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EP37: Sue Storm and Invisibility* What does it take—biologically—for a human to vanish? Guest: Writer and cultural critic Nick Ulanowski.
Transcript:
joe: [00:00:00] Hey, welcome back to the Rabbit Hole ofResearch down here in the basement studio. As
nick: who’s talking?I can’t tell. I hear a voice, but I don’t see anyone Stop it.
joe: Stop it. Lemme getmy intro
geo: I can’t seeanything
joe: guys now doingthis thing here
nick: where we
joe: you just starttalking over me. Come on. Yeah, we are going to go over the Fantastic Four andso there’s four members and so we’re gonna do four episodes and today we’regonna be talking about the Invisible Woman.
Sue Storm,
geo: And ininvisibility in general,
joe: invisibility inother characters who kind of factor in there. So yeah. We do have a guestjoining us on the Zooms. So you wanna introduce yourself?
nick_u: I’m NickRomanowski. I’m the author of MasterCard at The Comic Shop. It’s a horror novelabout a comic shop owner, his friends are, and his friends and regularcustomers, and a mask toxic fan, killing them off at the chainsaw. I’ve alsowritten comic book reviews for CBR, formerly known as [00:01:00]comic book resources.
However, I’m now writing comic book reviews and reporting oncomic book news on Substack at starving author.substack.com.
joe: Yep. And we’llthrow that in the show notes so you guys can find that and go check out Nickand stuff. He writes about, he does great reviews, so I’ve been reading themand. My college comic knowledge has improved greatly. So it
geo: a long ways togo, but
joe: I’m not saying I’mat the the pinnacle yet, but,
nick: Thanks forjoining us, Nick.
joe: Yeah. Yep. Yep. Soyou wanna jump in? Do this
nick: Yeah. You got alist for us, Joe?
joe: I’m gonna do I’mgonna do it a description. I’ve been doing descriptions, like descriptionheavy, so I’m gonna go
geo: can
joe: a littledescription
geo: no lists.
joe: have lists. Ialways have lists.
You’re just not gonna get
geo: I’m not sure whyyou’re
joe: I’m not sure whyyou’re, we’re gonna get into
geo: between list
joe: I kind of wannatalk about, introduce the Fantastic four. Oh, okay. Maybe some people don’tknow who the Fantastic Four are.
nick: Yes. Who arethe Fantastic
geo: to say I wasn’tthat interested until I saw Pedro [00:02:00]Pascal gonna be in the movie. Now I’m really interested.
nick: George waslike, I have a crush on Pedro.
joe: Yeah. There you
nick: go.
geo: So
nick: anyway yeah,the
joe: Fantastic Four,they’re a fictional superhero team. They were created by Stanley and JackKirby. They first appeared in Fantastic Four, number one in 1961. For MarvelComics and they were Marvel’s first superhero team of the modern era and kindof established a more human, flawed and family driven style that defined Marvelstorytelling.
nick: AKA, the firstfamily,
joe: AKA,
nick: the firstfamily.
joe: And there’s fourmembers, so I’ll go over their powers. Like I said, we’re gonna have an episodeon each Reed Richards, Mr. Fantastic. He can stretch his body, compress,reshape. He’s a brilliant scientist, dabbles in engineering and, exploring theboundaries of science In the multiverse we have Johnny Storm, human Torch.
He his pyro Canis so he can send his body ablaze fly Projectfire [00:03:00] And his background, he’s Sue’syounger brother, cocky, impulsive. Often comic relief.
nick: And
joe: we have Ben Grime.He’s the thing. And he has supernatural strength and near and vulnerableorange, rocky skin. He is Reed’s best friend, a former astronaut test pilot,has to deal with the pain of his transformation.
He’s the only one that became disfigured in all this. And thenthe woman of the hour is Susan Storm, the Invisible woman. Her power isinvisibility and she can force field generation background. She was initiallyportrayed as a team’s heart and emotional center, but later developed into atactical powerhouse.
She’s a second in command and her powers are among the mostversatile and potentially the most powerful in the Marvel universe. So that’sthe four. And just their origin story. ’cause every good comic story has anorigin story because they took an unauthorized space mission. To study cosmicrays.
Yeah, I’m [00:04:00] always,
geo: And
joe: the minute you sayunauthorized, something bad’s gonna happen. All four who are exposed to intenseradiation, but instead of dying their body’s mutated, giving each member thepowers that we just discussed when they’re based on their personalities. So readintelligent, flexible, mentally flexible sue, social invisible literal kind ofinvisibility.
Johnny Hotheaded, he became he,
geo: what was that?
joe: I don’t know.
nick: think that camefrom Joe, probably he became
joe: his fire powersand then tough exterior. Literally the thing with the rocky exterior. So Ithink I’ll stop there and dive in. We can talk we have the comic itself and therole that Sue plays, but then we have the biology of how one.
Might get or become invisible.
nick: So it ispossible.
geo: Yeah. What’s theplausibility of
joe: It’s a significantamount of handwaving.
geo: How many bigMacs would you have to eat to become invisible?
joe: It’s swing back tohow[00:05:00]
geo: although youprobably, it goes the other way, right?
joe: You would, no youneed to to become invisible.
And there are animals that, that have some transparency or nearinvisibly mostly marine organisms, like jellyfish x-ray fish,
nick: They don’t turntransparent. They are transparent. They are
joe: exactly right. Soyou have to
geo: Like I was gonnasay, like in a certain situation, they become more transparent.
joe: They, no, they’realways transparent, but you have to,
nick: to get there,you’re gotta say, we have something.
geo: there are somebiology
joe: Yeah, that’sright. Okay. And in cephalopods, cuddle fish, octopuses, squids, they cancamouflage, they have mechanisms to actually blend in.
And so they have, on the fly almost so not invisible onceagain, have to manipulate their.
nick: whole body.
Body
joe: to right tochange, so
nick_u: do you mindif I add a little something to your synopsis
joe: Yeah. That’s I,yes, please.
nick_u: Absolutely. Ithink that it should also be noted that, there’s a superhero. The super genreis very versatile a lot of ways, and [00:06:00]the Fantastic Four often used to tell more science fiction centered stories,necessarily hero teams.
I think that’s important to,
joe: Yeah
nick: I do feel likethey also have a little bit more human aspects to them. There’s more dramabetween the four members. Of themselves,
joe: Yeah.
nick_u: AlthoughMarvel’s whole thing in the sixties was that they were, oh, DC at the time, allthe superheroes were Godlike and Marvel came in we’re gonna give real, we’regonna establish real people with real problems, with flaw, with character flawsthat DC didn’t have at the time. And now that’s a lot more common in superherostories, but at the time it was a lot less prevalent.
