Phantom Limb
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From The Venture Bros. Wiki
| Phantom Limb | |||
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| 1st appearance: | Tag Sale - You're It | ||
| Voice Artist: | James Urbaniak | ||
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Hamilton G. Fantomos was the last male son of a long line of costumed adventurers. Unfortunately for Hamilton, he was born with severe birth defects that left him with withered and deformed arms and legs. As a result of this, the ultra-intelligent Hamilton was disowned by his family and forced instead to become a college professor, with his deformed limbs cloaked within artificial limbs designed by robotics expert Mike Sorayama, a former student of his.
Bitter at his deformed body and denied his chance to follow in his family's legacy of super-heroism, Hamilton turned to villainy instead. He became a member of the Guild of Calamitous Intent, ultimately using his college classroom to recruit fellow "freaks" into the Guild.
This placed him within the radar of Colonel Hunter Gathers, who was investigating the Guild. Along with his protege Brock Samson, the two government agents forced disgraced trivia contest contestant Billy Whalin to spying on Professor Fantomos for them, in hopes of busting Hamilton in the act so they could arrest him as part of their quest to expose the Guild. To make Hamilton trust Billy, Colonel Gathers was able to get noted scientist Stephen Hawking to do Billy's homework, a move that made Hamilton recruit the supposedly brilliant Whalin to help him with his new experiment: an accelerated muscle regenerator device that would, in theory, restore Hamilton's limbs to normal form.
However, as the device malfunctioned, Billy's inexperience with the technology caused the device to create a mini-black hole that sucked his eye from its socket, with the eye causing an explosion within the black hole, knocking Hamilton out of the building where the experiment was conducted. When he woke up, Hamilton found his arms and legs were normal sized and functional, but they were also invisible and possessed a lethal "death touch", as an unfortunate student found out.
Hamilton renamed himself "The Phantom Limb" and began his career as a super-villain in full. Despite not so humble beginnings (which involved, according to Phantom Limb, surviving on a diet of Ramen noodles and Spaghetti-Os and driving a Honda Accord with a ghost on the hood as his vehicle), Phantom Limb quickly rose up the ranks of The Guild of Calamitous Intent, ultimately obtaining a mansion home and an army of henchmen known as "The Shadowmen". A sophisticated world traveler, a villain and a gentleman, it is generally accepted that he is a complete ass. He enjoys cheese, wine and taking advantage of your teenage daughter.
Phantom Limb was the man who introduced a young Sheila into super villainy. He inducted her into the Guild and took her as his number two, and his lover, giving her the persona of Queen Etheria. At the same time Phantom Limb was employing as one of his Shadowmen henchmen, a young man who would soon become the Monarch.
Etherea was unhappy and felt underused by Phantom Limb. During this vulnerable time, she met up with the Monarch, not recognizing him as Shadowman 9, and after a rocking in the Monarch Mobile they ran off together. Phantom Limb is left only with the knowledge that his girl had left with someone going by the name Manotaur, a name the Monarch made up as a cover.
Phantom Limb would again meet up with Shiela while she was number-twoing for the Monarch under the name Dr. Girlfriend. After a rough breakup with the Monarch, Dr. Girlfriend returned to living with Phantom Limb. Not satisfied with just that, Phantom Limb, with the help of a misled Shiela, orchestrated a series of events that lead to the Monarch's trial and incarceration. During the trial Phantom Limb also took the opportunity to use a squadron of Strangers to successfully capture one of the Guild targets, Tiny Attorney.
In the climax of the second season Phantom Limb attempts to disrupt the Monarch and Dr. Girlfriend's wedding while at the same time attempting a coup to overthrow The Sovereign of the Guild of Calamitous Intent, David Bowie. The attempt was unsuccessful and Phantom Limb barely escapes a collision between his ship and the Monarch's cocoon escape pod.
Having betrayed his Guild and been abandoned by his love, Fantomas was left with missing limbs and , most likely, some marbles. He seeks to settle his scores with all those on his "shit list." One of his first victims is a former villain who once went by the unfortunate, coincidental name Manotaur.
[edit] Origin Stories
Several conflicting theories were presented as to the origin of Phantom Limb's eponymous appendages in the episode Victor. Echo. November.. The Monarch proclaims that during college, the Phantom Limb had his "12-year-old roommate" Billy Quizboy create a machine that speeds up the muscle building process. Apparently the machine was so successful that it accelerated Phantom Limb's appendages beyond the speed of light, thus making them invisible. This also gave Phantom Limb the power to "mess up a guy just by touching him" and also turned him into a "humorless dick." The visuals during this sequence also imply that Phantom Limb's powers are what damaged Billy's left hand. The muscle growth accelerator mentioned in this theory is also used on Brock with less catastrophic results in the earlier episode Hate Floats.
In the episode (The Invisible Hand of Fate) the Monarch's theory about the machine to speed up the muscle building process was revealed to be partly right, however Phantom Limb created it himself. Phantom Limb was a college professor during that time and Billy Quizboy was his lab assistant. Billy, who was working undercover for O.S.I. to expose Limb as a recruiter for the Guild, lost his eye when the machine malfunctioned.
