The Justice League is known to possess some really powerful heavy-hitters. Most of the heroes within the core team of the League have God like abilities. Superman can move planets with his bare hands. Wonder Woman possesses the blood of a God. Captain Marvel is the World’s Mightiest Mortal. Cyborg can take over the entire world’s technology in seconds. Each hero is a force to be reckoned with. Even when compared to their Marvel Comic Book Counterparts, the Justice League does have the upper hand in terms of raw brute force. Only a few villains have managed to penetrate the League’s defenses. But did you know there is actually only one superhero in DC Comics that has the ability to take down the entire Justice league if he wanted to?
The entire superhero roster of the Justice League has some really diverse superheroes from a variety of backgrounds. Some descend from the Greek Gods. Some are alien. Some have a morbid origin story. Even though they are counted among the greatest of the greats, they still pale in comparison to the power levels of this particular superhero, that if he gets serious, could cause some serious damage to the fabric of the cosmos.
Want to know which two superheroes we are talking about? The answer is – the Martian Manhunter.
Martian Manhunter
The alien superhero known as the Martian Manhunter hails from the Red Planet of Mars. After being the last survivor of his race in a planet engulfing civil war, J’onn J’onzz escaped to Earth where he became one of the founding members of the Justice League.
The reason Martian Manhunter is a freak of nature that can take down the League is simple – he has a myriad of abilities. With each issue, J’onn reveals a new set of powers not seen before in previous issues. His Martian physiology is a blessing. It can change and adapt to give Martian Manhunter some really amazing powers. Let us discuss in detail about his greatest abilities that give him the edge.
Martian Manhunter’s primary greatest asset in the battlefield is his tremendously potent telepathy. He is widely regarded as the greatest telepath in the DC Universe. Martians, in their erstwhile home world, never communicated verbally. They relied on telepathic communication. J’onn’s telepathy has a range that exceeds the entire Milky Way Galaxy. His telepathic connection works faster than light since he can talk to other Justice League members in real time even though they are several light-years apart.
The superhero known as Martian Manhunter has used his psychic prowess to scan the Earth several times in the past. It takes him mere seconds to go through the minds of the world’s entire population – human, animal, and any other species, to pin point any criminal. The feat that requires Marvel Comics’ Professor X the huge psychic augmentation machine Cerebro, J’onn does it like it’s a piece of cake without any support of any sort. His telepathy does not just stop with humans and Martians. He can read the minds of any sentient alien life form. In fact, he has also revealed that he can read the minds of machines and artificial intelligence.
While a great auxiliary asset, Martian Manhunter’s telepathy does have unique offensive abilities. Martian Manhunter’s telepathy gives him the ability of mind violation. He can drain the mental aura of any sentient being to the point that the being is either comatose or dead depending on the severity of usage. When J’onn was resurrected as a Black Lantern during Blackest Night, he easily subdued the Flash and the Green Lantern with a mere thought. J’onn can turn the nightmares of his opponents into reality. In various occasions, he has actually taken down the League by unleashing a blast of telepathic energy. Many of the League members have powerful psychic shielding but they could not even stand a chance against J’onn, who showed them all just how tiny they are in front of him.
We have not even mentioned his greatest feat. Up to this date, the Martian Manhunter has been the only telepath who has glimpsed into the mind of the Spectre, the instrument of God’s Vengeance and the most powerful superhero in the DC Universe. The fact that Martian Manhunter managed to take a look at the real face of the Spectre and survive says a lot about his telepathic acumen. The Spectre’s mind is said to be made up of the consciousness of every sentient being that ever was, is or will exist. J’onn has gone through such tremendous strain and lived to tell the tale.
J’onn’s telepathic prowess extends to heaven and hell too. In an issue, the Martian Manhunter once held all the souls of the Martian race from passing on to the afterlife. He did it using his sheer telepathy. The guy can use telepathy to stop an entire civilization from perishing. What chances do a Demi-God, the King of the Seven Seas or the world’s mightiest mortal have against him?
Superman has publicly stated that there are only a few entities in his list of people he would think twice before facing in combat. Batman, Doomsday and a host of other meta-humans adorn that list. But Martian Manhunter is at the very top. Superman considers Jo’nn J’onzz a threat greater than Doomsday or Batman. Superman is a hero who once moved an entire solar system from one point in the universe to another. The Man of Steel is no joke. So when he makes such a comment, you should not consider it a joke either.
Up until this day, J’onn is the only hero who has managed to do something that was thought to be practically impossible. He has healed the Joker of his insanity. By using his mind mending powers, he rearranged the way information was passed around Joker’s brain and made him temporarily sane again! That is basically inception at work. If the Martian Manhunter combines this ability with that of his power to access the minds of the entire planet, he is basically a God.
Should he ever go rogue, the Justice League will have a nasty battle ahead of them, one which they can never possibly hope to win if Martian Manhunter decides to get serious.