And I would say the X-Men have probably actually have even more
nick: oh, a hundredpercent. Yeah.
nick_u: But yeah.
geo: and the factthey’re a family too. That’s,
nick: Yeah.
joe: Yeah, no, I thinkthat’s the storytelling elements in there and that’s a good point you madeabout being more sci-fi than just a typical action comic was that one of thefirst [00:07:00] kind of
nick: Sci-fi
joe: Of
nick_u: There was alot of weird stuff in the golden Age, but certainly, since in the sixties itwas definitely known for being more sci-fi.
joe: Yeah, definitely.And, getting their powers. That was
nick: Definitely. And
geo: have a question
It’s the mom and dad,
nick: right?
joe: No, it’s justhusband, wife, a younger brother of Sue, and then best friend of
geo: So no kids. No
joe: No kids.
nick: No, not yet.Okay. They come later down the line. Okay. Oh,
geo: you’re spoilingit.
nick: I am sorry thatyou are not caught up on your comic books.
geo: actually,anything you say today will spoil
joe: it. Did
nick: the
joe: the
and half powers,
nick: I believe bothof them do correct. Nick?
nick_u: Yeah, Ibelieve so. Yeah.
nick: They have twokids. Because
geo: when you werefirst talking about it I automatically was picturing the Incredibles.
joe: The Incredibles.Yeah. No, I think that’s a
geo: And I was likebut then I was thinking, oh, that’s interesting, because their kids were reallyyoung but the, [00:08:00] these weren’t kids.
These were like the
nick: Okay.
joe: Going on anunauthorized space journey.
geo: Got it.
nick: But you’re
joe: right, theIncredibles, like when you watch it, the styling of the Incredibles.
Probably mid, mid modern and 60 esque, and I think it was adefinite kind of, nod to the Fantastic four in their setup.
nick_u: It definitelywas. There’s people who say that there can’t be a fan, a good, fantastic horrormovie, and that’s absolutely not true. Look at The Incredibles,
joe: yeah.
nick: A hundredpercent.
joe: That’s right.Which is, yeah, hopefully in the new movie I do
nick: have high hopesfor it, but I really hence why we’re doing this series. Yeah. I have high hopesfor this. And I think
geo: you always haveto kinda keep your expectations like moderate
joe: Some of that,
nick: that,
geo: sometimes youlike hype yourself, Yeah.
Out
nick: of
geo: enjoyingsomething. Oh, yeah. Do you know what I mean? I
joe: mean?
I think it also with the MCU, and this goes to the movie that’scoming out and their story, their general, when they stick to their characterbuilding and they [00:09:00] have a compellingvillain. They have compelling protagonists, heroes, and they complete thosestories. I think those are the best MCU movies. I think it gets complicatedwhen they try to weave in other storylines and then they dilute
geo: Oh, we’replanning on making that movie in five years and we wanna make a tie in, solet’s just throw this random character.
And it’s
nick: but with itbeing Marvel’s first family, I feel like they are going to be sticking more tothe story building of the characters.
joe: Yeah. Andintroducing Doom. I know, right? So that’s, that was one of their majorvillains besides, and the Silver Surfer Galacto, like you, you see these otherstorylines are gonna come in, but you just can’t throw it all in one movie and,
nick_u: Yeah. AndDOMA is a very compelling character ’cause he believes he’s right, all thebest, all believe that they’re a good guy in some way,
geo: and then I thinkit’s interesting, like you said, that it’s a brother and a
nick: sister,
joe: so Yes.
geo: Wanda, [00:10:00] right?
joe: And her brother,
nick: Paid
geo: maybe that Ijust, is there very many brother and sister
nick: Superhero,teens?
joe: Yes. I think thereare a few.
nick: Yeah,
joe: You’re right thatthey, yeah,
geo: I don’t know.
I just,
joe: Yeah.
nick_u: Yeah, that, Ican’t think of too many other than
nick: Yeah.
joe: It’s yeah, thereare, but
nick: We’ll throw itin the footnotes. Yeah.
joe: We’ll get in theshow notes there. We’ll look at that. We’ll
geo: I think thatautomatically becomes an interesting dynamic
joe: Yeah. You, I wouldimagine that in the X-Men kind of storyline, there would be more siblinginteractions.
’cause if one sibling got. Mutant power is you wouldpotentially, there’s high potential that the other sibling would also have somelevel of power,
nick: Scott Summershas a brother that also has, yeah. Superpower or is also a mutant
joe: Reen and sabertooth. They’re brothers technically, yeah. Yeah.
geo: So you saidthat, and I’m sorry, are already forgot her name.
Is it[00:11:00]
nick: Sue.
joe: Sue. Sue Susan.
geo: You said she wassecond in command? Second in command.
joe: Second in command
nick: who’s Reed?
joe: Reed?
geo: and
joe: the husband.
geo: Okay. Is herhusband.
nick: husband.
joe: Mr. Fantastic.We’ll talk all about him in his own episode.
geo: Yeah. Yeah. Idon’t, eh, we can wait on him, but okay.
joe: Yeah, you get intothat also with Sue being, she’s the woman of the team and she has invisibilityand Nick touched on like the, some of the sixties themes, but one just womenempowerment and that was part of her story arc, and she started out. Limited inher powers
nick_u: that soundsright. Yeah
joe: yeah. They regaher
geo: do you thinkthat she was limited in her powers or she just held back because she was awoman
joe: Prior the story inthe comics, she was, she had limited powers. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
geo: then she wasable through something that
nick: happened,
joe: all comic books.
They, yeah. New authors, new writers.
geo: they go to, didthey go on another unauthorized trip?
joe: No, I don’t thinkthey did. I think it was just, that, that they had a storyline gets clipped andthey [00:12:00] had, but they enhanced theirpowers with that, the force field. So instead of just being invisible, she thencould cast these, she did some of that, but she could do it much more extreme.
Like she could build the force field inside of someone andexplode ’em essentially. You could just, wow. Only think about, and then shecould control the entire visible white spectrum. So not just her own body, butshe could start to manipulate, make weapons, make, it was yeah.
So she had this, her voice got stronger too in thestorytelling. But also that’s that idea that women are invisible and then, theygo to this kind of position of power
geo: and some,
joe: yeah. Yeah. Yeah.And I think
geo: in some ways,women’s power can be their invisibility.
Because you just ignore, like you just disregard.
And then that’s when the person has
Sneaks up on you with their great power.
nick: is that whywomen make great spies? Exactly.
geo: I think that’sexactly right.
nick: real andfictional. Yeah,
geo: because you
nick: black widow, [00:13:00] that whole operation is females that are,yeah. I think that’s assassin essence.
joe: That’s right.
Right.
nick_u: I think onthis note it we should acknowledge Ms. Marvel, which later became captain, backin the seventies I believe, that was actually pretty controversial that hername was Ms. Marvel. ’cause it was viewed as being very feminist. And I get alot of angry letters about that.
nick: Yeah.
joe: Yeah. Yeah, andeven in the comic world, there’s some, a lot of progressive storytelling.
We highlight the X-Men, they’re probably the most allegory ofcivil rights, but I think they, Stan and Jack, they really weaved in these kindof social issues through their storytelling. So and
geo: I have animportant question. So when she would turn invisible her suit, her super suitwould also turn
joe: What’s that?
nick: That’s
geo: do they everexplain that? Except they did in the
nick: read, readcreated a, what was it? Unstable fabric?
joe: Yeah. I forgetwhat yeah.
nick: Could adapt totheir powers, which is why.
