OBEDIENCE DISKS / NEURO-LANCES

Classification: Extraterrestrial (Sakaar) technological item

Creator: Sakaarian Imperial engineers, based on Kree technology

User/Possessors: Hiroim the Shamed, Hulk/Bruce Banner, Elloe Kaifi, Ronan Kaifi, Korg, Margus, Miek, No-Name of the Brood, Silver Surfer/Silver Savage (Norrin Radd), Lavin Skee; other unidentified Kronans
    virtually all slaves/gladiators under the Red King, at least

First Appearance: Incredible Hulk III#93 (May, 2006)

Powers/Abilities/Functions: The "obedience disks" (also known as "obedience slugs" or "control disks") are attached to a protruding spike that is plugged directly into the victim's central nervous system.

    Via a staff known as a Neuro-Lance, one may send an extremely powerful electrical current through the disk-wearer's nervous system, compelling the victim to obey commands.

    Under some circumstances, a terminal charge can be projected from the Neuro-Lance into the Obedience Disc, incinerating at least an adult male, unpowered wearer.

    The Neuro-Lance's range is unspecified, but is at least effective over several yards; further it can affect multiple victims (at least five) at once.

    Even beings as powerful as the Hulk and the Silver Surfer were not able to resist the Obedience Disks.

    Those who resist the Neuro-Lance's control for an extended period may be killed or severely brain-damaged.

    Obedience Disks were implanted via some sort of hand-held device that resembled a gun/blaster of some sort.

    The Obedience Disks were used primarily to prevent slaves and gladiators from rebelling. The technology has also proven effective against beings without traditional nervous systems, such as robots or beings composed of rock-like material, due to its ability to interfere with and override their sensory and motor functions. 

History:
(Planet Hulk: Gladiator Guidebook#1: The Imperials: Technology: Miscellaneous Technology: Obedience Disks) <Circa 551 Post (see comments)> - The Great Portal brought a Kree Starstealth-class Assault Vessel -- which had been departing a Kree space station web located in the Milky Way galaxy's Duggil star system. In addition to several hundred Kree Uni-Blaster weapons, the Empire found a small arsenal of Kree Neuro-Lances, staff-like weapons that could shock a victim's central nervous system to the point of death.

    The Empire's engineers not only replicated the Kree technology, but vastly improved upon it. While the original design of the Neuro-Lance (or "Obedience Staff," as it is also called) required the user to be in close proximity to his or her intended victim, the Empire's engineers created disk-like receptors that allowed the Neuro-Lance's user to debilitate victims from a safe distance.

    The Obedience Disks were used primarily to prevent slaves and gladiators from rebelling.

(Incredible Hulk III#93 (fb) - BTS / Planet Hulk: Gladiator Guidebook#1: The Great Games: Skee (fb) - BTS) <Approximately two years before the main story> - A number of Kronans, including Korg and Margus, became prisoners on the planet Sakaar, where they were sent to the Maw to become gladiators.

    Margus and the other Kronans resisted their implants, and lost their minds, while Korg complied.

(Incredible Hulk III#93) - An Obedience Disk was implanted into the Hulk and the other would-be gladiators upon or before their arrival at the Maw.

(Incredible Hulk III#93 / Planet Hulk: Gladiator Guidebook#1: The Imperials: Ronan Kaifi - BTS) - Primus Vand cut off Ronan Kaifi's rant using a weapon that sent a terminal feedback charge through Ronan's Obedience Disk, vaporizing Kaifi.

(Incredible Hulk III#93) - Primus Vand activated the Hulk's Obedience Disk (see comments), forcing him to kneel.

    That evening, in their prison pen, Miek unsuccessfully tried to pull off his Obedience Disk, receiving a painful energy jolt as a result.

(Incredible Hulk III#94) - The Hulk and his gladiatorial group wore Obedience Disks to no consequence during their confrontations with the Death's Head Warguards on the Dreamskipper or in the Great Arena.

(Incredible Hulk III#95 (fb)) - After the Silver Surfer traveled through the Great Portal. Weakened, he was implanted with a slave disc by a number of Death's Head Warguards. He was thereafter forced to serve as a gladiator, the Silver Savage.

(Incredible Hulk III#94) - The Obedience Disk-wearing "Silver Savage" was prepared to face the Hulk and his allies (who had just declared themselves Warbound) in the Great Arena.

(Incredible Hulk III#95) - Via the Obedience Disk, the Silver Surfer's keeper forced him to reveal his origins to Caiera.

    Later, in the Great Arena, the Surfer was forced to attack the Hulk;  until a coordinated attack allowed the Hulk to shatter the Surfer's obedience Disk and beat the Surfer into submission.

    When the Red King instructed Caiera to have Primus Vand use the Obedience Disks to force the Warbound to slay Elloe Kaifi as a traitor, the Warbound resisted but were dropped to their knees; Caiera warned them they would fry their brains. However, the recovering Surfer then destroyed the Warbound's Obedience Disks and then Disks of the rest of the slaves in the Arena. The Warbound then broke out of the Arena and departed.

Comments: Created by Greg Pak (writer), Carlo Pagulayan (penciler), Jeffrey Huet.

    Arch-E told the Hulk he had been implanted by an "Obedience Slug" in Incredible Hulk III#93, but the art clearly shows an Obedience Disk, which is what they were called from #94 onward. Slug would make me thing it was some sort of organic creature that would force compliance, kind of like whatever Khan had put in Chekov's ear in Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan...but slug also refers to an elongated, typically rounded piece of metal.

    Or maybe there was some sort of breakdown in communication between writing and art in this issue. Maybe they had considered using organic slugs as the control vehicle, but a technological Disk was drawn instead...or maybe they used to use organic controls before switching to technological ones, and Arch-E just used an archaic term?

    Sakaarian calendar

•     The modern Sakaar calendar is a system of numbering years from the birth of the Father Emperor's oldest known ancestor.
•     The "current" year at the time of the Hulk's arrival on Sakaar was 566 Post, of 566 years after that start date.
• Which means the Sakaarian engineers first obtained the Neuro-Lance technology roughly five years before the Hulk arrived on Sakaar.
  
•     Generally, when something notes something as a number of years ago, that's from the stories...when a specific date is given, that 's from the Modern Sakaarian Calendar.

Profile by Snood.

CLARIFICATIONS:
The Obedience Disks of Sakaar should be distinguished from:

• Slave Collars - used on Kral to control gladiators--Fantastic Four I#93-ish
• other slave/control/pain-inducing/compliance-forcing technology
  

images: (without ads):
Incredible Hulk III#93, pg. 3, panel 6 (Neuro-Lance close-up);
        pg. 4, panel 1 (Vand demonstrating Neuro-Lance to Hulk);
    #95, pg. pg. 3, panel 2 (Death's Head Warguards bonding Obedience Disk to Silver Surfer);
       pg. 13, panel 1 (close-up of Obedience Disk on Hulk's chest);
       pg. 17, panel 1 (Vand threatening Warbound with Neuro-Lance);
       panel 2 (Warbound dropped to knees by Obedience Disks)

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

First posted: 07/27/2019
Last updated: 07/27/2019

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