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Description
Name: Patrick O'Brian
Group: Justice League of America, Justice Society International
First Appearance: Secret Origins Vol 2 #30
(September, 1988)

"Plastic Man survived for 3000 years as little more than crumbs scattered around the Atlantic. If that doesn't give you an idea of the level of power he hides behind that doofy smile of his, then you're brain dead." - Batman

Patrick "Eel" O'Brian was a small-time crook who became the stretchable superhero Plastic Man. He usually hid behind a smile and a joke, but was a very powerful member of the Justice League of America.

Some years ago, the criminal known as Eel O'Brian, along with his gang of underlings, broke into and attempted to rob Cole Chemical, but the police arrived on the scene. While Eel and the others fled, he was shot by a cop and exposed to an unknown acid. He managed to make it outside but collapsed, unconscious from the pain. When he awoke, Eel found that his flesh was elastic, and he had no control over it, morphing into strange and frightful forms. He scared everyone in his path: cops, drunks, and even his own gang, who thought him already dead, and shot him upon seeing his new form. Eel went to a bridge to commit suicide, but he is stopped by Woozy Winks, a former Arkham Asylum inmate. Together, they decided to use O'Brian's new-found powers to fight crime. After exposing a circus outfit to the same acid which gave him powers, O'Brian and Woozy thwarted an attempted robbery by his former gang. When the press interviewed him, Eel said he intends to call himself Elastic Man, which a reporter misheard as Plastic Man.

In the 1940s a crook named Patrick "Eel" O'Brian was shot by a security guard at the Crawford Chemical Works and struck by a falling drum full of an unidentified acid, some of which entered Eel's wound. He was saved in Rest Haven by a mysterious order of monks whose example cured his penchant for crime. This was the first time he had experienced mentorship from a positive male role model: "Eel" grew up with an abusive father who abandoned him at a Catholic nunnery. The acid bath gave him the ability to change his shape. He wore dark glasses and a red and yellow costume as flexible as his body. Whatever shape he took, the colors remained the same, so there would be a red-and-yellow chandelier over a table full of plotting gangsters, or a red-and-yellow abstract painting hanging on the wall, but the villains never caught on until it was too late.

At the request of President Franklin Roosevelt, Plastic Man helped bring together the All-Star Squadron, aided them in stopping Per Degaton's plan to force America to fight the war on a third front, and on one occasion impersonated Roosevelt himself to foil a Nazi assassination plot. During World War II, he also joined the Freedom Fighters. Plastic Man's exploits after World War II are largely unknown, though he was remembered decades later by individuals such as Robby Reed, who once transformed into a copy of Plastic Man with his H-Dial. Because of their powers, "Plas" have stayed youthful into modern times. Plastic Man (sometimes called "Plas") later acquired a sidekick called Woozy Winks, a clumsy oaf who was originally a brilliant F.B.I. agent. Woozy became a dumb but loyal friend of Plastic Man.

Description
Name: Patrick O'Brian
Group: Justice League of America, Justice Society International
First Appearance: Secret Origins Vol 2 #30
(September, 1988)

"Plastic Man survived for 3000 years as little more than crumbs scattered around the Atlantic. If that doesn't give you an idea of the level of power he hides behind that doofy smile of his, then you're brain dead." - Batman

Patrick "Eel" O'Brian was a small-time crook who became the stretchable superhero Plastic Man. He usually hid behind a smile and a joke, but was a very powerful member of the Justice League of America.

Some years ago, the criminal known as Eel O'Brian, along with his gang of underlings, broke into and attempted to rob Cole Chemical, but the police arrived on the scene. While Eel and the others fled, he was shot by a cop and exposed to an unknown acid. He managed to make it outside but collapsed, unconscious from the pain. When he awoke, Eel found that his flesh was elastic, and he had no control over it, morphing into strange and frightful forms. He scared everyone in his path: cops, drunks, and even his own gang, who thought him already dead, and shot him upon seeing his new form. Eel went to a bridge to commit suicide, but he is stopped by Woozy Winks, a former Arkham Asylum inmate. Together, they decided to use O'Brian's new-found powers to fight crime. After exposing a circus outfit to the same acid which gave him powers, O'Brian and Woozy thwarted an attempted robbery by his former gang. When the press interviewed him, Eel said he intends to call himself Elastic Man, which a reporter misheard as Plastic Man.

In the 1940s a crook named Patrick "Eel" O'Brian was shot by a security guard at the Crawford Chemical Works and struck by a falling drum full of an unidentified acid, some of which entered Eel's wound. He was saved in Rest Haven by a mysterious order of monks whose example cured his penchant for crime. This was the first time he had experienced mentorship from a positive male role model: "Eel" grew up with an abusive father who abandoned him at a Catholic nunnery. The acid bath gave him the ability to change his shape. He wore dark glasses and a red and yellow costume as flexible as his body. Whatever shape he took, the colors remained the same, so there would be a red-and-yellow chandelier over a table full of plotting gangsters, or a red-and-yellow abstract painting hanging on the wall, but the villains never caught on until it was too late.

At the request of President Franklin Roosevelt, Plastic Man helped bring together the All-Star Squadron, aided them in stopping Per Degaton's plan to force America to fight the war on a third front, and on one occasion impersonated Roosevelt himself to foil a Nazi assassination plot. During World War II, he also joined the Freedom Fighters. Plastic Man's exploits after World War II are largely unknown, though he was remembered decades later by individuals such as Robby Reed, who once transformed into a copy of Plastic Man with his H-Dial. Because of their powers, "Plas" have stayed youthful into modern times. Plastic Man (sometimes called "Plas") later acquired a sidekick called Woozy Winks, a clumsy oaf who was originally a brilliant F.B.I. agent. Woozy became a dumb but loyal friend of Plastic Man.