So consider this: Two guys are sitting in an office in New York back in the Sixties coming up with ideas for superheroes.  Now they are doing this because that is the business they’re in is making comic books with superheroes.  Problem is that you gotta have a reason for a gas station attendant to both decide to don a cape and a leotard and be able to start flying into abandoned warehouses full of counterfeiters. He’s gotta have what “we” in “the biz” call a “origin” but most people call a “Raison d’être.”

So what do these two do to get around this little creative roadblock?  They create the idea of genetic mutation imparting superpowers to their characters and the world hating them for it.  From one standpoint that is genius.  Just remove the roadblock to new characters and let the creative juices flow.

But here’s what pisses me off, and here’s my main point; they didn’t mine the depths of their awesome idea!  No, they did not!  The superpowers they created aren’t even remotely physically possible for human beings!  I mean really shooting lazers out of you eyes is not a mutation thing, it is magic!  Okay now super senses and super healing is more like it but turning to metal?!?  Come on!  That takes, like a miracle from God not just a minor mutation!  And that is just being lazy!   Not just “OOPS, sorry I forgot to post my blog on time Eric, I promise it won’t happen again” lazy but more like “Filthy stinking Let’s-take-over-the-means-of-production, Marx had it right, I’m a commie” lazy. 

Okay not really.  Not really at all.  I mean that would be really, really lazy.  And Stan and Jack were really pretty effective capitalist kind of guys (I think they came up with the idea, but heck I ain’t gonna look it up, not because I am lazy but because that would put this blog so irretrievably into the Nerd Zone as to make it unreadable.)

The point is that wouldn’t it have been more awesome if all of their superheroes powers were realistic genetic mutations?  We could have had heroes like:

Pigmentation Boy: Able to control the hue and darkness of his skin’s pigment.  Could have been often used as a vehicle for social commentary

Extra-sets-of-teeth Girl: Never afraid to be punched in the mouth because a newer, prettier incisor is ready to drop as soon as an old one gets knocked loose.

Hairy Man:Able to make any hair on his body grow to any length desirable (this is probably the power I would most want.  Actually I think everyone would want this power.)

Explosively Lactating Woman:Shoots milk out at any  or speed necessary to stop crime.  Could possibly have a secret identity as a part-time barista.

The Drooler:Whose incredibly long spittle never breaks and as such has is able to be used much like Spiderman’s webs or Indiana Jones’ whip.

That-didn’t-hurt-you,-you-whiny-little-sissy Grandpa: Who could keep the whole team realize that “no that didn’t hurt that much and that other people have it a lot tougher than I do but you don’t see them crying, No Sir” with his ability to make eveyone so ashamed for not being as tough as him, because he never seems to feel pain or cry, not even when Grandma wouldn’t wake up and we put her in that wooden box so she could go see Scruffy and Jesus.

Generosly-Donates-to-Webcomics Guy: Who generously gives money to people making webcomics for all of their efforts.

These are just some of my once plentiful ideas for realistic superheroes.  But I gots more.  Lots More… Sure.

You guys got any?  Feel free to share them in the comments section.  You can even draw ‘em!

–Bob

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