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WIZ KID

Real Name: Takashi "Taki" Matsuya

Identity/Class: Human mutant, citizen of the United States

Occupation: Student 

Group Membership: None;
formerly Avengers Academy student body (Batwing/Jimmy Santini, Butterball/Emery Schaub, Finesse/Jeanna Foucault, Hazmat/Jenny Takeda, Hollow, Lightspeed/Julie Power, Mettle/Ken Mack, Ricochet/Johnny Gallo, Reptil/Humberto Lopez, Rocket Racer/Robert Farrell, Juston Seyfert, She-Hulk/Llyra, Striker/Brandon Sharpe, Turbo/Mickey Musashi, White Tiger/Aya Ayala, X-23/Laura Kinney) X-Terminators (Boom-Boom/Tabitha Smith, Leech, Artie Maddicks, Rictor/Julio Esteban Richter)

Affiliations: Ida Fassbender, Gosamyr, Elaine Grey, John Grey, Lynne Huntington, Doctor Gloria Johnson, New Mutants (Cannonball/Sam Guthrie, Magik/Illyana Rasputin, Mirage/Danielle Moonstar, Sunspot/Roberto DaCosta, Warlock, Wolfsbane/Rahne Sinclair), Hank Pym, Sebastian Shaw, X-Factor (Archangel/Warren Worthington III, Beast/Hank McCoy, Cyclops/Scott Summers, Marvel Girl/Jean Grey, Iceman/Bobby Drake), X-Force (Boomer/Tabitha Smith, Cable/Nathan Summers, Cannonball/Sam Guthrie, "Domino"/Vanessa Geraldine Carlysle, Feral/Maria Callasantos, Shatterstar/Gaveedra-Seven, Warpath/James Proudstar)

Enemies: Alliance of Evil (Frenzy/Joanna Cargill, Stinger/Wendy Sherman, Tower/Edward Pasternak), N'astirh, S'ym

Known Relatives: Unidentified mother and father (both deceased), unidentified uncle

Aliases: None

Base of Operations: Unrevealed;
                                   formerly Avengers Academy, Palos Verdes, California, USA;
                                   formerly Saint Simons Academy, Exeter, New Hampshire, USA

First Appearance: X-Terminators I#1 (October, 1988)

Powers/Abilities: Wiz Kid was a mutant with the ability to techno-form. He could psionically rearrange parts of machinery into various forms and functions, depending on what he desired them to be. The range of his creations was only limited by Matsuya's imagination and knowledge. As a computer genius, he could effortlessly construct the most complex pieces of high tech machinery. He created a "magic computer" to help demons order and strengthen magical spells as well as a "breakaway ship" that could split into 6 separate, functional airplanes. He could only manifest basic, low yield power sources, forcing him to incorporate outside forms of energy to make his larger creations, like aircraft, work. He was, however, capable of making his machinery compatible with whatever energy was available, for instance the explosive power generated by Tabitha Smith's "time-bombs." Wiz Kid was rendered paraplegic and despite numerous operations, still did not regain his ability to walk. He used a wheelchair of his own design to move around. The chair could be easily augmented and adapted to whatever fit Matsuya's needs. Taki suffered from dyslexia.

Height: 4'7"
Weight: 87 lbs.
Eyes: Brown
Hair: Black

History: (X-Terminators I#2 (fb) - BTS) - Takashi Matsuya was born into a wealthy family in the Mitsubishi corporation. He was granted a considerable trust fund.

(X-Terminators I#1 (fb) - BTS) - Young Asian-American Takashi Matsuya lost both his parents in an accident that also robbed him of the use of his legs. His uncle eventually arranged for him to be transferred to the Saint Simons Academy, an exclusive boarding school in Vermont. Taki underwent several invasive operations in hopes of restoring his ability to walk. One of those failed procedures involved implanting computer chips into his body in an attempt to focus energy from his nerves to his muscles to help him walk. Being forced to spend his days in a wheelchair and resenting his parents for abandoning him, Taki became a recluse who spent most of his time puttering in his room. He discovered he had a natural aptitude for building inventive mechanical devices and used this talent, actually the early stages of his mutant techno-form abilities, to build a new wheelchair for himself that granted him better mobility and comfort than any common chair ever could.

