Powers and Abilities
As a youth, gladiator-in-training Jonathan Raven's physical prowess was heightened thanks to injections of experimental chemicals by Keeper Whitman. He was later given mental powers through Whitman's psycho-electric experiments, including the psionic ability to project his consciousness into and take over a Martian's mind, and the psychic ability to resist mental assaults and to mask his presence from robot scanners.
Killraven is also a superb hand-to-hand combatant, and a highly skilled swordsman, wrestler, and martial artist. He is a master of most hand weaponry, especially shuriken. He is a master strategist in guerrilla warfare. Killraven possesses an encyclopedic knowledge of human history, art, and science predating the Martian invasion of A.D. 2001, implanted in his mind by Keeper Whitman.
As artist P. Craig Russell described, "Killraven has a sort of extrasensory ability to counterbalance his gladiatorial skills. He is very much the barbarian type, yet at the same time he has this seed planted in his brain that is the history of the human race — a racial memory of everything that has been obliterated by the Martians. It's almost a magical ability.... It was what removed him from being just another sword-wielding gladiator type."
Killraven wears bulletproof fabrics and leather. He is armed with various weapons as needed, and usually carried a sword and shuriken. He sometimes rides a mutated serpent-horse, or appropriated Martian vehicles and aircraft.
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Famous quotes containing the words powers and/or abilities:
“To receive applause for works which do not demand all our powers hinders our advance towards a perfecting of our spirit. It usually means that thereafter we stand still.”
—G.C. (Georg Christoph)
“A child is born with the potential ability to learn Chinese or Swahili, play a kazoo, climb a tree, make a strudel or a birdhouse, take pleasure in finding the coordinates of a star. Genetic inheritance determines a child’s abilities and weaknesses. But those who raise a child call forth from that matrix the traits and talents they consider important.”
—Emilie Buchwald (20th century)