# Mesmero

Mesmero (Vincent) is a mutant supervillain appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by Arnold Drake, Don Heck, and Werner Roth, the character first appeared in The X-Men #49 (October 1968). He has been a member of Weapon X and the Brotherhood of Mutants at various points in his history.

## Publication history

Mesmero debuted in The X-Men #49 (October 1968), created by Arnold Drake, Don Heck, and Werner Roth. He appeared in the 2017 X-Men: Gold series.

## Fictional character biography

Mesmero is a small-time criminal who poses as a stage hypnotist using his mutant powers of hypnotism. He initially works with Magneto and battles the X-Men until the former strands him in a South American jungle.
Mesmero has encountered the X-Men on a few other occasions as well as teams such as X-Factor, and the Dark Riders. The Dark Riders intend to kill him, as they believe him to be weak. Mesmero uses his powers to convince them they had thrown him off a high ledge. With Alpha Flight, Mesmero takes over the minds of the junior members and is eventually stopped by the senior ones.
Mesmero later joins Weapon X, whose director enhances his powers, enabling him to control entire crowds of people at once. He later attempts to use his powers to help his dying mother and make her believe that she is healthy, but she sees through the illusions and temporarily causes him to lose confidence in his powers.
Mesmero is among the mutants who lose their powers to the Scarlet Witch in Decimation. Devastated and ruined, Mesmero is forced into poverty and reforms. Mesmero finally achieves a personal triumph by forming a relationship with a woman who had saved his life, promising to somehow help her in turn. She put her trust in him freely and unconditionally, something he had never managed before without his powers.
Mesmero eventually returns to villainy, becomes the leader of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, and regains his powers under unspecified circumstances.

## Powers, abilities, and equipment

Vincent is a mutant with superhuman hypnotic powers. He has the psionic ability to mentally influence the minds of others via eye contact, especially telepaths. Through a combination of careful planning and skill, he could manipulate their minds, even if they were much more prone to realizing/breaking his machinations than a non-psychic. Mesmero can hypnotize people into doing whatever he wants them to, alter their brains with false personalities or memories, and make his victims see him as a different person. He had proven unable to control Magneto, which his helmet that negates all telepathic attacks pertain brainwashing and Alysande Stuart, with her capabilities, for unknown reasons.
At one time, Mesmero wore a costume, which allows him to teleport, leaving only an energy blip where he once stood. That feat was only used for escaping an angry Alpha Flight and may have been controlled entirely by the technology of this suit or tied in some way to his mental capabilities.

## Reception

Benito Cereno of ComicsAlliance referred to Mesmero as an "oddball favorite villain."

## Other versions
### Exiles

In Exiles, an alternate reality version of Mesmero, originating from the Earth-653 timeline, was involved with the Weapon X Program before being recruited into Weapon X, the more ruthless counterpart of the Exiles. Early after the formation of the team, Mesmero was killed and his body remained in the Timebreakers' fallen heroes gallery in the crystal palace. After the Exiles took over the place, they sent Mesmero's body back to Earth-653. The corpse was teleported back to the facilities of the Weapon X Program, where it was incinerated.
Another alternate version of Mesmero was revealed to have existed on Earth-127. This Mesmero was part of the Brotherhood of Mutants alongside Magneto, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch (all gender-swapped, with Scarlet Witch now being called Scarlet Warlock). They planned to make Magneto (who was female in this reality) even powerful than she already was by removing Wolverine's adamantium skeleton out of his body and transfer it into Magneto's body. However the plan went wrong, and Mesmero and the other Brotherhood members fused into one powerful mutant being known as "Brother Mutant".

### Age of Apocalypse

In the Age of Apocalypse timeline, Mesmero joined with a group of telepaths to create a "psychic pyramid scheme" known as the Overmind which leader Quentin Quire uses to empower himself. Mesmero along with the telepaths that compose the Overmind are later confronted and killed by the Shadow King.

### X-Men '92

During the Secret Wars storyline as part of the X-Men '92 mini-series (which is based on X-Men: The Animated Series), Mesmero appears as a member of Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants.

## In other media

* Mesmero makes a non-speaking cameo appearance in the X-Men: The Animated Series episode "Beyond Good and Evil".
* Mesmero appears in X-Men: Evolution, voiced by Ron Halder. This version is a servant of Apocalypse.
* Mesmero appears in Ultimate Spider-Man, voiced by Dwight Schultz. This version possesses additional mind-swapping abilities as well as the ability to channel his mind control through technology.