- "I am still the shining one - while you remain no more than the banished sickly boy grown old in grotesque parody of my righteous life."
- ―The Golden Boy
- "It isn't you who's right or me who's injured. We're two halves of the problem—symptoms of the same disease."
- ―John about his brother
John Constantine's mirror twin brother. He was born together his identical twin brother, being the more perfect twin who died in the womb. He and his unborn twin brother had become almost one. He was ostensibly meant to be the greatest magus who would live, uniting Britain in an age of magi, but apparently died before being born. There were two explanation surrounding the infant's death; one was that the father Thomas Costantine attempted to get rid of it using a botched abortion, and two is that the other twin infant John Constantine unknowingly strangled him to death with their own umbilical cord. It later turns out that his spirit had been manipulating the events in John's life, including his cancer during Garth Ennis' Dangerous Habits, and his memory loss during Mike Carey'sStations of the Cross arc.
He apparently lives in an alternate universe where he survived while John was the one who perished. That universe itself lives in an almost perfect world with him as its ruler. His looks appears to be of similar of John, but is more beautiful and healthy, and sports longer, more golden hair due to not suffering the excesses and temptations of life like John has endured.
First Appearance in Hellblazer issue 35.
Background[]
At birth, due to a previous abortion caused by father, John Constantine came into the world almost lifeless, surprising everyone with his initial weakness but managing to survive. The mother was completely disfigured inside; they hadn't expected twins. The doctors were shocked to find another hidden baby, this time a perfectly healthy child, very different from the previous one. This led the doctors to express their regret, considering it one of the twists of fate. John, the fragile and small boy who survived. Thomas Constantine blamed John for everything: the death of his wife, the death of the healthy son. John grew up small, frail, and unloved, constantly reminded that he had lived in place of someone better. Hellblazer #39
In another reality, it was John who died, and the Golden Boy lived a fortunate life. Raised by a loving father, he experienced the affection and opportunities that were never available to his counterpart. In that world, he was regarded as exceptional, and his future was filled with promise. He would become “the father of all,” the greatest magician, even managing to save people John could not.Hellblazer #40
He and his brother began to appear in each other’s realities — the Golden Boy showing up like an imaginary friend in John’s world, while in the Golden Boy’s dimension John appeared as a grey, frail child, little more than a shadow.
On an important day at his mother’s grave, the Golden Boy encounters the weak boy the other side of himself, the one who survived in place of his perfection. John starts to feel envy. The Golden Boy, moved by compassion, tries to approach and comfort him, but is met with a bitter, resentful glare that pushes him away. In that moment, he rejects that part of himself.
The Hanged Man[]
Marj gathers the family she built — herself, Mercury, John, Errol, and Zed — at a seaside campsite, sensing that John will soon leave again. Feeling uneasy, he asks Zed for a tarot reading. He draws The Hanged Man, The Tower, and The Magus.
When John focuses on The Hanged Man, he relives the moment of his birth: he was born weak, while a healthier twin died undiscovered inside their mother. Thomas Constantine rejected him once the truth was known. The vision reinforces John’s belief that his life began with a loss that shaped everything after.
Seeking clarity, John takes a large dose of mushrooms and enters a ruined tower. Under the hallucinations, he symbolically returns to the womb and encounters the bright presence of his unborn brother. Jealousy almost drives him to repeat the fatal act, but he restrains himself and allows the twin to “become the Magus,” the role he was meant to fill.
By morning, John has vanished, leaving behind only his clothes and the tarot card of The Hanged Man, with no clear explanation for those around him.Hellblazer #39
The Magus[]
In the parallel narrative, the Magus the twin who survived in the alternate reality senses the presence of the sickly brother he left behind. When they finally confront each other, both understand that neither is innocent: each twin lived because the other died.
Lightning destroys the Magus’s tower, and Zed’s group finds him seemingly dead. As they take him to Ravenscar, they recall the extraordinary life he lived successful, gifted, admired, and capable of deeds John never achieved.
The Magus suddenly awakens. He realizes that the imbalance between the worlds is tied to his unresolved connection with John. Preparing to leave Ravenscar, he admits that the “breach” in his defenses was not caused by an enemy, but by another version of himself the twin he pushed away long ago.
In meditation, he enters a convergence point where all timelines meet and finds John waiting for him. John explains that neither twin is guiltless: both played a role in each other’s death in their respective timelines. Instead of fighting, they choose unity. They hold hands and walk toward a merged existence.
Afterward, John disappears from the physical world. Only a stone slab, his coat, and the Tarot card of The Magus remain, leaving his companions without answers.Hellblazer #40
The Roots of Coincidence Part Three[]
Later, through a mirror ritual, John reconnects with his brother, drawn in by the Magus’s influence. John awakens in the Golden Boy’s ideal world green fields that, according to John, smell like cow dung. There, he meets his brother directly. The fusion, however, does not unfold as planned because of John’s hesitation.
The Magus urges them to join their souls to repair the rupture between realities, trying to show John that he belonged in the perfect world made for the Golden Boy, not the other way around. John refuses to admit that he had been living a life meant for someone else.
Golden Boy pushes harder, encouraging John to see through his eyes so they can fulfill their purpose together. But his intentions become clear: he saw John as an obstacle and had been manipulating him all along — even contributing to John’s cancer because he wanted to exploit John’s synchronicity, his birthright, the “Laughing Magicians,” believing John unworthy.
Realizing the truth, John breaks the connection and severs the bond between them with a metaphorical scalpel. Hellblazer #249
New 52[]
In Constantine's story arc Earth's End, John meets another version of himself in Earth 2 that is reminescent of the Golden Boy. Like his Hellblazer counterpart, this John was a good man with a perfect family and friends who love him. And like in Hellblazer, John also ends up killing this version for his own gains.
The Golden Boy was finally reintergrated into the DC Universe when he was mentioned by a demon in The Hellblazer: Rebirth.
Powers[]
In the universe where the Golden Boy survived, he is named the most powerful magician. His powers largely involves his total dominion over the Synchronicity Wave Travelling, which he can even use in John's own universe to control his life. This involves putting John to all sorts of vile predicaments that the latter was suppose to die in, this includes John's lung cancer and his memory loss, but John managed to survive all of this with his traditional guile and trickery. The Golden Boy's powers over the Synchronicity Wave allows him to omnipotently use The First of the Fallen and even God in his plans.
Trivia[]
- Golden Boy seems more mature, often referring to John as his "little brother" during their first encounter. Ironically, he's the younger twin, with John being the elder, (which might be why John inherited the Laughing Magician and he didn't), as revealed in Hellblazer #39, where he was born after John.
[[Category:Characters]tegory:Magicians]]