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From: boyajian@akov68.DEC (Jerry Boyajian)
Newsgroups: net.comics
Subject: re: Forge's gun & Marvel Science vs. DC Science
Message-ID: <17@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 9-May-84 05:51:15 EDT
Article-I.D.: decwrl.17
Posted: Wed May  9 05:51:15 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 11-May-84 07:22:31 EDT
Organization: DEC Engineering Network
Lines: 46

> Therefore, the "suppress all super powers" is either VERY temporary
> or Forge was lying, or Clairmont [sic] is jerking off again.
> Hutch

The other possibility is that Forge has no idea of what he's talking about. From
what was said in the issue, I inferred that the gun had't been tested *at all*;
maybe it won't even work. His "mutant scanner" either doesn't work or he was
playing an elaborate joke and didn't have it turned on, otherwise, he *should*
have been able to detect that Raven was a mutant. No, waitaminute, it could be
that it only detects the presence of a mutant, but can't specify. If he is in-
deed a mutant himself, then his presence might have masked hers. In that, he
could well be kidding, though, otherwise why would he reveal the fact that he
was a mutant, knowing what the government has in mind for mutants (or does he)?

> Marvel Comics has NEVER paid even the lip-service to real
> scientific knowledge that DC pays.  They never let a little thing like
> credibility (or POSSIBILITY) get in the way of their plot twists.
> Hutch

What?? You have to be putting us on! ALL comic book science is bullshit, but it
has to be, or we wouldn't have any superheroes to kick around. However, it's al-
ways been my impression that Marvel has always tried to be more plausible in its
science than DC. Try reading THE OFFICIAL HANDBOOK OF THE MARVEL UNIVERSE. They
at least try to make the various powers *sound* scientificly credible. Could you
maybe give us some examples of DC scientific lip-service? How about the fact
that Gerry Conway is probably the least scientificly literate writer in comics?
How about the very nature and/or origins of the powers of Superman, Flash, or
Green Lantern? Are these really any more plausible than those of Spiderman, the
Hulk, or the FF? Furthermore, my nomination for the Scientific Idiocy of All
Time in the Comics goes to an early issue of GREEN LANTERN (I know it's perhaps
not fair to pick on something that old, but...) GL is fighting an orange-colored
monster, but his ring is powerless against it. He surmises that the beast is
surrounded by an "aura of infra-yellow light". An editor's note (from Julie
Schwartz, who should have known better) says: "Infra-yellow light is invisible
yellow light, just as infra-red light is invisible red light". Right. Well, I
suppose that orange can be called "infra-yellow" --- it is just below yellow in
the spectrum.
	I'm not trying to hold Marvel writers up as Paragons of Scientific Aca-
deme, but to say that DC "does it better" is ridiculous.

				  --- jayembee (Jerry Boyajian, DEC Maynard, MA)

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