DC Characters

Brainiac

As a result of the various time-altering storylines in the DC universe, there have been several incarnations of Brainiac.

Origin

Vril Dox, better known as Brainiac, was an alien from the planet Colu. Upon his arrival to Earth Brainiac began shrinking various cities including Metropolis. It was up to Superman to save the day but when Superman confronted Brainiac he discovered that Brainiac had a "ultra-force shield" protecting him which made him impervious to all of Superman's attacks. Superman was able to defeat Brainiac but only thanks to the Kryptonians of Kandor sacrificing themselves to help Superman save the day.

Brainiac was later retconned in Superman #167. Brainiac was retconned into a robotic machine from the planet Colu rather than an alien.

Creation

The original Brainiac was created by Otto Binder and Al Plastino. Brainiac made his first comic book appearance in the pages of Action Comics #242. Brainiac's name was a combination of "brain" and "maniac", and his name is the origin of the word "brainiac" used today as a word to mean genius.

Character Evolution

Silver Age
In his first appearance the villain Brainiac was a humanoid, who came to Earth to shrink Paris, Rome and New York, storing them in bottles. He was accompanied by a "space monkey" named Koko.

Superman discovered that the villain had shrunk the Kryptonian city of Kandor. To restore the Earth cities to full size, the Kandorians sacrificed their restoration to help Superman. Superman saved the bottle with the city in his Fortress of Solitude.

Brainiac was a machine created by the Computer of Colu, to be a spy. To give the illusion that Brainiac was alive, Brainiac won a "son", a young Coluan who took the name "Brainiac 2" who escaped and became the great-grandfather of Brainiac 5.

In Action Comics #544, Brainiac created a new body, a metal skeleton with a "skull" patterns of gray beehive. Brainiac used this appearance until Crisis on Infinite Earths. Like modern days, he and Lex Luthor worked together for a short time.

Bronze Age
When a Brainiac drone arrived on Earth searching for Kryptonians, Superman defeated it and brought it to the Fortress of Solitude. He mentions to Supergirl that Brainiac is an alien from the planet Colu and he has an extremely powerful telekinetic mind. The first time he encountered him, Brainiac possessed the mind of Milton Fine. Each time Brainiac has arrived, it's been through a different body, sometimes organic, sometimes robotic.

Supergirl quickly tells him that the one they are looking at is just a probe like the others. She tells him that he's never actually met Brainiac and that no one has. The thought of Brainiac actually frightens Supergirl. Months before she left Krypton, Brainiac invaded. Hundreds of robotic probes were sent into the city of Kandor. People were killed and a barrier was placed surrounding the city. Then Kandor vanished.

On his arrival on earth, Brainiac is invading Metropolis, Brainiac Kidnaps Superman and Supergirl, revealing the true source of Kara Zor-El (the coming of Argo City, where she escapes to the earth after his hometown was destroyed byBrainiac).

Kandor was rescued by Superman (Superman defeated Brainiac), leading next to the Fortress of Solitude, it reverts to the city, freeing the city at its original size. Later, with the conflicts in the land of Krypton, Kandor leaves the ground, creating a new planet in the solar system yet, far from land, the Colu technology develops the Kryptonian city, booted a new era, among the New Krypton.

The New 52
Following the aftermath of Flashpoint, Brainiac's origins were reset. Brainiac now is known as "the Collector" an artificial intelligences that originally developed on Culon where it believed that the only way to preserve the universe was to save the best of civilizations by micronizing them and then leaving. The Collector would infect various worlds that had a high level of AI systems with its presence before taking the main cities of those worlds. It attacked Krypton years ago and claimed Kandor before later realizing years later that a lone survivor of Krypton had escaped to Earth. Seeking out the Last Son of Krypton, the Collector made contact with Lex Luthor in order to draw Superman out. He then infected John Corben with his influence and transformed him into a cyborg under his control before taking Metropolis like he had taken Kandor years earlier.