ENTEMEN race
(of Reality-691)

Classification: Extradimensional (Reality-691) extratemporal (31^st century) extraterrestrial humanoid-octopoids (see comments)

Location/Base of Operations: Entem, fifth planet from the sun in the Donatut planetary system in the Milky Way Galaxy

Known Members: Mr. Slech
Estimated population: 98 million (in 20^th century) (see comments)

Affiliations: Entemen is apparently one of approximately fifty loosely-confederated planets in their sector of the Milky Way Galaxy.

Enemies: Force

First Appearance: Marvel Presents#5 (June, 1976)
   (race and homeworld identified) The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe II#15 (March, 1987)
   (first appearance in Reality-616) Avengers Spotlight#25/2 (November, 1989)

Powers/Abilities: None

Cultural Traits: On their homeworld, the Entemen maintain large temples to one or more deities.

Type: Humanoid-octopoid (see comments)
Eyes: Two (black)
Limbs: Four (all tentacles)
Fingers: Three or four (see comments)
Toes: None
Skin color: Orange (with multiple darker orange round spots)
Hair: Brown
Average height: 6' 6"

Type of government: Unrevealed

Level of technology: Inferior to Earth in the 20^th century, but by the 30^th century the Entemen had developed technology comparable to that of Earth, including starships capable of interstellar travel. Entemen temple guards were armed with handheld energy weapons that could "zap" their targets.

History:
(Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe II#15: Alien Races Appendix: Entemen entry) - Entem was the fifth planet from the sun in the Donatut star system of the Milky Way galaxy.

(Guardians of the Galaxy I#4 (fb) - BTS) - At some unspecified time after the 26^th century, a certain tablet was made on (or brought to) the planet Entem by an alien whose identity has never been revealed. After being made (or found or delivered), this stone tablet was placed in one of Entem's temples.

(Marvel Presents I#5 (fb) - BTS) - In the early 31^st century, an Entemen known as "Mr. Slech" was a patient on a world that had been turned into a mental institution for the most hopelessly neurotic beings of approximately fifty loosely-confederated planets in its sector of the Milky Way Galaxy. Its original name no longer used, this planet had come to be called simply Asylum. The administrators of this institution were very progressive and allowed the patients to structure their own society in whatever way they wanted. Bizarrely, the culture that they ended up creating closely paralleled that of "Old Earth" (i.e., the United States of America in 20^th century).

    Within this context, Mr. Slech became the leader of a criminal organization that mimicked a 1930s mob.

(Marvel Presents I#5) <3016 A.D.> - When their starship was disabled, four members of the Guardians of the Galaxy (Vance Astro, Charlie-27, Nikki and Yondu) were forced to teleport down to the nearest planet while Martinex stayed aboard to make repairs. Unaware of what the planet was, the foursome materialized in a forest that was actually the roof garden on top of one of the buildings in the planet's largest city but were quickly spotted and held at gunpoint by the gardener, Sod. Although he would normally just spray any such "pests" with lead, Sod figured that "Boss" might like to inspect the four personally so he escorted them downstairs and presented them to Mr. Slech who congratulated Sod for his nice work and promised to mark him down for a bonus.

    Believing that the four strangers were hit men sent by a rival, Slech demanded to know who their employer was. When Astro protested that they honestly meant no harm or even inconvenience and said that they would go peaceably, Slech reminded them that he would be the one to decide if they were to go at all. Slech then fondled Nikki's cheek with his left tentacle, prompting Charlie-27 to grab the offending limb and tell Slech to keep his tentacles to himself. As Charlie-27 was in the middle of threatening to rip off said tentacle if Slech did not say "Yes" to Astro's polite request that they be allowed to leave, the mob boss called out for his men, and a fight broke out between the Guardians and Slech's thugs. While brawling, Charlie-27 kept a hold of Slech's tentacle, yanked him forward over his desk and then tucked Slech under one arm and used him as a hostage to force the thugs to let them leave. When Astro stated that they would drop him off a few floors down, Slech swore that they would regret their actions because he owned the city, but then shut up when Charlie-27 threatened his ribs. As promised, the Guardians did leave Slech behind before they reached the ground floor and exited the building.

