Grrl Power #879 – Immovable grapple
He’s scratching his cheek, but I don’t think his cheek can itch. It’s probably an affectation.
Achilles would be a real pain in the ass as a grappler. There are certainly beings who can simple muscle him off, no matter how good of a lock he gets, but short of someone exceptionally strong, there’s no real way to shake him. Wrenching his pinky or thumb back won’t hurt him, you can’t poke him in the eye or kick him in the nuts. Well, you can, but it won’t help.
Of course, the fact that he is so potentially effective as a grappler is something Maxima has encouraged him to pursue. She was keen to impress upon him that drawing fire, while useful, is an underutilization of his abilities. He counter-suggested grappling people while clutching live grenades, as a sort of non-suicide bomber, at which point Maxima referred him to Doctor Frost.
“I meant flashbangs?”
I wonder when the last time the Human Torch was choked out. Sure, high level villains like Apocalypse or Darkseid could throttle him with little effort, but they don’t strike me as grapplers. Besides the high tier antagonists, anyone fire based could swing it. Maybe a Sand Guy. Or an Ice Guy. Or an energy absorber or power negator or someone with Nemesis or Asbestos Man. Okay, come to think of it, he probably gets strangled every other comic.
But you get my point. Someone like the Human Torch or Acid Man or Thorn Gal or Cherenkov Radiation Lass probably aren’t prepared for someone to put them in an arm bar.
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Good, I’m glad that Achilles has been practicing his martial arts. His usefulness as a team member is going up accordingly.
Nice opening line, by him, too. :-)
Unstoppable Force, meet the Immovable Object.
god every time i see achilles i laugh to tear…
I wonder how Achilles gets his hair cut?
How does Superman?
bolt cutters, apparently. lol
https://youtu.be/q-cSMTMp01w
Gah, what an irritating clip! So many issues with it.
Not least being that hair itself does not contain DNA, and Lex Luthor clearly did not get the root (which could, if it included the non-keratin part of the hair). So the only way the hair would have superman’s DNA on it would be if he has dandruff. Which just does not seem right!
80’s superhero movies were a wild and lawless frontier..
To be fair, he IS an alien. His hair might contain a live core. Sort of how like birds have full nuclei in their red blood cells.
Good point. Although, running with that, how Lex would know that in advance, is another matter.
Glad you spotted that before Panda came online. She would be stomping all over my comment otherwise! Thank goodness it was only a movie clip and not one of the sacred paper issues.
Flakes of STEEL!
I remember a book called “Man of steel, woman of Kleenex” (Larry Niven) with an argument that Clark masturbating at any point in his life would release a cloud of flight capable sperm that would likely seek out an impregnate women continents away. Consider that for how all the Metagenes got out there for a moment…
[ScottotheUnwise]:
“Flakes of Steel” reminds me of an issue of “Action Comics” (#590, Jan.1985), in-which Superman teams-up with the Metal Men, after their nemesis, “Chemo” acquires some of Kal-El’s skin-flakes, & becomes correspondingly more powerful.
—
I find it very “convenient”, plot-wise, that Kal-El’s hair seems to stop growing once he reaches maturity.
The alternative is to imagine that 2-or-more polished parts of his original rocket are used to safely reflect his heat-vision, so that he can “barber” even the hair behind his head. This would be no more than an extension of the method he already uses every day, to “shave” stubble off his face-&-neck.
—
As for the Larry Niven article, he points-out elsewhere in the same article that Humans are most-likely lacking the pheromones that a Kryptonian response requires. Any Kryptonian resemblance to Humanity is merely “Convergent Evolution”, where separate, unrelated DNA under similar environmental pressures comes-up with identical ‘survival solutions’. Lois Lane’s DNA can find a common ancestor with a house-fly, an octopus, a banana, & even a mossy lichen, if we look far-enough backwards in time…
…but **NOT** with Kal-El, who evolved in a separate solar-system, with a separate ecosystem.
His attraction is far more likely to be based upon the culture in which he was raised, rather than on their hormones.
There was an excellent short story(iir in an anthology called “Heroes”) based on the more realistic presentation of a Super man-type alien. Despite being intelligent, he’s effectively autistic… he doesn’t have the brain hardware to read our expressions, body language, and social cues.
A girl he saves tracks him down and figures out his secret identity. He’s not attracted to her. She asks if he’s gay, and he says that he’s not attracted to men either. It’s just, whatever it is that is supposed to trigger his sexual response, humans don’t have it, or he wasn’t exposed to the right developmental environment, or whatever.
