Grey Gargoyle

The Grey Gargoyle, born Paul Duval, is a French scientist and villain with the ability to turn objects and people to stone by touch.

Biography

In 1964, Paul Duval botched an experiment, spilling a potion on himself that caused his hands to turn to stone. He found that touching other things with his hands had the same effect; while touching other humans caused them to become inanimate statues for an hour, he could safely touch himself and simply take on a tough rocky skin. He used this power to take on a life of crime as the Grey Gargoyle, and quickly set his sights on the hero Thor. Duval was interested in Thor's hammer Mjölnir, which was apparently the source of his immortality. Flying to Thor's home base of New York City, Gargoyle was not subtle about turning random innocents to stone. He trailed Thor to the office of one Dr. Don Blake (secretly Thor's alterego), fighting him and eventually knocking Mjölnir from his hand. Gargoyle found that he couldn't lift the hammer despite his significant strength, and so turned Thor to stone instead and escaped. Later, he witnessed Thor flying through the sky despite the fact that 24 hours hadn't elapsed. In fact, it was simply an image created by a projector attached to a motorcycle driven by Don Blake across the city. Gargoyle eventually caught on, chasing Blake into the river and sinking to the floor. Trapped in his stone form, Gargoyle was stuck motionless at the bottom of the river for several months.

In early 1965, a pair of archaeologists recovered the Gargoyle from the bottom of the Hudson River and examined him in a museum, believing him to be potentially a relic from an ancient culture. Gargoyle soon came to, turned them to stone, and began to regather his senses. He set his sights once more on Thor, eager to learn the secret of his apparent immortality. Gargoyle returned to the office of Don Blake, demanding to know where to find Thor. He chased Blake and his nurse Jane Foster into the streets, and quickly had them at his mercy. Thor had had his power stripped by Odin moments before Gargoyle's arrival, but had it returned to him in time for Blake to transform into Thor and pelt Gargoyle with a blast of electricity. Thor fused the limbs of Gargoyle's stone form against his torso, preventing him from moving, and allowing the police to easily bring him to justice. By the end of the year, Gargoyle was out of jail, and was coerced by Doctor Doom's emotion machine into attacking the Baxter Building on the day of the wedding of Reed Richards and Sue Storm. A veritable legion of villains fought a similarly powerful force of heroes defending the Baxter Building. In the end, Reed Richards used a device provided by Uatu to transport all of the villains back slightly in time and wipe their memories of these events. Reed and Sue Storm were thus successfully and peacefully married.