Origin
Basil Elks was originally a small time crook. One day he broke into a museum and was about to steal an emerald. Little did he know the emerald came from an alien world and possessed power. When he was about to grab it, the guards at the museum shot at Elks but missed. Instead the guard’s bullets hit the emerald and all of a sudden this turns Elks into a powerful reptilian being. He attacks the guards and later decides to start a new life as a super villains and begins to call himself the Basilisk.
Creation
Basilisk was created by Len Wein and Gil Kane and first appeared in Marvel Team-Up #16.
Character Evolution
Basilisk would occasionally come into conflicts with Spider-Man, Captain Marvel and the Fantastic Four. However his career as a villain was some-what short lived as the masked anti-hero Scourge shot Basilisk and instantly killed him.
Arnim Zola created numerous proto-husks from DNA samples of deceased heroes and villains including Basilisk whom he called his Corpse Corps. These resurrected husks would secure riches to fund his genetic experiments but come into conflict with Deadpool after Animus steals some files from him. The merc with a mouth kills Basilisk by placing two hand grenades in his eye sockets and tells him “Grenades…gets the red out”. Deadpool destroys most of the proto-husks and defeats Arnim Zola.
Years later Basilisk would be brought back from the grave with other villains killed by Scourge by the Hood. The Hood then tells Basilisk and the other villains the the Punisher was Scourge all along and waned the villains to kill him. Basilisk wanted to kill Punisher on his own terms and him and Death Adder walk out of the group to kill the Punisher themselves.
Major Story Arcs
Dark Reign
Basilisk was resurrected through the demonic powers of The Hood alongside a cast of other victims of the Scourge. Feeding them lies about the true identity of their killer, The Hood used the revived villains to target the Punisher. The Hood’s resurrection spell was only temporary and would expire in 30 days, although he offered to extend this and let them stay alive if they succeeded in killing his enemy.
Immediately recognizing most of his would-be colleagues as losers and nobodies, Basilisk immediately left their company alongside the mute assassin Death Adder to complete the task without the rest of the villains bungling it.
Tracking down G.W. Bridge, a former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who had been previously tasked with capturing the Punisher, Basilisk and Death Adder brutally murdered his wife and took him and his step-son hostage demanding Bridge summon the Punisher to them. Although Bridge managed to escape, temporarily, the Punisher eventually arrived to liberate his occasional ally but Basilisk and Death Adder beat both the vigilante and S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. After delivering them both to The Hood alive and having completed their mission, the Hood allowed the two to remain alive indefinitely.
Realm of Kings
Basilisk was summoned alongside various other villains by the Sphinx to battle against a band of heroes led by Nova. After Basilisk defeated Black Bolt with relative ease for his new master, Basilisk and the rest of the villains realized the true intention of Sphinx and instead allied with the heroes to battle him. While fighting against the common threat, Basilisk was hit with a blast of intense heat fired from Sphinx’s hand and was completely disintegrated.
Fear Itself
The Raft Penitentiary is severely damaged when a mystic hammer lands inside the prison facility and nullifies the cell block’s force-field. Several super-powered felons escape including Basilisk, Man-Bull and Griffin. They flee the island with a female inmate that has a raft boat and head to Brooklyn. The four criminals participate in a bank heist in Cadman Plaza and come into conflict with Hercules who has been depowered after his epic battle with the Chaos King. Hercules has been equipped with various mythological weapons and has over three thousand years of battle experience under his belt. Basilisk tries to blast Hercules with his eye beams but he deflects the attack with the Shield of Perseus. The energy is deflected back to Basilisk and he is knocked through a window. Basilisk warns Man-Bull to not look into the shield or he will be turned into stone before he passes out. Basilisk quickly recovers and is surrounded by raging civilians under the control of Hecate and the gang of Warhawks led by Kyknos. The crowd rushes Hercules so Basilisk and Man-Bull flee the scene.
The city of Brooklyn is transformed and innocent civilians have morphed into various creatures because of Hecate’s magic. Basilisk and Man-Bull would help Hercules and Griffin fight off some goblins. Basilisk and Man-Bull agree to form an alliance with Hercules and try to stop Kynkos. Hercules comes up with a plan to get close to Kynkos and tells Basilisk and Man-Bull to become villains once more. Kynkos is in Coney Island where he watches civilians kill each other when he is presented with Hercules who was transformed into a stone statue by Basilisk, Man-Bull and Griffin.
Alternate Earths
Marvel Adventures
Basilisk would be involved in a story taking place in the Marvel Adventures comics which are standalone stories and does not take place in the current Marvel Universe continuity.
Egghead would form a team consisting of Basilisk, Xeron the Starslayer, Cobalt Man, Psycho Man, Invincible Man and Gargantua to take down the Fantastic Four. Egghead and his team wanted to gather as much information on the Fantastic Four before heading into battle. They were able to steal some FF uniforms and spray millions of subatomic cameras onto the fabric. Egghead and his team would sell photos and information gathered from the Fantastic Four to the paparazzi, particularly a tabloid newspaper called the Super Hero Trumpet.