"Ridiculous Questions About Superheroes" or "How Does Superman Get A Haircut?"

[Seil]

So I live in a small town. About a half hour away by car is the main campus of my school, and since I don't drive, that's a long way away/ It's okay, though, because my school has taken space above the public library in town for classes. That means that whenever I finish Biology, I can go downstairs and read comic books. Over time, I've started to wonder about a few things.

Like how does Superman get a haircut? He can stop bullets with his eyes, he no mere human scissors are going to be able to cut his hair. Or shave him. Or trim his nails. Or flush his waste.

For that matter, does Batman go out and get haircuts, or does Alfred do it? Also, if Alfred does it, how dedicated is he that he hasn't just indignantly quit?

Also, why is it that only a few select Batman villains know his identity? How hard is it to deduce? You can see that he's caucasian, tall, and well built. He knows a variety of martial arts. He's got to be a genius, rich or both to come up with his equipment. He's got to be a recluse, or at least on the unavailable side due to the whole crime fighting thing. Hey! You know who's built, rich, knows a variety of martial arts and rarely strays out of the mansion where he lives with only one boy and their butler? Bruce Wayne.

With all the radiation just being all radioactive in Metropolis, how come people aren't in the hospital what with the cancer?

How does one get good insurance in the superhero world?

Who cleans Spiderman's webs off of buildings?

How does Daredevil get through court while being able to hear everyone in the gallery and their heartbeats and everything all the time?

When do superheroes sleep?

The Hulk goes to a variety of places, does a few different things, but something always remains the same. He tears his purple pants. Aside from the fact that I can't find purple pants anywhere, how does he get around? People see the Hulk in torn purple pants, and then they see the resident reclusive scientist walking around naked except for the Hulks pants.

Is Mr. Fantastic good in bed?

In a male-dominanted world, why did Wonder Woman choose a onesie for her costume, despite being built like an amazon?

Why are villains like Doctor Doom and Lex Luthor even alive, let alone holding political office? Haven't they tried to destroy the world once a week, at least?

How did Superman turn back time by reversing the spin of the Earth? Or alter reality with a punch?

Why do so many villains have doctorates?

[Token]

So I live in a small town. About a half hour away by car is the main campus of my school, and since I don't drive, that's a long way away/ It's okay, though, because my school has taken space above the public library in town for classes. That means that whenever I finish Biology, I can go downstairs and read comic books. Over time, I've started to wonder about a few things.

Like how does Superman get a haircut? He can stop bullets with his eyes, he no mere human scissors are going to be able to cut his hair. Or shave him. Or trim his nails. Or flush his waste. It depends on how they're defining his powers today. In some cases, hair and whatnot can be cut because it's "dead cells." Sometimes, he cuts it himself with careful heat vision and mirrors. Occasionally, his invulnerability is a subconscious tactile-telekinesis type deal, which means he can sort of shut it off for stuff like that.

For that matter, does Batman go out and get haircuts, or does Alfred do it? Also, if Alfred does it, how dedicated is he that he hasn't just indignantly quit?
Dude's rich, and you're operating on a pretty inaccurate concept of Batman. The entire point of the Wayne persona is to be a bumbling rich idiot so no one suspects him- I'd be surprised if he didn't go out to get his hair cut.

Also, why is it that only a few select Batman villains know his identity? How hard is it to deduce? You can see that he's caucasian, tall, and well built. He knows a variety of martial arts. He's got to be a genius, rich or both to come up with his equipment. He's got to be a recluse, or at least on the unavailable side due to the whole crime fighting thing. Hey! You know who's built, rich, knows a variety of martial arts and rarely strays out of the mansion where he lives with only one boy and their butler? Bruce Wayne.
Once again, inaccurate. No one really knows Wayne's good with martial arts, he's out of the cave pretty frequently and is well known to the public, has way more than one boy running around, and it's DC. There are built, tall white dudes all over.

With all the radiation just being all radioactive in Metropolis, how come people aren't in the hospital what with the cancer? Only important when it's a plot point. Giving Luthor cancer, for example.