(X-Terminators I#1) - When X-Factor members Cyclops and Marvel Girl brought the young mutants Artie Maddicks and Leech to Saint Simons, Taki watched from a distance as the Academy's leaders Gloria Johnson and Lynne Huntington warmly greeted their newest students. Matsuya felt ignored and wept a few quiet tears because, while he was in a wheelchair and felt treated as a freak, the two mutants were actually fawned over. Some time later, Taki decided to show off his "souped-up double-wheelie wheelchair," hoping to impress Miss Huntington and the others. Huntington was coaching Artie and Leech and when Taki came too close to the power-dampening Leech, the wheelchair immediately fell apart, leaving a frustrated and furious Matsuya stuck underneath the mountain of parts. Despite this initial mishap, Artie and Leech started hanging around with Taki. A week went by in which Taki unknowingly used his mutant gift to build an energy analyzer in his room while Artie helped. As soon as Leech came too close, things went haywire again and Taki fell out of his chair once more. Furious and ashamed, he first lashed out at the two before realizing they had only been trying to be friendly. He apologized and they helped him back in his chair. Later that night, Taki was woken up by the sound of Crotus and several Limbo demons near Artie and Leech's room. Remembering a similar incident in New York at Christmas, where demons also had tried to steal babies, he decided to go to their room and help them, all the while wondering why he even bothered because he didn't like them very much. As soon as he reached the room, one of the demons jumped him and, sensing his mutant powers, asked Crotus if he should be taken too. Much to his own surprise, Taki created two energy guns from the sides of chair that blasted the creature. Crotus decided to leave Taki behind but the boy subconsciously transformed his chair into a mini-battlewagon called the Goblin Buster and tried to stop them from taking Artie and Leech. Crotus knocked him out and took off. When he came to, Taki was questioned by Huntington about the missing mutant boys. As soon as it became clear Huntington and the others didn't believe his story about demons, he decided to call Artie and Leech's friend Boom-Boom, who was enrolled at nearby Philipps Academy in Exeter. When he couldn't reach her, Taki decided to enroll himself to the Academy. After a few minutes, he suddenly realized he could change his wheelchair into anything he wanted and proceeded to transform it into a helicopter. He then figured the limitations of his powers when the machine wouldn't fly because it lacked an engine. Incorporating a nearby garbage can into his design as a makeshift engine, he took off and reached Philips Academy in minutes. There, he got both Boom-Boom, Skids and Rictor to accompany him. Their added weight proved too much for Taki's simple aircraft to handle, though he quickly converted the design so that Boom-Boom could use her time-bombs to power the craft. Next, they went to Portsmouth Naval Prison to free the recently incarcerated Rusty Collins with Taki turning his chair into an impenetrable tank capable of withstanding the guards' gunfire. With Rusty free, he shifted it back into an aircraft and took off with the teen mutants in tow.

(X-Terminators I#2) - Taki and the others learned where the demons had taken Artie and Leech when Maddicks sent them one of his holographic images, which showed he was in New York City. They set course for the Big Apple but because Taki's aircraft wasn't that quick, they needed to make a quick stop at an abandoned gas station. There, Boom-Boom generated a small but still too powerful explosive to blow up some vending machines, dousing everyone in soft drinks. Taki used his powers to restore the damage and refused any of the sugary snacks they'd recovered from the wreckage, calling it "the white death" and preferring a snack like bean sprouts and tofu on brown rice. As soon as the young heroes reached New York, they were spotted by Crotus and his minions, who recognized Taki and his magic chair. They began to follow them and watched as the teens broke into a closed sporting goods store to "borrow" some clothes. Taki used his powers to reconfigure sports gear into what he felt was appropriate superhero attire and then produced a credit card, announcing he would be paying for all their clothes as well as the damage that they'd caused to the store and the gas station. Boom-Boom watched with amazement as Taki turned part of his chair into a makeshift modem to make the necessary transactions. Matsuya explained to Tabitha that he'd always been a genius with computers and that they even helped him with his writing problems as the computer also included a spell checker. Crotus and his demons misinterpreted this and believed the preteen was talking about magic spells. A little while later, Crotus succeeded in abducting Taki, who had briefly wandered away from the others when they didn't believe his story about seeing objects come to life. Crotus brought him before N'astirh and informed the master demon that the child possessed "special sorcery of this dimension" called "computer."

