Kaizen Gamorra

Origin

Kaizen Gamorra was born on a small Asian island called Parousia. He had two brothers named Sum and Wai. Kaizen had conquered their home villa alongside his siblings with their father at the very tender age of 10, when they reached 16 the brothers controlled all of Parousia and by 18 renamed it Gamorra. At 20yrs of age Kaizen murdered his kin, gaining sole control over their land of birth and began a career in global terrorism to honor family tradition. Remaking the island into a beach head to strike out at the world at large to convey his demented vocation. However the dictator still loved and respected his family even to this day. Choosing to take the symbol he knitted together with his brethren as wristbands in the name of conquest for a personal logo to honor their memory.

Creation

First appearing in Stormwatch comics conceptualized by Jim Lee, Brandon Choi and Ben Fernandez during their Image tenure. His first full appearance in Stormwatch #40 done by Warren Ellis and Tom Raney with his release and reassertion of authority.

Character Evolution

Image/WIldstorm

Kaizen is vetoed as an incredibly mysterious figure of international renown yet very little characteristic expose. Largely due to his operating behind the scenes whilst being imprisoned within his own domain. Many believe he was inspired by the titular oriental mastermind Fu Manchu. Kaizen was depicted as cruel, unsympathetic as well as megalomaniacal. Ruling over the fictional East Asian territory isle of Parousia, later to be christened after his family namesake; Gamorra with an iron hand.

He is a cunning scientific mind with an angle for next generation genetics, cybernetics and criminal enterprising. Having made the island nation a beachhead to launch global terrorism campaigns while disguised as a humble technological corporate empire for the sake of domestic customs. As an autocratic totalitarian, Kaizen Gamorra is bereft of compassion or empathy. Stating he loves no one despite the intercoms of his headquarters stating their fabulous overlord loves all of his subjects equally, something even his eugenically engineered creations often recite as a credo when enacting his will. Contradicting him saying to Gamorra’s personal army; his clone children, to go out with his love and his hate.

Even despite this however, he still holds some affection for certain kinspersons; once citing his mother as both lovely and terrifying in persona. Kaizen also cares for and deeply cherished his siblings Sum & Wai enough to use the lanyard bracelet crest they designed in their youth’s; three knots tied to a leather string, as his country’s marketing insignia and national flag in their loving memory. When returning to his haunt as a propagator of chaos and discord; Gamorra would go so far as to use the genetic material of his deceased clansmen to breed his private army of mass produced SPB’s in a similar manner. He even showed affection toward his only biological daughter, a bionic hunter-killer enhancile made from the bodily tissue of Katrina Kupertino using the mental engrams hardcopied off of his progeny Yumiko Gamorra, Cybernary.

In spite of terse and complicated family history between the two, Kaizen held Yumiko in some esteem, bequeathing territory of her own when the cyberized citizenship of the kingdom declared their independence of his nation. Whence she rises as the newfound leader of the Mecha-Jin state, the father raises no outrage towards such designs and respects her enough to expect her prosperance as a sovereign.

Sited to be a sadistic and depraved individual, Lord Kaizen’s amorality knows no bounds. Even some of his vassals described him as a madman whom hid behind his loyal citizens while lashing out at the world. Quite egotistical and conniving to the extreme. The brutal business owner/international enemy is, was and always has been a cruel and malignant individual whom took extreme pleasure in the cruelty he divulged in. Even the people of his fiefdom weren’t exempt from the master of terrors enmity. This psychotic belligerence pushing kaizen to often use the very serfs whom toil under him as outlets for his more so malignant acts from time to time. Be it indulging in his sociopathic character or enacting his latest iniquitous scheme to cast the world in flames for fun and profit. Kaizen’s time spent incarcerated within his own base of operations only driving these psychopathic tendencies to genocidal extremes upon his release.

DCnU

The New 52 presentation of the Gamorran mogul remains much the same as it was in the old wildstorm imprint. Only he is far more coarse in his language and conveying dismay with his subordinates. Shown to be infinitely more brutal and power-hungry in his presentation when dealing with Team 7 and or the Worlds Finest. Making the dictator a deal greater ambitious than in previous media, Kaizen has shown to be somewhat callous to the plight of those whom serve under him.

Particularly when seeking to further his own influence. He highlights such traits while showcasing an acute narcissistic arrogance in his tendency to tamper with powers beyond his or anyone’s comprehension.

Faults which usually end up costing him dearly. In the new publishing he is depicted with two classes of personage; one being the older more grizzled would-be conqueror of the world battled by the government sanctioned superhuman operatives over possession of a powerful artifact. And a younger version of himself; whose inter reality counterpart was the lover of Karren Star. This iteration put more emphasis on subtlety in his designs for ultimate ascendency in order to achieve his goals.

He was also less prone to enacting new ventures to expand his dictatorship by his lonesome. Being more than willing to work with outside forces in order to further his quest for furthering his rule & dominance over all.