He became “the hero” because he could understand the role, and did not want to be “the monster”.
It was in “Superheroes”, edited by John Varley and Ricia Mainhardt
The story was “One of the Boys” by Lawrence Watt-Evans.
in the John Byrne era, one of the in comic explanations for For how Superman keeps his hair short was that his invulnerability was to a large part cellular level force fields that Could extend a short distance out from his skin which is why his Skintight costume was also indestructible.
since his hair wasn’t actually living tissue the Longer it got the less invulnerable it became and the easier to cut.
in comic he’s actually had hair down to his shoulders a couple of times, but any longer than that and it loses all invulnerability and would burn off At superspeed.
these force fields and unconscious telekinesis were used as an explanation as to why he could Rescue people at superspeed without reducing them to a pulp, or pick up things like cars or other heavy objects and not have them come apart in his hands.
in fact during Burns reboot origin story run, Superman Lifts Lex Luther’s yacht out of the water
when by all rights the attempt should’ve just punched him through the Bottom of the ship,
and he has a thought balloon About how Odd it was that whenever he picked something very heavy up it seems to be somehow lighter once he got it off the ground.
as to the compatibility with humans, I honestly can’t remember whether this Was actually in the official comics or Fanfic ( after reading the things for 60 years some of the details Blur)
but I think there was a story once were kryptonian’s were actually descendent from A United planets research vessel crewed by humans that got thrown back in time tens of thousands of years
and crash landed on krypton, and then adapted to the environment.
Sounds like some bullshit from the “Smallville” series (or maybe “The Kryptonians” series), that implied that it wasn’t an accident that he ended up on Earth after his planet blew a fuse
Sounds like the reverse of Superman: Red Son. This version of Superman landed in Russia and the end explains that he came from Earth in the future and was sent back in time to avoid the destruction of Earth during a time it had a Red Sun.
Can’t superman not just use his own heath vision or kryptonian tech to cut his hair.
I remember seeing a comic where Superman did exactly that – using a mirror to shave with his heat vision. So with some proper mirror set up he probably can give himself a heat haircut. Would also explain why his haircut doesn’t change all that much over the years.
One of the Suicide Squad comics had Zod using his heat vision to surgically remove the control device (a kryptonite bomb, as I recall) from his body…
Thought that that was Soupcan? Gave himself a lobotomy to remove a bomb implanted deep within his brain (he did it in a hair dressers shop)
See also the excellent Interviewing Leather, which mentions this conundrum along with many other clever observations on the difficulties of a super lifestyle.
Probably the same way he shaves: heat vision and a mirror. That wouldn’t work for Achilles.
Wow, a mirror tougher than Super Man’s heat vision (and his hair). Impressive.
If I recall correctly, he made it by polishing a piece of the ship that carried him to Earth. Kryptonian metallurgy was apparently pretty advanced. In that era, his Superman costume was also made from the clothes and blanket that were with him in the ship, which could expand and stretch nearly indefinitely, being a sort of smart fabric. That’s why they had the family crest on them — apparently if you’re elite enough to be on Krypton’s Science Council, monogrammed baby blankets are de rigueur.
He also made his glasses from the window of the rocket, to hold back his x-ray vision.
He made the glasses like that from glass fragments of his ship because trying to be mild-mannered using normal glasses just didn’t cut it as they couldn’t survive him trying to use his heat vision through them. Only Kryptonian glass was able to let his x-ray and heat vision through without melting.
There is also a story where its said the kryptonian lenses extended his hypnotism, projecting an aura of “Clark”. Which he noticed when the picture of him drawn by the newpaper artist looked a lot skinier than he was.
That would make sense.
They literally had to make Superman more and more vulnerable over the years so that things like haircut and clipping of his fingernails it happen even though most people never gave it a thought except for those red Kryptonite stories. Also used to be that while he could be overpowered by beings such as Darkseid they were few and far between and even though they correct I’ll Superman physically they weren’t actually physically harm him. While they could just overpower him and throw his body Any Which Way because his body was more durable than anything they could come up with. even though his strength was vast their strength was seemingly greater than his.
It was just reversing the process that made him more and more invulnerable over years and years.
When he started out he could be temporarily stunned by artillery fire.
its a cycle that repeats with every retcon of the DC universe. he starts out at a certain level, then gradually overcomes every single weakness they gave him, gets stronger, till he is at ludicrous punching black holes through time levels; right before the universe reboots again.