Her clothes go invisible with her, but later on she is able to [00:14:00] change all of her clothes. Invisible aswell as other people.
joe: That’s right.That’s
geo: can change otherpeople to
joe: could make otherfolks
Yeah.
nick: Okay. If she’son a mission with Reed or they’re out somewhere,
joe: What
nick: I was readingsomething recently and she had both her and Reid go invisible.
geo: that’s handy.
joe: So then I thinkher power essentially is that she can bend light around her body. So inmatching the index or refractive index. Of what her surroundings. So that’s theway to power. And then she can extend that
nick: to someone
joe: to cover otherpeople. And Ben so you’re projecting some sort of, you’re projecting a field.
geo: So is there anyplausibility for to have clothing that would go invisible?
joe: go invisible
geo: You know what Imean? Because there’s like probably no, like a person probably can’t goinvisible. But can clothing go
joe: You can. I meanyou, so there are technologies now where using materials that you can bend thelight and essentially reflect what’s [00:15:00]behind and to front.
So that, as you look at it a couple ways, it could be thematerial, but also gonna be cameras. If you have cameras set up, you then cancreate a projection that would fool you and have you look at that. So thosetechnologies do exist, but they’re materials or equipment, they’re not,
geo: they seemcumbersome.
joe: Yeah.
Lot of, there are folks who characters who go invisible thathave. Potentially tiger from the Thundercats he has the belt and that’s whatgives him his invisibility. And generates the field, if you think of it thatway. Not an innate biological phenomenon.
nick_u: Do you knowoffhand when Susan Storm got more powers? Was that in Jonathan Hickman’s run?Because I know that’s when, that’s the, those are some of the very belovedmodern fantastic four
joe: yeah. I don’t knowthe exact
geo: Who was
joe: was writing thatstoryline, but Yeah.
nick: I’m so bad withknowing who’s write, who I’m reading from, like currently I’m trying to gothrough what was like the last few like story runs I’ve been reading and it’s [00:16:00] oh man, there’s so many of them that I’vegone through and I’m like, oh wait, which one are we on now?
But go ahead.
geo: Oh, I haveanother question related to the physical things being
nick: invisible.
geo: how plausiblethat is. And I think that’s a very important question, but is it possible tohave an invisible jet?
joe: They are workingon materials that would be able to do that, right? If you just, you reflectrain.
The whole idea is to bend light around optically fool the eye,right? That’s, yes, they’re working on that type of thing. I know there’stanks, ships, all sorts of, and if it’s a material thing, they can do it. It’sreally the person that you would go and that’s, so it’s a little bit ofbiology, so her powers are even more kind of awe-inspiring because not only isshe invisible to the eye where you bend light, okay, maybe we can figure out a [00:17:00] machine or something to do that.
But she’s also visible from infrared. She’s invisible her smelllike so no one smells her. So you have all these things that also no heat
geo: and sound. Isthe sound totally gone?
joe: think she stillcan talk. You can hear, she’s, her thermal signature is gone. Wow. So you’remanipulating all of this the MAs stat.
So that, that’s where this idea of the field, the force fieldmakes sense. So if you generate some sort of forward field that you emanate outof your skin or your body, then you can start to explain these other thingsthat happen. Along there that she cannot be detected. So
geo: Back to theInvisible Jet. No I always
joe: I didn’t wanted toget to this,
geo: no, that’s my
nick: only
joe: you’re here isWonder Woman that’s gonna say Wonder Woman,
nick: I know.
geo: And those werelike my favorite episodes, but they were so silly because she’s flying along inthe air and you could totally see her, but you know what I mean? Her jet wasinvisible, but she still, you could see her flying in there. So that was just
joe: I [00:18:00] think she would turn invisible also in areal world. Like
nick: yeah, itwouldn’t make sense just to have because then you could see the rest of thestuff inside
joe: Hey, look, there’sa lady. It looks like Wonder Woman
geo: that’s justsitting there flying through the air
nick_u: feel likemodern writers have moved away from the invisible jet thing ’cause
joe: Yeah. Yeah.
geo: Oh
joe: So you do havelike vehicles in, in movies. There’s tons of those. The Visible Jet, the shieldhe carrier the Rolin, Warbird and Star Trek. The Predator goes invisible.
geo: and thepredator. You saw the heat signature though, right?
nick: I don’t
joe: know. He would seeother people’s heat signatures.
Oh, that’s right. Yeah. He had the, but I don’t know. I guessno one ever looked, but he,
geo: that would’vebeen a smart thing
joe: He bleeds and youcan kill him. Yeah, the the Quinjet.
geo: Was gonna say,in like some of the modern Marvel movies, right? That’s right. Hasn’t thathappened?
joe: Yep.
Yep. The Blackbird and the
nick: the X-Men
joe: the Tardis. Wejust had the doctor [00:19:00] episode earlierthis season. But yeah, the TARDIS does become invisible to people. The Observercan’t look at it because that’s the other I
nick: I thought itturns into something that blends in. Yeah,
joe: I thought it could
geo: more likecamouflage.
nick: like camouflagealso.
I thought it was more camouflage than Goes Invisible. I couldbe wrong. I don’t remember. That episode was a while back.
joe: we gotta bring theexpert back in Dr. Who fan. Chime in there. Let us know.
nick: So I, why doesinvisibility go hand in hand with a force field like. I feel like those
joe: Yeah. Yep.
nick: yeah. Arepretty hand in hand with damier every care hero that has that power.
joe: I think it’seasier to explain, right? So we had to make a human or anything invisible. Wehave a lot of problems. You might go, okay, skin is transparent. But if youlook at like the aquatic examples, I point out earlier, you still see theirbones, their organs your blood is pigmented.
So the hemoglobin, so you [00:20:00]gotta de pigment that. Your bone structures certain organs, your eyes, you havepigments that produce colors throughout your body. So to go invisible, youwould have to find some means to get rid of all of that, and so that’s
geo: But you’resaying, but you’re saying with a force field, it’s possible,
nick: or is that justthe bubble that keeps it encased?
joe: yes, That’s thebubble that you’re hiding in. It’s like a cloak then.
geo: Okay. And I wasgonna say, I really dislike someone and I don’t want to talk about their booksand I don’t even wanna bring it up. But I also enjoyed,
nick: got beef andthis is Georgia’s beef corner.
Can
geo: talk about theinvisibility cloak without talking about
joe: Oh yeah.
geo: who had that?
nick: So
joe: the, that’s, thatconcept has been used throughout mythology. So you can talk about the cloak ofArthur. That’s King Arthur mantle of invisibility and mythology, welsh’smythology kind of thing.
Or the rings of the Gorges. So there’s all sorts of referencesto a [00:21:00] physical object that allows youto become invisible. And the cloak is, one of these things that this particularauthor used I think a lot these elements were scattered through folklore and,mythology.
So Sure. You could
geo: we can just skip
joe: Yeah, you’re gonnaskip. Yeah. I see.
nick: and
geo: talk about Yeah.
nick: So
joe: So you can go backto the
nick: I don’t knowwhich one you’re talking about. Georgia. Yes.
geo: you do.
joe: you’re you are,where you’re just bending light, right? You’re reflecting light and you’rematching then the index of the surroundings, right?