(X-Terminators I#3) - N'astirh, convinced Wiz Kid might be of use, forced Taki to work for him by threatening to turn Artie, Leech and the other infants into demons. N'astirh was sent to Earth by his techno-organically altered master S'ym to set up the spells that would open a portal from Limbo to Earth. Loathing his master, N'astirh wanted to use Taki's proposed "spell computer" to use technology against S'ym and possibly even replace him as ruler of the realm. Realizing N'astirh needed him more than the demon let on, Taki cleverly manipulated them by demanding fresh, healthy food and blankets and toys for the infants the demons had kidnapped. N'astirh complied but when Taki pressed his luck by complaining about overripe fruit, N'astirh had his men brutally devour a random New York City police officer to prove he was serious. Wiz Kid immediately went to work on the proposed "Spell Computer" but when it was finished, N'astirh found out he couldn't use the device because Limbo demons were charged with a kind of electro-magnetic energy that messed up electronics. He forced Taki to operate the computer in his stead but before he had to cooperate, Rusty Collins, Skids, Rictor and Boom-Boom arrived to try to rescue them. Unfortunately, the mutants stood too close to Leech and were depowered, thereby quickly losing the fight. Now with even more proverbial "bargaining chips," N'astirh forced Taki to comply. Teleporting everyone to the heart of Times Square, N'astirh had his men fly the 10 kidnapped infants up into the sky to form an inverted pentagram while Taki fed the final spell into the computer. The pentagram formed with N'astirh in control of the massive "light disc" connecting Earth to Limbo. As he realized what he'd been forced to do, Taki wept a quiet tear. He then began to think of ways to undo what he'd done before millions died.

(X-Terminators I#4) - Taki watched helplessly as hundreds of Limbo demons poured out of the massive pentagram in the sky over Manhattan. When he saw that N'astirh had offered Crotus the lives of his friends Artie and Leech, he sprang into action. Swiftly shifting his wheelchair to form a giant, iron hand to knock Crotus aside, he then attempted to destroy the magic computer. N'astirh stopped him and ordered Crotus to guard Taki while he himself would go and confront S'ym. The somewhat simple minded Crotus was not prepared for Taki sneakily unplugging the computer, thereby closing down the pentagram in the sky and freeing Rusty, Boom-Boom and the other X-Terminators. N'astirh's demons charged the rooftop to make sure the computer was unharmed, leading to a massive, impossible to win fight. Taki transformed part of the skyscraper's machinery to form a "breakaway ship" that housed the X-Terminators all in separate compartments that could function as individual aircraft thanks to Boom-Boom's energy infusion. Furious at being played for a fool, Crotus attacked the ships and recaptured Taki just in time for N'astirh's fight with S'ym to reach Times Square. Using magic to trap Taki in living stone and mind control him to do his bidding, N'astirh had Wiz Kid work the computer to type a few magic spells but repeatedly square them to exponentially increase their power. This made N'astirh more than a match for S'ym but Matsuya resisted long enough to make a subtle change in the spells, which caused an overall destruction spell to hit all combatants and nearby demons. Finally realizing Taki was more trouble than he was worth, N'astirh tried to use the boy's stony prison to crush him but Wiz Kid was rescued by Rictor and his tectonic powers. At the same time, the final, physical confrontation between S'ym and N'astirh had changed the demon into a techno-organic lifeform as well. Now capable of operating the computer without damaging it, N'astirh rushed to it to claim final victory. Already wounded and without his wheelchair, Taki dragged himself close enough to N'astirh and successfully took control of his living circuitry, locking it back into its real, non-living components. The resulting explosion destroyed the computer and temporarily disrupted N'astirh. Wiz Kid was also hurt and crying about having endangered all those people, including the abducted babies. Both X-Terminators and New Mutants assured the banged up boy genius that everything had worked out fine.

