Quentin Beck was born in Riverside, California. Before becoming Mysterio, Beck was a special-effects wizard who worked for a major studio and had dreams to make a name for himself in the film industry. Quentin Beck began his career as a movie stuntman in Hollywood, then became interested in special effects. He became one of the most accomplished special effects designers in the industry but due to lack of recognition wanted to become an actor with no success. However, he lacked the looks and talent to be a star and the patience to be a director, and saw his career in special-effects to be a dead-end job. When a friend jokingly suggested that the quickest way to become famous was to take out a costumed hero, Beck realized that his expertise in illusions could make him an effective super-villain. Choosing Spider-Man, a relatively weak and inexperienced target, Beck prepared his resources for a few months before attempting to eliminate the wall-crawler^[1]. Mysterio, his chosen identity, became one of Spider-Man's most elusive and persistent foes.

He studied Spider-Man and wanted to emulate and eventually take Spider-Man's place as a costumed crimefighter. Under the guidance of the Tinkerer he became a convincing alien, but was defeated by Spider-Man^[2]. Later he posed as Spider-Man and created the identity of Mysterio^[1], but again was defeated. He joined the Sinister Six^[3] and was one of Spider-Man's more frequent villains. He took on the alias of psychiatrist Ludwig Rinehart and nearly convinced Spider-Man he was insane and to reveal his secret identity^[4].

In later years he was succumbing to cancer and decided to drive a hero insane in the form of Daredevil. After finding out Daredevil's true identity, he brought together an elaborate scheme of driving Daredevil insane by portraying an innocent baby as the Anti-Christ, framing Foggy Nelson for murder and tricking Matt Murdock's ex-lover Karen Page into thinking she was a carrier of H.I.V. due to her past as a porn star. After hiring Bullseye to locate Daredevil and the baby, it resulted in Karen Page's death who died protecting Daredevil. Eventually Mysterio was confronted by Daredevil, and he then committed suicide having nothing to live for, with Daredevil refusing to give him the pleasure of killing Mysterio personally.^[5]

After committing suicide, Beck supposedly came back from Hell in a red Mysterio suit to wreak havoc on Peter Parker's life after Peter was unmasked. Beck took off his helmet at one point to show the giant hole in his head from where he had shot himself, showing he was still dead. It is yet to be seen how he was animated or what sort of new powers he has or whether this was just an illusion.

More recently, Mysterio helped Norman Osborn fake Harry Osborn's death. He has seemingly come back from the dead, and is back in his original green suit.

Now, again as part of the Sinister Six, Mysterio helped Doctor Octopus with his plans of robbing technology. Also, he participed in the battle against Intelligencia, where his group robbed the Zero Cannon and killed almost the whole rival team.

Time later, Doctor Octopus, in his plant to be remembered as the man who saved Earth, offered the chance to stop the Greenhouse effect, as well as speed it up, using a special device connected with different satellites on the orbit.^[6]

Disguised as Al Gore, Chameleon tried to accelerate the decision of world's leaders about the matter, but was uncovered by Spider-Man, who irrupted the scene along the Avengers. When the Chameleon was freed, he arrived in the Mediterranean on a meeting with the rest of the team. The Avengers followed them and arrived, fighting the Sinister Six, but they where all defeated by the villains, the price of the battle was Electro, who was sent to space by Thor.

Using an explosion as a distraction, Silver Sable saved Spider-Man and Black Widow. When they tried to get to one of Octavius manufacturing plants of satellites, they defeated Sandman, but Octavius asked for help to all nations, due his position in the matter, to capture Spider-Man.

Powers and AbilitiesEdit

Abilities

Beck was a master of make-up, physical stunt work, mechanical and visual special effects. He knew basic psychiatry and could employ hypnotism successfully. He also learned a great deal of applied chemistry, especially the use of hallucinogens, and electronics. Beck was a meticulous planner and organizer, and a skilled actor who kept himself in top physical form.

Power Grid ^[7]

* Teleporter

ParaphernaliaEdit

Weapons

Mysterio (in any incarnation) has personal weaponry that include a one-way acrylic glass helmet (with 30 minute air supply) and holographic projector, and gloves and boots armed with nozzles which emit hallucinogenic gas. He developed a gas that can cancel Spider-Man's spider-sense, and when he is cloaked in his mist gases, he uses sonar to detect objects and beings nearby. He also has more advanced technology (not of his own design) at his disposal. Mysterio has also created his own version of Spider-Man's webbing, but lacks the complete knowledge of the formula Spider-Man uses, since Spider-Man had also designed his artificial webbing to begin dissolving after an hour has passed.

TriviaEdit

This character appears in TSR Inc.'s RPG adventure The Weird, Weird West. In the plot, he had been hired by Doctor Doom in 1968 to travel back in time to 1871 Dodge City. Alongside with other super-villains (including Sandman, Black Knight and Scorpion), he was to provide support to Doom while he analyzed a time anomaly and tried to obtain profit from it. Doom took his lackeys (no name was provided for the team) to a Krozzar camp to deal with the Krozzars. Doom eventually found the origin of the anomaly, a chronovore, but he and his lackeys were also found by time-traveling heroes from 1989, and defeated.
The Sinister Six trilogy of novels (Gathering of the Sinister Six, Revenge of the Sinister Six, and Secret of the Sinister Six) strongly imply, but never outright state, that Quentin Beck is gay.