So when light passes through things or interacts with somethingit reflects, it bends, refracts, and so can you use that and can you just bendthe light? So essentially, light rays are hitting everything. So can you justbend a light around you from what’s behind you? So that way then when you look,it’s oh, I don’t see you, I see what’s behind you.
So if you have a cloak like that made outta some mythicalmaterial or has some sort of magical powers. Or an energy source, and it’s got,so right. So then you can just do that. You can have it and hide [00:22:00] behind it. So yeah, the cloth, actually,the cloak may be the most plausible of all the invisibility,
geo: and why is thatmore plausible than like a
nick: vehicle? Is itbecause it covers the whole you?
geo: any, anythingthat’s like a physical thing that’s not a human
joe: non biology. Yes,that’s right. Yes. Okay. So there’s the bi the biology to get to someone that’sinvisible. You could start, you go, okay, that’s difficult.
But there could be other things, like it could be some sort ofquantum kind of shift. So I. The observer effect, we talked the observer effectwhere once you look at something, it locks it into some state. The weepingangels in the Dr. Who,
nick: so have yougone back to Dr. Who recently? I’m going back. You feel like you’ve beenbringing it
geo: like he needs toI
nick: He’s trying toredeem himself. Yeah.
geo: he’s got a lotof ground to
joe: I got a lot ofbeef for only watching a couple episodes,
nick: so
joe: Don’t stop givingme a hard time. I was like the Lord of the Rings. I get there. I get
nick: Which I’mshocked that you haven’t brought up that the ring turns ferdo invisible.
joe: You to talk aboutthat.
nick: Oh, you did.You just did.
joe: this is a perfect,[00:23:00]
nick: So
joe: you, this is agreat segue. Thank you, Nick. That’s why, because I was gonna say that if youare tapping into the multiverse that you are, you may not be invisible, but youmay have gone to another.
Dimensional space and therefore,
geo: and that’s whathappened in Lord of the Rings, he went to another
joe: Yeah.
nick: it was,
joe: yeah. Some fi it
nick: was, oh,
geo: Ooh, anotherdimension like Twilight Zone.
joe: is there aninvisibility episode?
geo: Oh my gosh, Idon’t know. I gotta do some research.
nick: Can’t believeyou Georgia,
joe: But you could havethat type
geo: I bet you thereis, don’t
joe: that type ofthing. And I always think of when I think of that as an infants and their, theconcept of permanence.
nick: Oh, so likeplaying peekaboo.
joe: They playing
geo: They love peek
nick: invisible tothem.
joe: You do. Yeah. Soit
nick: is,
geo: just disappear.
joe: So you could do,That was the thing with the
geo: I can’t waittill we have video for
joe: Oh my gosh.
geo: that
joe: but the shadow inthe thirties. He was a noir detective, pro nore, ’cause thirties that what [00:24:00] happened and he was manipulate minds.
He had a cloud of kind of illusion and people would not see himand
nick_u: that sounds,yeah. And yeah, he predates a lot of pretty much any superhero,
joe: Yeah. Yeah. That’sright. Yeah.
geo: Yeah. I wasactually thinking about that. Maybe it was, it wouldn’t even be that someonewouldn’t see it, but that someone’s controlling that person’s mind where theydon’t see
joe: That’s right.Yeah. Yeah. So you could do that. You could become, so there’s a number of waysto get there without. Trying to,
geo: though that ispretty, not very plausible
These are not the droids you’re looking for.
joe: That’s right.Yeah.
nick: I,
geo: droids areinvisible.
joe: I’ll say that theFantastics four science nose dives into hand avium early on with theirinteractions with the cosmic these cosmic particles these high energy. Sourcesof energy bombarding their bodies. Generally, 99.99% of the time you’re gonnadie a horrific, normally cancerous tumorous death.
geo: Normally that is[00:25:00] not,
nick: but there’s achance, is what you’re telling me. I’m
joe: yes. Yeah,
nick: There still isa chance, but
joe: we have a soup, wehave a meal and a suit. That’s a and a spaceship. Let’s go.
geo: It’s likethinking, oh, it’s a good idea to go in a little tiny submarine and under thewater. That sounds like a good idea.
joe: Yes. No, I thinkit’s a,
nick: a
nick_u: and that,that’s a lot of oh, superhero, super villain origin stories though. But likerealistically, they would just die. Electro for instance, got electrocuted andit became a,
nick: Sandman. It’salways some kind of experiment gone wrong.
joe: Yeah.
nick_u: right.
nick: But
joe: did, since we leftthat small door open, I think one you could go, maybe as they passed and he isgot bombarded by these cosmic rays
nick: Okay.
joe: that potentiallytheir ship could have had some level of shielding.
geo: And
joe: so our selectiveprotection, so maybe as they were getting [00:26:00]bombarded, that’s why their powers are different. It affected ’em differently.Maybe the radiation activated dormant kind of genes transposons or theseretroviruses that are contained in our bodies and started to do careful geneticand what you have.
Is you essentially they probably speciate in real time.
nick: So
joe: they
nick: became, is itpossible that they were mutants that got accelerated along the lines of aninhuman? And
geo: and thosemutations are what got activated.
nick: That’s
joe: exactly right.That’s where I was headed. The speciation.
Because now they’re just they’re the proto X-Men.
geo: It’s like thatexact perfect.
Moment in the exact Perfect.
joe: So that’s why
nick: circumstancesmade this
joe: And that’s why Iwas asking
geo: And that’s why Iwas asking, it’s kinda like Dr. Strange would say that is a one in a like 5trillion chance that
joe: I don’t think hesaid 5 trillion, but
geo: know. I’m justmaking that
nick: up.
joe: I was gonna say,that’s why I asked about the Children’s, because mutants, if you look at theX-Men story, when mutants have kids, [00:27:00]they generally have powers. The Incredibles, they have their kids off, sobecause those are genetic inheritable traits. But if they were not, they werepoint mutations, they didn’t infect the kind of your genome of your
nick: sperm.
joe: and egg, that’s,when you have kids, they would just be normal human kids.
nick: So wouldn’t youneed to have another super to the, alright, so
joe: I dunno wherewe’re going.
nick: This is, if theIncredible Hulk
joe: Yes.
nick: was with anyoneother than a superhero, wouldn’t it still hold a massive amount of radiation?
joe: So Go ahead Nick.You
nick_u: No I actuallyjust didn’t understand the question.
joe: Oh yeah.
nick: so
joe: this isreproductive biology 1 0 1 here.
nick: We all knowthat. The incredible hu is it’s extremely radiated. He has all kinds of riddledradiation,
geo: it probablywouldn’t even be safe to get [00:28:00] busywith.
nick: Exactly. Unlessit he’s with another super. That can withstand that.
joe: But he doesn’temanate radiation, does he? He, in a, especially MCU, comics, he’s around
geo: I think he he,
joe: I think he wasjust mutated.
