I've seen a lot of Superhero cartoons and TV shows, and these are my rants.

Captain America: Once he throws his shield, he's totally vunerable to getting shot.

Solution: Get body armor, Cap!

Wonder Woman (TV) Wonder Woman is easily captured because she openly talks about her secret magic belt to every Tom, Dick & Harry she meets.

Solution: Keep your yap shut & SEW that belt on!
Also, get a gas mask just in case the bad guy as chloroform or something like that!

Batman Without that utility belt, Batman is virtually helpless.

Solution: Don't allow yourself to get captured to begin with! Wear gas masks, anticipate traps, etc.

Superman (The movie) Supe tells Lois that he can't see through lead and tells her that he came from Krypton thereby informing Lex Luthor about Supe's weakness.

Solution: Get a lead suit of armor, Supe...and wear it wherever you fight Lex Luthor

Of course, if they followed your advice, there wouldn't be any story left if the heroes are never in any kind of danger...

Re: Captain America. He does wear body armor. His costume is chain mail, not spandex.

Chain mail? Are you serious? Whatever for? Chain mail doesn't stop bullets (not even arrows, which is why the knights switched to plate armor). It only protects a bit against sword blows. How often does Cap encounter sword-wielding enemies?

And does he clink slightly whenever he moves? How does he manage to disguise that in his civilian clothes?

That's news to me about Cap, Green Banana. Thanks!

Constanze, I'm not defeding, just reporting the official stance on Captain America's costume.

Athough I could hazard a guess that the "clinking" is muted by the links beind coated in plastic or whatever it is that gives them their color.

And the strngth/bullet stopping power might be better than medieval chainmail if instead of wrought iron the links are made of a modern alloy, particularly if if the alloy includes one or both of the Marvel Universe's miracle metals "Adamantium" and Vibranium." We do know that the sheild is made of just such an alloy.

Modern chainmail is in fact utilized in armor for divers to protect against shark attack. It is very effective even against the force of a sharkbite. It also is used in protective gloves for butchers.

Also, in WWI, tests with chainmail veils for soldier's faces proved that it could stop a three-ounce shrapnel round fired at a distance of one hundred yards. In short, chainmail's better than nothing.

And the strngth/bullet stopping power might be better than medieval chainmail if instead of wrought iron the links are made of a modern alloy, particularly if if the alloy includes one or both of the Marvel Universe's miracle metals "Adamantium" and Vibranium." We do know that the sheild is made of just such an alloy.

But still, a chainmail is basically a lots of holes put together. Modern chainmail (for butchers and divers) uses much smaller links than medieval chainmail, yes. And the advantage of chainmail vs. normal body armour like the kevlar vest is of course weight and mobility. But I'd expect a body armour for a guy who's shot at to be made of something like kevlar vests, only more sophisticated - maybe using the "magical alloys" to keep it light, and broken up in enough segments to make it flexible. Maybe if the alloys allow for the bullets to rebound, the don't need to be as thick as kevlar, which has to stop the bullets.

Snick, I've never heard of these test. If they worked, why was chainmail never used, then?

And yes, the butcher's gloves and shark bites... I think they're relatively similar to sword strikes, and not to bullets. (Besides, AFAIK, both are only to prevent small force - an accidental blow by the butchers, a shark nibbling a bit, when the divers are exploring them from the shark cages. I doubt a shark who wants to eat a diver has a problem with chainmail, since he has a lot of muscleforce to use.)

So how often is the Cap attacked by sharks or with knifes?

constanze: But still, a chainmail is basically a lots of holes put together.
Luigi Novi: But Captain America's isn't. They're overlapping circular plates, as seen here.

Then its not chainmail, but scalemail. (Click on the "Constructed D-Scale Example" link, or here to see how the scales fit together.)

Snick, I've never heard of these test. If they worked, why was chainmail never used, then?

I believe because the soldiers unanimously thought it looked stupid and refused.

Anyway, I can't believe I didn't remember that Cap actually wears scalemail. It's been too long.

In the Wikipedia entry for Cap, his scalemail can be clearly seen.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_America

Green Lantern: He can do anything except fight against anything yellow. Yet Sinestro has a yellow power ring & Green Lantern is battling him at times.

SOLUTION: ????? I dunno. ????? Hal Jordon (Green Lantern) must have a death wish or something.

Thor: He throws the hammer & is helpless.

SOLUTION: DON'T THROW IT! Use a lightning bolt to zap the bad guys...I mean, you have the power to command the thunder & lightning, right? SO USE IT!

I thought Thor's hammer returned like a boomerang after he threw it?

And actually chainmail is pretty effective against shark attacks, even if the shark wants to take more than a nibble, because a shark uses its teeth more like a chain saw or hacksaw and the chain slides over minimizing the damage to the diver. Not stopping it but minimizing it.

