MinOnion (from Mizfits)

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(Note: I’ll get back to The Journey soon. Today is a step towards building a rogue’s gallery for the Mizfits.)

MinOnion (45)

Project: Comic (“The Mizfits”)

Known as: No nicknames

Real name: Al Lium (search on it – it’s a classic style comic book name)

Group affiliation: Counter

Physical description: Al/MinOnion is a small, thin man with a large nose and substantial overbite. He likes to wear suspenders with buttons on them (perhaps a Mork or Office Space fan). Otherwise he is pretty unremarkable. One might think he would have bad breath, but he actually takes is dental hygiene very seriously (one can only stretch the onion theme so far).

Personality: MinOnion is annoying and needy. He consistently invites himself to events and parties but is utterly socially tone deaf. He tells bad/offensive jokes, brays loudly at these jokes, and regularly invades people’s personal space. He frequently interrupts people’s stories with tangents only marginally topically related. He is very lonely but tries too hard and can’t read social queues.

At his core, he’s not a BAD guy. On the other hand, he’s not a good one either. So desperate to be accepted, he will do about anything for someone willing to keep him around (and who at least pretends to like him). He lacks principles and thus his morality is dictated by whomever he is following at the moment.

History: Al Lium grew up on a farm in Iowa (they grew corn; again, the onion theme can only be stretched so far). He showed his talent to be annoying at a young age, asking endless questions. He didn’t care about, or even remember, the answers and often repeated the questions. He just seemed to love getting a response – any response – from others. He didn’t develop the social skills to increase the likelihood of a positive response in part because he didn’t care about nor empathize with other people. This combination meant that he often sought out interaction with others, while others avoided the same.

He lost his parents early in his adulthood (several believe they lost him) and became something of a drifter. Ultimately, he became a truck driver (he couldn’t keep a job where he had extended exposure to others). He would speak nearly non-stop on his CB even though very few ever responded (nor stayed on the same channel).

One day he was carrying a load of (you guessed it) onions to a distribution center near New York City. Unfortunately, this was during the “All Saint’s Anarchy” event when Boost amplified Random’s power to a degree that the laws of reality were temporarily on hold. Al and his truck were struck by the wave and his truck cab was transformed into tapioca pudding.

The suspension of reality somehow resulted in Al surviving this calamity and he woke up on the side of the road with his load of onions strewn about him. Al soon found that he was permanently changed by the event. While getting up, he touches a couple of the onions and they transformed themselves into duplicates of himself. Startled, he tried to flee and tripped – touching and transforming still more onions. The duplicates began to just follow him around but obeyed when he yelled “get away from me!” As the duplicates wandered off in random directions, Al tested a few more commands and found these duplicates were quite obedient.

At first Al thought his loneliness problems were solved but without the ability to speak and no emotions, the duplicates made for poor company. He then thought he could use his powers to some sort of benefit but lacked vision or the ability to plan well. He attempted a bank robbery with his duplicates, but it went poorly. The duplicates were good at following a command but less so with plans. Plus, they looked just like him, so they weren’t great for protecting his anonymity.

Eventually he was found by Counter, who did have ideas for how to best take advantage of Al’s abilities. Dubbed “MinOnion,” Al is happy to be part of any organization and feels like he has found family with Counter and his crew. Most of them (Counter included) prefer the duplicates’ company to Al. Still, and extremely cheap army of obedient workers who don’t need to be fed is simply too useful to not keep MinOnion around.

Role in the narrative: Villains with big plans need workers/armies/henchpeople. MinOnion supplies these without

The world of the Mizfits isn’t TOO serious, but I do worry I went a little too silly with the whole “onions” angle. When I first conceived the character, he was more of a Multiple Man type and I might have to remove the onions ultimately. I do think it would be a cool scene if the Mizfits caught a sprout and found out it was an onion, though.

Abilities: MinOnion can transform onions into nearly perfect duplicates of himself (sans clothes, btw). It’s possible he could do this with other vegetables/plant matter, but he has never tried (at least he believes it only works with onions). The onions have to draw the extra matter from somewhere, so they need to root and grow to complete the transformation. The process is very fast – the duplicate is complete within about 10 seconds. MinOnion doesn’t have to wait for one to complete before starting another but he does need to touch the onion to initiate the process. Finally, the size and characteristics of the onion have no effect on the resulting duplicate (MinOnion carries around a bag of pearl onions for emergencies).

The resulting duplicates (MinOnion calls them “sprouts”) are not smart, can’t speak, and are without emotion – but can follow basic instructions pretty well (e.g., “kill those heroes!” “load the boxes into the truck,” “stand in formation and listen to the boss’s speech”). These instructions can come from about anyone but they tend to follow Al’s most closely. Physically they can do most things MinOnion can do and are of similar strength. Underneath their pseudo-skin they are still big, human-shaped onions though, so they aren’t that durable (e.g., they lack bones). Much like an onion in your kitchen, they eventually go bad and they quickly stop moving once that starts to happen.

Inspirations: I did a Google search and found some “minonions” but they seemed to be profiles/screen names people used (I didn’t search long). Villains need henchmen – often times just for the heroes to beat up. Comics are filled with them – I mean, how does AIM and Hydra have so many members? Who thinks it is a good idea to work for the Joker? Can the salary and benefits be sufficient to regularly take a flying shield to the head or be fed a knuckle sandwich served by Chef Batman? I always liked the Despicable Me Minions; why even bother to explain why henchpeople do what they do – just invent a species of sentient tic-tacs that have always existed to serve evil. Lots of “copy” characters out there (the Multiple Man, DupliKate, etc.). Of course, the whole “power in contrast to their person” is a Mizfits theme (in this case, a lonely person can duplicate himself – but the resulting “people” are poor company).