Major Story Arcs

Team One/Stormwatch

For many years Kaizen ruled, until he and his pregnant wife were kidnapped by a C.I.A agent named Miles Craven. The future C.O. of Internal Operations had replaced said tyrant with John Colt,

who had underwent surgery to look more like Gamorra and had the people informed due to an injury he needed the surgery to help with any doubts the mans subjects may have.

Gamorra would grow to become a land full of leading cybernetics and mechanical engineering, a veritable pioneer in genetics, on top of robotics, research the world over. Eventually moving on to creating Hunter-Killers; deadly biconically enhanced reanimated loyal to the will of the nation and its ruler. However due to the combined efforts of Mr. Majestic and Spartan (an android with Colts thoughts and memories) Colt was dethroned and permanently killed.

During this time the fake Kaizen also tricked Cyberjack, an old employee of his to come back into service under Gamorra City.

Attempting to convince the former Team 7 agent to continue his research on neural passageways which would, quite unfortunately only work on him (as the former operative was seeking to try and regain control of his lower body).

The real Kaizen would reappear proving to be much worse than his impostor. Causing over 233 British fatalities in an engineered plane crash in a terrorist assault upon regaining his throne. The death toll only increased from there due to the release of the terrible chemical agent used in the attack serving as a byproduct of the catastrophe. Henry Bendix (who would later be proved to be insane) sent Stormwatch Red to strike back at Kaizen in a retaliatory fashion. He sent the assassin Rose Tattoo with orders to kill exactly 233 people, while other factotums Fahrenheit and Flint were told to cause non-life threatening property damage on Gamorra Island. However the two were still unsettled by what they had done under orders.

Rise & Fall of Gammorra

Two years shortly afterwards, when Stormwatch had been broken up due to an alien attack and the U.N pulling the plug on the crisis prevention organization’s funding. The real Kaizen felt it was time to strike back with an army artificially produced using his family’s DNA makeup spliced with a select of superpowered genetic material called the Children of Kaizen Gamorra.

Each was made using DNA begotten of his mother and 2nd/3rd brothers, the army adorning the family emblem which held patented teleportation fiber linens weaved into it’s threading while the duplicates themselves were endowed with a menagerie of superpowers. He planned to have three major cities wiped out to mark a territory as his own. By his standard anything that bore the crest of the Brothers Gamorra was theirs by right and as a means of showcasing Gamorra’s power, Kaizen would brand said symbol over the very planet itself. His children were more than able to do a great deal of damage to Moscow, but due to the interventions of the Authority; a team made up from many former Stormwatch members, his incursion of London was stymied, leading only to minor destruction & casualties. Using special devices in their suits, Gamorra had his remaining forces transferred back to his island, activating a powerful energy shield in the meantime for prepping the next stage of his plan. He even intended to continue his attack on his next target L.A, but the Authority killed all of his super soldiers and one amongst their number; The Midnighter, used the hero teams shift ship known as the Carrier to decimate Gamorra’s city, his synthezoid reproduction facilities and very home in it’s tower fortress. Before his death his last words were “ I only wanted to have some fun”.

Resurgence

This would not be the end of the vindictive schemer however. As his daughter steadily resurfaced upon the face of Gamorra as geopolitical stages became discontented. Kaizen had been secretly biding his time, replenishing his forces and building up a new power base in order to return to ruling the nation with impunity. It was revealed that as Midnighter ran the superteam’s main mode of transportation into the face of his global terror attack, that said liege took a headlong dip into the unique biochemical soup used to rapidly produce his super powered children which he used to attack the globe with. The technomechanical stew he’d plunged into had the effect of rejuvenating him; making Kaizen look & appear younger, healthier stronger even. He would align himself with one of the cybernation’s young and ambitious lords of the kingdom whom took up power in their masters absence by the name of Toshiro, whom sought to use his legacy Yumiko to puppeteer an all new Gamorra in his and his fellow usurpers image. Once the lordling outlived his usefulness however, in the wake of Cybernary reunifying with her Catrina counterpart, Kaizen would admonish Toshiro for interjecting between father & daughter after her new technopathic abilities raised a storm door class curtain by tossing him straight at it. His cloned strikeforce would then be ordered to pick up the disgraced would-be leader of a nation to have refitted as a cybernetic organism whom the distraught nation could pin blame on for Cybernary’s upheaval of already destabilized tensions.

Worldstorm

Sometime after the company wide reboot, a presumed to be deceased Kaizen was next seen to’ve been revived through unknown means and has taken up working with the extrastellar supervillain Helspont. To what end was as of yet to be ascertained. The Worldstorm initiative would later be undone for the World’s End event.

Revelations/World’s End

Kaizen would be assaulted by his wayward daughter just as the Reaper Initiative tore through the delicate structure of the world. Causing a mass geological shift in the planetary axis leading to a slew of global extinction level events which left the planet a devastated wasteland.

New 52

Kaizen has recently made his DCU debut in Team 7. He appears much the same as he did in Wildstorm, and is in search of the Eclipso‘s Black Diamond, presumably to help him build a super-powered army.