Dr. Manhattan
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Real Name
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Jon Osterman
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First Appearance
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Watchmen #1 (September, 1986)
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Creators
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Alan Moore, Dave Gibbons
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Team Affliations
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Crime Busters, Watchmen [In the film only, in the original comic, there is no team called the Watchmen]
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Alias
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None
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Base of Operations
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New York City
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Powers
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Total Control of Molecules, Teleportation, Precognition, nigh omnipotence
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Skills and Abilities
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Nuclear Scientist, Super Genius Level Intellect
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Tools and Weapons
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Himself.
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Dr. Manhattan is a superhero from the comic book Watchmen and is the only character in the series to have actual superpowers.
Origin[]
When Jon Osterman was trapped in a intrinsic field test chamber, he was seemingly destroyed, only to be slowly reborn as a god-like being afterwards.
Biography[]
Creation[]
Born August 14, 1929, Jon Osterman was raised by his father, a watchmaker and was interested in following in his footsteps. However, when America dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, his father pushed his son to become a physicist, believing that his work was now obsolete (due to the proof of the theory of relativity) and throwing out all of his tools and pieces out Jon's window. Jon followed his father's advice, studying physics and eventually spending 10 years in Harvard University (1948-1958) while earning a Ph.D. in physics.
In early 1959, Jon Osterman accepted a position in a Gila Flats research base to assist with a study involving the intrinsic fields of physical objects that will disintegrate said objects if tampered with. It is here that he met Janey Slater, another researcher at the facility and the two fell in love and became lovers. In July of that year, Jon and Janey, visiting New Jersey, go to an amusement park where a large man accidentally steps on Janey's watch after it falls to the ground when the watchband breaks. Jon promises to fix the watch and that night the two make love, a memory that Jon later considers among his most significant.
On August 20th of that year, Jon attempted to return the newly fixed watch to Janey, only to remember that he left it in his coat that he left inside the intrinsic field test chamber. When Jon retrieved it, he was accidentally locked in and while other workers attempted to turn off the machine and get him out, he was completely vaporized and seemingly killed. Weeks later, strange phenomenon began, including the sighting of a disembodied blue brain and nervous system. In fact this was Jon, transformed into a new sort of high-powered entity, trying to build a body for his free-floating consciousness.
Powers & Abilities[]

Dr. Manhattan on Mars
His power is to control matter (anything and everything around you) and because of this power he can change his size, fly, turn any thing in to any thing else, go through walls, teleportation, multiply himself and objects, and he will not age. He can also see any point in time and space but this power can be stopped by big nuclear explosions in a global scale. And he does not need to breathe.

Dr. Manhattan

Dr manhattan over 50ft tall
Powers[]
- Transcendent Meta Physiology / Pure God Form
- Transcendent Scientist Physiology / Scientist Supreme Physiology
- Connective Energy: Due to being exposed to Connective Energy, Osterman's "intrinsic field" was removed due to an accident that sent his atoms flying, leaving him with barely enough control over his DNA structure. Over time, he was able to re-evaluate his physiology and become Doctor Manhattan, a quantum being of nearly unlimited power.
- Nigh-Omnipotence: Jon's "intrinsic field" was removed due to an accident that sent his atoms flying, leaving him with barely enough control over his DNA structure. Over time, he was able to re-evaluate his physiology and become Doctor Manhattan, a quantum being of nearly unlimited power. Mister Mxyzptlk, a near-omnipotent being in his own right, has stated that Manhattan's power far exceeds his own.
- Nigh-Omniscience: Jon perceives time in a non-linear fashion. This means that he sees the past, present, and the future simultaneously. Likewise, he can grant others with this "atemporal" vision. While originally limited to only his perception of time, Jon later learned to view the timelines of others, as well as possible timelines that never happened. He was able to see the entire timeline of the metaverse when reconstructing the changes he made to it. However, this power can be blocked by tachyons, restricting him to only the present as the only facet of time that he can see and actively experience, blocking his atemporal vision from probing far enough to perceive the future.
- Hyper Cosmic Awareness: Jon possesses an understanding of the workings of the universe on a cosmic scale, and has the ability to oversee other universes as he wishes.
- Chrono Vision / Time Sense
- Precognition: Due to his ability to see the past, present, and future simultaneously, Jon is able to look into the future of his own timeline, or any timeline he wishes.
- Retrocognition: Due to his ability to see the past, present, and future simultaneously, Jon can see past timelines that were erased or altered.