And as for Kevlar vests I used to work security so I was around cops a lot. We where talking about vests and getting shot and one of them told me about when he got shot from 10 feet by a .357 (This was corroburated by the news so it wasnt just him BSing). He was wearing a tac3 with trauma plate and the bullet didnt penetrate him but it did bruise him severely and break 2 ribs. Justa little real world info.

Actually, John, the yellow impurity is no longer the weakness it was. Ever since Paralax was exposed recently as the cause of it, and eventually trapped back in the Power Battery on Oa again in the Green Lantern: Rebirth miniseries, the Corps now knows how to beat it, by simply overcoming their fear, as mentioned in the new Green Lantern #1.

Ah...thanks, Luigi. I'm glad the writers "fixed" that.

And R, yeah...thanks for reminding me about Thor's hammer. However, how much time elapses before the hammer returns to Thor?

Super-faults

1. Superheroes always believe the words and statements of arch-villians, no matter how diabolical the villians are.

2. Superheroes always have a gadget (or gadgets) of some kind that won't work in certain areas (or objects) or against certain villians

3. Superhero secret identities are not so secret after all....SOMEBODY ALWAYS finds it out!

4: When a superhero assumes their secret identity, they wear glasses or change their hairstyle or mannerisms to "fool" people.

5. All superhero's superpowers are vunerable (or useless) to something. (IE certain colors or objects)

4: When a superhero assumes their secret identity, they wear glasses or change their hairstyle or mannerisms to "fool" people. - John A. Lang pt. 1

I think that one applies mostly to Superman. Most other superheroes wear full masks or masks that cover the entire face except the mouth. I mean, there are one or two other exceptions - Green Lantern and Green Arrow wear domino masks. But neither, in their alternate identities (Hal Jordan/Guy Gardner/Kyle Rayner, etc. for Green Lantern or Oliver Queen for the Green Arrow), wear glasses. That's really a Superman thing.

5. All superhero's superpowers are vunerable (or useless) to something. (IE certain colors or objects) - John A. Lang

That one tends to apply more to DC Comics' characters than Marvel. Which might be why I never really liked DC's characters that much.

Excelsior!

RE: Benn: Wearing glasses also applies to Wonder Woman

But since "everybody" knows women who wear glasses are unattractive, no male would give her a second look, and the disguise therefore works, right?

I dunno. I knew one woman at work with glasses that was QUITE attractive. (She got married to someone else)

[Which is the story of my life, BTW]

Men never make passes
At women who wear glasses.

RE: Benn: Wearing glasses also applies to Wonder Woman - John A. Lang

True dat. But my point is that it isn't a widespread convention in comics. It only applies to two characters for the most part. More importantly, the stupidity doesn't lie with the heroes for using those disguises. It lies with Lois, Jimmy, Perry, Steve Trevor and the other morons who could never make the connection. I mean, how stupid are they?

Excelsior!

I totally agree, Benn.

I recall one story several years ago where someone had done a portrait of Clark Kent. When Clark/Superman looked at it, he was surprised that the artist had drawn him as looking older, slightly balding and thinner, and maybe with a bit of gray hair. I think the explanation given later in the same story was that he unconciously projected a kind of Super-Hypnotism while as Clark, to make people see him differently as Clark Kent. I don't think this was followed up much in the seriew.

The Jay Garrick Flash disguised himself simply by putting on a hat.

LOL

Yeah, and the amazing thing is that the hat never flew off his head whenever he was running at superspeed. You'd think that once Garrick got started, that hat would have been miles behind him.

Excelsior!

Maybe the hat used its wings to stabilize itself.

Superman: Takes no precautions whatsoever when taking on Lex Luthor and walks into some kind of dang blasted Kryptonite trap EVERY TIME. Is that stupid or what?

Yes,Thor's hammer does return to him after he throws it.Also,even if it didn't,he's hardly helpless since his strength level is at such a level that he can battle the Hulk & hold his own.How about Clark on the tv series Smallville not ever wearing glasses? Luthor will immediately recognize him when he does adopt the Superman persona in later years after their association from those years together in Smallville.

In one of the old Superfriends cartoon, the villain uses fear gas on Superman. And it works!?

Unless said fear gas was made from Kryptonite or magic, it should have NO effect on Superman.

Superman can be affected by non-radioactive things from Krypton or Krypton-like planets. It was a Silver Age trope that things from Krypton were just as super (relatively speaking) as Superman. So if the fear gas used a Kryptonian chemical it could affect him.

Of course the villain would probably have to have gotten into the bottle city of Kandor to get such a chemical, so it's probably more likely that he just put some kryptonite dust into the fear gas, since, as some internet comedians have pointed out, kryptonite is available on every street corner.

But the dialogue seemed to indicate that this was ordinary fear gas.

One line, saying that Kryptonite had been added, would have fixed it.

Yep.

No one ever thinks of these tings, it seems.

Well, it was Superfriends. I don't think too many of the screenwriters read the comics.

That much is obvious.