Overdue realisations: Are you a dummy?

[Zander]

I saw the Fantastic Four film on Saturday. Even though I've known about the characters since I was a kid (I'm in my 30s now), it was only after watching the movie that I realised that the characters are all based on different materials or states of matter:

Mr Fantastic - rubber
Invisible Girl - glass
The Thing - stone
The Human Torch - fire
Dr Doom - metal & electricity

I feel like a dummy for not having realised this sooner.

So are you a dummy too? What are your should-have-realised-that-a-long-time-ago moments?

 

[Henry]

So are you a dummy too? What are your should-have-realised-that-a-long-time-ago moments?

I never thought about the FF one you just mentioned, but my goof is about Spider-man.

You know that signature style of his when he comes descending on a webline upside-down with legs bent? Took me a good 10 years to realize that was EXACTLY emulating the way a descends from its spinnerette. Ditko should be praised for that beautiful piece of unheralded symbolism, and I should be hit with a ball cap for not noticing until the early 1990's.

 

[Chaldfont]

Aren't the FF based on the Four Elements: Earth, Air, Fire and Water?

Of course, I didn't realize this until much much later (when I read about the anti-FF group in the Mutants and Masterminds Freedom City book).

 

[Zander]

Aren't the FF based on the Four Elements: Earth, Air, Fire and Water?

I thought of that and maybe that's the official line, but water doesn't stretch (though it does expand/contract).

Also, Dr Doom doesn't fit the elemental schema.

 

[WayneLigon]

It took me a long time to realize that it wasn't 'Submarine-er', it was 'Sub-mariner'.

I always though 'Darkseid' was pronounced 'Dark Seed' instead of 'Dark Side' though either works well.

It took me the entire series to realize that Suguru Fujisaki in Gravitation is a boy.

Watching The Island, I thought through the entire movie that Sean Bean was actually Anthony Stewart Head.

 

[Welverin]

I thought of that and maybe that's the official line, but water doesn't stretch (though it does expand/contract).

Also, Dr Doom doesn't fit the elemental schema.

Well, the electricity bit seems to be a movie thing anyway.

I always though 'Darkseid' was pronounced 'Dark Seed' instead of 'Dark Side' though either works well.

That's what I always thought it was, but then I don't read any DC books. On a related note, I don't think I get Ra's Al Ghul right either.

 

[sniffles]

Well, the electricity bit seems to be a movie thing anyway.



That's what I always thought it was, but then I don't read any DC books. On a related note, I don't think I get Ra's Al Ghul right either.

Yes, I don't think the movie Doom is much like the comic version, except cosmetically. I also think the elemental scheme is unintentional, since the Human Torch actually began with a different character who wasn't associated with the Fantastic Four, and the idea was just reused when the FF were created many years later.

As for Ra's al Ghul, in the animated Batman (the cool '90s one, not the sucky new one) they pronounced it Raysh al Gool, but I noticed that's not quite how it was pronounced in Batman Begins.

 

[Dingleberry]

I also think the elemental scheme is unintentional, since the Human Torch actually began with a different character who wasn't associated with the Fantastic Four, and the idea was just reused when the FF were created many years later.

Someone with better Google-fu may be able to find it, but I believe Stan the Man himself has said the FF's powers were based on the elements.

 

[trancejeremy]

Just a couple months ago, I had this thought about Blade Runner....

If they have photographs of what the various replicants look like, then why exactly do they have to give them that test?

Especially the first guy, Leon. The actor who played him, Brion James, is quite disctinctive looking. Anyone would recognize him from a photo.

 

[John Crichton]

Um.

It's not comic/genre related but a few years back I realized why the called Space, space. Cuz there's alot of space... heh