COMICS FOR PHYSICISTS My very first post to Usenet was in April 1988, to the newsgroup rec.arts.comics. Entitled "Comics for Physicists," the article contained the efforts of several of us in the U. Chicago Science Fiction Club to inject a bit of realism into certain well-known comic book characters and stories. Two additional posts followed. Included here are both: * the reformatted versions of the best of the bunch (as edited by Greg "Elmo" Morrow (morrow@physics.rice.edu), who reported that these bits were (as of June 1995) the most requested items from the "sig-o-rama," his random signature-file generator * the original posts, rediscovered recently (February 1998) by Corey Liss (cpl1@midway.uchicago.edu). I find it very weird that my first post to the net seems to have outlived all others I've made since then... * * * * * * REALISTIC ORIGIN COMICS: Young Billy Batson was wandering the streets of San Francisco, late at night when a mysterious figure in a trenchcoat beckoned Billy to follow him into the subway station. Billy followed him. Poor Billy hasn't been heard from since, and alas, the police are not optimistic as to his fate." --Paul Estin "Hi, I'm Robin. That's my buddy Batman hiding in the shadows in his dark cape. Me, I prefer flashier colors. I'm acting as bait so that the bad guys will come out; then Batman and I will take them in. By the way, I'm the third or fourth Robin... he never told me what happened to the others..." Batman: "He was a good soldier. He honored me." --Paul A. Estin et al. REAL SCIENCE COMICS: "Hi, I'm Lex Luthor. Y'know my arch enemy-- Superman-- well, he can't touch me. See, I've got this here kryptonite ring, so he can't come within several feet of me--so he can't hurt me. Pretty cool, huh?" (cut to picture of Superman two miles away preparing to throw a bus) --Paul A. Estin et al. "REAlISTIC ORIGIN COMICS: THE FANTASTIC FOUR. Flying in the first spacecraft, they and their ship are bombarded by cosmic radiation. They manage to pilot the ship back to earth, but the rays have changed them forever. That's right-- they all get radiation poisoning and die." --Paul A. Estin et al. "REAL SCIENCE COMICS: In a world full of superpowered mutants who can do such superhuman feats as dying of malnutrition from not having critical enzymes or getting sunburn from having mutated melanin, this man is the most powerful mutant of them all. His name is Magneto. He can synthesize vitamin C." --Paul A. Estin et al. "REAL SCIENCE COMICS: Superman flies down and struggles to lift the huge building standing in the path of the tidal wave. He succeeds in tearing off a corner of the foundation--after all, buildings aren't strong enough to be picked up from the corner." --Paul A. Estin et al. "REALISTIC ORIGIN COMICS: THE INCREDIBLE HULK. Bruce Banner was caught in the heart of a gamma ray bomb detonation. He's probably vaporized, but he might be far enough out from ground zero to die of massive third- degree burns instead. In fact, he might only die of radiation sickness--or even only of cancer!" --Paul A. Estin et al. "REALISTIC ORIGIN COMICS: CAPTAIN MARVEL. Billy Batson is confronted one day by an old man who invites him into a back alley and promises him power undreamt of. He falls for it, and spends the rest of his life recuperating from the physical and psychological trauma." --Paul A. Estin et al. "REALISTIC ORIGIN COMICS: SPIDER-MAN. Peter Parker, shy science student, is bitten by a radioactive spider. Aside from an increased risk of cancer, this has no long-term effect." --Paul A. Estin et al. "Hi, I'm Captain America. Recently I had a crisis of conscience. You see, I found myself forced to kill a terrorist to save an innocent life. I've never killed before, and it made me wonder whether I should continue my career. What's that? You in the back? Oh, you're asking what I did to the Nazis during World War II? Um..." --Mike Schiffer "REALISTIC ORIGIN COMICS: SUPERMAN. The young Kryptonian, born under the red sun of Krypton, now felt the much brighter yellow sunlight of Earth for the first time. The radiations worked changes on his very cells. Tragically, the higher level of ultraviolet radiation gave Kal- El almost immediate third degree sunburn, and the last son of Krypton died of skin cancer a few painful months later." --Mike Schiffer et al. "REALISTIC ORIGIN COMICS: BATMAN. Young Bruce Wayne was walking home with his parents one night, when a mugger stepped out of the shadows and murdered his parents in front of him. Bruce never truly got over the trauma, and after a childhood full of reform schools, he was placed into Arkham Asylum after claiming that a bat had told him that he had to dress up in a funny costume and beat criminals into submission." --Mike Schiffer et al. "LOGICAL FLAW COMICS: THE HULK. Doctor Bruce Banner succeeded in aiding a government team in creating the fearsome Gamma Bomb, the latest escalation of the arms race. This weapon, when dropped on enemy troops, turns even the least of them into an eight foot tall green (or gray) monster which can lift on the order of one hundred tons and is immune to bullets." --Mike Schiffer "Hi, I'm Ben Grimm, aka the Thing. Oh, look! My pal Johnny Storm's flame just went out, and he's falling to the