Universe
Marvel Universe

First Appearance
Thor #202 (1972, only Kimball), Thor #203 (1972, Kimball as Genii, Bright Sword and Harvest), Thor #300 (1980, all the rest)

A long time ago, the Celestials, a mysterious, alien race, came to Earth to perform experiments on man’s ancestors. The experiments were genetic in nature, and because of this genetic engineering all humans have the potential to have superhuman abilities written in their genetic code. Nearly a thousand years ago, the Celestials again visited the Earth, but this time was met by a union of the gods who looked after Earth such as Odin of fabled Asgard. The gods knew that the Celestials would eventually return to judge humanity, and if they were deemed unworthy, the Celestials would destroy the Earth. As the male gods made plans to go to war with the Celestials, the goddesses decided on a different course of action. They decided to use the time they had to find nine human subjects and released the latent genetic potential within them. They were then placed in suspended animation and watched over, in turn, by every goddess of every kingdom. These individuals had become known as the Young Gods and while the wife of Odin, Frigga, was absent because of her task of watching over them, Odin chose the last three Young Gods himself. He had the god, Heimdall, contact these individuals and then Odin manipulated Ego-Prime, once part of the sentient planet Ego, to release the superhuman powers within them.

When the Celestials did return, Gaea presented the Young Gods as an offering. She asked that the Celestials train them in the use of their powers and that these beings represented the potential of humanity. The Celestials left Earth with the Young Gods in tow after judging in humanity’s favor, and left the Young Gods to be trained on a distant planet by the aliens, Juniper and Katos.

The Young Gods have since returned to Earth and continue their exploits either as a team or on an individual basis, such as when the member Calculus manipulated Spider-Man, the Avengers and the Space Phantom into removing a deadly swarm of insects from the Earth before they fell into the wrong hands. Another time, the Young Gods discovered the rogue god Nauda was seeking three mystical stones from around the world, and they defeated him by becoming a Uni-Mind.