How does one get good insurance in the superhero world? Carefully, and by not living in New York.

Who cleans Spiderman's webs off of buildings? Spider-Man has a hyphen in it. Also the webs dissolve after a couple of hours.

How does Daredevil get through court while being able to hear everyone in the gallery and their heartbeats and everything all the time? Same way anyone with super senses manages?

When do superheroes sleep? Depends on the hero. Batman takes tiny micronaps, because he's an obsessive douche. Superman doesn't really need sleep, but he tends to get by at night, since he mostly operates during the day. None of them are really active 24/7

The Hulk goes to a variety of places, does a few different things, but something always remains the same. He tears his purple pants. Aside from the fact that I can't find purple pants anywhere, how does he get around? People see the Hulk in torn purple pants, and then they see the resident reclusive scientist walking around naked except for the Hulks pants. Hulk is boring, who cares.

Is Mr. Fantastic good in bed? Yes in that the sex is fantastic, no in that he's inattentive.

In a male-dominanted world, why did Wonder Woman choose a onesie for her costume, despite being built like an amazon? Because male writers and male audiences

Why are villains like Doctor Doom and Lex Luthor even alive, let alone holding political office? Haven't they tried to destroy the world once a week, at least? Not really? Once we get out of the silver age, Luthor is pretty legitimate in the public's eye- there was a time when he was even the president, in fact. Claiming you've changed and being charismatic and rich as fuck can do wonders. As for Doom, he's a leader of a nation that's practically a utopia, once you ignore the dictator thing- he's incredibly good to his people, and even the god of the most advanced nation in the MCU admitted that Doom's rule is the only way humanity can survive. Frankly, if it wasn't for his grudge against that accursed RICHARRRDS, he'd probably have turned the entire planet into a paradise.

How did Superman turn back time by reversing the spin of the Earth? Or alter reality with a punch? Time thing is stupid movie logic. As for the altering reality thing, that wasn't technically Superman (long story), the character was from the fictional version of our dimension, and he essentially punched the fourth wall because he was unhappy with how the story was going. Insanely stupid, but in the long run, worth it to fix a lot of stupid plot holes and shit (while accidentally creating a few new ones, but that's comics for ya.)

Why do so many villains have doctorates? Because they're the smart ones. Besides, it's pretty bitchin' to have a PhD in Horribleness.

alright let's sperg this shit

[tacticslion]

Dang it, Token! You beat me to it! :)

... well played, sir. Well played.

[Amake]

Okay let's up the ante heah.

What would happen if Captain Marvel and Zatanna held hands and yelled MAZAHS together?

What powers do Crazy Jane have exactly?

What if Jesse Custer told a dude to fly?

Speaking of "Preacher", what would happen if the Saint of Killers shot himself?

In "Powers", how can they have a universally effective genetic-level power drainer when the world's collective medical expertise breaks down crying every day because they have no idea how any given power biologically compares to a regular person, let alone other powers?

And most important of all, how come Master Chief has three rivets on the back of the hand of his Spartan suit in one issue and then all of a sudden in the next issue he has four?

[Bum Bill Bee]

I wouldn't know about most of those things, but with the Spider-man's web question, its well known that his webbing disolves in an hour, so no one would have to clean it.

Now here's a classic question from me: What's the use of an invisible jet if the pilot can still be seen?

[Bells]

Not a single question about Superman having sex.... or the Flash.... or Wonder Woman... you guys are way more mature than i thought you were.

Fo'shame...

[Shyria Dracnoir]

I wouldn't know about most of those things, but with the Spider-man's web question, its well known that his webbing disolves in an hour, so no one would have to clean it.

Now here's a classic question from me: What's the use of an invisible jet if the pilot can still be seen?

Most recent media make this moot by making the pilot invisible as well.

qmlPm3KlVlM

[Bells]

Does it make moot the point that an ancient Greek Amazon Goddess Tribe has the msot advanced Stealth Jet and knows how to fly it...::

[Amake]

We've been over the question of how Superman has sex before. The answer is, very carefully and don't let a porn mag editor write it. But the much bigger question is what happens when he unleashes several hundred million flying, invincible supersperm.