- Time-Travel: Due to his ability to view the timestream from a third person perspective, Jon is capable of traveling throughout the timeline at will. He can also pull others through time along with him. By altering the outcomes of certain events while travelling throughout time, Jon can create new timelines that splinter reality in both past and future.
- Synscience
- Nigh-Omnipresence: After fracturing his timeline into infinite alternate realities, Jon learned that he exists as one entity across all universes throughout the past, present, and future. This allowed him to live in all of these universes simultaneously, until he eventually collapsed all of the timelines into one.
- Bio-Fission: Jon is able to split and replicate himself. He is capable of dividing his quantum consciousness among other separate physical forms resembling his physical appearance.
- Bio-Fusion Manipulation: Likewise with his Bio-Fission ability, Jon can bring his sentient copies back into his body without any adverse side effects.
- Dimensional Travel: Jonathan is able to travel to other realities at will. He was capable of travelling from his universe to Prime Earth.
- Elemental Control: Jon is capable of manipulating elements at will. He was capable of creating an oxygen aura around Laurie Juspeczyk when he brought her to Mars. He was also able to instantly create water. Jon's footsteps have also been shown to create plant life and cause flowers to blossom.
- Electrokinesis: Jon can manipulate electrical energy at will, even electricity that is magical in nature. He was able to cause the Shazam Family's lightning to backfire against them.
- Superhuman Intellect: Jon's mind is far more enhanced than that of a normal human. He has perceived events so tiny and so fast they can hardly be said to have occurred at all.
- Enhanced Senses: Jon's senses are far acuter than any normal human. He has been able to sense the heartbeat of a child inside of an unnoticeably pregnant woman.
- Enhanced Hearing
- Enhanced Vision: Jon states he is able to read atoms.
- Atomic Vision
- Energy Construct Creation: Jon can create and manipulate various energies in a manner that creates matter from virtually nothing. It is unknown whether some of the creations he made were the manipulation of matter, molecules, or entirely quantum energy constructs.
- Energy Projection: Jon is able to manipulate multiple forms of energy with precision. His control over energy is so great that he was able to pull all of the energy out of Guy Gardner's Green Lantern Ring and manipulate it, although he stated he found it difficult to affect. Jon was also stated to be made up of Connective Energy, a form of positive cosmic energy used by Super-Celestials to birth multiverses, opposite in nature to negative Crisis energy. Jon radiates this energy from his body, as well as from the objects he telekinetically levitates. Ozymandias stated that if it was synthesized, it would be able to solve all of the world's energy problems. Jon's energy is also powerful enough to create life, as displayed when he used his energy to accelerate evolution on an uninhabited planet.
- Living Activation Power Plant
- Bio-Energetic Transduction
- Flight: Manhattan is not restrained by basic physical laws and can levitate and fly at will.
- Force Field: Jon is capable of projecting powerful force-fields.
- Immortality: After his transformation, Jon never appears to age physically and mentally. He stated that his appearance was based on his perception of himself, and since his perception of himself does not change, his appearance does not change or age.
- Intangibility: Bullets and blows travel through Jon; as such, he can allow all objects to pass through him without so much as a reaction. He can extend this ability to other people and objects. His intangibility coincides with his ability to phase through matter, allowing him to pass through solid substances without any considerable difficulty or loss of control. His intangibility has no specific emphasized drawbacks.
- Phasing: Jon is capable of phasing his body through solid matter.
- Invulnerability: Jon possesses incredible durability and is practically invulnerable to any physical harm. His durability has allowed him to walk across the sun unharmed.
- Magic: When attacked by Etrigan and Zatanna, Jon analyzed their magical energies and quickly learned to replicate their spells, creating a powerful magic sigil that projected a massive energy blast.
- Eldritch Blast
- Magical Energy Manipulation
- Molecular Reconstruction: Jon was able to restructure himself after the removal of his intrinsic field. Manhattan is not limited to using this reconstruction power only on himself. He has taken apart most inanimate objects and even taken apart human beings as well as reconstructing Martian sand into large glass structures. He was also able to instantly transform water into milk.
- Disintegration: Jon is capable of using his power to completely disintegrate human beings.
- Molecular Acceleration: Jon is able to use his power to accelerate the speed of molecules, causing massive explosions at will.
- Absolute Regeneration: Jon can regenerate his entire body from total disintegration (down to the sub-atomic level), endlessly, as long as his consciousness survives. He was also able to instantly recover from a snapped neck.
- Reforming Reforming
- Photokinesis: Jon can shift the color frequencies of the light around him in order to hide his true appearance and make himself appear as he wishes others to see him.
