Thaddeus Bodog Sivana is a supervillain appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Doctor Sivana is the archnemesis of Captain Marvel created by Bill Parker and C. C. Beck, first appearing in Whiz Comics #2 (cover-dated February 1940) by Fawcett Comics. A mad scientist and inventor bent on world domination, the character was established as Captain Marvel's main archenemy during the Golden Age, appearing in over half of the Fawcett Captain Marvel stories published between 1939 and 1953. Sivana has kept his role as one of the key archenemies of Captain Marvel (now Shazam) throughout the character's appearances in DC Comics, which eventually acquired the rights to Fawcett's superhero characters. In 2009, Doctor Sivana was ranked as IGN's 82nd-greatest comic book villain of all time.Doctor Sivana is number 82 IGN. Retrieved 10-05-09.
Doctor Sivana has made his cinematic debut in the DC Extended Universe 2019 film Shazam!, portrayed by Mark Strong, who reprised the role in a post-credits scene cameo in the 2023 sequel Shazam! Fury of the Gods.
Publication history
Fawcett Comics and Pre-Crisis DC Comics
Infamously evil, Doctor Sivana appeared in well over half of all of the Golden Age Captain Marvel comic stories, and in all of the first four stories, after having deduced Captain Marvel's dual identity as boy radio broadcaster Billy Batson early on. Depicted as a brilliant, if evil, scientist, Sivana used all manner of unusual inventions and techniques against the Marvels. He was at first a good man who wanted to help humanity, but big business, bosses, and other concerns blocked and checked him and even called him mad, until, embittered, he turned against humanity and moved to Venus. He somehow held high status among the beings of the planet Venus.Whiz Comics #15, (March 21, 1941) He returned to Earth, establishing himself as a villain, and clashed with Capt. Marvel in the latter's first fight. Along with the Marvel Family, Sivana entered publishing limbo in 1953, following a ruling in the National Comics Publications v. Fawcett Publications court case finding that Captain Marvel was an illegal infringement of the existing copyrights on Superman.
National Comics (today DC Comics) acquired the rights to the Captain Marvel characters in 1972, relaunching them in a new title, Shazam! the following February. The characters' 20-year absence from publication was explained as the result of Doctor Sivana and the Sivana Family having trapped the Marvels, their friends, other superheroes, and, by accident, themselves in a sphere of Suspendium, due to Sivana Jr. distracting Doctor Sivana by slapping him on the back in congratulation and making him crash the spaceship into the Suspendium sphere, a compound that kept them in suspended animation from 1953 until 1973. They were released when the Suspendium sphere neared the sun, melting it enough that Captain Marvel was revived. He and the other Marvels then pushed it back to Earth. The Sivanas escaped in their spaceship but were captured by Captain Marvel in the same issue despite another attempt at world domination. He still makes many attempts at world domination, including a multi-issue storyline where he traveled across America, threatening to destroy entire cities unless he was acknowledged as Rightful Ruler of the Universe.Shazam! #25–29 In Shazam! #28 (1977) he was responsible for bringing Black Adam back using his reincarnation machine.
Shazam! The New Beginning and The Power of Shazam! Sivana continued to appear in Shazam!-related stories through the Crisis on Infinite Earths limited series in 1985. He was reintroduced by Roy Thomas and Tom Mandrake in the miniseries Shazam!: The New Beginning in 1987. This Sivana was the same mad scientist that the previous one had been, except that he only had two children (Beautia and Magnificus), and was Billy Batson's step-uncle.
Jerry Ordway revised the character of Sivana for his 1994 graphic novel The Power of Shazam! and the resulting ongoing series, and this revision has been retained in all following DC publications. The modern Sivana, in addition to being a mad scientist, was also a powerful and influential tycoon, similar to Lex Luthor. The former CEO of his own Sivana Industries, Sivana's corrupted dealings and crossing of Captain Marvel led to his own destruction and his intense hatred of the Marvel Family. Beautia and Magnificus Sivana are reintroduced again in this series; their mother, Sivana's ex-wife Venus, is briefly seen in The Power of Shazam! #27.
Later appearances After The Power of Shazam! series ended in 1999, Sivana was rarely seen until Outsiders vol. 3 #13–15 (August–October 2004), in which he reorganizes the supervillain group the Fearsome Five, appointing himself leader. Sivana and his four associates Mammoth, Psimon, Jinx, and Shimmer (a fifth, Gizmo, is killed by Sivana for challenging the scientist's position as resident genius) continued to appear at irregular intervals in the pages of Outsiders.
Fictional character biography Pre-Crisis Sivana is a short, bald, self-described mad scientist with a penchant for developing unusual technologies. He often plots to do away with Captain Marvel and his Marvel Family, but is usually thwarted in his plans. His trademark phrases are "Curses! Foiled again!" and his mocking laughter "Heh! Heh! Heh!" He also coined the insulting name Big Red Cheese to refer to Captain Marvel, a name that the Captain's friends have adopted with which to light-heartedly tease him.