(Guardians of the Galaxy I#4) <3017 A.D.> - Following a clue that they had apparently found on the planet Courg, the mercenary group Force arrived on the planet Entem. When they tried to enter a certain temple, some of the natives tried to prevent them from doing so. During this confrontation, one of the Entemen broke one of Broadside's fingernails, provoking a massive overreaction.

    Aside from those Entemen who were injured when Photon and Broadside used their powers to damage buildings, Eighty-Five used his mutant magnetic powers to wrap a metal wall around three Entemen, Brahl became intangible so that the energy blast fired by one of the two guards confronting him passed through his body and struck the other guard behind him, Scanner used his tail to knock away two more Entemen, and Tachyon blasted another two Entemen by reflecting energy back at them. All in all, by the time Interface arrived and put an end to this wanton destruction, at least eight Entemen had been injured or killed by Force.

    With all opposition thus subdued, Force entered the temple where Interface quickly found the tablet for which the group had come. After using his transmutation power to free the stone tablet from its setting, Interface observed that it was written in runes that were very similar to those found on Centauri IV and then gave it to Photon to decipher. Once Photon had provided a translation, Force departed from the planet, leaving, as always, death and destruction in their wake.

All of Reality-691 (including the Entemen and their homeworld) was destroyed along with the rest of the Sixth Multiverse by the Beyonders
...and presumably recreated by Franklin Richards...

Comments: Mr. Slech created by Steve Gerber, Allen Milgrom and Howard Chaykin.
   Entemen race created/named by the staff of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe: Deluxe Edition (led by Head Writer Mark Gruenwald).

   In Marvel Presents#5, Charlie-27 suggested to Mr. Slech that he "Keep your tentacles to yourself" and the Official Handbook staff followed his lead by stating that Entemen had "tentacles in place of arms and legs." This means that the limbs of Entemen are muscular hydrostats (like the legs of octopuses or the trunks of elephants or the tongues of humans) that are composed mostly of muscle tissue without any skeletal support. Accordingly, Entemen limbs have no bones and no joints. However, Entemen presumably do have bones in the rest of their bodies (i.e., their torsos and heads).

   The Official Handbook lists each extraterrestrial race by the plural form of their race's names. These plural forms usually have a letter "s" added to the end of the word for a single member of the race. However, since "Entemen" is the plural form for this race, does that mean that "Enteman" is the singular form?

Problems with the Official Handbook's profile
   The quarter-page entry on the Entemen that appeared in the Alien Races Appendix of the Deluxe Edition of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe contains several inaccuracies. First, although the skin color of the Entemen has always been listed as being yellow, their actual skin color is orange with darker orange round spots all over.

   Second, although the quarter-page entry on the Entemen race states that they have no fingers or toes, a CAREFUL examination of Mr. Slech's appearance in Marvel Presents#5 reveals that each of his arms actually ended in several miniature digits that helped him to grasp objects (like his cigarette holder). In the six panels in which they are depicted, these "mini-fingers" vary between three and four (per hand) in number, but they are definitely present. You can see these digits in two of the images above and in the two images to the right.

   Third, as with other alien races who had only appeared in stories set in future time periods, the Deluxe Edition of the Official Handbook attempted to provide some information not only about those races in those futures but about their status in the present-day (20^th century; now the 21^st century, due to the sliding timescale...) "mainstream" reality. Unfortunately, this extra data was limited to changes in the level of technology possessed by these races and didn't deal with population data. So, when the Entemen entry states that their estimated population was 98 million, was that figure meant to be accurate for the 20^th century or for the 31^st century? Considering how the human population on Earth increased from maybe 310 million in 1000 A.D. to over 6 BILLION in 2000 A.D., exactly WHEN there were 98 million Entemen is significant information that should have been provided.

