Cable Facts

Are you a fan of Nathan Summers? Because we got One Dozen Cable Facts from the future!

1. Cable's parents are Scott Summers/Cyclops and Madelyn Pryor. Pryor is a clone of Jean Grey created by Mister Sinister. Rachel Summers and Nate Summers-who come from an alternate future-share the same father, but have Jean Grey as a mother. Cable was also the subject for the creation of his evil clone Stryfe. 

2. Nathan Summers is infected with the Techno-Organic Virus, which turns the victim's body into metal. Cable uses a majority of his telekinetic powers to fight the virus back. In his timeline, Cable was infected when he was a child by Apocalypse and Scott allowed a woman named Anaski to take Cable to the future where he could be cured. This was a one-way trip and Nathan grew up to become the half-metal mutant.

3. Cable is the founding member of X-Force, which was founded in "The New Mutants #100" in 1991. His team included characters like Shatterstar, Cannonball, and Warpath, to name a few. In 2004, Cable's creators Louise Simonson and Rob Liefeld wrote "Deadpool & Cable". Deadpool's mouthy attitude and Cable's stoic personality meshed well together, leading to the characters having a love/hate relationship.

4. In 2005, Scarlet Witch used her reality-altering powers to remove a majority of mutants from Earth and turn them into humans. Only 198 mutants kept their powers and the X-Gene was wiped out from genetics around the world. The first mutant born after "Decimation" was a little girl Cable named Hope. Hope's town was destroyed an anti-mutant group and Cable saves her. Cable believes Hope is a Mutant Messiah, but fellow time-traveler Bishop believed she was "a mutant anti-christ". Cable raised Hope in the far future, training her how to use her mutant powers. She became significant in the event "Avengers vs X-Men" and remained an X-Men in the future.

5. Cable shortly led The Avengers Unity Division in "Uncanny Avengers" where he helped the heroes battle Stryfe. This team included fellow X-Men like Rogue and Deadpool.

6. In the "Earth X" reality, Cable is fully infected and becomes a blob of metal. In "Deadpool Pulp" Cable is a US military General who hires Wade Wilson to steal back a nuclear briefcase. In "Marvel Zombies" he helped Forge create artificial limbs for Black Panther, who's limbs were eaten by a zombie Hank Pym. In the fantasy-inspired "Wolverine: Rahne of Terra" Cable is known as The Mage, and he wields a crossbow and a staff made from the body of the alien mutant Warlock. In The Ultimate Universe, Cable is actually the future version of Wolverine who comes back in time to train Professor X in preparation for Apocalypse's appearance.

7. Artist Alex Ross has admitted to hating Cable's design. He felt that Rob Liefeld's character "looked like they just threw up everything on the character". Writer Mark Waid asked Alex Ross to create the character Magog based off the character design aspects Ross hated most. When creating Magog, Ross used Cable and Shatterstar's helmet and claimed the helmet just made the design one his favorites of the book.

8. Cable's middle name is Charles, named after Scott's adopted father Charles Xavier. Rob Liefeld created Cable by the direction of Louise Simonson to be a "man of action" to be the opposite of Charles Xavier and lead The New Mutants after him. Rob named the character Cable, but editor Bob Harris suggested the name Quinn and Louise thought of Commander X. One of Cable's solo series was titled "Soldier X".

9. Cable once had a wife in the future named Jenskot, but she was killed by a grenade. His second wife was named Hope. When Cable raised the "Mutant Messiah" he had been in a relationship with Hope and married her. She was killed fighting robotic insects and protecting the child. In her memory, Cable named the child Hope. Cable has also had romantic relationships with Domino, Psylocke, and Storm.

10. Cable once traveled the time-stream in an entity named Ship, a transforming, metal-bodied, artificial intelligence created by The Celestials to imitate humans.

11. In an event where Cable battles The Avengers, Cable defeated Iron Man, Captain America, The Falcon, and Red Hulk. After this event, Cable is hit with Hope's Phoenix Force which cured him of his Techno-Organic Virus. This gave him his original flesh and the ability to see multiple timelines. This eventually wore off.

12. Mister Sinister orchestrated the events of Cable's life. He created the clone Madelyn Pryor to fall in love with Scott Summers because of Scott's powerful X-Genes. He planned on Apocalypse infecting the baby and having the child sent to the future. Mister Sinister did all of this in an effort to create a mutant who could kill Apocalypse.