Thaddeus Bodog Sivana,Whiz Comics #14 (March 1941) born in 1892,Captain Marvel Adventures #138 (November 1952) began with the best intentions and was one of Europe's best scientific minds, with progressive scientific ideas that could revolutionize industry but were rejected by everyone he approached. Laughed out of society by people who called his inventions impractical and his science a fake, Sivana took his family to the planet Venus in a spaceship he had invented. There he stayed until his children were grown, and Earth not so backward as when he left it. Since his children were adults by 1940, his departure from Earth would implicitly have been the late 1910s or early 1920s. During his years away, struggling to tame the Venusian jungle, Sivana turned bitter and planned his revenge against the world that had shunned him.Whiz Comics #15, (March 21, 1941)
He initially plotted his revenge with a radio silencer that would disable all radio communications permanently. He tried to extort $50 million, only to be stopped by Captain Marvel in his first adventure. Cap broke through the window of the building where Sivana was hiding and defeated the guards, binding them securely with tubing ripped from the radio-silencer.Whiz Comics #2 (February 1940) Sivana planned to kill Captain Marvel with a blast from his Atom-Smasher, but Cap leaped back out the window and escaped. During the fight, Sivana's returning army angrily asked why Captain Marvel had defeated them in their war against America despite their highly advanced weaponry.Whiz Comics #3A (March 1940) Sivana appeared to have been killed by the Atom-Smasher blast, but he returned a short time later, having somehow learned Captain Marvel's identity. He sent a letter to Billy Batson to lure him to the planet Venus, disguising himself as 'Professor Xerxes Smith'.Whiz Comics #3B (April 1940) Sivana's henchmen bound and gagged Batson, and Sivana tried to take away his memory using a Memory Mangler. Billy regained his memory after stumbling into the cave of Shazam and accidentally saying the word "Shazam". Sivana's henchmen rebelled against him and set off an explosion that destroyed the Mangler. Ironically, Captain Marvel saved Sivana and his daughter Beautia Sivana, who the henchmen had left to die.Whiz Comics #4 (May 1940) Sivana continued to nurse a megalomaniacal grudge against humanity and also a personal enmity with the Marvel Family. This persisted even after Cap revealed Sivana's former benevolent inventions (which Sivana considered useless), leading to his being awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics. Far from being pleased, Sivana was insulted by the prize and stated that only when he was crowned Ruler of the Universe would he consider himself properly honored.
The Golden Age Sivana was a twice-widowed father with four children: good-natured adult daughter Beautia Sivana who, when first seen, was Empress of Venus. Beautia has bewitching beauty which affects men like a drug, which Sivana once used to try to make her win an election. Beautia's remaining siblings include the super-strong Magnificus Sivana,Whiz Comics #15 (March 1941) and evil teenagers Georgia SivanaMary Marvel Comics #1 (January 1946) and Thaddeus Sivana Jr.Captain Marvel Adventures #52 (December 1945) As the Sivana Family,The Marvel Family #10 (April 1947) Sivana, Georgia, and Sivana Jr. attempted to destroy Captain Marvel, Mary Marvel, and Captain Marvel Jr., respectively. They traveled through time via the Rock of Eternity to various points in the history of Atlantis (ancient, modern, and future). There they attempted to steal technology to build a machine that would create a barrier around the Earth, thereby preventing the Marvels from calling down lightning. Georgia and Thaddeus Jr. possess brilliant minds like their father and share his enmity with the Marvel Family, but Magnificus and Beautia rarely fight the Marvels. In fact, Beautia has an unrequited crush on Captain Marvel, not realizing that he is really an adolescent boy.
Post-Crisis Following the Crisis on Infinite Earths miniseries, Sivana was first reintroduced as Billy Batson's step-uncle in a 1987 miniseries, Shazam! The New Beginning. Magnificus and Beautia were depicted as his only children.
A second retcon in 1994 established Sivana as a wealthy tycoon with political influence, similar to Lex Luthor, only to have the events surrounding an archaeological expedition to Egypt he sponsored lead to both the creation of Captain Marvel and the fall of Sivana's fortunes. Blaming Captain Marvel for his fall from grace, Sivana dedicated himself wholeheartedly to using his inventions and intellect against the Marvel Family. In current continuity, Sivana's ex-wife Venus is still alive, as are all four Sivana children. They resemble their Pre-Crisis counterparts.
The evil scientist appears briefly in the "Infinite Crisis" storyline. Sivana also appeared along with Lex Luthor in the four-issue 2005 limited series Superman/Shazam: First Thunder by Judd Winick and Joshua Middleton, which depicts the first meeting between Superman and Captain Marvel.
In the 2006–2007 limited series 52, Sivana was abducted to Oolong Island, a tropical paradise run by Intergang, where he and many other DC Universe "mad scientists" are allowed to live a hedonistic lifestyle while creating the inventions of their wildest dreams as members of the Science Squad and pitting them against one another. They create the Four Horsemen of the Apokolips and succeed in capturing Black Adam, whom Sivana then tortures for weeks, until Adam is freed by heroes storming the island. Georgia and Thaddeus Jr. were reintroduced in 52 Week Twenty-Six (November 1, 2006), in which they appear alongside Beautia, Magnificus, and Beautia and Magnificus' mother Venus, who wants Sivana found and has a charity dinner with the Black Marvel family.
Sivana later captures Mind and mutates him into a "hyperfly", a colossal moth-like figure with the ability to travel across time and realities.
On the cover of Justice League of America #13 vol. 2, Sivana appears as a member of the new Injustice League.