P got the large blast of gamma
geo: What about thefact that he stayed the incredible
nick: ho now
geo: Now that hasnothing to do with it. Nevermind
nick: Yeah.
nick_u: yeah. Thewhole thing with units is that they’re born
nick: But if itaffects, but
joe: if you I think thepoint is of that. If you become, and I think that was a line in some of theX-Men storylines, like who is considered a mutant and who isn’t? Do you havepowers that you were innately born with? Or did you inherit the powers becauseyou licked the rock and you
geo: you, are youjust really wealthy and you can build it in a cave
nick: Scraps?
nick_u: Okay.
joe: where’s the thatidea of speciation that, that was magneto’s push, was that the mutants were thenext evolutionary step of humans. Like they, [00:29:00]they became speciated to something else, but from a total species, they stillcould reproduce with regular heat.
So
nick_u: yeah. Hohomo,
joe: Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
nick_u: Yeah. Yeah.And yeah.
nick: But
joe: yeah.
nick_u: I was justhomo superior instead of homo.
joe: superior, right?Is that what that was it? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
geo: I think that’sdefinitely his point of view, right?
joe: Yeah. No, and asNick pointed out earlier, that the villains often think they’re a hundredpercent correct and,
nick: But likeMagneto was,
geo: I was gonna say,I was gonna say you have these special powers.
You, you and these special mutations. You are superior, right?You, if you’re stronger, faster, or whatever, that makes you, what are youdefining as
joe: superior?
nick: You know whatI’m saying?
nick_u: Magneto isone of those characters that there’s a lot of different interpretations of him.I think sometimes he’s more right. Sometimes he’s less Right. Depending onwho’s writing
nick: Exactly. Yeah.It’s like sometimes he’s written, even though he’s still [00:30:00] a bad guy, he’s a hero. It makes sense,or,
joe: or,
nick_u: Yeah.
nick: but it dependson who he’s going against and what side he’s standing against.
geo: seems so muchmore realistic.
nick: Oh, a hundredpercent.
joe: Yeah. Very nuancedapproach to that.
geo: Okay. I wantedto bring up something, but I should have done a little research,
joe: Okay.
nick: but
geo: Kevin Macon,
joe: The Invisible man.
geo: No. Wasn’t itHollow Man?
Was it called Hollow
joe: I don’t know. Theydidn’t not get the IP to invisible.
I don’t, and Right. But yes, it was hollow man, but I think itwas just the invisible man and,
nick: and
geo: I’m just like,you know how I’m number one fan? And Kevin, if you are listening, I’m numberone fan. But
nick: she has a lotof number one fans,
joe: your number onefan.
geo: And I guess thisgoes back to the invisible man, I can’t remember what happened that made himinvisible.
nick: Yeah.
joe: There was aformula
nick_u: Yeah, he was,it was an experiment that went wrong.
joe: Yeah. Again, itwas an unauthorized experimentation.[00:31:00]
geo: So he was liketrying to do something else, and then he realized
nick: he was, I
geo: I can’t, I justcan’t remember. All I can remember is
nick_u: Wasn’t hetrying to make
joe: invisible? Yeah.That was his goal was to become invisible. So he, it, I guess it succeeded.
Yeah. But then he went
nick_u: Yeah.
geo: yeah.
joe: and all sorts ofstuff. Yeah. But he changed the reflective, the refractive index of his body.That was the idea. That’s that we were talking about. You’d have to do. But he,it clothes didn’t disappear, so he was just be walking around
nick_u: So how muchof a tangent would it be to talk about ghosts or is that a whole other episode?
joe: We are planning aghost episode, but Yeah. If you wanna touch on it. Yeah. Go forward. Yeah.’cause they were. Yeah.
nick_u: Yeah. I I wasjust I’m just thinking that there’s a lot of ghosts and fiction, including incomics, there’s a comic called Cyrus Perkins in the Haunted Taxi Cab, which isa very indie comic, but it is all about, how this guy can’t be seen. He’sinvisible and how frustrated he feels with that.
I know with ghost, sometimes they have, it’s, they leavetrails. I can’t think of [00:32:00] the termoffhand, but yeah, I just, that’s, something that we see a lot in fiction. Theghosts are invisible,
nick: definitely.
joe: are. Yep. As youdon’t see ’em, they’re
geo: Except sometimesin
nick: likephotographs and stuff.
joe: Yeah, inphotographs.
geo: No,
nick: look at thisphotograph. Georgia.
geo: They have allthose things where yeah,
nick: but so whenyou’re talking about ghosts being
joe: invisible. Yeah.But
nick: they do havethat ability to make themselves known, right?
So would that be a power of them then? ‘ cause they are able toshow themselves, but their regular state is so it’s like a reverse invisibility, right?
nick_u: Yeah. I thinkit depends on another thing that depends on the writer. I think Ghost Ghostsare sometimes that way, and sometimes they’re not. I know the Remember Me booksby Christopher Pike, there were also, there was also about, the character beinga ghost and frustrated with not being seen, and she couldn’t make herself seen.
nick: Yeah. Yeah.
joe: No ghosts. Yeah,you’re right. I don’t know what their base state is.
nick: Because I feellike in any story, ghosts can always see other [00:33:00]ghosts, but humans can’t always see the ghost.
nick_u: Yes. Thatsounds accurate. Yeah.
nick: I feel like itwould be the willingness to wanna be seen in that.
Where for invisibility, it’s the willingness to not wanna beseen. I don’t know.
joe: Or to, it could bethe perception of the observer. So you have that, you also have that to keep inmind is that, are you prepared to see what and believe?
I think there’s that’s the other idea. There’s some belief andthings like that cooked into the ghost lore.
nick: We’ll find outsoon enough, Joe. We’re
joe: We’re gonna findout soon enough,
geo: And this is atotal tangent, but like daredevil. Okay. Daredevil is blind, so he can’t see.But then he does see
nick: everything
geo: and that’sbecause it’s like he can hear echo,
joe: Yeah. I thinkthat’s his ability there. Yep.
nick: So would he beable to pick up Sooth storm?
Like
nick_u: I guess youwould
joe: he would. Hewould, yeah. Yeah.[00:34:00]
nick_u: Done beforein
joe: Yeah.
geo: It was done.
nick_u: I wonder ifthere’s a comic where that has been done
joe: over. Yeah.
geo: Oh yeah. That’sa good question.
joe: she, yeah, it’sinteresting because he relies on the echolocation, but also smell and heatsignatures. He picks up on all of sensory is, and, but Sue actually mass allthat. She becomes
nick: minus thesound,
joe: invisible. I don’tthink she makes sound unless she wants to talk.
nick: See,
geo: the, myquestion. Like
joe: I don’t think,
I don’t think
geo: able to say,okay, no sound. Exactly. Yeah. Or does she just, she can just get really quiet,’
nick: cause her force
joe: fields can fly.She can float ’em. So you wouldn’t have to make any sound. It, you’re, she’spretty powerful, when you think of her as a character and what her powers areand how she could exploit those powers
nick: and within thebubble, she probably can’t be smelled.
geo: That’s what hewas
joe: That’s what sayingThat’s right. Yeah.
nick: Huh.
joe: I get funky inthat bubble.