Also the Amazons have much more advanced technology than the patriarchal world. They have mastered asexual reproduction so I wouldn't wonder about an invisible plane. . .although it's really just a remnant from the golden age when for some reason Wonder Woman had the most outlandish powers and contraptions to get away with flying despite for some reason never being given the basic power of flight.

[Bells]

*Golden Age Editor*

"Flying Super Amazon! PSHA!! What a bunch of Humbug..."
"Super Amazon with invisible fighter jet! FUCKING GENIUS!"

[Bum Bill Bee]

Not a single question about Superman having sex.... or the Flash.... or Wonder Woman... you guys are way more mature than i thought you were.

Fo'shame...

Well, in Spider-man Dark Reign (or whatever it was called, it was the one where Peter was an old man) Peter killed MJ with his radioactive semen during sex. And in Adam Warren's Empowered several characters got their powers through STDs.

I also liked to think that Shocker used his vibration gauntlets as a sex toy (http://kyrtuck.deviantart.com/gallery/40866911?offset=24#/d5mgffy), but that's all I got on the subject of sex.

[Seil]

N1AadzrK324

[Flarecobra]

Who gets the bill for all the destroyed stuff when superbeings engage in fisticuffs and wreak half the place?

[Marc v4.0]

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[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

How did Superman turn back time by reversing the spin of the Earth? Or alter reality with a punch?

*Sigh* I thought people had gotten over this one? He didn't reverse time by spinning the earth backwards, he travelled back in time by flying fast enough to break the light barrier. The earth spinning backwards was just a visual aid to show he was travelling through time. The real question you should be asking is why didn't this create a time paradox/leave us with 2 Supermen.

[Locke cole]

Like how does Superman get a haircut?



http://media.comicvine.com/uploads/0/3125/301218-19245-122559-1-supermans-girl-frien_super.jpg

[Marc v4.0]

*Sigh* I thought people had gotten over this one? He didn't reverse time by spinning the earth backwards, he travelled back in time by flying fast enough to break the light barrier. The earth spinning backwards was just a visual aid to show he was travelling through time. The real question you should be asking is why didn't this create a time paradox/leave us with 2 Supermen.

He reversed time by flying the Earth backwards and no amount of fan-canon justification is going to change that.

[Aldurin]

He reversed time by flying the Earth backwards and no amount of fan-canon justification is going to change that.

Just because you want movie writers to be smart doesn't mean they are, so spinning the earth backwards was what they learned from a guy who claimed to know a guy who sat next to a physicist in a bar once.

[Dracorion]

http://media.comicvine.com/uploads/0/3125/301218-19245-122559-1-supermans-girl-frien_super.jpg

I've always said Superman's spit-curl is the real source of his power.

[PyrosNine]

How do you get insurance in a superhero world/who pays for things when super heros blow up the place:
The question only seems hard when you compare it to how insurance works for us: in a world where explosions of all kinds and causes are pretty commonplace, and that the likelihood that everyone will need such an insurance in major metropolis areas, we can assume that the cost of Insurance with a "superhero" clause is actually pretty cheap by average. Furthermore, in certain cities like Metropolis, LexCorp also owns most of the repair/insurance companies by proxy, so one could imagine that part of Lex's riches come from getting paid by teh city and it's people to fix the damage.

In the end, the cost of repairs has gone down in relation to the populace's ability to pay, so Metropolis can still look awesome after hundreds of super battles daily.


What would happen if Captain Marvel and Zatanna held hands and yelled MAZAHS together? Nothing, it only works if Billy/Marvel says Shazam, and it's not a proper spell for Zatanna because it isn't giving a command.

What powers do Crazy Jane have exactly? It's best implied she's a reality warper, who manifests powers as an extension of her current emotional/mental state- since her mind is fractured she divvies out various aspects of herself or people she would like to become in response to situations, and these people develop powers that match. If she was ever not crazy, and stable, she could conceivably do anything.

What if Jesse Custer told a dude to fly? HE would try really, really hard until his mind made the logical leap of buying airplane tickets.