   Fourth, classifying the Entemen as being "humanoid/octopoid" in their physical characteristics seems a bit confusing. I know that the term "octopoid" is an adjective defined as "Characteristic of or resembling an octopus or the tentacles of an octopus" and that this usage is meant as a reference to how the Entemen are octopus-like due to their having limbs that are tentacles but to me this term immediately causes me to think of "eight" of something, as in an eight-legged life form. I would have preferred it if they were just classified as being "Semi-humanoid" with the data about their tentacles left to the special adaptations section. But maybe that's just me.
    I agree...octopoid is a poor descriptor. In addition to the eight limbs thing, Octopi are molluscs and are classified as cephalods (ceph = head and pod = feet/legs...limbs coming off a central head structure); that's not true of the Entemen, they have a body with tentacles for limbs.
--Snood

   The Entemen are one of the five alien races listed in the Alien Races Appendix to the second volume of the OHotMU who were first seen in stories set in the alternate 31st century future of the Guardians of the Galaxy. The other four races are (in order of appearance):
1. The Centaurians from Centauri-IV (Marvel Super-Heroes II#18);
2. The Courga (Marvel Presents#5);
3. The Achernonians (Thor Annual I#6);
4. The Procyonites (Thor Annual I#6)
   Of these five alien races, the Centaurians were the only ones with a member (Yondu Udonta) who appeared in multiple issues. They were also the only race whose name and homeworld name were not invented by the Official Handbook staff. Considering how minor the characters of Dr. Pazz-Ko, Mr. Slech, Brahl and Tork were, their races hardly seem to be significant enough to deserve having entries written about them. In fact, it seems likely that their races and the data about them were "made up" just so that there would be enough races to fill the 128 quarter-pages that had been set aside for them in OHotMU II#15. If that was what happened, then it seems unlikely that much thought was given to developing the backstories of these races.

Entemen race in Reality-616

   So far, only two (or three) members of the Entemen race have appeared in any stories set in the Prime Marvel Universe. The first of these Entemen appeared in the second story in Avengers Spotlight#25 (November, 1989) which was about an intergalactic auction that was held to bid on the autobiography of Rick Jones. Many alien races were interested in the manuscript because they believed that it contained information about how Jones had once been able to defeat the Kree and Skrull armadas. However, when the salient chapter was presented for viewing, the assembled bidders discovered that Jones had ended the Kree-Skrull War through a fluke and that he had no real knowledge of how he had accomplished it so his memoirs were judged to be worthless. An Entemen was among the crowd of would-be bidders who were shown reacting in disappointment to the contents of the chapter. This Entemen was not named, had no dialogue, and didn't seem to be wearing any clothes on his upper body. Also depicted in that panel are the following: a female Pink Kree, a Froma, an Elan, a Kronan, a Ciegrimite, a Dakkamite, a Glx, a Guna, a Fonabi and a Horusian. Of these eleven alien characters, only the Kree woman (Major Vron-Ikka) has ever been named.

   Although the Entemen bidder from Avengers Spotlight#25 doesn't do anything in the only panel in which he appears, his presence aboard the intergalactic auction cruiser as one of the bidders indicates that the Entemen were a space-faring race. This strongly suggests that the Entemen race that existed in Reality-616 during the late 20th century possessed starships capable of interstellar travel. This seemingly contradicts the data in their quarter-page entry in the Alien Races Appendix of Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe II#15 which states that their level of technology was "Inferior to Earth." Then again, the Note in that mini-entry adds that "By the 30^th Century, the Entemen have developed technology comparable to Earth." As was the case with several alien races who had only appeared in stories set within future time periods, the handbook was attempting to provide data about the race as they existed in the 20th century "mainstream" reality as well as what their status was in their alternate future, and the results were a bit unclear. In any event, while the handbook writers definitely meant for the 20^th century Entemen to be technologically inferior to 20^th century Terrans, Avengers Spotlight#25/2 disproves that claim.
    I don't think one Entemen showing up on a starship says anything about the level of technology on Entem. We've seen plenty of examples of people from low-tech worlds being picked up and brought into space by others and then becoming space travelers.
--Snood

