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This subject is from the Portal 2 era.This is a safe article.
 
"Those of you who volunteered to be injected with praying mantis DNA, I've got some good news and some bad news. Bad news is we're postponing those tests indefinitely. Good news is we've got a much better test for you: fighting an army of mantis men. Pick up a rifle and follow the yellow line on the floor. You'll know when the test starts."
Cave Johnson[src]
 

One of the first series of tests performed by Aperture Science Innovators, along with testing of the Aperture Science Portable Quantum Tunneling Device and Repulsion Gel, were tests of the effects of praying mantis DNA on the human body. The large number of resulting human-mantis hybrids (referred to by Cave Johnson as "mantis men") were themselves the subject of testing; namely, how long it would take to kill an army of them using rifles. Somewhat inhumanely, the mantis men were apparently required to kill each other during the test, thereby ridding Aperture of most, if not all, of them and preventing the problem of cleanup or compensation.

Trivia[]

Mantis man lego

The Mantis Man as seen in LEGO Dimensions.

  • In the Perpetual Testing Initiative DLC, one of the alternate Caves is a Mantis version of him, delivering the same announcement that the real one said but in reverse, telling the test subjects to fight an army of "Man-Mantises".
    • In another line, Cave was barricaded in his office after Mantis Men broke out of the mantis lab.
  • When asked about the fate of the Mantis Men, Erik Wolpaw replied that the answer "would be too big of a spoiler [for Portal 3]," but suggested that some of them may still live in the facility.[1]
  • The Mantis Men make a physical appearance in the Portal 2 Adventure World of LEGO Dimensions. They resemble green humanoids with praying mantis heads. They all wear torn Aperture Science jumpsuits and undershirts identical to Chell's.

List of appearances[]

References[]

  1. Portal 2: The Official Guide by Future Press
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