ground. Oh well, I'll catch him. That is, rather than letting him fall on the flat grassy ground, I'll let him fall on my two arms, which are made of jagged orange rocks. (I always said I'd get back at him for stealing Alicia...)" --Mike Schiffer * * * * * * Article 6390 of rec.arts.comics: Path: sphinx!esti From: esti@sphinx.uchicago.edu (Paul A. Estin) Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics Subject: Comics for Physicists Summary: various retelling of comics in real life Date: 10 Apr 88 07:43:56 GMT Organization: U Chicago Computation Center Some friends of mine in the U Chicago Science Fiction Club (thanks, Todd, Mike, and everyone else) came up with the idea of "comics for physicists"- taking well-known comics origins and stories and sort of changing them to fit the "real world." A few examples follow: "Hi, I'm Robin. That's my buddy Batman hiding in the shadows in his dark cape. Me, I prefer flashier colors. I'm acting as bait so that the bad guys will come out; then Batman and I will take them in. By the way, I'm the third or fourth Robin... he never told me what happened to the others..." (sound of gunfire) Batman: "He was a good soldier. He honored me." CAPTAIN AMERICA: Given the super-soldier serum (say it five times fast) and an unbreakable shield, he is sent into the battlefield against the evil Nazis. An enemy soldier fires at him but, as planned, the shield neatly deflects the bullet. Of course, the recoil is so hard that Cap's arm is broken behind him, so that the next few bullets kill him, but... "Hi, I'm Lex Luthor. Y'know my arch enemy- Superman- well, he can't touch me. See, I've got this here kryptonite ring, so he can't come within several feet of me- so he can't hurt me. Pretty cool, huh?" (cut to picture of Superman two miles away preparing to throw a bus) THE FANTASTIC FOUR: Flying in the first spacecraft, they and there ship are bombarded by cosmic radiation. They manage to pilot the ship back to earth, but the rays have changed them forever. That's right- they all get radiation poisoning and die. THE FANTASTIC FOUR (version 2): Actually, they never make it back to Earth- the radiation killed the controls. In a world full of superpowered mutants who can do such superhuman feats as dying of malnutrition from not having critical enzymes or getting sunburn from having mutated melanin, this man is the world's most powerful mutant of them all. His name is Magneto. He can synthesize vitamin C. Superman flies down and struggles to lift the huge building standing in the path of a tidal wave. He succeeds in tearing off a the corner of the founda- tion- after all, buildings aren't strong enough to be picked up from the corner. THE INCREDIBLE HULK: Bruce (Robert? David? whatever) Banner was caught in the heart of a gamma ray bomb detonation. He's probably vaporized, but he might be far enough out from ground zero to die of massive third-degree burns in- stead. In fact, he might only die of radiation sickness- or even only of cancer! How does the Thing use a toilet, anyways? SHAZAM, the origin of CAPTAIN MARVEL: Billy Batson is confronted one day by an old man who invites him into a back alley and promises him power undreamt of. He falls for it, and spends the rest of his life recuperating from the physical and psychological trauma (look, do I have to spell it out?) SPIDERMAN: Peter Parker, shy science student, is bitten by a radioactive spi- der. Aside from an increased risk of cancer, this has no long-term effect. WOLVERINE: He was given adamantium claws (that are supposed to be a foot long, yet they fit into the forearm of a 5' 5" man) that slice through almost anything, and his skeleton was bonded to adamantium. Of course, now his white blood cells, manufactured in bone marrow, can't get out, but thanks to his mutant healing factor he might live a few weeks. He also now weighs a helluva lot with all that metal in him. / Paul Estin esti@sphinx.uchicago.edu.UUCP \ \ Apt 707, 5454 S Shore Dr. Chicago IL 60615 / / "No, that's just normal paranoia. Everyone \ \ in the universe has that." -HGttG / From: mss2@sphinx.uchicago.edu (Michael S. Schiffer) Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics Subject: Re: Comics for Physicists Date: 12 Apr 88 22:41:39 GMT Organization: University of Chicago Science Fiction Club Lines: 69 In article <3933Usphinx.uchicago.edu> esti~sphiox.uchicago.edu.UUCP (Paul Estin) writes: >Some friends of mine in the U Chicago Science Fiction Club (thanks, Todd, >Mike, and everyone else) came up with the idea of "comics for physicists"- >taking well-known comics origins and stories and sort of changing them to >fit the "real world." A few examples follow: Thanks for posting them, Paul. Here are a few more little questionable facets of our favorite heroes. "Hi. I'm Captain America. Recently I had a crisis of conscience. You see, I found myself forced to kill a terrorist to save an innocent life. I've never killed before, and it made me wonder whether I should continue my career. What's that? You in the back? Oh, you're asking what I did to the Nazis during World War II? Um..." PRE-GRELL: "Hi, I'm Green Arrow. I'm one of the best archers in the world, and I've decided to put my skills to use to fight crime. Of course, I don't