(New Mutants I#72) - In the midst of the demonic "Inferno," the X-Terminators and New Mutants decided to continue their team up. While Boom-Boom and Rictor joined the New Mutants to continue the fight against the demons, the X-Terminators took Wiz Kid, the recently injured Danielle Moonstar, their ally Gosamyr and the ten saved babies to a church.

(New Mutants I#74) - The still woozy, slightly loopy Taki was being cared for by Artie and Leech on the steps of the church while the X-Terminators had their hands full dealing with the children.

(X-Factor I#40) - Wiz Kid accompanied Artie, Leech and the other X-Terminators when they visited X-Factor's Ship. They briefly socialized with the team, as well as Jean Grey's parents John and Elaine Grey. Artie and Leech made sure to tell Cyclops of Taki's part during the "Inferno." The grateful Scott told the trio he'd love to keep them all there but Taki refused, explaining to Cyclops that they needed to learn to "read and write and stuff." He also noted that following his fight against N'astirh, his mutant powers had diminished considerably and that he needed real knowledge to be able to control it. The three of them then returned to St. Commons.

(New Mutants Annual I#7/3) - Scott Summers and Jean Grey attended a school play at Saint Simons, where Artie, Leech and Taki sang and acted in a rendition of the classic Disney song It's A Small World After All. Afterwards, they briefly visited with their former charges before returning home. Noticing Artie and Leech were a bit upset after this all-too-short reunion, he decided to cheer them up. Using his powers to reshape his wheelchair into an aircraft that somewhat resembled a flying saucer, he took them for a late night flight. During this unauthorized joyride, they were spotted by UFO enthusiast Ida Fassbender, who quickly took a photo of the passing craft and contacted the media. The next day, Fassbender and her "proof" of extraterrestrial life made headlines. Artie and Leech happened to catch Fassbender on the news, giving a press conference and looking concerned. The elderly lady reminded the two of them of their recently murdered surrogate mother Annalee, which made them inclined to go out and comfort her. After some trials and tribulations, briefly involving the police who thought they were actually aliens, the trio reached Fassbender, who happily took them into her home for a visit. Some time later, Mrs. Huntington came to collect her students, promising they could pay Ida a visit any time.

(New Mutants Annual I#7) - The Alliance of Evil attacked the Saint Simons Academy to clear the way for Harness and Piecemeal, who had come to collect a piece of stray energy belonging to the mutant Proteus. Wiz Kid, Artie and Leech decided to engage the Alliance with Taki forming a makeshift attack vehicle. They stormed out of the dorm room but Tower effortlessly smashed apart the craft while Frenzy and Stinger took care of both Artie and Leech. While Taki lay on the ground, helpless and dazed, he was stomped on by the giant-sized Tower. When he came to in the hospital, most of his bones broken, Taki was met by Tabitha and her new allies: X-Force. He told them what he knew of his attackers.

(X-Force Annual I#1/2) - Taki slowly but surely developed a crush on Mrs. Huntington and was thoroughly annoyed when she began to date one Patrick Conrad. When she was on another date with him, the lovelorn Taki waited up for her. After she hadn't returned to the school after midnight, he went down to her office to look for clues about Conrad. Just as he was searching through her belongings, the lovebirds returned and while Lynne made coffee, Conrad excused himself to make a call in her office. Taki techno-compressed his chair into a metallic egg to quickly duck behind the desk as he overhead Conrad, who came into the office, talking to himself and looking for the files on "filthy mutant scum" Artie and Leech. Shocked, he quickly returned to Artie and Leech and got them to accompany him as he followed Conrad to his anti-mutant terrorist cell. The trio attacked, with Wiz Kid's chair shifted into a make shift iron fist. In the end, the three mutants succeeded in getting Conrad and the others arrested. In the aftermath, Taki tried to comfort the heartbroken Mrs. Huntington by telling her that if only she was willing to wait a few years he knew a guy that would make a great date for her.

