Description

Personality

Ben is generally thick-skulled and in a bad mood, and he likes to take his anger out on whatever gets in his way. Finese and stealth are generally not his strong suits. However, he also displays a philosophical nature, and likes to take walks back to Yancy street, in bouts of nostalgia. Usually, these result in the gang throwing trash at him.
Johnny likes to play praks on him, and often this will lead to fighting, insults, and Sue having to pull them apart before they hurt someone. Although Ben has been known to prank back on occasion.

Equipment

He only wears a pair of blue shorts as his uniform. On the exceedingly rare event that he isn't the Thing, Reed has made Ben a suit to replicate the Thing's powers. No other equipment.

History

Benjamin J. Grimm was born on Yancy Street on Manhattan's Lower East Side, where he grew up in poverty. His father, an alcoholic, was unable to hold a job. Much of the family's income came from Ben'solder brother, Danny, who was the leader of the Yancy Street Gang. Ben idolized his brother, and became embittered against the world when Danny was killed in a battle between rival gangs. at that Time, he was only 8 years old; within 10 years, he would succeed his brother as leader of the Yancy Street Gang. After his parents died, Ben was taken in by his Uncle Jake, who had risen from poverty to become a successful physician. At first he resisted his new guardians' kindness toward him. But eventually, he came to return their love. He left his life with the Yancy Street Gang behind, entered high school, and became a football star there. While he was a senior at Stuyvesant High School, Ben received a football scholarship to Empire State University.
His freshman year roommate was the brilliant science student Reed Richards, who eventually became his closest friend. During their first meeting Reed confided in Ben, that it was his intention someday to build a starship for interstellar travel. Ben jokingly promised that he would pilot the starship for Richards if he ever built it.

Upon graduating he went into the U.S. Air Force and became a highly skilled test pilot and astronaut. In the meantime Richards went ahead with his project to build a starship, using both his own fortune and funding from the Federal government. On the day that Grimm left the military, Reed came to Ben to remind him of his promise to pilot the starship.

Reed's project was based in Central City, California. When the federal government threatened to withdraw its funding from his project, Reed decided to take the starship on a test flight himself as soon as possible. Ben was opposed to the idea, warning (rightly) that the starship's shielding might prove to be inadequate protection from intense radiation storms. Nevertheless, he was persuaded to be the pilot, and Richards' future wife Sue Storm and her young brother Johnny insisted on accompanying them as passengers. The four friends stole onto the launch facility, entered the starship, and launched it. They intended to travel through hyperspace to another solar system and back. However, unknown to Reed, a solar flare caused Earth's Van Allen radiation belts to be filled temporarily with unprecedented (as far as is known), ultra-high levels of cosmic radiation. Since the ship was designed to shield against ordinary levels of radiation, the cabin interior was subject to intense cosmic ray bombardment which irradiated the four passengers and wrought havoc on the ship's controls. Ben was forced to abort the flight and return to Earth.

Once back on Earth, the four passengers discovered that the cosmic radiation had triggered mutagenic changes in their bodies. Ben was transformed into an orange colored, thick-skinned, heavily muscled, and superhumanly strong "thing." Richards convinced the three others that the four of them should use their new powers for the good of humanity as members of a team ha named the Fantastic Four. Richards called himself Mister Fantastic, Susan and Johnny Storm took the names of the Invisible Girl (later Woman) and the Human Torch, and Ben, morose (as he would be for countless years) over his new grotesque appearance, named himself the Thing. Under Richards' leadership the Fantastic Four has become Earth's most honored team of superhuman adventurers, and has saved the world from conquest or destruction many times.

Over the years the mutations to the Thing's body have continued to progress slowly. The composition of his epidermis changed from an abnormally dense, somewhat lumpy but still comparatively smooth hide to a flexible, interlocking network of rock-like lumps. His superhuman strength increased considerably over time. Early in his life as the Thing, Ben would sometimes revert to his original human form unexpectedly. But neither these changes nor those induced by Richards in his efforts to turn Ben back to human form ever proved to be permanent. Eventually Grimm always reverted to his monstrous, superhumanly powerful form. Appalled by his appearance, he was at first filled always with anger at his situation, but he eventually became resigned to his fate, although he continued to be disturbed by his appearance and to hope for a means of regaining his human form that would last.

Eventually, fate stepped in, and Ben found love. The girl was Alicia Masters, daughter of the villain the Puppet Master, and a famous blind sculptress. For a time they lived together in harmony, as much that could be had. Often Ben feared that the only reason Alicia loved him was because she could not see him. They never married.

Their began to fall apart when Ben was transported to the distant "Battleworld" by the alien Beyonder for the first of the so-called "secret wars." On that planet Ben found himself able to change to human form and back. Once the "secret war" was over, he remained on the planet for months. Eventually, however, he found himself trapped once again in his monstrous form, unable to change to human form, and he returned to Earth. There he learned that Johnny and Alicia had become lovers (and would eventually marry). Furious and distraught, Ben quit the Fanatic Four. He worked for a time as a superhumanly strong wrestler for the Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation, and also participated in missions with the West Coast Avengers.