   While it's possible that two (or three) different Entemen could have made it onto deep space starships even though their race lacked the advanced technology needed to do so, the particular circumstances of the intergalactic auction would seem to indicate that the Entemen really were part of an interstellar society. After all, the organizers of the auction would not have included any prospective bidders unless it had been established that they actually had the resources that they would need to cover their potential bids. With that in mind, it seems unlikely, at least to me, that any bidders from low-tech worlds whose contact with aliens was minimal would have been invited to the auction. Then again, maybe my opinion is being overly influenced by the whole "Prime Directive" concept from Star Trek which prohibited Federation members (or maybe just Starfleet personnel?) from interacting with alien civilizations that were less advanced (i.e., had not yet developed warp drive technology).

   Of course, just because the Entemen from Reality-616 had starships by the late 20^th century doesn't mean that the Entemen from Reality-691 were as technologically advanced in their 20^th century.

    I don't know the reasoning, but I always wondered if the Entemen were named for Entenmann's doughnuts, but the fact that their planetary system was Donatut cements it for me!
--Snood

   I had never heard of Entenmann's donuts before reading your comment but I agree that the "Donatut" connection is more than mere coincidence. Whoever came up with the names for the various alien races clearly had a lot (possibly too much?) time on their hands if they felt that they could be so...whimsical...in their choice of names.

Profile by Donald Campbell.

CLARIFICATIONS:
The Entemen race has no known connections to

• Ent, a large, strong and mute Morlock who was the son of Mother Inferior, the husband of Pester and the father of Baby--Web of Spider-Man#77
• Enteki, an archer, a member of the evil ninja group Snakeroot, who sacrificed his life in battle against Daredevil and Stone to enable two other members to accomplish their mission--Daredevil I#321
• Enteki, an archer, a member of the evil ninja group Snakeroot and the son of the previous Enteki, who replaced his father in the Enteki role after his father's death--Daredevil I#324
• Entos, one of a group of Inhumans in Attilan who harassed a human "paleskin" guest of Black Bolt only to learn, to their horror, that Bruce Banner was also the Hulk--Incredible Hulk II#175
• The Ents, a fictional race of ancient tree-like beings who existed in the fantasy world of Middle-earth as described in The Lord of the Rings trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkein
• "Entym", a male human who was mutated into a monstrous form that could fire energy blasts from his eyes after the mutant Roger Fieldston bumped into him while at a mall in New York City--X-Men and Captain Universe: Sleeping Giants#1
• any of the large number of beings known simply as "Entity" who exist in the Marvel Multiverse
• or any other alien race

the temple and the tablet

   Located somewhere on the surface of the planet Entem, this temple is apparently the place to which a clue found on the planet Courg directed any who sought to claim a certain invincible shield (which proved to be Captain America's shield).

    Since only the interior of the temple has ever been depicted, it's impossible to describe what its exterior looks like but the glimpses of Force's rampage that have been shown indicate that the buildings around the temple seem to be of an advanced design with walls that were made of (or plated with) metal. The single view of the interior of the temple made it clear that it was a large building with vaulted ceilings that were at least 50' high. Force member Brahl appeared to be somewhat awed by the temple's interior, but Interface only commented that he was "always impressed with the lengths primitive cultures go to to please their deities."

   Nothing has been revealed about the religion whose members constructed the temple or about the deity or deities who were worshipped by that religion's followers. The function of the temple was presumably to provide a place where religious ceremonies were held to honor the deity or deities, and where religious relics could be kept safely. Although it is known that some Entemen (including armed guards) attempted to prevent Force from entering the temple, their reason for doing so has not been revealed. It could be that entry to the temple was forbidden to anyone who was not a member of whatever religion maintained the temple. Or maybe only Entemen were allowed inside. It's also possible that the Entemen tried to keep Force out of the temple because they (rightly) suspected that the aliens were evil-doers who had come to steal from it.

