Magneto

One of the most powerful mutants on the planet, Magneto has been an antagonist of the X-Men for many years. Along with his Brotherhood, he seeks the supremacy of the mutant race over the mass of homo sapiens humanity.

Erik Lehnsherr was born in Gdansk, Poland to a working-class Jewish family. In 1944, his family was sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp, where all but Erik perished. As a young orphan, Lehnsherr journeyed to America and eventually met Charles Xavier in college. The two forged a strong friendship over mutual interests such as science and social politics.

In the 1970s, Erik returned to Europe to find his roots, marrying a Gypsy woman, Magda. In 1977, Magda bore Erik children, Wanda and Pietro. However, shortly thereafter during a riot, Erik's mutant powers of magnetism emerged and, thinking his wife and children dead, he lashed out, killing many of the rioters. Horrified by what her husband had become, Magda fled with the children to her Gypsy clan, where Erik could not find her.

Erik then returned to America to assist Charles with the founding of his school. Charles and Erik searched out young mutants and trained them in the use of their abilities, with the goal of both protecting them and integrating mutants into society. Over time, however, Erik became disillusioned with Charles' aims, instead espousing a philosophy of mutant superiority over humanity. Reaching the breaking point of their friendship, Erik left the school intent on protecting "his people" from another Holocaust, by any means necessary.

Erik reappeared years later, having taken the guise of Magneto, and having gathered other mutants to his side to form the Brotherhood of Mutants. One of their first overt terrorist acts was the kidnapping and murder of Senator Robert Kelly, followed by an attempted attack on UN diplomats at Liberty Island, an attempt which was foiled by the X-Men.

After the Liberty Island incident, Magneto was imprisoned without trial in a secret government facility, overseen by Colonel William Stryker, who used sadistic interrogation methods to force Erik to divulge what secrets he knew about Charles Xavier and his X-Men. Freed from prison by Mystique, Magneto actually assisted the X-Men in foiling Stryker's plans, and left afterwards to regroup with the Brotherhood.

Of recent, Magneto has shown a habit of using other mutants, often young children, to accomplish his goals. While he has not shied away from direct conflict with humanity, he has often used manipulation to further his cause, including the kidnappings of Forge and Julio Richter, and brainwashing Lorna Dane into believing she was Lehnsherr's daughter.

Magneto's stated goal is the survival of the mutant race, and he espouses outright domination over homo sapiens as the preferred route to this survival. His philosophies reflect his ideals, and have been spread online as The Lehnsherr Manifesto, and used both as inspiration by like-minded mutants and as fuel for growing anti-mutant sentiment in groups such as the Friends of Humanity.

Powers/Abilities

Magneto can sense and manipulate magnetic fields, as well as control some forms of electromagnetic energy. He has used this ability to control amounts of metal as minute as a few grams of iron in a prison guard's bloodstream and as massive as an entire sunken oil platform.

While Magneto's power primarily affects ferrous metals, he can control magnetic fields to such an extent that he can manipulate other metals and structures. He has also been able to create 'bubbles' of magnetic force that repel any object he can affect with his powers.

Magneto cannot affect his own body with his powers, but has used even trace amounts of metal on his person both to armor himself, to levitate, and to travel at high speeds underwater through the use of a metallic cocoon.

In addition to his mutant powers, Magneto is also a brilliant engineer and scientist, surpassed only by Charles Xavier and Moira MacTaggart in the field of mutant genetics.