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Superhero Excuse

replace radiation for superpower creator
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Back in the 50's and 60's people could believe that super powers could come from radiation and comic book companies milked that for all it was worth, from radioactive spiders to radioactive sand.

Nowadays, though, people know too much about radiation to believe anything cool like turning you into a superhero could come from it.

What we need is a new excuse for odd superheroes.

What I suggest is that a well respected science group pretends to discover some mysterious force. Give it some sort of catchy name that doesn't sound like science fiction. "Research" it just enough to get the public interested and hint that there might be some affects on humans, then make up some roadblock in their experiments and stop learning about it forever.

Comic book companies would then be able to make up some ridiculous superheroes, and replace the radioactivity in the story with the new mysterious discovery. Then it will be more believable, plus new and exciting.

Of course, the science organization would charge the comic book companies and after they go under, still keep it a secret that they lied and enemy countries would spend thousands of dollars trying to research something that never existed.

jellyfisherman, Jun 13 2008

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       Maybe those superstrings? They're already super, and I understand they have not been good for too much since they were, er... discovered? Some prehero could get tangled in superstrings and get powered up from that. I understand they control dimensions and stuff.
bungston, Jun 13 2008
  

       Isn't this baked by "Dark Matter"?
MisterQED, Jun 13 2008
  

       Quantum.
david_scothern, Jun 14 2008
  

       What? You mean something like a celetrian particle?
BLSTIC, Jun 14 2008
  

       Baked.   

       The new Spiderman movies had a genetically modified spider that bit Peter Parker, not a radioactive one.
Giblet, Jun 14 2008
  

       Well that makes sense. My midichlorians are always stronger after eating GM corn.
Laughs Last, Jun 15 2008
  

       "Yes, I've had these trememdous powers ever since that misfortune at the Cold Fusion laboratory....."
MaxwellBuchanan, Jun 15 2008
  

       //spend thousands of dollars trying to research something//   

       Hahahaha. Ever commissioned any reserch? "thousands of dollars" might buy you a rainy afternoon with a research assistant and about 3 1/2 minutes microscope time.
Custardguts, Jun 15 2008
  

       Nanotechnology. Genetic modification. Dark matter. There are always plenty of fancy science terms to misuse.
GutPunchLullabies, Jun 15 2008
  

       There are plenty of heroes, and villains, that have recieved their powers from phenomena that exclude nuclear radiation.   

       Venom is an alien parasite. X-men are mutants from beneficially mutating "x-genes". Fantastic four were exposed to extra-solar radiation (although wierd it is still radiation though). Superman's powers came from his home planet, everyone was like that. Galactus and therefore the Silver Surfer are powered by Power Cosmic. The list goes on...
4whom, Jun 16 2008
  

       ... and then there is Blokeman! Bad yeast infection!
4whom, Jun 16 2008
  

       Anyone powered by Bluetooth?
Jinbish, Jun 16 2008
  

       I've got Intel Inside.
Noexit, Jun 16 2008
  

       Off the top of my head:   

       Superman: Extraterrestrial. Strangly Kryptons evolved superpowers on Krypton that didn't actually work there.   

       Batman: Actually just a billionaire vigilante with no special powers   

       Green Lantern: Has a powerful ring charged by a lantern (yes it's green) given to him by an intergalactic police force race that even has blue skin.   

       Captain America: Made superhuman by a formula developed to fight the Nazis in WW2. Sadly the lab was blown to bits and the researcher killed before he got any comrades.   

       I don't think comic writers lack imagination really. None of these required radiation. They do plenty of stuff with molecules, parallel universes, interstellar travel, black holes etc.   

       The real problem of believability is down to the extremely high bullshit factor regarding what they can do. They are all nearly indestructable, half of them fly without obvious means of propulsion, are impossibly strong etc. I doubt this is possible regardless of the technology you have.
Bad Jim, Jun 16 2008
  

       And for the same reason he can't catch a plane with his hands. He'd only make a hole in the thing.   

       Not forgetting the way Louis Lane was saved a couple of times by Superman and saw him real close up, but never saw the similarity between him and Clark Kent until he told her about it. She's supposed to be the Daily Planets' top reporter but she didn't notice.
Bad Jim, Jun 16 2008
  

       PSI.... goto www.psipog.net
wuhisn, Jun 17 2008
  

       We should probably do some experiments to find out how to reverse the polarity of the neutron flow. I think this could be done by generating a Higgs boson field to align the spin axes of the neutrons, then flipping it over by top-antitop quark pair transmutation, thus reversing the spin polarity.   

       Can i have some money now please?
nineteenthly, Jun 17 2008
  

       Actually Superman does get his powers from radiation, the radiation from a yellow sun. Krypton had a red giant.   

       Though this is from the movies and may not jive with original comic book info, but I think it does.
MisterQED, Jun 18 2008
  


 

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