unmasked and unable to properly defend themselves in attacks from their villains. Being paid in unmarked bills from Tony (disguised as Iron Man) Bullski stated that soon America would cast their heroes away in the same manner as his own government, and they would be reduced to a mercenary, much like himself.

Much later on, he would later be featured as apart of the Mandarin's army of villains to battle against and defeat Iron Man, having been given a modern updated version of his old bulky suit. Despite attacking Stark with multiple other individuals and the Detroit Steel Corps, he was easily defeated and his armor destroyed by Stark's far superior Bleeding Edge suit technology.

Bullski also helped battle against the Scorpion in Russia, fighting him off during the "Ends of the Earth" storyline.

Gremlin

First Appearance as Titanium Man: The X-Men vs. The Avengers #1

The Gremlin was killed in combat with Iron Man during the first "Armor Wars" when the titanium in the suit exceeded its combustible temperature.

Armor Statistics

The first Titanium Man suit showcased a unnaturally wide and massive frame, standing at over nine feet tall and weighing in at about 830 pounds, being specifically made for Bullski's size. On the outside, it was covered in titanium flakes which were molded into the suit to provide a strong external base to withstand physical attacks, like tank blasts, full missiles, and even strikes by the mighty Thor himself. This titanium could also be driven dangerously close to combustible temperatures under intense heat.

The armor was fuelled by nuclear batteries, and was physically powerful enough to increase the strength of the pilot by 60 times their average striking and lifting capabilities, allowing them to accomplish extreme feats of strength. The suit also had a backup system of normal batteries, through these were not as powerful as the nuclear variant and were barely used.

Using multiple sensors in the feet, arms, and head of his actual body, Bullski was able to move around in the suit and it was responsive to his movements using them to track exactly where he was positioning himself within it using magnetic liquid that contracted and allowed for the suit to move freely. While usually functional, damaging the sensors within the head particularly led to the suit being unresponsive and possibly unable to function at all, which was a major weakness of it. The suit also came with a life support filtration system that lasted for 300 hours, allowing the suit to be used in dangerous areas with high amounts of radiation, or a lack of oxygen with a 5 hour supply of it.

Within the head section of the suit, a particle accelerator was designed and integrated into the suit. Using a electrical force, it was powerful enough to completely shut down Iron Man's suit by short circuiting it, making the armor immobile. It also came with miniature lasers within the eyes of the head, which were concentrated enough to nearly burn through steel and iron.

The old suit also came with Radar Rings, which were magnetic rings of steel that orbited and cramped onto a person, making them unable to move, a Power Sapper that could drain the electrical energy out of a machine, as well as concentrated lasers within the gauntlets of the arms, as well as jet boosters on the legs that allowed for limited flight (to be more exact, 230 miles per hour for 18 minutes)

When the suit was first modernised, many of the gadgets were removed, and the suit was streamlined, becoming much smaller (through also losing strength in the process) but as a result was faster and could keep up with some of the faster armors around.

When the suit was updated again, the old design was returned to but updated, keeping the bulk as well as updating the armor with new materials and more advanced interfaces, through it was considerably weaker compared to the Bleeding Edge suit. This armor seems to have been destroyed or abandoned at some point as the next time Bullski is seen, he is using his more slimmer suit rather than the updated old design.