Really, all Superman needs for a haircut, shave and maneceur is a couple of milligram of kryptonite…not enough to make him sick, just to give him a break from vulnerability during personal hygiene time.
How does superman? Lead mirror and X-ray vision.
Since the redux of his origin in 1985, Superman has shaved using his own heat vision and a reflective surface. Originally, this was a piece of the rocket that brought him to Earth that he had buffed down. Later versions allowed him to use standard mirrors, probably through practice. See here: https://youtu.be/cvkDcrbLP2s
I’ve seen a couple of comics where Superman “shaves” by using his heat vision and a mirror.
Generally Superman doesn’t need to cut his hair or shave, when he does he generally uses his heat vision reflected off a mirror surface (although most mirrors don’t last long before being fried). When Red Kryptonite caused his hair and nails to grow super-long he called in Supergirl and Krypto to help him get them under control because they also became too tough for just his own heat vision to work.
Of course they always ignored the basic feature (like the X-men ignored with characters like Rogue and Cyclops) of him simply getting under a red sun lamp which would make him normal therefor cutting his hair or shaving becomes completely normal. They also had one issue where it starts out with him actually go to a barber and he starts cutting Clark’s hair then it fills in backstory that he’d exposed his hair to an alien pollen and it temporarily made his hair vulnerable (which wore off during the hair cut naturally). He promptly used the opportunity to help add to his cover as a normal human.
He does it himself, one hair at a time. He grabs one side of a hair in one hand, and one hand on the other side, and pulls the hair apart.
I assume he doesn’t.
His hair doesn’t grow. His invulnerability is more ‘unchangeability’ than anything.
I agree. This does bring up the question about how he is forming new memories in his brain.
It looks like more of a spell than a power behind this. It needs a few loopholes built in. Probably the wizard who tried out version 1.0 of this incantation on himself spent the rest of his immortal existence in an endless loop of “Aha, it worked! I am invincible!” Then five seconds later “Aha, it worked! I am invincible!”
(this example actually falls under the trope ‘fridge horror’ if you think about it too hard)
Brings to mind Alexandria and Grey Boy from Worm. The reasons why would be pretty spoilery though.
If you analyze the superhero genre, you find numerous inconsistencies. We just simply never discuss them because each question raises a dozen more. I mean, how do you explain the amount of energy needed to handle running at mach five? When I’m referring to energy, I’m talking about food intake. Because when you run, you’re burning energy. How do you explain being able to run at mach five without increased dietary needs.
Just one power, and suddenly things fall apart.
It’s interesting to think about it of course, but from inside the story, it creates more problems than it solves. The best route is “there’s a lot we don’t truly understand. And if we did understand it, it could be used against us.”
Imagine if someone figured out what causes superhumans. One criminal with resources gets ahold of that and he now has his own personal army. Then the good guys have to respond and in short order, humans without some form of superhuman power become the rarity.
Each speedster has a separate rubber science explanation. Some of them actually use chemical energy and do have to eat tremendous amounts, whereas others are doing tricky things with time, or going into a state where the molecules of air don’t occupy the same zone they are in, and therefore friction doesn’t exist.
The natural limit on your second scenario is quite simply that the kind of people who are willing to do risky stuff to get powers don’t stay minions long, so when you create a super army, you are generally making your own rivals.
Also, in origins, due to the unpredictable nature of super powers, things tend to go “boom”.
Barry Alan, The Flash, was siphoning energy, from a speed dimension!
The invincible goldfish *giggles maniacally*
When you design a character and say, “they are invulnerable”, it is a really tricky thing to work with. Especially…I am going to say post Bronze Age of comics *dark age hated invulnerability…but not regeneration because it was an excuse to be gory in comics*, but getting back on track; I sense a good chunk of people asking these questions stem from the late dark ages into the deconstruction and neo-deconstruction ages of comics where the idea is to treat it like “what if it was real”, as apposed to the various power and hero fantasies of previous ages.
