The Maestro is a fictional comic book supervillain in Marvel Comics and is a version of the Hulk from an alternate future (designated by Marvel Comics as Earth-9200). The Maestro is a combination of Bruce Banner's intelligence and the Hulk's more malevolent aspects.
Publication History
The Maestro first appeared as a vision in The Incredible Hulk vol. 2 #401. He was the main antagonist in The Incredible Hulk: Future Imperfect #1-2 (Dec 1992 - Jan 1993). The character was created by Peter David.
Maestro's next appearance is in The Incredible Hulk vol. 2 #460-461 (Jan-Feb 1998).
The character also made appearances in Exiles vol 2 #79-80 and Captain Marvel vol 3 #27-30 (Mar-May 2002), which come before Future Imperfect chronologically.
The term maestro is an Italian/Spanish word meaning master, teacher, or professor.
Fictional character biography
Approximately a hundred years into the future, a nuclear war has killed almost all of Earth's superhumans and has taken the world to the brink of extinction. A future version of the Hulk called Maestro has seized control upon being driven insane by the nuclear radiation he has absorbed and feeling the bitterness he feels towards the world at his continued treatment. He has the intelligence of Bruce Banner and the absorbed radiation has significantly enhanced his strength.
An elderly Rick Jones encounters the reality-hopping mutant Proteus, who has possessed the body of an alternate reality Hulk from the year 2099. Proteus intends to discard his current body and possess the Maestro. Jones, unaware of his plan, provides a weapon created by the X-Man Forge, which might be able to kill Maestro. However, the plan fails when the Maestro is warned by the Exiles, who are pursuing Proteus. Proteus possesses a new host and flees to another world, breaking the Maestro's neck during his escape.
Years later, the Maestro (fully recovered from his injury) encounters a time-traveling Genis-Vell and Spider-Man. Manipulated by the supervillain Thanatos, the three battle. Genis-Vell and Spider-Man 2099 eventually return to their own time, with no consequence for the Maestro, when the elderly Rick uses his ability to wield Thor's hammer Mjolnir to defeat Thanatos.
Acquiring Doctor Doom's time machine, the rebels opposing the Maestro bring the Professor Hulk forward from the past, hoping that he can defeat the Maestro. Although Hulk's ability to improvise allows him to score some effective blows against the Maestro, the Maestro's superior strength and experience, combined with his knowledge of the Hulk's strategies, allow him to easily dominate the Hulk and break his neck. Knowing Hulk will soon heal, he shows Hulk around the city, attempting to convince his younger self to side with him, but realizes that the Hulk is pretending to be more injured than he is with the intention of launching an attack. The Maestro is defeated when the Hulk lures him back into the rebel's baseâ€"the Maestro throwing Rick Jones into Wolverine's skeleton in the processâ€" subsequently using Doom's time machine to send the Maestro back to the time and place that the Hulk was created: ground zero during the testing of the atomic Gamma Bomb. Appearing next to the bomb itself, Maestro is killed in the same moment that creates the Hulk.
Hulk learns that the "homing sense" that has always allowed him to locate ground zero, his "birth" place, is actually attracted to the Maestro's spirit and remains. The Maestro has been absorbing gamma radiation from the Hulk each time he returns to the site, gradually restoring himself. He emerges, initially in a weakened and emaciated form. The exhausted Maestro attempts to use the Destroyer against the Hulk, but he is driven out when the Hulk manages to transmit his soul into the Destroyer as well, exploiting the fact that the Maestro is still technically him, and forces the Maestro back into his body, which is last seen buried in a small rockslide.
At some unknown point in his future, he teams up with a version of Wolverine to go back in time in search of the Red Hulk. They are defeated by the present Wolverine and Hulk and jump back to their time. There, we see that time's version of Red Hulk, declaring that the Red Hulk of the present must be killed in order to save the world.
When the Hulk was "upgraded"' to the persona of Doc Green (a version of the Hulk with access to Banner's intellect after being treated with Extremis following shot in the head), he began to experience dream-like visions of the Maestro, creating the possibility that Doc Green would eventually become his dark future self, starting with him contemplating growing a beard.
When Spider-Man 2099 attempts to return to his own time after the events of Spider-Verse, he ends up in a world accidentally devastated by Alchemax and ruled by the Maestro, who mistakes Miguel for the original Spider-Man. The Maestro beats Miguel into submission, and places him in a cell with Strange 2099. The Meastro then travels back to present day by having the demon Strange shares her body with manipulate Miguel into repairing Doctor Doom's Time Platform.
The Maestro timeline is described by Miguel O'Hara as having overwritten the 2099 timeline he originated from. Maestro is pictured sitting on his stone throne.
Powers and abilities
The Maestro largely possesses the same powers as the Hulk, but to a greater degree than most incarnations due to the century's worth of radiation he has absorbed as a result of the nuclear wars that decimated his Earth (the present Hulk speculated that his insanity might also contribute to his greater strength). This includes certain mental powers, such as the Hulk's ability to see and interact with astral forms, as shown in The Defenders series. Although he possesses Banner's intellect, and has been implied to have built Dystopia himself, various sources have speculated that the Maestro is less technically inclined later in life than he was in the past due to his attempt to disregard his former selves, with the result that he once resorted to tricking Miguel O'Hara into repairing a time machine rather than do it himself.
In other media
Television
- Maestro is mentioned in the Avengers Assemble episode "The Age of Tony Stark." A group of robots from the future brought to the present by the disruptions of the Time Infinity Gem identify the Hulk as the Maestro before opening fire.
- Maestro appears in the Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H. episode "The Maestro Enter," voiced by Fred Tatasciore. Maestro first appears where he helps Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H. stop a Gamma Meteor (which was previously forewarned by High Evolutionary in "Future Shock") before it can hit the Earth. What none of the other Agents of S.M.A.S.H. members know is that Maestro is in the present where he is to make sure that Hulk's gamma infection will lead him on the path to become Maestro. This lasted until A-Bomb met his future self and proved it to the other Agents of S.M.A.S.H. members. With their help even after keeping Maestro at bay, the future A-Bomb uses the Gamma Neutralizer to get rid of the Gamma Infection in Hulk. With even Maestro freed from the Gamma Infection as a result, both Maestro and future A-Bomb fade away upon their future being rewritten.
Video games
- The Maestro appeared as an opponent in the PlayStation video game The Incredible Hulk: The Pantheon Saga, and as a playable character in the 2008 The Incredible Hulk video game, serving as a new 'skin' that can be unlocked when the player has collected all the Landmark tokens in the game.
- The Maestro appears as an unlockable costume for the Hulk in the 2012 mobile game Avengers Initiative.
- The Maestro appears as an alternate costume for the Hulk in Marvel Heroes.
- In 2014 Maestro was featured as a villain in Kabam's Marvel's Contest of Champions game for iOS and Android.
Toys
- The Maestro was part of the Marvel Legends action figure series. His figure came with the left arm of Apocalypse.
Novels
- An alternate timeline version of the Maestro appears in Peter David's novel Hulk: What Savage Beast.
See also
- Alternative versions of the Hulk
References
External links
- Maestro at Marvel Wiki
- Maestro at Comic Vine
- Maestro at the Comic Book DB