approve of killing criminals, so I've designed a number of specialty arrows to stop them without harming them. This is my favorite: the boxing glove arrow. It's great because, not only doesn't it hurt people who are hit by it, but I don't hit with it very often! I get beat up a lot..." Before the planet Krypton exploded, scientist Jor-El placed his infant son in an experimental spacecraft and sent the child to the planet Earth. On Earth, an elderly couple found the spaceship and removed the alien baby. The young Kryptonian, born under a red sun, now felt the much brighter yellow sunlight for the first time. The radiations worked changes on his very cells. Tragically, the higher level of ultraviolet radiation gave Kal-El almost immediate third degree sunburn, and the last son of Krypton died of skin cancer a few painful months later. Young Bruce Wayne was walking home with his parents one night when a mugger stepped out of the shadows and murdered his parents in front of him. Bruce never truly got over the trauma, and after a childhood full of reform schools, he was placed into Arkham Asylum after claiming that a bat had told him that he had to dress up in a funny costume and beat criminals into submission. Doctor Bruce Banner succeeded in aiding a government team in creating the fearsome Gamma Bomb, the latest escalation of the arms race. This weapon, when dropped on enemy troops, turns even the least of them into an eight foot tall green (or gray) monster which can lift on the order of one hundred tons and is immune to bullets. Wait a minute... Thirteen year old Billy Batson was walking the dark streets of the city one night when a figure in dark clothing beckoned to him and offered him a chance to fight evil: (Cut to picture of Billy in new costume, with caption reading: ROBIN VI) "Hi, I'm Ben Grimm, aka the Thing. Oh, look! My pal Johnny Storm's flame just went out, and he's falling to the ground. Oh well, I'll catch him. That is, rather than letting him fall on the flat grassy ground, I'll let him fall on my two arms, which are made of jagged orange rocks. (I always said I'd get back at him for stealing Alicia...)" "Hi, I'm the Beyonder..." (need I go on?) Thanks for getting this started, Paul. -- Confusion to our enemies! "Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, Mike for you are crunchy and good with ketchup." --Anonymous Path: ...ihnp4!gargoy|e!sphinx!mss2 Article 6454 of rec.arts.comics: Path: sphinx!esti From: esti@sphinx.uchicago.edu (Paul A. Estin) Newegroups: rec.arts.comics Subject: Re: Comics for Physicists Summary: comments, plus two more Date: 13 Apr 88 01:26:02 GMT Organization: U Chicago Science Fiction Club Lines: 54 Note: Yes, the Mike refered in my original post is the Michael S. Schiffer who added stuff. I think he's just too modest to take credit. Just to clarify to daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU (tyg galloway, I think; he posted as "Dr. Pseudo-Science"), actually most of us who made these up aren't and probably won't become physicists; though a lot of us are _former_ physics majors (well, I am, Todd was, Mike's kind of ex-everything :) We're a common occurence here at the U of C. Also, the squash court underneath Stagg Field, where the first sustained nuclear reaction took place, hasn't been there for some time; instead there's (above ground) this large metal monument/statue that sort of resembles an eight-foot high melted glob, right next to some tennis courts and the Regenstein Library, which was built where Stagg Field used to be. A short story, however: back when I was still in physics, I was in a lab doing a radioactivity experiment. We had to measure background radiation, so we held the sensor to the Geiger counter steady (click... click... click) Then, as a joke, I pointed the sensor out the window towards the library 100 yards or so away... (CLICKCLICKCLICKLCKLCKLCKLCKLCKLCKLCLK) Well, maybe it wasn't _that_ bad, but there was an increase of a factor of about two or three. I'm a behavioral sciences (psychology) major now... since most of my classes are farther from the library than most physics classes are, I _feel_ safer. Anyone want to commission a study of the rate of cancer in U of Chicago graduates? Finally, two more "comics for physicists" to add: HAWKEYE: Clint Barton became a fantastic archer by training under the Swordsman (huh?) Right. He has a lot of neat trick arrows (like pre-Grell Green Arrow) like... the boomerang arrow. He may be the world's most powerful mutant. His name's Magneto, and he can manipulate huge magnetic fields. For instance, over there he's using his powers to raise a car into the air. He's also near some electrical wires... anybody want to calculate the flux he's sending through them? >Confusion to our enemies! "Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, >Mike for you are crunchy and good with ketchup." > --Anonymous >Path: ...ihnp4!gargoy|e!sphinx!mss2 Disclaimer: If I've made a mistake in a certain topic: hey, I'm no longer majoring in whatever it is.-- / Paul Estin esti@sphinx.uchicago.edu.UUCP \ \ Apt 707, 5454 S Shore Dr. Chicago IL 60615 / / "However, due to terrible miscalculation of scale, the entire \ \ invasion fleet was swallowed by a small dog." -HGttG /