   Whatever meaning the temple may have had for the native Entemen, the most significant thing about it to non-natives was that it was where the final clue to the whereabouts of the legendary invincible shield had been left. This final clue, written on a stone tablet in runes very similar to those used on the planet Centauri IV, spoke of a machine that walked as a man in the morning but spent the night as a world. It also stated that, beyond the Pleiades, around a star that gave no light, the shield waited for any worthy enough to possess it.

   The exact nature of the connection between the temple on Entem and the tablet remains mysterious, like so many of the things associated with the Book of Antag. It is known that the message on the tablet was inscribed there by an unspecified alien being (possibly Antag) and that Interface had to use his transmutation power to free the tablet from its place within the temple, but nothing else has been established. For one thing, it has not been revealed whether the tablet was carved on Entem or if it was created on some other planet and later brought to Entem. Also, if the tablet was created on Entem, was it carved into a rock outcropping around which the temple was later built or was it carved into a separate piece of stone that was later brought to the temple and incorporated into one of its walls? The fact that this final clue refers to something (the android Vision's merger with the world-wide sentient computer that existed on the planet Klatuu) that happened after the beginning of the 27^th century suggests that the clues must have been created no earlier than the mid-to-late 27^th century but this has never been confirmed.

   And then there are the runes in which the message on the tablet was written, runes that were "very similar" to those found on the planet Centauri IV. Does this mean that, as improbable as it seems, both the Entemen and the Centaurians somehow spoke (or at least wrote in) the same language? Or were the runes in which the message was written actually unreadable by the Entemen and they kept the tablet in their temple without knowing what the message said? The latter possibility seems more likely, especially if the (alien) being who carved (or delivered) the tablet was able to somehow persuade the Entemen of that time to keep the tablet safe so that it could eventually be found by someone for whom its message was meant.

--Guardians of the Galaxy I#4

images: (without ads)
Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe II#15, page 40, panel 3 (main image)
Marvel Presents#5, page 5, panel 2 (Mr. Slech - head shot)
      page 4, panel 1 (Mr. Slech vs. Charlie-27)
Guardians of the Galaxy I#4, page 16, panels 1-2 (Force on Entem)
      page 16, panels 3-6 (more of Force on Entem)
Marvel Presents#5, page 3, panel 5 (Mr. Slech's left hand)
      page 3, panel 3 (Mr. Slech's right hand)
Avengers Spotlight#25, page 21, panel 4 (Entemen bidder from Reality-616)
      page 21, panel 4 (close-up of the Entemen bidder)
Guardians of the Galaxy I#4, page 17, panel 2 (temple interior)
      page 17, panel 3 (tablet with runes)

Appearances:
Marvel Presents#5 (June, 1976) - Steve Gerber (writer), A. Milgrom & H. Chaykin (artists), M. Wolfman (editor)
The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe II#15 (March, 1987) - Kyle Baker (Appendix: Alien Races artist)
Avengers Spotlight#25/2 (November, 1989) - Glenn Herdling & Dwight Jon Zimmerman (writers), Rod Ramos (pencils), Don Hudson (inker), Mark Gruenwald (editor)
Guardians of the Galaxy I#4 (September, 1990) - Jim Valentino ("writer/arter"), Steve Montano (inker), Craig Anderson (editor)
Quasar#26 (September, 1991) - Mark Gruenwald (writer), Dave Hoover (guest penciler), Fred Fredricks (guest inker), Kelly Corvese (new editor)
Quasar#35 (June, 1992) - Mark Gruenwald (writer), Greg Capullo (penciler), Harry Candelario (inker), Kelly Corvese (editor)

First Posted: 02/20/2020
Last updated: 03/21/2020

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

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