Speaking of "Preacher", what would happen if the Saint of Killers shot himself? HE'd survive because Garth Ennis LURVES himself some Villain Damn Sues.

In "Powers", how can they have a universally effective genetic-level power drainer when the world's collective medical expertise breaks down crying every day because they have no idea how any given power biologically compares to a regular person, let alone other powers?
The same way they can have power removers for EVERY super hero in the Civil War: Handwave, say nanomachines several times, and make sure a guy wearing a white lab coat says something about it. Though not knowing how the superbody works doesn't mean they couldn't drain powers, probably just have some sort of "life energy" zapper that just has a side effect of messing with other people's powers.

And most important of all, how come Master Chief has three rivets on the back of the hand of his Spartan suit in one issue and then all of a sudden in the next issue he has four?
Because next issue, he'll have five.

[mauve]

In regards to Batman and how only a few characters seem to know that he's Bruce Wayne, I kinda liked how the Arkham games handled it. Most of the villains there have been dealing with Batman for so long, they're pretty much beyond the point of caring who he really is. Joker really doesn't give a damn because there's no fun in that. Penguin, Ivy, Two-Face, Freeze, and even Mad Hatter don't particularly seem to care at this point, either: They obviously have bigger problems to deal with and are content to just hate Batman and actively work to kill him.

The only two people who seem to want to know (aside from Strange, who already knows because EVIL PSYCHOLOGY) are Harley Quinn and Riddler, and Harley is too inept and Riddler too sidequesty to make a difference. I did kind of like how Riddler tries to work out where Batman could possibly come up with enough money to fund a private jet, custom car and a never ending supply of gadgets. The "robbing supervillians of their stolen wealth after capturing them" theory is actually kind of a clever excuse for why nobody connects GUY WITH MILLIONS OF DOLLARS WORTH OF GADGETS with GUY WHO LIVES IN TOWN AND ACTUALLY HAS MILLIONS OF DOLLARS TO SPEND ON GADGETS.

Aside from the previously-mentioned fact that Bruce purposely acts like a doofus to avoid suspicion, I mean.



This has been another Mauve Is A Batman Freak Moment.

[Magus]

He reversed time by flying the Earth backwards and no amount of fan-canon justification is going to change that.

There is no "canon" answer, at least definitively. There were no time travel shenanigans in the script, or at least the one I've read. All we have is what's in the movie, and since it can easily be interpreted "correctly" so it's not as silly I see no reason to continue to say that he made the earth go backwards--especially since it is just stale fodder for a lame joke that's been told a zillion times now.

[Marc v4.0]

No reason to continue saying he made the Earth go backwards other than the fact that he flies around the world and it goes backwards. Gotcha, just go ahead and make things up about it that didn't happen then.

[Aerozord]

Here is a thought on the "who pays for all the damages" thing

Supervillians. To be more exact the one with legit public personas. Not only would covering the cost of all the damages keep people placated so they dont push as hard to discover the ultimate source of the problem and its great PR.

I'd also like to add something to Batman's identity. Its not like he's the only rich guy in town. Nor does his resources automatically mean he is rich or that he is the one that builds them.

On a related note why are you asking how no one has figured out who Batman is when superman gets away with just wearing glasses?

[Locke cole]

Superman defends his identity with subconsciously firing super-hypnosis.

Amplified by the lenses in his glasses.

Transmitted across TV.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

How many weet-bix can the Hulk do?

[Nique]

I read once that Superman super-vibrates his super-face in front of cameras so that he looks super-different from not-super Clark Kent.

[Locke cole]

You must have heard wrong. "he vibrates something" is the catch-all answer for The Flash, not Superman.

[Shyria Dracnoir]

On a related note why are you asking how no one has figured out who Batman is when superman gets away with just wearing glasses?

Superman alters everything from his posture, body language, voice pitch and personality to disguise himself. Look at the difference between Christopher Reeve as Clark and Christopher Reeve as Superman in the original movie.

Besides, what sounds more likely to the average onlooker: that Clark Kent is the secret civilian identity of Superman, or that Clark is a reporter who just happens to resemble Superman?

