Curse (comics)

The Curse
The Curse and his minions
Publication information
Publisher	Image Comics
First appearance	Spawn #27
Created by	Todd McFarlane
In-story information
Alter ego	Phillip Krahn
Abilities	Supremely gifted mind, various cybernetic and mystic enhancements created from knowledge both scientific and occult.

The Curse is a fictional villain in the comic book, Spawn. The Curse in the book is a billionaire and a religious zealot who seeks a place in Heaven and knows far more about the war between Heaven and Hell than most on Earth. The Curse closely resembles a cyborg version of Doctor Doom. (a fictional character appears in Marvel Comics publications)

Background

The Curse, born Phillip Krahn, has been fairly active in the Spawn universe. He seeks a place in Heaven and a chance to lead them against the armies of Hell. He had been preparing for this his whole life. When he was a small boy he removed his own left eye. Later he scarred his face with a large, deep scratch from a rusty metal fence running horizontally down the face over his right eye. When he was older, he removed his own right arm. All of this self-mutilation was to show his dedication to God. He always felt his prayer going unanswered and decided to go to do what was expected of him. He went to college, made a fortune and with all that money studied the occult. He used technology to rebuild his arm, far stronger and better than it was before. With the new superpowers rising around the world, Krahn felt forgotten. News of Spawn brought him to the alleys. He sought to gain Spawn's powers, believing him at first to be a soldier of Heaven. After being led to Spawn by some of the bums he had already converted he blasted a large hole in the Hellspawn from behind and left him for dead so that he might preach and convert others in the alley. Spawn was already dead though, and he wasn't going to simply lay down and die twice. His first appearance led to a fairly gruesome defeat. Spawn destroyed his bionic arm. He beat him severely and the Curse was left crucified on a wall in Rat City. This was done to teach him and others a lesson, that the alleys belong to Spawn. While there, he was found and tortured by the demon-hunter, Sankser. This proved to be quite painful and the whole ordeal gave Curse a new purpose in life.

The Curse escaped from the alleys and returned to his castle-like mansion where he began to plot his revenge and to fix his many injuries. He accomplished this by combining cybernetics with demonic parts. Feeling his place in Heaven forever denied to him because of his failure to destroy Spawn he sought to gain all the knowledge of Hell so that he might overthrow Malebolgia and recreate Hell as his own Kingdom. He also created numerous minions in the form of tiny, twisted humanoid shaped creatures born of human and demon flesh and mixed with cybernetic enhancements. They helped lay a trap for Spawn.

The trap was placed in Spawn's throne, and after his capture he was taken back to The Curse's lab, deep within his mansion. There he began to dissect Spawn in an attempt to understand every secret that lay within him. His symbiote has been forcibly removed and severed from his neural pathways and placed in a containment tube. The Curse's ultimate prize was to be Spawn's brain. While working on the dissection Spawn was able to make his dismembered parts move on their own and break his symbiote free, resulting in the symbiote lashing out at everything in its path in order to get back to its host. This led to the symbiote saving Spawn, as in a previous encounter with The Redeemer, by ripping into The Curse's flesh. Unlike The Redeemer, who only lost his hand, Curse was almost completely dismembered. As he lay bleeding, he began to laugh at Spawn and show his true conviction. He was ready to die for his cause and revealed a ticking time bomb with only second to spare before it went off. The bomb exploded as The Curse laughed maniacally and Spawn was sent flying away from the mansion from force of the explosion.

This was not the end of The Curse however, his body was not found in the smoldering wreckage. He appeared later in the book, Curse of the Spawn, aiding and ultimately betraying Tony Twist before another apparent brush with death. There was a Knight Templar in Twist's organization. Curse sought him in order to try to gain the legendary heavenly shield that was bound to the soul of all Knights Templar. This shield would be necessary for Curse to enter Hell and establish his Kingdom. While cutting into him he was unable to find what he was looking for and while raving and ranting was ambushed by two groups of men. He was hit by Twist's car and shot by numerous weapons as the volatile chemicals around his lab were also hit and the resulting explosion engulfed everyone involved. Given his penchant for survival, and the fact that he has never been shown to be in Hell as other Spawn villains before him (Kincaid, Freak, etc.) it is unlikely that The Curse is actually dead.

The Curse's Entry in the Spawn Bible

It is said that there is a balance between genius and insanity. That same balance is separated between a line that is as fine as a razor's edge. Philip Krahn was cut from the wrong side of that razor. His scars run deep. Krahn comes from 'old money'. His father was a wealthy steel tycoon from Boston, Massachusetts. He and Philip's mother did extensive travelling most of his formative years, leaving Philip to be raised and home taught by his grandmother. Philip's grandmother instilled in him at a very early age a hard-line puritan foundation of religion. So hard were her teachings, they bent the young boy's beliefs to a warped curve. Krahn began preparing himself to lead God's army at a very early age. Krahn made sacrifices to try and please God as a child. Acts that were more self-abuse than sacrifice. 'As an offering toward the end of my suffering, I took out my left eye with a sharp stick. Then I marked my face with a cut deep enough to scar me forever,' young Philip Krahn remembered. 'Even with that, my prayers went unanswered, so I knew I would have to give more of myself. Without hesitation, I sacrificed by right arm,' Krahn added. He used his almost unnatural talent to construct metal into very highly technical machinery and weapons. His obsessive ways with religion and invention separated him from the normal track. He was shunned by those around him. Philip looked down on those thinking them a part of the mass of unbelievers. With the appearances of various super-powered beings, Philip felt that Goddess was overlooking him for the position of Heaven's general. Spawn was the final stone cast that pushed Krahn's twisted mind over the edge of no return. To enter Heaven and ensure his place with God, Spawn must die. Again, Philip Krahn was denied. Spawn not only defeated Krahn, now known as The Curse, but he humiliated him and left his torn and battered body on the wall in the alley as a warning to all that cross him. Trouble continued to plague The Curse, this time in the form of the vampire, Sansker. His interrogation of The Curse proved to be most painful. Eventually The Curse was free and began to plot and reconstruct his revenge on Spawn. Truly his place in Heaven had been denied. Now he would make a new kingdom for himself: Hell. He would learn the secrets to master the necroplasm that Spawn is made of. When those tales are revealed to him, he will have the ultimate power over Satan. The dissection of Spawn will be the tool to give him that power. The demented mind of The Curse proves to be his undoing. Spawn once again brought an end to Krahn's plans. The Curse proved that he would truly sacrifice everything to attain his goal. He set off an incredible explosion that brought his hellish castle to rubble. When the dust had settled, the remains of The Curse were nowhere to be found. Is this his end or just the beginning of a rebirth that will descend on Spawn once more like a windfall of bloody razors?

See also

• Spawn villains