(New Avengers I#18 - BTS) - SHIELD analyzed the Collective's multiple energy signatures and traced them back to Wiz Kid and 50+ other former mutants who had all lost their powers on M-Day (see comments).

(Avengers Academy I#21 - BTS) - Wiz Kid joined numerous other young, super powered teenagers at the newly formed Avengers Academy, its campus located at the former site of the Avengers West Coast compound in Palos Verdes, California.

(Avengers Academy I#21) - Wiz Kid enjoyed some super powers-centered downtime with his fellow students while Hank Pym and visiting Avengers Captain America, Hawkeye and Luke Cage looked on.

(Avengers Academy I#22) - Excited after hearing Magneto and Cyclops were about to visit Avengers Academy, Wiz Kid and Batwing rushed to see them arrive. In their hurry they interrupted a heated basketball match between the Academy's original recruits. The Asian Hazmat sneered at Wiz Kid, mockingly calling him "Asian stereotype boy" and wondering if perhaps the new issue of Scientific American had gotten him worked up. Taki told her about Magneto's imminent arrival, which startled Finesse, who would later pick a fight with the master of magnetism, which led to Wiz Kid and the other mutant Academy members to consider if they should act and who to back. Taki ended up doing nothing.

(Avengers Academy I#30) - In the middle of the conflict between the Avengers and the X-Men right before the Phoenix Five crisis, a number of Xavier Institute students were incarcerated at Avengers Academy. Wiz Kid called a meeting in the student lounge of the Academy to discuss the situation with fellow mutants Ricochet, X-23 and Hazmat, who was included not  because she was a mutant but because she was Japanese and Taki felt she could relate to the situation given the fact that Japanese-Americans were forcibly interned during World War II. The meeting didn't immediately resolve anything but when the X-students tried to escape a little while later, Taki and the other mutant Academy members backed their brethren. Before they could come to blows with the other Academy members, Justin Seyfert's malfunctioning Sentinel provided a shared threat. Taki tried to prevent Dust and Surge from hurting the inherently good Sentinel but he was inadvertently knocked out of his flying wheelchair by X-23 who used it as platform to reach the Sentinel's upper arm control booth where Seyfert was hiding. Wiz Kid was still unconscious when Sebastian Shaw showed up to take the mutants away from Avengers Academy.

(Avengers Arena I#13) - Wiz Kid was briefly seen on the grounds of the Avengers Academy when Hank Pym met with the Runaways about the disappearance of Nico Minoru and Chase Stein.

(Young Avengers II#11) - Wiz Kid was contacted by Striker as part of a convoluted "phone tree" construct concocted by Young Avengers member Prodigy (David Alleyne) to help save the world from the threat of the enigmatic Mother.

(Young Avengers II#13 (fb) - BTS) - Wiccan, newly empowered to be the Demiurge capable of stopping Mother, used his abilities to walk across the timescape. Among the vistas of days gone by was a scene with Wiz Kid.

Comments: Created by Louise Simonson (writer), Jon Bogdanove (pencils), Al Williamson and Al Milgrom (inks).

Man, for a preteen paraplegic, Wiz Kid sure got beat up a lot, didn't he? First N'astirh stoned and smacked him around in the closing pages of Inferno and a year or two later, Tower stomped on him just for the fun of it during the appropriately titled 1991 summer crossover Kings of Pain.
The illegitimate lovechild of Forge and Madison Jeffries can hardy catch a break. Enough already.

Also, while I'm sure Louise Simonson had nothing but the best of intentions in mind when she came up with Wiz Kid, since there were only a handful of Asian characters in comics, was it really necessary to make him a bookish, genius kid inventor who was bad at spelling but great at math and who preferred bean sprout and tofu on brown rice with miso over a common candybar? One might say that's a bit of an erm.."Taki" stereotype.

Wiz Kid was listed by SHIELD as one of the many mutants who had lost his powers on M-Day, though he was later seen at Avengers Academy with his abilities apparently still intact. No explanation was given, though it might be possible Taki was indeed depowered and now uses the devices and vehicles he had created in the past to continue his heroic career.