- Power Distribution: Jon was capable of transferring his power to Clark Dreiberg. He was also able to imbue a portion of his power into the Mobius Chair.
- Radiation Production: Jon's body emits some level of ultraviolet radiation.
- Thermokinesis: When Jon restructured his body, he produced great amounts of heat from his body's ultraviolet radiation. It was great enough to give nearby people sunburns.
- Radiation Generation
- Radiation Physiology
- Radiation Empowerment
- Bio-Nuclear Manipulation / Living Nuclear Power Plant
- Bio-Radiation Manipulation
- Reality Alteration: Jon can create new universes with even the most casual act, as well as destroy them. He was able to merge multiple timelines that he had created into one. After the events of Flashpoint, when Barry Allen attempted to revert his universe back to normal, Jon interfered with this process by erasing ten years from that would-be, reverted universe, creating Prime Earth as a side-effect. He was later able to undo all of the alterations he had made to Prime Earth, reverting back to the way it was before he interfered. Jon was also able to keep the Flashpoint timeline in existence after it was supposed to be erased, as well as erase this universe himself later.
- Absolute Condition
- Physical Godhood/ Physical Perfection
- Self-Sustenance: Jon doesn't require food, sleep, or oxygen to survive.
- Superhuman Strength: While in microscopic size, superhuman heights or in a seemingly normal form, he displayed great physical strength such as hurling tanks, lifting planetary structures, and heaving delicate technological equipment about.
- Physical Godhood/ Physical Perfection
- Telekinesis: Jon is capable of manipulating the movement of objects with his mind. He could also use this ability to cause a person's head to forcefully explode.
- Telepathy: Jon is able to telepathically invade the minds of others, as displayed when he forcibly showed Ronnie Raymond a vision of the past.
- Teleportation: By warping space around him, Jon can teleport himself and others at will. Jon had teleported huge and small objects, people and animals alike.
- Energy Mimicry
- Bio-Electroweak Manipulation
- Binding Energy Manipulation
- Replication
- Nigh-Omniscience: Jon perceives time in a non-linear fashion. This means that he sees the past, present, and the future simultaneously. Likewise, he can grant others with this "atemporal" vision. While originally limited to only his perception of time, Jon later learned to view the timelines of others, as well as possible timelines that never happened. He was able to see the entire timeline of the metaverse when reconstructing the changes he made to it. However, this power can be blocked by tachyons, restricting him to only the present as the only facet of time that he can see and actively experience, blocking his atemporal vision from probing far enough to perceive the future.
- Ultimate Power
- Absolute Wave Absorption
- Potential Energy Power Link
- Space-Time Lock
- Nigh-Omnipotence: Jon's "intrinsic field" was removed due to an accident that sent his atoms flying, leaving him with barely enough control over his DNA structure. Over time, he was able to re-evaluate his physiology and become Doctor Manhattan, a quantum being of nearly unlimited power. Mister Mxyzptlk, a near-omnipotent being in his own right, has stated that Manhattan's power far exceeds his own.
- Physics Powered Physiology
- Meta Science/Omni-Science
- Connective Energy: Due to being exposed to Connective Energy, Osterman's "intrinsic field" was removed due to an accident that sent his atoms flying, leaving him with barely enough control over his DNA structure. Over time, he was able to re-evaluate his physiology and become Doctor Manhattan, a quantum being of nearly unlimited power.
- Transcendent Scientist Physiology / Scientist Supreme Physiology
Abilities[]
- Architecture
- Genius Level Intellect
- Science
- Nuclear Physics
- Quantum Mechanics
- Intuitive Perception
- Sexual Mastery
Weaknesses[]
- Mental Disorder: Without being able to truly feel or embrace things in a virgin perception, Doctor Manhattan had begun to lose his sight of humanity and his sense of humor. He grew bored of the Earth and its inhabitants multiple times. He finally chose to leave Earth after he stated he understood humanity again; signifying his final departure from humanity. His inability to understand emotions lead to him creating utter chaos on Prime Earth, all just for the sake of sating his curiosity about that reality
- Veidt correctly assumed tachyons; a large burst of them can slow his ability to see the future to a moderate extent, but still, his telekinetic powers were unaffected. (Note: tachyons exist only in theoretical physics)
- Although it was not seen in practice, Dr. Manhattan surmised that an EM pulse would cause such "static" that obscures the future, hinting at another possible weakness.
Extended Links[]
- Dr. Manhattan from DC Comics Wikia
- Dr. Manhattan from Watchman Wikia
- Dr. Manhattan from Wikipedia