[Bells]

if anybody posts that silly ass speech about Superman from Kill Bill, i WILL choke a bitch.

[Aerozord]

Superman alters everything from his posture, body language, voice pitch and personality to disguise himself. Look at the difference between Christopher Reeve as Clark and Christopher Reeve as Superman in the original movie.

Besides, what sounds more likely to the average onlooker: that Clark Kent is the secret civilian identity of Superman, or that Clark is a reporter who just happens to resemble Superman?

right, and you can just apply that to Batman is all that I'm saying

[Lumenskir]

And most important of all, how come Master Chief has three rivets on the back of the hand of his Spartan suit in one issue and then all of a sudden in the next issue he has four?
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if anybody posts that silly ass speech about Superman from Kill Bill, i WILL choke a bitch.
Hey, that's a great speech! Just because it's only one of like ten nerd visions for how Superman/Clark works doesn't mean it's stupid.
right, and you can just apply that to Batman is all that I'm saying
But they're not 1-to-1 comparisons. Bruce Wayne can act as oafish as he likes, but that still only hides the physicality part. Batman is still composed of enough identifiable elements that any persistent enough individual should be able to ping Bruce as a shortlist contender. Like, anyone should be able to work out that Batman requires a lot of infrastructure to function, and then look at likely sites for that infrastructure to be, who could afford it, etc. Unless there are other local billionaires with land holdings just outside the city proper, Bruce should be a prime suspect.

Superman on the other hand is hard to pin down, mostly because he's so open. Like, why would you even assume that the guy with no mask has an identity to hide? And how could you narrow down the list of suspects from "Built white guys"? The only ones who would ever have reason to suspect anything are his coworkers, and presumably Clark is bumbling enough to throw off any suspicion (although I do like the theory that these Pulitzer prize winning journalists figured it out a long time ago and just indulge Clark).

Also, has there ever been a side story where Clark gets entered into a Superman Lookalike contest and loses? Because if not, does anyone have a time portal to the 90's I can use to sell that script to the New Adventures of Lois and Clark?

[Premmy]

Man, who let all these Kevin Smith movies post in here?

[Magus]

No reason to continue saying he made the Earth go backwards other than the fact that he flies around the world and it goes backwards. Gotcha, just go ahead and make things up about it that didn't happen then.

Uh, yeah, exactly? Not sure which part you're not getting here.

You must have heard wrong. "he vibrates something" is the catch-all answer for The Flash, not Superman.

No, I think I heard that too. I think some writer basically also gave that power to Superman. Leaving the Flash with only the faint hope that maybe, just maybe, he is slightly faster at running than Superman.

But probably not.

I'm glad they've (mostly) removed the telekinesis aspects because it makes it harder to revert back to when he had mind control powers, too. But they'll probably pull that shit when its convenient as well.

Man, who let all these Kevin Smith movies post in here?

You ever watch Spoilers! on Hulu? They gave Kevin Smith an entire TV show where he can expound on his movie posts.

[Token]

You must have heard wrong. "he vibrates something" is the catch-all answer for The Flash, not Superman.

No, that's actually accurate. His glasses also distort the color of his eyes, which are an unhuman shade of blue.

ULeaving the Flash with only the faint hope that maybe, just maybe, he is slightly faster at running than Superman.

But probably not.

No stop you clearly have no idea what you're talking about

[PCD]

Related to the whole insurance question:

How come, after suing superheroes into hiding in The Incredibles, all the supervillains stopped showing up too? There is the argument that without heroes, villains may feel like they have nothing to do, but I have trouble believing that there weren't a few superjerks out there who tried stirring up trouble enough to make people want the heroes back in the twenty or so years before Syndrome.

[PyrosNine]

Actually, Bruce Wayne as Batman isn't as clear cut as you think: Bruce is not the only Millionaire in Gotham City, he's just the main one we see and hear about it. It's a city of wealth and excess, he's not the only rich guy out there, especially when there's a high amount of turn around with rich people with resources becoming larger than life criminals. If anything, I would think people would suspect that Bruce Wayne was a super villain long before they thought that he was the Batman, considering all the other rich people in Gotham who are villains.