There is another explanation - Wiz Kid deliberately faked his depowering. In the days following M-Day, being one of the handful of still powered mutants got you effectively incarcerated at Xaviers' School, so Wiz Kid used his powers to mess up the files and detection devices to appear to be depowered. The energy signatures that SHIELD detected within the Collective had other inaccuracies. Assuming he messed up a few other files to cover his tracks explains why the wrong Quill got depicted, and why the non-mutant Conquistador, Orlando Furio, was shown, rather than the mutant one, Miguel Provenza.
--Loki


Wiz Kid received a profile in the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Update '89 I#8.

Profile by Norvo.

CLARIFICATIONS:
Wiz Kid should not be confused with


images: (without ads)
Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Update 89 I#8, p27, pan1 (main image)
X-Terminators I#2, p10, pans 5&6 (considers tofu and bean sprouts snacks)
X-Terminators I#2, p17, pans6&7 (had trouble spelling)
X-Terminators I#3, p15, pan3 (makes N'astirhs flunkies sweat)
X-Terminators I#4, p26, pans5&6 (fights N'astirh)
X-Force Annual I#1, p50, pan4 (doesn't need legs to walk)
Avengers Academy I#30, p20, pan1 (used as springing board)


Appearances:
X-Terminators I#1 (October, 1988) -Louise Simonson (writer), Jon Bogdanove (pencils), Al Williamson & Al Milgrom (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
X-Terminators I#2 (November, 1988) -Louise Simonson (writer), Jon Bogdanove (pencils), Al Milgrom (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
X-Terminators I#3 (December, 1988) -Louise Simonson (writer), Jon Bogdanove (pencils), Al Milgrom (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
X-Terminators I#4 (January, 1989) -Louise Simonson (writer), Jon Bogdanove (pencils), Al Milgrom (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
New Mutants I#72 (February, 1989) - Louise Simonson (writer), Bret Blevins (pencils), Al Williamson (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
New Mutants I#74 (April, 1989) - Louise Simonson (writer), Bret Blevins (pencils), Bob Wiacek (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
X-Factor I#40 (May, 1989) - Louise Simonson (writer), Rob Liefeld (pencils), Allen Milgrom (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
New Mutants Annual I#7 (August, 1991) - Fabian Nicieza (writer), Guang Yap (pencils), Dan Panosian (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
New Mutants Annual I#7/3 (August, 1991) - Judy Bogdanove (writer), Jon Bogdanove (pencils), Hilary Barta  (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
X-Force Annual I#1992 (May, 1992) - Gavin Curtis (writer & pencils), Dan Panosian (inks), Bob Harras (editor)
New Avengers I#18 (June, 2006) - Brian Michael Bendis (writer), Mike Deodato Jr. (pencils), Joe Pimentel (inks), Tom Brevoort (editor)
Avengers Academy I#21 (January, 2012) - Christos Gage (writer), Sean Chen (pencils), Scott Hanna (inks), Bill Rosemann (editor)
Avengers Academy I#22 (January, 2012) - Christos Gage (writer),
Sean Chen (pencils), Scott Hanna (inks), Bill Rosemann (editor)
Avengers Academy I#30 (July, 2012) - Christos Gage (writer), Tom Grummett (pencils), Cory Hamscher (inks), Bill Rosemann (editor)
Avengers Arena I#13 (October, 2013) - Christos Gage (writer), Kev Walker & Karl Moine (pencils), Mark Pennington (inks), Jon Moisan & Bill Rosemann (editors)
Young Avengers II#11 (December, 2013) - Kieron Gillen (writer), Jamie McKelvie (pencils & inks), Kris Anka & Mike Norton (inks), Jon Moisan & Lauren Sankovitch (editors)
Young Avengers II#13 (February, 2014) - Kieron Gillen (writer), Jamie McKelvie (pencils & inks), Stephen Thompson, Mike Norton (inks), Lauren Sankovitch (editor)


First Posted: 07/03/2015
Last updated: 07/02/2015

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

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