The usual method is just to say, they aren’t completely invulnerable; like maybe they have a reactive defensive aura shield, or their living tissue is super-dense or has interlocking personal shields *seems popular, even Godzilla got this one in Godzilla Earth series, of course Godzilla also got regeneration back in the 90s, so whatever the current most popular way to be indestructible is*, anywho, generally this whole thing ends up a “dead tissue generates no field” so hair follicles, finger and toe nails, and the body still sheds skin and pores still have oil and what not, its just the living tissue can’t be damaged.
even then to keep from being “boring” as so many online put it (whole other rant where they focus on stronger enemies rather than interpersonal relations for story build up in there so avoiding that), they make it so they are indestructible up to a point, or have some weakness…or decide out of no where they have to focus and see the attack coming *thank you Dragon Ball Super for contradicting the very first episode of Dragon Ball with how guns affect them…sigh*, among various kryptonite type scenarios, or the field drops when asleep or only works at full strength when in motion (dumbest retcon to Juggernaut ever), among other odd ways to do it.
In the end total invulnerability starts to fall apart when you pick away at the biology side of things, how the body grows, general on-going maintenance, eating, try to get too invulnerable and explain it in great detail on the biology and it starts to feel like your character isn’t even human, or alive. Like they are made of folded dimensions in a human shape experiencing the world like a projection from the outer dimensions or the far dark; or else they are an avatar of some cosmic being (M-Body sort of deal) so any force used on them is absorbed into the fabric of that higher reality or whatever.
Or just make them some type of World Eater; where the body gives nothing back to the environment; no waste, no skin flakes, no tears, no dandruff, no hair follicles breaking down, no exhaled breath, nothing other than energy, where even food and water or anything else taken into the body is gone forever like a Kirby style pocket dimension. I doubt it, I cracked the joke before if Achilles was a World Eater he was the least effective one ever; I shall eat this cheeseburger, this mass is now gone from the Earth forever; I might eat another tomorrow…as opposed to sucking up the atmosphere, mouthfuls of the planet’s crust, sucking up the oceans, ect…just…oh a burger…so slow…would take trillions of years to actually make any noticeable difference…so long the planet likely wouldn’t still be around anyway.
But I digress. When you go from power fantasy *I am impossible to harm, the hero who cannot be scratched* to a deconstruction era style of “yes. but how”, you end up tugging at so many strings and writers scramble to explain them; especially when moving older characters from the (who cares how) eras into the modern ones.
My invulnerable RPG character was a cyborg, so biology less of a factor. She did have a covering skin to provide a more natural appearance, but the chassis was some kind of unobtainium alloy. Kind of a compromise, really… you’d get the semblance of injury since the skin would get pretty messed up after a heavy fight and require time spent regrowing it in a tank… but underneath that skin was a Terminator-like robotic frame that could survive orbital bombardment without a scratch.
Trying to kill her was a waste of time, so from a GM point of view, combat tended to involve the villain trying to keep her at a healthy distance… throwing minions in the way, dropping buildings on her, dropping her down pit traps, etc. It wouldn’t stop her, but every moment spent punching through armies of terminators was a moment where she wasn’t punching him repeatedly in the face like an angry jackhammer.
I myself also have a few indestructible and/or unkillable in any real sense characters; a whole era of my writing I even personally find an eye rolling mess as I had too many of them on the stage at the same time; to the point it was *okay, they can be hurt but not permanently, or some special conditions were being met like limiters on an avatar, and so on*
Eventually I started to push these characters more into the background and focus on other characters. Some unfortunately became a kind of deus ex machine waiting in the winds I have to avoid the temptation to use; or else focus on the ones not at the top tier but at the *can be hurt, its just really hard*; although more recently I’ve taken to putting them more in the background; more like the kind of story where one or more is a looming threat behind the threat; my stories involving a cosmic horror that likes to turn people into dolls for her collection for instance mainly focus on the people involved; and the other dolls themselves; sometimes the cosmic horror isn’t even in the story but just gets a mention as a living doll refers to a “mistress” who is off somewhere unseen…and for some reason I actually did twice try to write that character into my older style of big battle stories (which I just can’t get into like I could only six years ago, just burned myself out on Dragon Ball/Disgaea level fights I guess), but it was a bad mesh; I was having a (the greater threat beyond the veil in a horror story fighting against a monster themed character I had designed for the Darkstalkers character creation contest/waste of our time that Capcom did about eight years ago)…
Although that falls into what I said with the almost indestructible, my strongest characters put limitations on themselves or are playing a game so they come across as being hurt or sealed away or warded off; but only because their true highest selves placed these limitations on their avatars.
or else characters that too a mundane setting come across as indestructible/unkillable, like Jason Voorhees or Freddy Krueger; in their natural settings against mundane humans there is little that can be done against them. But if you put them in a setting like an anime fantasy they’d both be blown away thanks to high level spells and exorcism magic. Which what I remind myself to keep my horror monsters away from the Overlord and Super being fantasy stories, The Moonlight Dancer in her own story; horrific spirit in the corn fields that nothing short of magic could keep at bay; but stick that in a story with super powers and city destroying ki blasts…it falls apart.
