The Diabolu Idol-Head: Eighth Most Important Martian Manhunter Adversary

Forensic Psychiatrist Dr. Michael Stone's Scale of Evil Rank
0) Inapplicable.

Why Diabolu has been selected for 8th Place:

• Diabolu forever altered the original formulation of the Manhunter from Mars

The John Jones strip originally centered around an alien stranded on our world who posed as a police detective to help ease the suffering crime caused his adopted Earth. Based out of Middletown, U.S.A., J’onn J’onzz initially fought a different human crook in each story, but once the public became aware of a Manhunter from Mars amongst them, J’onzz confronted more unusual threats. Jones’ primary support came from Captain Harding, the superior officer who doled out cases, and later policewoman Diane Meade, who was a sometimes partner and foil. Near the end of the almost decade long run of the strip in the back of Detective Comics, a cute alien sidekick named Zook was added.

Meanwhile, by the end of the first appearance of the Idol-Head of Diabolu, John Jones was “dead,” the entire Middletown setting and cast were abandoned, the strip had been ousted from Detective Comics, and the Martian Manhunter had his first ongoing villain. The relatively fresh arrival Zook was all that remained of J’onn J’onzz’s life prior to the touch of Diabolu. For years afterword, the strip was defined more by the monsters unleashed by the Idol-Head on a regular basis than by the actual lead characters.

• Diabolu “killed” John Jones.

It’s become de rigeur in comics for a hero to be forced to abandon one of their identities for a time, purely in service to dramatic effect. For years, Detective John Jones was the Clark Kent to the Manhunter’s Superman, and it seemed safe to assume this would always be so. Instead, a menace which had erupted from the Idol-Head attacked John Jones in front of witnesses, and destroyed the plausibility of J’onn J’onzz continuing in the role. As his former supporting cast wept for a fallen comrade, John Jones was left as dead for over twenty years.

• Diabolu was the Manhunter’s first ongoing menace.

Before the arrival of the Idol-Head, J’onn J’onzz had only fought one villain, Monty Moran, on more than a single occasion. It had been years since Moran’s second and final appearance when the Diabolu Idol-Head began troubling Manhunter nearly every issue for almost two years.

• Diabolu is the only long term menace to remain exclusive to the Martian Manhunter.

Professor Arnold Hugo was created to fight Batman and Robin, while most recently he turned up in a kiddie comic battling Aquaman and Superman. Malefic, Commander Blanx, and Mr. V all had run-ins with the Justice League early on. Even Bette Noir turned up in a Harley Quinn story arc. As a consequence of there being so few villains to reappear in the Manhunter from Mars’ Silver Age solo series, and most of J’onzz’s enemies coming from team books later on, the Idol-Head of Diabolu is the only adversary to be exclusively engaged by Martian Manhunter and Zook.

• Diabolu was the de facto star of House of Mystery.

With Middletown left behind, the Manhunter from Mars strip became about a pair of alien heroes trying to track down an arcane totem of evil. For better or worse, the Idol-Head defined the run to the point where, when sales were underwhelming and the device had to go, it took Martian Manhunter’s status as the cover feature with it.

• J’onn J’onzz destroyed the Idol-Head of Diabolu.

The death of Jean Grey helped launch the X-Men to the top of all super-hero franchises. The resurrection of Jean Grey a few years later left best-selling comics in its wake. Ever since, the impermanence of death and destruction has become the norm in comics. Further, Martian Manhunter has few enemies to call his own, and aside from his three year blip of a solo series, is mostly a glorified supporting player in team books. J’Onn J’Onzz is rarely in a role to definitively defeat anyone, but when the writing was on the wall regarding sales on House of Mystery, another massive shift in the status quo was called for. Martian Manhunter finally located the Diabolu Idol-Head, learned its origins, then crushed it to bits with his bare hands. Once again, Diabolu signaled the end of an era for the Alien Atlas, and has remained untouched for nearly half a century. The destruction of the Idol-Head remains the Manhunter from Mars’ greatest and most lasting victory.

The Counter Argument:

• The Idol-Head isn’t a villain—it’s an knickknack. It’s your granny’s keepsake box turned sour. Lacking sentience and basic articulation, how bad must the Martian Manhunter suck to call this thing one of his greatest enemies? The Idol-Head is like Evan Dorkin’s four panel gag strip “Myron the Living Voodoo Doll,” except unfunny and less developed.
• The Diabolu stories were sub-literate garbage for slow children which barely functioned on dream logic. The Idol-Head stories killed the strip.
• Martian Manhunter never fought the Idol-Head, but instead the various monsters released from its captivity.
• Diabolu was the wizard that created the Idol-Head, not the object itself. That hunchbacked, loose toothed old fart only appeared in one story.

What Diabolu Represents:
The Idol-Head of Diabolu was basically a tool for completing the transition of the Manhunter from Mars into a purely cynical generic comic strip. House of Mystery was already a watered down and highly repetitive EC rip-off, but the Idol-Head was the engine to take it to its lowest level. At least in the anthology stories, bland characters were introduced to confront menaces with their own varied origins. Concurrently, Manhunter from Mars was basically Superman in a cop uniform, but at least that was a hook. Brought together every month, the Idol-Head would spit out some weird threat, and the sole purpose for the existence of Martian Manhunter and Zook was to stop the dangers and try to find their implausibly mobile source. It was the boiling down of a concept to its most purely formulaic core. No need for personalities, locations, casts of characters, any sign of development, etc. Instant, soulless product—just add water and repeat as desired. The Diabolu Idol-Head is so vapid, its greatest accomplishment is to stand as the strongest evidence against the perceived value of the Martian Manhunter on record.

Analogies:

• The Idol-Head of Diabolu is to the Martian Manhunter as the Puzzle Box is to Hellraiser/Bottle City of Kandor is to Superman/Cosmic Cube is to Captain America/Random evil objects is to Friday the 13th: The Series

A MacGuffin. An object that is used to motivate certain types of stories.

In Closing:
The Idol-Head of Diabolu was a cheap tool to lure the Martian Manhunter into action, but it also effected some of the first and most devastating changes ever visited upon an established DC comic strip.