Drax the DestroyerDrax

Created by the Titan god Kronos to kill Thanos, Drax the Destroyer has spent most of his existence either trying to do exactly that or dealing with the fact that others killed his target first. After going through a metamorphosis, Drax helped the universe survive the Annihilation Wave and Ultron's attack on Kree-space. Having done good and made some important allies, he joined the likes of Star-Lord, Gamora, Rocket Raccoon, Groot, and others in the Guardians of the Galaxy, a ragtag group that perseveres no matter what the cosmos throw at it thanks to their unique abilities and their strong bonds with one another.

Family Foundations

The cosmic powerhouse known as Drax the Destroyer actually began life on Earth as a simple man named Arthur Douglas. Upon returning from seeing Elvis live in 1953, he, his wife Yvette, and their daughter Heather happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. While flying over on his first Earthbound scouting mission, Thanos became worried that the people inside a car saw him and destroyed the vehicle with Arthur's family inside.

Meanwhile, Arthur's soul floated out into space where Kronos captured it and infused it with the body he created to stop Thanos. Since then, Drax has gone through a variety of changes, but always focuses his intense powers on one thing: killing Thanos.

Unstoppable Force

Over the years, Drax undergoes a variety of different changes in regards to his physical size, powers, and cognition. At first, he is nearly invulnerable and super strong. He can fly, survive in open space, and utilize telepathic abilities and a connection to the super computer of Titan called I.S.A.A.C.

After one rebirth, Drax boasts an even higher level of strength, but suffers a brain injury, making his personality more childlike. Adam Warlock grants him the Power Gem, which he only subconsciously uses to make himself even stronger.

These days, Drax's abilities are more consistent. He still possesses super strength and is incredibly hard to kill or even injure. He is a master-class fighter who can use a variety of weapons to dispatch his enemies.

The Unforgiven

Having been directly created in response to Thanos, that particular villain sits at the top of Drax's enemy list. He tries to kill the Mad Titan more times than anyone can count and actually succeeds a few times.

In his travels, he has run-ins with just about every intergalactic villain around, although he also fights future and past comrades like Captain Mar-Vell and Silver Surfer.

Drax also stands in the way of Annihilus and his wave of bug-creatures from the Negative Zone, before then getting embroiled in Ultron's plan to use the Phalanx to overtake the Kree Empire. As a Guardian of the Galaxy, he takes on the Universal Church of Truth, the Cancerverse, J'Son of Spartax and plenty of other Super Villains.

Chosen Family

While a regular human on Earth, Arthur Douglas had a family: wife Yvette and daughter Heather. When Thanos blew up their car, Yvette died as did Arthur, but Heather survives. She winds up on Titan and becomes the intergalactic adventurer and Avenger known as Moondragon.

A regular in the world of big cosmic events, Drax makes allies with Captain Mar-Vell, Silver Surfer, and Adam Warlock. Adam even puts him on the Infinity Watch, a group in which each member takes possession of an Infinity Gem.

Drax traveles the spaceways with a human teenager by the name of Cammi. During Annihilation and Annihilation Conquest, he comes to know Nova Richard Rider, Peter Quill, and other warriors. He joins Quill's Guardians of the Galaxy in its first incarnation and continues serving with his makeshift family to this day.

The Destroyer

Drax the Destroyer made his first appearance alongside Thanos. Upon meeting Iron Man, he explained that his sole mission in life revolved around killing the Mad Titan. Drax also explained that the cosmic entity Kosmos responded to Mentor's call for help in stopping his wayward son, Thanos. As a result, Kronos zapped a piece of nearby Titanian earth and created Drax by combining it with the soul of the Thanos-killed Earthling Arthur Douglas.

Drax and Iron Man worked together to take on Thanos' minions the Blood Brothers and then Thanos himself, only to discover he'd pulled a Doctor Doom and escaped, leaving a robot replica behind.

The next time these two foes met, Thanos intended to steal a Cosmic Cube from a secret cave on Earth, but the Destroyer appeared to stop him. Drax lost his battle inside the Sync-Warp, leaving Thanos to walk away with the Cube. Defeated, Drax teamed up with Captain Mar-Vell by way of a near-disastrous meeting with the Avengers.

They all banded together to take Thanos down, but not before he used the Cube to turn himself into a god. Ultimately, Captain Mar-Vell defeated Thanos, which didn?t sit well with Drax.

Those two would have a fair number of conflicts with one another, although they reconciled before Captain Mar-Vell died. Drax even gave Mar-Vell some solid advice about death just before the Kree warrior passed.

Drax later traveled the galaxy with his daughter Moondragon after Thanos died temporarily. Father and daughter did alright traveling together until she elevated herself to goddess. To stop her, Drax sent her ship to Earth to pick up some Avengers for assistance. By the time they arrived, Drax seemed to be mind-controlled by Heather. After he broke free, Drax died at Moondragon's hand.

While still dead, the Grandmaster used Drax to battle the Avengers as part of the second Legion of the Unliving, but returned to the "land of the living" not long after Thanos did. This time, he exhibited a much larger physical frame and the apparent mental age of a child due to some brain damage during his reincarnation. Silver Surfer believed he'd killed Thanos in a confrontation, but Drax knew this to be false.

