Fin Fang Foom is a fictional dragon in the Marvel Comics universe, who has served as an ally to various other monsters and an antagonist who has opposed a number of superheroes.

He first appeared in Strange Tales volume 1 #89 (1961).

Although once believed by legend to be a native of the Valley of the Sleeping Dragon in China, Fin Fang Foom - which, roughly translated, means “He Whose Limbs Shatter Mountains and Whose Back Scrapes the Sun” - is an alien being from the world of Kakaranathara.

Resembling a humanoid Chinese dragon, Foom and several other like-minded members of his race departed their peaceful homeworld with the intention of conquering other planets. Landing their craft, of which Foom was the navigator, in ancient China, the crew used their natural shape-shifting powers to mimic human form, intending to enter human society and bide their time before beginning their conquest. Foom was the exception, elected to serve as a “back-up” in case something went wrong, and was placed in a tomb and given a herb that would send him into a deep slumber, so that he might sleep while his fellows entered man’s world.

Fin Fang Foom was somehow briefly awakened in the 8th Century, and returned to sleep through a second application of the herb. He consequently entered into Chinese legend, and a group of humans guarded his tomb, passing the job onto their descendants. And so, Foom slept until the year 1961, when he was deliberatley awakened by teenager Chen Liuchow, whose homeland was under threat from the Communist Chinese. Luichow taunted Foom with the threat of the herb, goading the dragon into chasing him, and led him straight into the Commnunist camp, which Foom decimated. Luichow subsequently led him back into his tomb, where the herb returned Foom to his sleep.

At some point, the sleeping Fin Fan Foom was captured by the Elder of the Universe known as the Collector, and imprisoned in his subterranean collection of monsters. When the Mole Man attacked the facility, Foom and the other monsters were liberated and later rounded up by the recently-formed Fantastic Four and deposited on Monster Isle. However, as the island had no real security measures, and being more intelligent than his fellows and possessing no desire to serve the Mole Man, who used the island as his base, Foom departed and returned to his hibernation. Again, however, outside force acted upon him, as the madman called Doctor Vault mentally controlled Foom and had him attack It the Living Colossus. Resiting the control, Foom instead helped It fend off an invasion of Earth by the alien race called the Stonians, saving the planet for his own race to later conquer. Vault’s mind control briefly forced Foom to battle It, and Foom overpowered his opponent with martial arts before freeing his mind and returning to his tomb yet again.

Years later, Fin Fang Foom was again roused from his slumber when his body was possessed by the demon Aan Taanu. Combating the group of occult adventurers known as the Legion of the Night in New York, Taanu was exorcised from Foom’s body by his opponents, and the confused Foom once again escaped to his resting place.

At some point in the past, the Makulans’ starship had been ransacked by the man who would become the supervillain called the Mandarin, whose signature rings of power were, in fact, artifacts from Makulan’s ship. The Mandarin was directed to the Valley of the Sleeping Dragon by the starship captain, in the human guise of Chen Hsu, and found and awoke Fin Fang Foom, using him to threaten the Chinese government. Iron Man confronted the villains and was defeated, but when the remaining dozen other Makulans shed their human forms to begin their conquest, the Mandarin realised he was being used, and combined the power of his rings with Iron Man’s armor, yielding a small nuclear blast which wiped the dragons out.

This was not, however, the end of Fin Fang Foom. Though his body was destroyed, his spirit enduring, surviving by bonding itself to a small dragon statue which was stolen from a curio shop by teenager Billy Yuan at Foom’s mental urging. Using Yuan’s body as a conduit for his power, Foom summoned thousands of lizards from the sewers beneath New York, merging them with Billy’s body to recreate his own form. Iron Man was successfully able to defeat him, however, with some help from the last remnants of Billy’s mind within Foom’s own, and he was taken into the custody of Sunsen Bain. Legal complications resulted in Foom being exiled to Monster Isle once again, where he and several other monsters briefly battled the dimensionally-displaced Justice League of America.

Shortly after this, Thor was heard to claim that the Hall of Bones on Asgard was crafted from the skeleton of Fin Fang Foom, who he professed to have slain. Whether or not this is an accurate account is in question, as Foom turned up alive and well soon after - Thor’s foe, the Midgard Serpent once adopted Foom’s form, so confusion may stem from that. Having spent some time rethinking his role in the world, Foom had become a follower of Buddhism, and, with the rest of his crew gone, decided to reform. He willfully entered into a rehabilitation program, which saw himself and three other monsters - the robot Elektro, the giant ape Gorgilla and the alien Googam - shrunk down to human size, hypnotically stripped of their powers, and allowed to enter human society. Taking up a job as head chef in a Chinese restaurant within the Baxter Building, he teamed up with the other monsters to defeat the size-changing warlord Tim Boo Baa.

taken from wikipedia