Heck, considering every other villain or vigilante can get their own base of operations and infrastructure in Gotham, perhaps it's not immediately blazing clear that Batman has a better, if not perfect infrastructure set up compared to other folks running around.

Hugo Strange himself I believe came to his conclusion that Bruce was Batman after some testing, and had several other hypotheses as to who Bruce was, and it's possible he only figured it out with the process of elimination. Every other person who figured it out was either psychic, had help, or was looking at Bruce Wayne for other reasons, especially Hush, and happened to stumble onto the fact that he was Batman, not discover that Batman was Bruce Wayne.

As for why it's also danged hard for people to realize that Bruce is Batman, he's a recluse who only shows up when he wants to show off his money, more than capable of being Batman AND Bruce Wayne at the same time, and always goes out of his way while being Bruce to not show off any particularly exemplary martial arts/skills until he's out of sight. Batman shows up and takes everyone down like some sort of superhuman force of darkness, inspiring terror and doubt, while Bruce wayne just gets a few lucky hits in and then makes for stage left like any sane person.

Batman also has his air of mystery and mystique, to the point that most believe him to be either some sort of superhuman, or hardened killer/assassin/ninja, even the people who know him best think he's much more than human (Gordon and Joker included) and the average joe moreso, so while Bruce is just some rich guy, Batman is some sort of ubermensch.

Then we get the fact that the populace, probably the same sort of people who think Sonic and Shadow look totally alike, also tend to immediately believe any sort of vigilante patrolling the streets is Batman in a new suit. Nightwing, Batwoman, and Red Robin have often found that their own crime fighting antics of defeating criminals quickly and disappearing before anyone notices has lead to witnesses ID'ing them as Batman, as all they saw was a cape and fists. The average person doesn't even know what Batman looks like, if he's done his job well.

As for villains, either they know, or they don't care, and most have some sort of mental blinder to keep them from noticing- Two Face probably knows, but Bruce and Batman are both his homeboy and enemy, so the disconnect between his personalities keeps him from knowing, and while Strange has his monomania driving him to become Batman, he is also torn between what Batman is and WHO Batman is. He figured out that Bruce was Batman, but he's not sure exactly how Bruce became THE BATMAN (I.E. How Bruce became badass ninja incarnate) and in Arkham City and in the Comics was under the impression that Bruce simply had hired goons and used tricks of technology and weaponry to create the illusion of being such an asskicker.

For the time being, Batman actually has the advantage of not being Bruce Wayne in the comics, because for a time Hush was running around wearing his face, and Batman has saved Bruce Wayne, in person, and in front of cameras, and is frequently in the news on different parts of the world at the same time Wayne's off partying in excess. So for even the criminal masterminds, Bruce Wayne =/= Batman.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

Everyone's Batman isn't obvious explanation rely on Bruce Wayne being sane when he is clearly obviously as batshit insane as Batman. Look at Christian Bale Bruce- within 5 minutes you'd work out this is a clearly disturbed individual.

[Arhra]

But Clark Kent wears glasses! If he was really Superman, he'd fly around crashing into things, because he wouldn't be able to see where he's going!

[Nique]

You know, it would probably be pretty interesting to have a one-shot comic book or graphic novel story where you follow the hero as a superhero but are not given confirmation as to their actual identity until the end of the story, if ever.

[POS Industries]

Look at Christian Bale Bruce
No.

[Magus]

You know, it would probably be pretty interesting to have a one-shot comic book or graphic novel story where you follow the hero as a superhero but are not given confirmation as to their actual identity until the end of the story, if ever.

That would be interesting. It would be like the usual mystery in reverse--instead of finding out who the murderer is, you find out who the hero is. Even make the villain the protagonist and have him continually frustrated as the hero nefariously saves his victims from being killed and shuts down his "business operations".

But even just a story where you had a protagonist who is not the hero, but interacts with various people who he or she is trying to figure out MIGHT be the hero, would be interesting.