I always, with force fields, I’m always like, what’s the flowof oxygen? You need [00:35:00] to breathe andso how big is your force field? How much oxygen was in that force field whenyou got contained? Is there some passive, can
nick: you fit throughthis door
joe: molecules likeoxygen flow through? Yeah I’m always, ’cause the force fields are impenetrable.I mean they’re, so maybe it’s a size, maybe it’s a speed of projectile. I don’tknow. But that’s always something that’s not really explained. It’s like we gottaa force field around us.
Let’s go do some work. And it’s and that was in the IncrediblesViolet, she can also make force fields. That was her part of her power set.
nick_u: Nice. Yeah.
joe: And I was gonnasay I had other characters, but in that timeframe, in, in the sixties, it wasinteresting that you have a few the shadow thief from DC Comics in 61.
Was
geo: was
joe: invisibledimensional. He is a dimensional dimen, dimen meter. It was a tech
geo: Can you saythat?
Three
joe: No, I am not
nick: wait, I wasn’tpaying attention. What is that Phantom girl?
joe: 61 also. And shehad phase shift to other dimensions. It was all this kind of [00:36:00] dimensionality shifting. We were talkingabout one way to become invisible.
DC also had a 63 chameleon. Boy, explain. I didn’t evenrealize. I was,
geo: was gonna say,these are all like band names. This is like
joe: the
nick: one I realize
joe: the spot. But hehas inter interdimensional portals usage. So
nick: I wouldn’tconsider the spot invisible.
joe: It dips out,right? So if someone’s there and they leave,
nick: that’s notgoing invisible. That’s dipping out.
joe: Yeah. But if youshow up again, you’ve, if you go to a different dimension. That’s the sameidea. That’s just inter, so if you’re here, it’s like playing
nick: people that’sjust leaving.
joe: weaving.
geo: Just,
nick: that’s just,hold on. I’m gonna walk out this door, but I’m going invisible. Don’t worry.
geo: Yeah. I have toagree with Nick on that one because if you’re not there, then what? What? Yeah,
nick: can
joe: come back. You caninstantly,
nick: I can walk outand come back in.
joe: Yeah. But I cansee you.
nick: You didn’t oncethe door shut.
joe: Yeah. I don’tknow. What do you think, Nick?
nick_u: I’m not sure.
joe: He
nick: He wasn’t gonnahelp you on this one. Joe, [00:37:00] knows I’mright. He sticks with the nick because
geo: ’cause. Thewhole idea of being invisible is that you’re still there, but people don’t seeyou. If you are just suddenly not there, then how is that?
joe: If you if when Suestorm goes invisible, she generates this force field, what if it’s aninterdimensional force field?
What if she goes away,
geo: Then she’ll missout on some important information.
joe: Maybe she can hearit.
geo: she won’t be agood spy. Maybe
joe: she can hear theinformation. Still
nick: from adifferent German dimension.
geo: a different what
nick: dimension?
joe: Okay, I’ll skipit. So 87 you had Ghost
nick: Unrevealed
joe: ID and Iron Man.Two 19 Marvel.
That was quantum stealth tech. So yeah, you guys have shut
nick: Oh, was
nick_u: MilesMorales, and I didn’t know how that’s modern though.
joe: Yeah. Yep.
nick_u: My MilesMorales shirt right now.
nick: Hell
joe: Yep. Yeah, he did.Yeah. Like a bio bioelectric. Camouflage. Was that his, [00:38:00] that was how he went invisible, right? Yeah. Yeah.
nick_u: Yeah. And Iwonder are there actual spiders that can do that? And that’s where they got theidea.
Dennis got the idea.
joe: I, I don’t know ifthere’s, there may be spiders that can camouflage themselves that wouldn’t beout the realm. That’s like the
geo: bet there
joe: cephalopods, thechameleon itself. Like they can blend in so
geo: And spiders arerelated to,
joe: They are related.
But I don’t know, I don’t know any off the top of my head thatdo that, but it wouldn’t surprise me if there were,
geo: like I
joe: I said, I blendinginto your environment as a chameleon or as the CE epha pods do. I think that’s
That’s within the realm of,
geo: The most
joe: critical, right?
Yes.
geo: It’s like theguy in guardian guardians of the galaxy.
joe: Oh Drax. I’m gonnamove so slow.
nick_u: Yeah,
geo: I
nick: He learned thatfrom Gru
geo: That’s so good.
nick_u: invisible to.
joe: Yeah. Yeah,exactly.
nick: I’m standing.So still.
geo: Was
joe: I eating the Znuts or [00:39:00] zar nuts?
geo: z nuts?
joe: Yeah. Then therewas a whole bunch of like
nick: cool characters
joe: I’ve found throughcomics that have these things and we can, I don’t know, split hairs if it’s, ifquantum. Dimensional traveling to, to disappear is becoming invisible or not?
nick: I feel likethat one is a stretch.
geo: Ooh. Good pun
joe: All right, Mr.Fantastic.
nick: But yeah I feellike to be invisible, you have to be still present in this dimension.
joe: So you can’t be ina different dimension.
nick: No,
geo: put that outthere. So anyone listening to this weigh in on that.
nick_u: Yeah. Yeah,that does sound accurate. If you’re still here, you’re just invisible. You’rein this.
geo: I think it, it’sa different definition,
joe: but you could be,you could beat us in super position, right? You could be in both states. So you
geo: oh, now you’retrying to change it. It could be
joe: in this otherdimensional space, right? So you are still present, but you’re not Well,
nick: but going backto the spot, he’s not, unless he has another portal there, which he still [00:40:00] visible.
joe: Yeah I’m, okay,I’ll give you the spot one. But all the other ones I’m going to,
nick: I wasn’tpushing back on any other one, but the
joe: The spot. So I hadnight crawler also. But that’s the same, you’re, you’re probably gonnadisappearing,
geo: But
nick: thendisappearing
joe: is becominginvisible.
nick: That’steleportation. No,
geo: but then you’renot there once you disappear.
You’re not there even if you reappear super fast.
joe: But you are, he isthere, right? I don’t
geo: gosh. Okay. All
joe: Yeah. No.
nick: That’steleportation. We’ve already covered this,
joe: but we didn’t saythey could become invisible with it, right?
You guys are a hundred percent hand waving on now I gotta makethese yeah.
nick_u: Yeah. Yeah. Ifeel like if you can split yourself and we’re, you’re also in anotherdimension, a whole other power,
joe: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah,early fiction the Invisible Man by HG Wells, the 1897
geo: an accident gonewrong? Yeah, that was the same as The Hollow Man.
joe: Yeah. Hollow Man.Yeah. And then Topper’s Ghosts. So we had this, the ghost that was once again [00:41:00] came up and
geo: Topper’s Ghost,are you talking about like Carrie
joe: 1937, the film?
geo: Yeah. Oh my God,I’m so impressed.
