The Juggernaut is one of the X-Men’s greatest villains, as he represents a threat the mutants aren’t too well-equipped to handle: magic. Juggernaut isn’t a mutant, he’s powered by a magical gem of elder demonic origin, which is why it’s so hard for the X-Men to take him down time and again. However, on top of his established strength and near invulnerability, the Juggernaut has yet another power that has the potential to turn him into a literal god–too bad he completely forgot about it.
Cain Marko aka the Juggernaut served in the Korean War, and during his time overseas, Cain stumbled upon a hidden temple dedicated to the ancient demonic deity known as Cyttorak. Within this temple was the Crimson Gem of Cyttorak, a magical artifact that would possess anyone who accepted its power with the essence of Cyttorak himself, turning that person into the demon-god’s avatar on Earth, a living Juggernaut–an offer Marko gladly accepted. Juggernaut is powered by magic to cause as much chaos as possible in the name of Cyttorak, and as it turns out, those methods sometimes include a bit more of a magical finesse than pure brutish mayhem.
Juggernaut is Strong in Magic on a Cosmic Scale (& Doctor Strange Proves It)
In Doctor Strange #182 by Roy Thomas and Gene Colan, Doctor Strange finds himself in the realm of Nightmare after the Lord of Dreams himself conquered Eternity, and began using Eternity’s unparalleled power to reshape the waking world. Strange’s mission is to stop him by any means necessary, but to do that, he needed a distraction: enter the Juggernaut. At this point in Marvel canon, the Juggernaut has been banished to the Crimson Dimension, which is how Doctor Strange was able to pull him into the realm of dreams during this battle, as he was already on the mystical plane. While the Juggernaut was meant to act as a simple distraction, he proved far more useful than that. In the Crimson Dimension, the Juggernaut learned some fairly powerful spells that actually allowed him to put up a fight against Nightmare. While they proved ineffective in actually beating the all-powerful deity, Nightmare did admit that the power exhibited by Juggernaut would have made him the ruler of other entire cosmos.
The Crimson Gem of Cyttorak fueled Cain Marko’s body with otherworldly, mystical power, making him physically unstoppable. That baseline invulnerability is then taken to new heights by Cain Marko himself, as he decided to lean into his magical form and actually learns legitimate spells to use during battle. While he couldn’t take down someone like Nightmare (who was also channeling Eternity’s power), the Juggernaut did give him a fair fight, and even earned the deity’s respect. This is perhaps the Juggernaut’s most impressive feat, as it proved he’s strong enough to rule over an entire plane of existence. One would think this would be a game-changer for his Marvel Comics career, but sadly, the Juggernaut would hardly ever use this immense power again.
Once he returned to the physical plane, the Juggernaut never again called upon the magical spells that Nightmare himself called out as being strong enough to conquer entire universes. Hopefully, the Juggernaut will remember that he has god-tier magical capabilities that make him unstoppable in an entirely new sense of the word, but until then, fans will just have to be content knowing that he has the power to become a literal god, but doesn’t, because he seemingly forgot that he learned powerful magic.
This story originally appeared on Screenrant