-invincible in their setting. A folklore creature method of doing things.
vs
-invincible period.
is not a good mash up, but is a good distinction for a story teller when making them. Like we know Pinhead from hellraiser can’t be physically stopped by the humans messing with the cube; but we also know that he’s not a fighter so a cross-over with anything else supernatural wouldn’t be as fun as some thing it would be. A good example of this being Freddy vs Jason, even in Freddy’s home field of dreams the movie had to make up a weakness for Jason (that contradicted a lot of what he’d seen the character doing in his own movies), to excuse Freddy having an advantage when these two unkillable horror characters fought.
I have not had a haircut in decades; once your hair gets to a certain length it sheds out. People say it “stops growing” but no, that’s just shed length. He really should have a beard though. In some comics Superman shaved with his head vision reflected off a mirror, or off of a polished piece of spaceship metal. In at least one I remember he used his fingernails to scrape hairs off of his face, which means his nails must be hella sharp
I think the author already established that supers don’t have hair anywhere but their heads, they’re completely smooth and for the men they never grow beards. It’s part of that heroic physique that’s standard for all human supers.
Whether as comic relief or incredibly effective law enforcement, Achilles is ALWAYS low-key awesome.
It would be interesting to see him oppose a ‘puny god’.
I would love to see the puny god scene recreated with Achilles.
He’d laugh the whole time. “Hey big guy! DO IT AGAIN!!!”
It would be … interesting.
Although a hole punched through the Earth, with Achilles popping out the other side, might cause a bit of magma leakage.
Achilles is ALWAYS!! Awesome…
ok maybe only medium but never low-key not with entrances like that.
Well… the dude abides.
Not to be ju-jitsu guy but that choke wouldn’t work as is. Its
He’d need to have his left arm against the right side of her neck .
Also while it’s safe for him as is, he really should be wrapping up her sword arm with his legs to protect others.
Well we can’t be sure of her physiology, either. Can she even BE choked out? Does she have an extra windpipe on her chest? It looks like he’s using her own arm to choke her.
Agreed with using her arm to choke her. Plus he has a clear field of view of view, so can see if anyone is near enough to be endangered. Other than someone sneaking up behind him, but they would have a clear view themselves, so can make their own choice about whether to step into such danger.
So if no one is at risk, it is reasonable to take the foe out by choking her out, rather than wasting time changing grips (and thereby possibly risking her wriggling free, in the process).
He was likely using his free left arm to cover her mouth and pinch her nose to “choke” her out.
Daniel here. Ages ago my Dad got me in a sleeper choke hold (play wrestling of course) with my own arm once, took a little working out but I eventually worked out how to do it too, and Achilles is doing it here pretty much. He would be slightly stronger than someone of his build due to the lack of damage from lactic acid, but should be able to hold her arm in place like this. Once he decides to upgrade to full “goodnight dopey” sleeper hold, I can see this working…
Absolutely not, he cannot hold her arm like that.
1: Try to lay your bicep across the front of your throat. Unless you are a pencil, you cannot.
2: It’s his grip strength vs her triceps and she can push off of the ground with her left hand. If he had wrist control, it’s doable but not there. The only thing holding her arm down is his fingers.
3: She could 2v1 his right hand with her right and left hand (assuming she drops the sword) fairly easily.
Generally what he’d do instead is wrist control her left arm with his right, snake up to wrap her right arm, and get his left arm to complete the choke. Or just do a head and arm triangle from side control
Except, she was busy using her right arm to hit him in the head with her sword, because that has always worked in the past. And she doesn’t have the leverage to push off with her left hand
By the time she realised it wasn’t going to work against Les, it was too late
All she has to do is roll to her right and his control over her goes away, as does the choke.
Note how he has his legs wrapped around hers? She ain’t rolling no where
I say: keep in grapple until some alien expert makes comments about how to properly hold her,
Hey Achilles, ease up already. She is starting to turn blue!
P.S. I appreciate the ‘throwing off the coat/cloak’ move that is obligatory for the start of all anime battles.
Hey, if that jacket gets shredded, it’s coming out his pay!
“Oh for god’s sake Achilles, put your pants back on! I will BUY you a new set if they get ripped!”
