Saturday, June 03, 2006
Comic Art
NOW LOOK WHAT I HAVE GOTTEN MYSELF INTO!
Back in March I announced that I have found the nearly perfect web site - The Periodic Table of Comic Books. So, now that we have concluded the series on villains here in Comic Art, I thought we'd explore that a little, after all what could be more fun that to review comic images that have to do with chemistry - what could possibly be more fun or interesting?
My "plan" if there is such a thing here is to devote this space in the upcoming weeks to an element and look at the related images the site presents. What elements and for how long will pretty much be on a whim - something I like, and we will quite when I don;t find that much interesting anymore.
I thought we'd start; however, by looking at a few "chemical" based heroes. There are numerous villains, but I thought they could be revealed as we move through the elements, but these heroes show up so much in the table, I thought they deserved some introduction.
Say hello to Metamorpho - The Element Man. Lab accident caused his body to transform and he can now convert it into chemicals at a whim - cool idea, unfortunate origin - lab accidents are just too convenient, and least without a great twist that gives them appropriate pathos, unfortunately in the early days, Metamorpho lacked that pathos.
He did; however, have a really cool look with his body all subdivided that way. Far as I know they never did explain why this that was his "default" state - seems to me the second law of thermodynamics would demand that he rest as a single element, but hey this is comic books. In all the chemical heroes, the limited nature of the writers knowledge became apparent pretty quickly, at least if you really liked chemistry like I did.
It's an interesting question - What role did chemistry in comics play in forming my personal, ending up professional, interest? I think quite a bit actually. All those little hints of chemistry in these books was fascinating to me, and frankly I always hoped I could synthesize up the witch's brew that would give me powers!
These guys - The Metal Men - influenced me quite a bit. Metamorpho was always a little flat as a character, but with the Metal Men they tried to fashion personalities to match the metalurgical properties of the materials from which they were made - Now that was a solid teaching concept for a kid like me.
I always found Mercury problematic because as a kid I never got a "mercurial" personality - he just came off pissy, and I really never understood why he stayed solid except when he wanted to be liquid, but I did break more than one thermometer trying to figure it out.
There was a problem with the fact that the Metal Men were also grossly sexist. As a very young child, Platinum was just a yucky, mushy "girl," but when I grew some I really wanted something more to her than just emoting over Dr. Magnus, the creator of the Metal Men.
You'll note the bad guy on this cover - Chemo! We'll see more of him as we go along, but this is where he came from. He went on to be one of Superman's greater foes (hey he could pull kryptonite from that stew he called a body) but this is where he came from - a chemical foe to a metallurgical hero group.
You also have to love the way that as robots the Metal Men were always being disassembled and re-assembled - see the heads laying around here? Made for a bit of comic relief too as the mismatched heads and bodies were often created.
And here we see a johnny-come-lately to the chemical hero game - Firestorm. He is sort of a modern alchemist, capable of transmuting materials on a nuclear level. Needless to say he was forged in nuclear "fires" and in what I think is a vague homage to the Hulk who has a similar origin story, he is two personalites blended, only in this case the professor and the teenager (Ala Banner and Jones) instead of the man and the monster.
This is a character whose look was stupendous when he first showed up, but now appears a bit dated, and I have not seen a modern image that was any better. He also has generally been pretty lame as a character - He has settled into a reasonable existence guest spotting in the Justice League.
Well, emugh intro - I hope as the weeks go by you will enjoy looking at chemicals in comics as much as I am going to enjoy writing it.
Related Tags: comics, comic books, chemistry, chemical heroes, Metal Men, Metamorpho
Back in March I announced that I have found the nearly perfect web site - The Periodic Table of Comic Books. So, now that we have concluded the series on villains here in Comic Art, I thought we'd explore that a little, after all what could be more fun that to review comic images that have to do with chemistry - what could possibly be more fun or interesting?My "plan" if there is such a thing here is to devote this space in the upcoming weeks to an element and look at the related images the site presents. What elements and for how long will pretty much be on a whim - something I like, and we will quite when I don;t find that much interesting anymore.
I thought we'd start; however, by looking at a few "chemical" based heroes. There are numerous villains, but I thought they could be revealed as we move through the elements, but these heroes show up so much in the table, I thought they deserved some introduction.
Say hello to Metamorpho - The Element Man. Lab accident caused his body to transform and he can now convert it into chemicals at a whim - cool idea, unfortunate origin - lab accidents are just too convenient, and least without a great twist that gives them appropriate pathos, unfortunately in the early days, Metamorpho lacked that pathos.He did; however, have a really cool look with his body all subdivided that way. Far as I know they never did explain why this that was his "default" state - seems to me the second law of thermodynamics would demand that he rest as a single element, but hey this is comic books. In all the chemical heroes, the limited nature of the writers knowledge became apparent pretty quickly, at least if you really liked chemistry like I did.
It's an interesting question - What role did chemistry in comics play in forming my personal, ending up professional, interest? I think quite a bit actually. All those little hints of chemistry in these books was fascinating to me, and frankly I always hoped I could synthesize up the witch's brew that would give me powers!These guys - The Metal Men - influenced me quite a bit. Metamorpho was always a little flat as a character, but with the Metal Men they tried to fashion personalities to match the metalurgical properties of the materials from which they were made - Now that was a solid teaching concept for a kid like me.
I always found Mercury problematic because as a kid I never got a "mercurial" personality - he just came off pissy, and I really never understood why he stayed solid except when he wanted to be liquid, but I did break more than one thermometer trying to figure it out.
There was a problem with the fact that the Metal Men were also grossly sexist. As a very young child, Platinum was just a yucky, mushy "girl," but when I grew some I really wanted something more to her than just emoting over Dr. Magnus, the creator of the Metal Men.You'll note the bad guy on this cover - Chemo! We'll see more of him as we go along, but this is where he came from. He went on to be one of Superman's greater foes (hey he could pull kryptonite from that stew he called a body) but this is where he came from - a chemical foe to a metallurgical hero group.
You also have to love the way that as robots the Metal Men were always being disassembled and re-assembled - see the heads laying around here? Made for a bit of comic relief too as the mismatched heads and bodies were often created.
And here we see a johnny-come-lately to the chemical hero game - Firestorm. He is sort of a modern alchemist, capable of transmuting materials on a nuclear level. Needless to say he was forged in nuclear "fires" and in what I think is a vague homage to the Hulk who has a similar origin story, he is two personalites blended, only in this case the professor and the teenager (Ala Banner and Jones) instead of the man and the monster.This is a character whose look was stupendous when he first showed up, but now appears a bit dated, and I have not seen a modern image that was any better. He also has generally been pretty lame as a character - He has settled into a reasonable existence guest spotting in the Justice League.
Well, emugh intro - I hope as the weeks go by you will enjoy looking at chemicals in comics as much as I am going to enjoy writing it.
Related Tags: comics, comic books, chemistry, chemical heroes, Metal Men, Metamorpho
