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Half a century ago, Belgian Zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans first codified cryptozoology in his book On the Track of Unknown Animals.

The Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) are still on the track, and have been since 1992. But as if chasing unknown animals wasn't enough, we are involved in education, conservation, and good old-fashioned natural history! We already have three journals, the largest cryptozoological publishing house in the world, CFZtv, and the largest cryptozoological conference in the English-speaking world, but in January 2009 someone suggested that we started a daily online magazine! The CFZ bloggo is a collaborative effort by a coalition of members, friends, and supporters of the CFZ, and covers all the subjects with which we deal, with a smattering of music, high strangeness and surreal humour to make up the mix.

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Friday, August 05, 2011

HARRIET WADHAM: Superheroes

So, sorry I haven’t been uploading to the blog lately, it’s just that it’s the first week of the holidays. And I know you know I know you know how tired we all are at the end of the term.

My first year at Secondary School has flown by, and I am pleased to say I received no detentions throughout the whole year.

WHO DA MAN?

I’m never saying that again.

I’m going to blather on about superheroes! Because I can! Would you say they’re a type of cryptid..?

No..?

You.. you.. you don’t?

Oh well, here it is anyway. People might claim that the reason for fictional superpowers is magic. Unfortunately (me being a person who puts all her faiths in Science and ignores everything else), I can’t quite see this happening. I’m a bit of a nutter on superheroes and heroines, and it was only a matter of time until I poured out all my ideas into a blog. If you’re not the Marvel type, look away.

What do you think makes a hero? Is it the hard work they put into helping others, or is it how they act? For instance, Batman is your worst nightmare, yet he’s a little bit... sick-minded, shall we say? Superman’s just a bit BOOM-here’s-a-superhero-with-every-imaginable-power-IN-YOUR-FACE!

Wolverine... now there’s a superhero. Feral senses, adamantium making him near-invincible, an amazing healing factor and claws in his forearms!
I’m so sad!

Catwoman. She’s a bit like Batman, always just going that extra edge. However, she saves people, in her own strange way. She doesn’t get much recognition, but hey! She’s famous!

Now who would you make up if I asked you to create your very own superhero/heroine? Blog Man? The Caped Cryptozoologist? The Cloaked Cryptid?

I’ve made up one, and my two best friends and my other half have too. My superheroine is called Jaguar. By god, she’s brilliant. My friend(remember ‘Mandy?’) has made one up; she’s called Eclipse and my other friend’s heroine is called Phoenix.

My boyfriend’s is called Psychic and he’s very powerful indeed. Telekinesis and telepathy! Psychic powers for a psychic guy called Psychic!

Fail. He also has great big white wings that come out from his back. There’s a minor healing power around his shoulder-blades where the wings come out, leaving no indication that it’s actually him. There’s also weird symbols on the palms and backs of his hands.

Weird BLUE symbols *gasp*.

Jaguar is eternally 19. Here’s the beef: She’s very much like Wolverine, apart from the obvious fact that she is a woman. However, where Wolverine has 3 claws that extend from his knuckles when his fists are clenched, she has four. Instead of Adamantium, she has a completely made-up metal called Lontoca coating her bones. Lontoca is the product of a chemical reaction between genes in her bones, named Commutatio, and a chemical called Metadermicreo.

As you can probably guess, all of the above named forms of matter are completely made-up.

By me.

Which I would class as an admirable feat… but that was just my inflated opinion of myself talking there.

Okay. Now for Phoenix. She has the power to manipulate light at her own will, and also heat. At her most powerful, she can control fire as well, so with all these powers combined, she could make the natural oils on people’s skin inflame. How does she do this, I hear you ask? She makes the molecules holding whatever she wants to burst into flames vibrate. Conjuring light up out of air is a completely different matter, however. She sort of… copies the light matter and basically messes about with it.

Eclipse Solar!

She can transform into a lioness (which I would imagine is painful) and can wield a sword like nobody else can. She trained with the, and I quote the creator of Eclipse, bets fighters in the world. However, she is very secretive about her character and so I won’t write who the fighters are. Eclipse has the power of gravity manipulation, therefore she can walk on walls and ceilings and stuff. She can also slam somebody into the ground from a great distance, so if you annoy Eclipse…

…you’re basically doomed. In her beast form, she has a blue diamond sunk into the flesh on her side.

AND THAT IS ALL ON OUR CHARACTERS.

But there are a lot of superheroes in the real world.

Firemen!

Police!

Paramedics!

Fairies! …Hang on.

You can be a hero too; like Jon is (he makes us famous via blog). Do helpful stuff! Love everything! You don’t have to be in a yellow Spandex suit to make a difference...

Be yourself.

Damn, I needed to write this.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Since I have done self-published comics in the past, I have a few theories about Superheroes. The first general notion I have is that most powers described as superpowers or Magic are really Psychic in nature although comic book characters usually deal in far greater levels of power than any ordinary Psychic would ever claim. Superstrength and flight are varieties of gravity control and so on. Some superheroes are apparantly using their astral bodies to pull off spectacular feats.And supersenses are varieties of Clairvoyance.

There are also several problems with superheroes that everybody ignores. Wolverine's claws will never tuck neatly in his forearms, for one example, and he will have difficulties arranging the natural bones in his forearms with the switchblades so that they will not interfere with each other. Furthermore, once he has the blades out, he has nothing to conrol them or hold them in place other than a little strip of flesh on the backs of his hands, easily torn. If he hacks too hard at something he will rish disarming himself. It is not like he is doing something like gripping kung-fu tiger claws with his hands, which would be the real-world analogues of his claws.

I have no problems with Adamantium, BTW, and I have an idea or two about whgat it must be made out of.

Best Wishes, Dale D.

RR said...

Great blog post Harriet! I really enjoyed reading that :-)

Anonymous said...

I know, Dale. I don't really believe in magic, as well, and I also think that 'magic' is really psychic powers. It's a easy theory, and some people seem to overlook that.

I've had a couple of theories about Wolverine myself. I think that the claws are pushed out and held in by strong muscles in his forearms. I wonder what Adamantium is made of, though... It's a clever idea, but what I don't get is exactly how it managed to bond itself to his bones. Surely it would just end up in one almighty lump somewhere? Still, at least he's not real.


Although, if he WAS real, he'd be very helpful...


I don't know. I've just watched the X-Men movies again and I'm buzzing with epic action exhilaration ;)

I like seeing comments like that, because it means I can improve Jaguar. Thanks for your help!