Thanos had tricked the Surfer so he could focus on his nefarious plan to collect the Infinity Gauntlet along with the stones that powered it, leading to a massive conflict with the Mad Titan that saw nearly half of all living beings killed. Drax fought alongside the other survivors, stalling long enough for Adam Warlock to snatch the dropped Gauntlet and end the conflict.

Instead of keeping the Infinity Gauntlet for himself, Warlock started a group called Infinity Watch and granted each member one of the gems. He selected Drax for the squad along with Moondragon, Gamora, Pip the Troll, and secretly Thanos. In the process, Drax received the Power Gem and a place on a team that would establish a base on Monster Island and help save reality during the Infinity War and Infinity Crusade.

After time spent interacting with Gens-Vell and living in the Microverse, Drax underwent another significant change after the prison transport that crashed on Earth. Landing in a remote Alaskan town along with the Blood Brothers, Lunatik and Paibok the Skrull, Drax soon came into conflict with his fellow aliens. He was beaten to a pulp and thrown off a cliff, giving the others time to enslave the town.

During this time, Drax went through a metamorphosis that resulted in a less-addled mind, as well as a sleeker physique and red tattoos adorning his arms and shoulders. Soon after recovering, Drax met a teenage girl named Cammi who became his traveling companion.

He then quickly dispatched the town's tormentors.

Thanks to his regeneration, Drax actually escaped being charged by the Nova Corps for killing two hundred thousand beings because of a change in his DNA. The timing couldn't have been better - he and Cammi managed to save themselves as the Annihilation Wave hit Xandar, destroying all Novas but Rich Rider.

They met up with Rider to find a way off the mostly dead planet. In exchange for finding a ship that could fly them away, Drax agreed to teach Rider how to focus and properly use the full Nova Force that resided in his head.

Drax was the first to recognize Annihilus as the force behind the wave and informed his newfound colleagues Nova and Quasar (Wendell Vaughn) that they could stop the entire Wave by killing the head of the hive. Quasar died in that first altercation, but Drax and Cammi flew in with a ship to save the downed Rider. Once again they made a deal: Nova would open a stargate for them if Drax specifically taught him how to be a destroyer.

In the middle of the war, Phyla-Vell appeared to tell Drax that Thanos kidnapped his daughter Moondragon. He didn't respond right away, instead taking on the Wave itself on a planet so that the resistance could get away with Cammi, ending their partnership. He then battled his way to Thanos, punched a hole through his back, and ripped out the Mad Titan's heart right in front of Moondragon.

This threw a wrench in the works as Thanos intended to betray Annihilus and end the threat himself.

To make up for her mistake, Drax freed the Silver Surfer who in turn released his former master Galactus. To express his thanks, Galactus shunted Drax and Moondragon to a world far from the action. Ultimately, his training with Rider paid off as the Nova succeeded in killing Annihilus, ending the war.

Drax remained out of the way until the Phalanx-infected Nova and Gamora tracked him down so they could make him a Select. The process went well and he teamed up with Gamora to take on Rider after Nova surpassed the Phalanx programming. They followed him to Knowhere and another planet where he made an ally of Technarch and former New X-Man Warlock who figured out how to purge them of the Phalanx. Drax then entered the real battlefield with Nova, Gamora, Warlock, and his brethren Tyro to assist in the ultimate defeat of Ultron and his Phalanx forces.

Drax soon joined Peter Quill and his nascent Guardians of the Galaxy to put an end to potentially massive threats while still in their infancy. He was none too pleased to find out that fellow member Mantis mentally pushed him to join upon Peter Quill's request, but ultimately stuck with the rag-tag group through this first incarnation. This put them into conflict with the Universal Church of Truth, Skrulls, Magus, Thanos, and the murderous denizens of the Cancerverse.

Along the way, Drax helped Phyla-Vell bring her girlfriend and his daughter Moondragon back to life, though it meant tangling with Maelstrom, the Dragon of the Moon, and Oblivion. Later, while trying to stop the threat of the Cancerverse from overrunning their reality, Drax seemingly lost his life to Thanos. It was later revealed that anyone from the regular universe could not die there, so realizing the futility of an enduring fight with any enemies, Richard Rider sacrificed himself to send Star-Lord and Drax back home.

The Guardians of the Galaxy soon reunited to help the Avengers stop Thanos' latest plan. He and his teammates spent the next era saving Earth, stopping Thanos, rescuing an alternate reality Jean Grey from the Shi'Ar, watching over Peter Quill as head of the Spartax government, serving as a Guardian under Kitty Pryde, and fighting Mister Knife and Hala. They also became involved in the second Earth Super Hero Civil War to support one-time teammate Carol Danvers, AKA Captain Marvel.

During Pryde's leadership of the Guardians, Drax went out on his own to kill Thanos once again. He failed in his primary mission but succeeded in palling around with Terrax, fighting in Fin Fang Foom's arena, and reuniting with Cammi and Pip the Troll.

Between the events of second Civil War and rejoining Star-Lord, Gamora, Rocket, and Groot as the all-new Guardians of the Galaxy, Drax traveled to a remote planet to hunt, but wound up stumbling upon a race of poachers and slavers. He quickly murdered the evil ones, only to discover that the'd tied their own lives directly into those of their slaves - when one of the bad guys died, so did the innocents. After that, Drax took a vow of pacifism that took a great deal of concentration and dedication to maintain.

While his teammates don't specifically understand why he continues rolling with them when violence is an almost guaranteed result of their actions, they keep him around because he's family.