So long as that sword can disintegrate into a stream of razors and perform ranged attacks, bystanders are endangered whether Achilles restrains Detla’s arm or not. This way encourages her to attack him rather than them. (Which also lets A show off his invulnerability, thereby establishing dominance and taking the fight out of her.)
Itches i think would still occur. An itch is not so much a pain response or a damage response as it is a nerve going WAGGGEEHHHDDDIITTYY sometimes its due to out side stimuli but at times its just a random thing. And he seems to still have a sense of touch. A neat thing is he would be able to feel sensations that a lot of people never get to. Like what does 20,000 degrees feel like. what is it like to work hot metal like clay with your hands. He could make some really organic and neat silver work or gold work with out the need for jewelers tools.
I know, right!? I’m super jealous of that.
If I could have a superpower, it’d be at the very least temperature immunity, if not full high-level invulnerability (though probably not full Achilles-level ‘outlive the heat-death of the universe’ style). Just so that I could play in lava, or do bare-handed forging.
Alternative suggestion: If some godling ever offers you “Whatever superpower you want”, choose omnipotence. If the godling balks, just say “Hey, the Beyonder had it. I’ll take his powers.”
Don’t know if it’s been addressed elsewhere but here’s also the possibility that he’s not receiving enough nerve sensations due to his invulnerability. Maybe he has a really high threshold and only gets proper stimulus when someone super strong or something super heavy slams him. Might be a reason for some of his ‘wheeeeee’ moments during fights.. he actually got to feel something.
it has come up.
and what I always say,
you don’t have to be damaged to feel things. Pain is a nerve response to damage; even without it, you can still feel texture, smooth, rough, thin edge, wide edge, wet, dry. You don’t have to be hurt to feel these things. But yes it would still be a pretty alien sensation to be able to feel a super thin edge against your skin and because its not cutting you, there is no pain, just this thinness sensation no other human body would feel. Including impact response, not numb just different.
It does also bring to question his emotional responses, as the human body treats emotional threats like physical ones (the gut feeling, or pain in your gut from anxiety and stress),
So… random thought just occured. One of the thoughts might be them using some manner of teleportation tech to just zoop out of this situation [presuming it exists in this universe]
But if we go with the ‘particle by particle’ theory of teleportation, that means Achilles has ‘immune to teleportation’ as a side power, since his particles aren’t allowed to be separated. It’s mentioned that he’s taken atomic-level damage and ignored it, so his atomic bonds are apparently as invulnerable as his hairdo or his composure. I could see that being both an upside and downside, if teleportation tech exists in this setting. The only way to teleport him would be something like relocating him and his local whole surroundings as one unit without disrupting any of his personal bonds.
Side note, I wonder about kinetic transfer rules in general. On one hand, he HAS been shown to take hits and get launched, on another, he took a sword lunge to the eye earlier without his head snapping back, and now just took a pommel to the face similarly. His kinetic absorption has to play a bit fast and loose with conventional physics as a result.
And that also just made me think of something powerful but potentially a little bit grisly. I wonder if Anvil can use her kinetic manipulation to just ‘reject’ incoming kinetic energy transfer, instead of absorbing it, or just do an instant ‘absorb and return to sender’ with similar results. It’d make her effectively unmovable by impact, and it’d turn into the equivalent of slamming your hand/weapon into something with no elasticity. I can imagine this might have poor results on the weapon in question, and if that weapon happens to be a fist… well…
So no Star Trek teleportation, portals work just fine.
the one super who punched Anvil said it felt like punching a sandbag. she didn’t redirect his puch she absorbed his kinetic energy
Yep, but that’s something she’s doing volitionally. She obviously has control over the influx and outflow of energy, so instead of storing it up for the Noseboop of Doom, she could just third-law it right back into your punch through your knuckles, and watch your wrist shatter.
And Mr. A JUST got finished telling everyone that things would get Bureaucratically complicated if they initiated hostilities too. They have NO idea how long it will take to just set a legal precedent for prosecuting an actual space alien for assaulting a law enforcement officer. Not to mention the hoops Earth will have to jump through just to ensure they can be safely fed without any…explosive consequences.
*Dons his best Mortal Kombat announcer voice*
“Immoveable object wins! Flawless victory.”
I’ve had a glimpse for de Darkshield gag.
After capturing a naked blue man…
“It’s not the smartest move you’ve done… I can quote a former teammate …:
“None of you understand. I’m not locked up in here with YOU. You’re locked up in here with ME.”