I love Topper. I love
joe: The InvisibleAgent film 1942. Yeah, that, and then in the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen,there was a,
nick_u: Nice.
nick: the invisible
joe: man, right? Yeah.So it was the Invisible man.
nick: I wonder whyinvisibility did become as well known as it is, like beyond like superherorealms.
It’s also in the scientific realm where it’s oh, if they weretrying to go with an experiment to do this why? What was the purpose for thatthen?
joe: You mean
geo: I’m not sure Iunderstand what
nick: mean. Yeah.Like why were they trying to go invisible?
joe: You mean in reallife or in the,
nick: in, I thinksome of it’s in like the Invisible Man or hollow man.
joe: I think he wasdoing it just to do it right. And I think it had practical kind of tech imple,you could sell us to, [00:42:00] industries
nick: but it wasn’ttech. It wa it was experimenting. Yeah.
nick_u: the madscientists with a precursor to the. Tech, the Mad Tech guy.
joe: You can imagineThat was in 18, 18 96, 7. That’s,
geo: I think
joe: Not buildingIronman suits.
geo: I think thedesire to be able to be somewhere without being seen, I think that’s somethingthat probably like people have always wanted to do,
nick: That’s becauseit’s creepy
joe: to be present
geo: But also to belike, you find out a lot of stuff.
Yeah.
joe: Or situationallyyou may wanna be, not seen and that’s an invisible man, the novel. That’s
geo: you said, alwayssay I want oh, I would’ve liked to been a fly on the wall. Because people don’tpay attention to the flies on the wall unless there’s a lot of ’em.
Then they do.
joe: Yeah. Yeah. Idunno where we’re headed today.
nick: I get veryannoyed if there’s a fly in the room.
geo: I really dislikeflies.
joe: But the invisibleman, the novel. That was what it was about being invisible in society and.
There. So I think becoming invisible [00:43:00]can have both as a power where you can spy on people.
Creep on people.
geo: Like we weretalking about the women, women not being taken seriously and then sneaking upon you.
joe: What are yousaying, Nick? Oh,
nick_u: yeah. And the2020 Visible Man was essentially about gaslighting where he an abuse tacticwhere make making everyone think she’s crazy when, ’cause no one’s believingher, that he turned himself invisible and that these things,
joe: Yeah.
nick: As I said, itgoes back to being creepy.
joe: Yeah.
nick_u: right?
nick: I think
joe: you also just go,I think in a lot of these they were playing off the mad scientist trope, butthen also just losing your mind. ’cause now you are invisible right now, nomatter how cool that power is, no one can see you.
You could be in a space
nick: but
joe: seen. That’salmost
nick: it does havethat social commentary where there are people that do just feel invisiblebecause of X, Y, and Z where they exist. But no one like the ghost Taxi or itwas Ghost.
nick_u: Oh, Cyrus [00:44:00] Perkins in the haunted taxi camp. It’s a,yeah, it’s a horror comic from the, about 10 years ago.
nick: I haven’t readit, but it did catch my interest already.
geo: know. I justlove the title. Yeah.
joe: Yeah. That’s cool.We’ll throw that in the show notes.
nick: just to seewhere that goes, because I don’t know if you can. Comment on this, but what isthe general social commentary for that? ’cause it feels like it’s just a driverthat just everyone ignores.
nick_u: Yeah, I thinkthat’s act. It was been some time since I’ve read it, but I read it when it wasnew and I think it was about 10 years ago, 2015 ish. It, it was definitelysaying something about class I remember that much where, people, like peoplejust don’t pay attention to the taxi driver.
It’s like he is invisible, and they’ll just say whatever theywant in front of a taxi driver,
nick: yeah. And thatmakes extreme sense.
joe: Yeah. And just foreveryone out there, don’t know, that was Ralph Ellison, his novel I wasreferencing
geo: and it hadreally nothing to do with
joe: to do with beingphysically
geo: Invisible Man isvery [00:45:00] different
nick: than the
joe: Yes. HG Invisibleman. So I wanted to make sure the commentary was there that the Ralph Ellison’sbook was a social commentary about being black in America.
And being invisible.
geo: it was in, andit’s so timely. And it was written in the forties, but
joe: yep. Yeah. Let’s,good read, put it in show notes. Cool.
nick: so Nick who isyour favorite invisible person?
nick_u: That’s a goodquestion. As far as superheroes, I guess would be Miles Morales love the 2020Invisible Mad movie that, that guy’s so creepy.
joe: Yeah. Yeah.
nick: I feel likethere’s a good reason why there aren’t that many men who are invisible.
joe: It’s probably,yes.
nick: At least Milesis a genuine person where it’s okay, I can trust this character with thispower.
nick_u: right.
nick: Any other onesyou’re like, ah, let’s not,
nick_u: and that’sthe whole thing with great power
joe: Yeah. Exactly.Yes.
nick_u: bad thingswith this power. Or you can do horrible things
joe: right?
nick_u: [00:46:00] I’ll, excuse me. You can do good thingswith the power. You can make the world a better place or you can do horriblethings with it and self selfish things with it.
joe: Yeah. That’s oneof the special things with Sue is that she can control the invisibility.Because a lot of folks, you, you’re either invisible all the time and there isno coming back.
So like the invisible man, he was just invisible and then hehad to live with that state for the rest, for the rest of his life and docreepy stuff. Then you just start,
If you’re like, I’m just be invisible, why not? Why not creepout? I don’t know.
nick: Why not creepout Joe? Oh, no.
geo: Okay. Okay.Nick, what’s your favorite?
nick: Oh, so I thinkit’s a, it’s probably a tie between Sue and Miles because both of them havesuch a strong personality.
joe: Yeah.
nick: And both usetheir powers in different ways. And their range of powers goes to two endswhere miles is very much more contained.
Where Sue. [00:47:00] Does havemore of a ability to blend others as well and other objects. So it’s like
joe: Protective role,right? Yeah. So she has that
nick: a veryprotective, motherly figure.
joe: Yes. That she cando that, use her powers, Georgia.
geo: Yeah. Since,like I said, I’m not super familiar with Sue.
I would,
I look forward to finding out more about her.
I don’t know if I really have a favorite invisible character.Yeah. ’cause the jet, that’s not a person. Jet, I
joe: but Jet, I knewyou were gonna say that. Jet Georgia
nick: No. And
geo: and I would sayKevin Bacon’s character, but that actually, to be honest, is not one of myfavorite Kevin Bacon
joe: Yeah. The HollowMan.
geo: You know what Imean?
yeah, it’s tough to,
nick: I’m shocked
that you didn’t go violet.
You,
geo: I actually, Iwas just gonna say
joe: yeah. Violet.Violet par.
geo: and the Yeah.
joe: Yep. From theIncredibles. Yeah, that’s a good one.
geo: that is a goodone.[00:48:00]
joe: And yeah I I’mwould go with Tiger from the Thundercats 85. That’s, that was,
nick: that was
joe: was right. Thatwas right in my wheelhouse there.
So I’m gonna do it. That was. I love me some Thundercats.
geo: How could younot like someone named Tigris?
joe: tig.
geo: Oh, sorry.
joe: But you’re right.Tigris
nick: want to takethat again? Georgia?
geo: I like Tigressand I like tiger.
joe: Maybe a quickquestion for everyone. Would you want the power of in. Invisibility and maybeto make it a little more difficult, you’re stuck with it.