Oh god that scene is one of my favorites, hate to say it but I’d probably end up a deadpool esq anti-hero, or Rorschach esq one. I’m not exactly the most stable person mentally, and I don’t mean depression though I do have a issue with it.
Dayum
this is going on Escher Girls
Like on one hand I’m aware that this comic relies significantly on cheesecake and straight-male gaze – regardless of how dimensional the lady characters are in the writing -, and the fact that conveniently-mammalian aliens are also coming in with exaggerated hourglass figures can be a … play on tropes, of some sort. But idk, I’m starting to get boobs and butt fatigue to the point where it’s less fun to read.
Boobs and butts are always welcome.
No offense, but maybe this comic and it’s stated, up front and easy to read warning labels aren’t for you?
The comic actually has a sidebar with the “Cheesecake and beefcake” warning.
There is no shame to bee found in just saying maybe this comic and it’s creators preferences aren’t for you, this doesn’t also mean there’s anything wrong with it.
Nor anything wrong with you.
None taken – I was enjoying the comic, including all the -cake, up til now, and would much rather keep reading and discover the expanding alien cast and shenanigans!
Maybe it’s not the T&A per se, but when they’re paired with wasp waists, and the hips just… pop out way too much – I can’t place a pelvic bone in this first panel. Yeah, I guess I feel like sticking to the typical comics “boobs and butt but no fat!” figure might be limiting the potential for exploring alien anatomies, in a sense?? When I was sort of looking forward to something different, as aliens were coming in.
But tbf, there’s also something satisfying about an artist knowing what they like, drawing what they know, and sticking to it! c:
Yeah the very thin waists can look a bit odd sometimes. I don’t mind though, I mainly read the comic for the jokes. Dave can be very funny.
10 quatloos says Detla the Space Drow falls for him! ^_^
Lemme get, Max Genius and Miria Fan? ;)
“You defeated me, I must kill you!” “You’re Beautfiul” “…I love you.”
Not necessarily.
I just like Achilles, and think there’s room for more than one extraterrestrial relationship.
And he’s got that Benedict Cumberbatch/Jeff Bridges/Kurt Russell thing…and I am so here for it. It’s a hokey old trope, and definitely sexist, but I love the idea of “i can only fall for a guy who can beat me.” Even better if she genuinely starts having feelings for him, and her Space Drow Mom shows up with a huge “wtaf is going on here.”
Nah, Les was originally modelled on a mix of MacGyver and the original Starbuck slash original A-Team’s ‘Face’ (hair of the Mac, face of the, well, Face :P )
And yes, I got the reference.
*squeeing intensifies*
Well, that’s one way to test your indestructability.
Also, his power being described as ‘aggravating invincibility’ is very accurate.
I love how he’s crossing his fingers even as he is offering a free hit! Like, he really don’t feel comfortable lying but it’s ok if he says “psyche”!
Fingers not crossed, he’s tapping a “right here” target location with his forefinger.
Would Dabbler be able to take out Achilles with her succubus sex or would she be unable to feed on him b/c of his invulnerability?
As long as Les can still get horny, Dabbles can still feed off of him
I know SOMEONE called it. XD
I laughed way too hard at Achilles’ attitude on this page.
He waited for them to brag about being unbeatable and then got them to accept a challenge to a fight.
Sydney would be so proud.
Not a fan of the Punisher epaulets (though maybe she has 4 eyes under there?), that her thighs connect directly to her waist with no bone structure, or that the lower half of her face is immune to road rash while the rest of her isn’t. But “schism blade” is a really good name for an assassin’s swarm blade. If she can stop monologuing, I think this character has a lot of potential.
Would love to see some of the great one-off villains pop up again, at least on an Archon training slide or something if not in person.
So, Archon is about 3-4 months old now right, post press conference reveal? When does the merch start coming out in-universe, Arianna may have had to update some spreadsheets but she should’ve had at least a starter batch ready for market by now. Some team posters would make a great background on the Times Square screens, as well as desktops or even real-world merch.
His hair doesn’t grow, he’s “quantum-locked”, AKA stuck in a state of unchangeability – which is why he’s sporting a mullet in the 21st century.
Ack, was trying to reply to someone.