You, you are invisible or you’re not you get to pick.
nick: Nick, you wannastart off?
nick_u: I think Iwould like the power if I could turn it
joe: Yeah. Yeah.
nick_u: but I.
geo: Yeah. I agree. Iwouldn’t want it if I could’ve turned it off.
nick: I know Inormally go with yes for most of these, but I’m gonna go back to being theinvisibility power gets creepy with guys, and
joe: Yeah. You don’tthink you could control, you don’t think you would serve restraint.[00:49:00]
nick: I like to fuckwith people. This would just enhance that ability.
geo: Then, but youwould enjoy it.
nick: It wouldn’t befor anything good.
geo: Okay.
joe: Yeah. Okay. Yeah
nick_u: I feel likeit’s power could used to expose powerful people or the corrupt very easily, ordo behind closed.
nick: exactly.
joe: Yeah.
nick: but thenthere’s the element of I can really make this person. You start gaslightingbillionaires
joe: and that’s stillit becomes a slippery slope. Because that’s when you get on it. You might bedoing something in your head. As Nick pointed out, like most good villains,they feel just in their actions that they’re doing it for the right reason.
nick: And
joe: if you write, ifit’s a good storytelling and well written, you go, you know what they do have apoint. I think they’re going about the wrong way,
nick: all right. Yousold me. I can keep this job as a podcaster.
joe: Yeah.
geo: And in a waywe’re, we are invisible.
nick: Our liveperformances just could be me recorded.
joe: Yeah, that’sright.
nick: here? Yeah, I’mright here.
joe: Nick at?
nick: Just
[00:50:00] behind the curtain,I promise. What about you, Joe? You taking the power?
joe: Yeah. I
think I’m a pass, I’m gonna pass on this one. I think if Icould, I threw that little disclaimer in ’cause if I could control it.
I would do that, but I’d eat a lot of Big Macs. So
nick: do you neverdid go over like I, is it calorie count for being able to
joe: so yeah. I don’t,speculating out what you would have to do to generate and bend light, are youcountering energy? What’s the role of that?
You probably are gonna be burning some galleries to throw forcefields over other people or yourself, or to make weapons. And if you’redimensionally traveling, that also is, gonna cost some,
nick: no one was, noone brought that one up.
joe: We did bring itup. It was there, it works. Yeah. So
nick: I didn’t knowif that would be more of a mind thing over like a physical
joe: We had, we touchedon a couple different ways. One could. Get to invisible. One was mind control,like the shadow in the
geo: and then, so if
nick: Controlling [00:51:00] the force field with your mind. Yeah.
joe: We didn’t talkabout some of that.
I think to, to go invisible and then come back, you probablyare gonna have to have some neural reworking. You might have a new layer ofskin. You might actually have to physically have all this ’cause your reactiontime has to be fast in a control ad.
You’re now controlling almost another sense in some ways to goinvisible. So you’re right. I think, from a, from some level, I think it’s I’msurprised people haven’t, I guess they were just bombarding themselves withcosmic rays trying to recreate invisibility or get that what genes were turnedon or off.
nick: So now I have aquestion. Is for the invisible man, is he just not smart enough to turn it off?Yeah, I don’t,
joe: yeah I, go ahead
geo: but I think.
nick_u: I don’t thinkthat what, that’s what
joe: Yeah. I don’tthink it was about him not being
geo: I think itdepends on the mechanism. I think if it’s the force field mechanism, you’reable to turn it off Do you know what I mean? I don’t [00:52:00]that’s,
joe: I’m
nick: like, is itjust that part of your brain that you’re not like. Focusing on. See,
geo: I don’t thinkit’s a part of your brain. I don’t know.
joe: I think I thinkthat’s, that was a, that point about is it genetically viable? Because I thinkin the Invisible Man story where it got turned on, he drank some sort of potionor a compound that then remove pigmentation like that was, he wasn’t generatinga force field.
He was going more the way. The cephalopods would do it, orchameleons, like they, he was actually trying to modify the refractive index ofhis body to have light pass through without being seen or Ben. So
geo: That makes itperfectly clear.
nick: Yeah.
joe: yeah. Yeah.
nick: Crystal. Allright. Nick you want to go ahead and run through your plugs for us one moretime?
nick_u: Sure. Yeah, Iam. I’m Nick. I am [00:53:00] currently writingabout books on Substack, starving author.substack.com. I have a horror novelcalled Massacre at the comic Shop. And I’ve written two books of poetry as wellAmerican Bug and as the Moonlight Shines. And and I also wrote about comic booksfor comic book resources.
You can check those reviews out. Oh, I’m no longer at thecompany. The thing that I really want people to check out is my substack, whichwhere I’ll be updating on the first and third Friday of every month. And notjust writing comic book reviews, but also reporting on comic book news,especially any indie comic books that I don’t see.
Any of the websites talking about I’ll, I might occasionallywrite an article about that.
geo: Nice.
nick: Very cool. Arethere any specific articles you want people to check out?
nick_u: For comicbook resources, I wrote an article titled a Action Comics Number one is one ofthe greatest works of anti-fascist art ever made where I write about and it’sconsidering that Superman movies coming out soon. You should definitely checkthat out.
nick: hell yeah.
nick_u: I in theoriginal [00:54:00] action comics, the firstappearance of Superman and widely considered to be the first superhero comicbook, not necessarily the first superhero story, but, or even the firstsuperhero comic, but comic book and where Superman, beat up a domestic abuser, gotan innocent woman off death row.
And and went after a lobbyists. And that was the originalSuperman and how it was created by two Jews in the 1930s during, the rise ofAdolf Hitler and global antisemitism and and how there were a lot of Jewishrefugees at the time and people didn’t accept refugees. It was the union polls,actually, if you compare it to I’m getting, I’m just diving into the wholearticle right now, but it’s
nick: Yeah. Yeah.
nick_u: But if youactually compare it to opinion polls in the 1930s, the attitude towards Jewishrefugees 1930s were significantly worse than the attitude towards Muslimrefugees today, believe it or not people.
In America hated them. And and I don’t think it was acoincidence that when they wrote [00:55:00]Superman, they made him a refugee. And I view it as statement of solidarityagainst other people that have, were being mistreated by society. And and it’s,again, the article settled Action Comics number one is one of the greatestworks of anti-fascist art ever made.
joe: Nice. cool. Yeah.Cool, cool. We’ll have that in the show notes for people to check out. Yep.
right. On that note let’s wind it down. You got me, Joe, here,you got Nick.
nick_u: How’s it?
joe: Gotcha. We
geo: Nick, we haven’tgot,
nick: And we got Nick
joe: we got anotherNick. And we have Georgia.
geo: Bye. See youlater.
nick: Thanks again,Nick, for joining
joe: Thank you. Thankyou.
nick: And
we went down an invisible hole. I
geo: I can’t seeanything.
joe: stay visible outthere. Stay safe.
Love y’all.