Obviously Achilles doesnt need food, air and or his body cant change shape, even from inside… if not, any bomb, poison, super heavy object or lack of food would kill him… his body must be “the perfect amount of Entropy of mass/energy” or at least generate an equal/similar amount to “perfect” instead of invulnerable…
While his powerset seems kind of boring on the surface, just the fact that he can pull off the invulnerability thing is pretty brokenly overpowered. Since that blade actually got stuck inside an object I’m guessing it’s not quite up to monomolecular sharpness, but the fact that he didn’t even get scratched by it suggests that he’s probably not going to care too much about most kinetic weapons.
…Now I want to see him face tank an asteroid drop.
He’s regularly had mountains fall on him. They don’t hurt him, but it takes a while for him to get out from under. I doubt if he’d provide much protection for the planet from an asteroid drop. He’d just be swimming in magma a while, until he could crawl up through the mantle..
Have to wonder if his invulnerability started out less but grew exponentially for each hit he took till present day where he can eyeball tank everything short of teleportation into another realm.
That would fit with the implied common way of gaining super powers(Harem’s question in the restaurant before the Vehmence fight) being born with them, since growing makes one require to change their body and thus to on a certain level damage it’s old form.
Now I think about it, I think I found a way to maybe kill Achilles: force him to sit a lot, so his own body develops his muscles in such a way that they curve his back forward in rest, so he can develop a deadly hernia.
He can move and train so his muscles apparently can change their power and he can think so he probably relies on a(n invincible) nervous system, so if you can make him bend forward so far his nervous signals take to long to effectively travel he could maybe die.
I’ve never seen freebie spelled like that. Free bee…
Buzz! Free bees for everyone! :)
Is Achilles naturally clean shaven, did the hair on his body stop growing one day luckily after he shaved, or does his invulnerability for some reason not include his hair?
It is stated early on in the comic that Supers don’t have body hair. It came up during a gag about Sydney not having shaved her legs.
So, realizing that he is not, technical, “hidden,” I still think Achilles makes an awesome CMHB (Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass).
I always get the feeling from him that he’s this amazingly laid back goofball, only because he hasn’t yet had to act in a terrifyingly competent manner so far. And there is _zero_ denying he is a goofball. A low-key clever goofball, but still the guy who is happiest with a good beer & his mates about.
And while this contest is very definitely _not_ going to be it, someday, something is going to make him put his beer down, and stop grinning at his private joke. And on that day, someone is going to discover just how much conventional violence relies on fear and pain, and how completely unprepared they are for the loss of those tools.
We joke about the immovable object, but as long as he has the freedom and time to act, Achilles has the potential to become an unstoppable force. Slow, grinding, relentless…and as inescapable as an avalanche.
damn.
you just got me on the Achilles bandwagon with that one. he is the CMHB for sure.
Aww… thank you!
*SHANE*
[Beard: Lvl Up!]
[Friendship: Lvl Up!]
*BHARDA*
[Diplomacy: Lvl Up!]
[ADDED: Minion]
An immovable object, and an irresistible force, cannot exist in the same universe.
what happened when the irresistible force met the immovable object? They surrendered.
One question: who gets to claim the sword? Les or Cora?
What use has Achilles for a super-techno space sword?
You have never played an MMO, have you? Not everyone rolls for a weapon they can use, just so they can have it (and the one who does need it doesn’t get it)
His DEF game is maxed out, but he lacks DPS.
ITEM: Schism Blade would totally help improve his overall combat rating.
Anyone who specializes in close range combat can use a super sword.
No one until the auction after the trial as it is evidence.
“Evidence, souvenir… To-may-to, to-mah-to.“
Making a note to check out that comic later, looks interesting.
So much fun. Start at the beginning and don’t mind the changing art styles*, the story is well worth it.
As are the Rachel Peng spinoff crime-solving novels, they do a good job exploring the implications and possibilities of the cyborg tech in a way that Grrl readers would enjoy.
* The first 1/4 got an art reboot, then there’s the original (rough) line art in the middle, then the new style again up until the last couple months, and now an entirely new artist for the final act.
If someone finds a way to ensure that super powers breed true, Achilles is going to be in high demand. Knowing that your children will outlive the stars would be a high incentive in many quarters.
My analysis of the 1-200 comments about the nature of Achilles invulnerability is that his sperm are immune to being absorbed into an egg. He’s functionally sterile.
He is not like Midas. His super power does not block him from using metabolic processes necessary for a normal life. He can breathe, eat, drink, metabolise, talk, move and lay down new memories (as shown by him learning the new technique above). All of which would be impossible if his cells and body components were immovable and impervious (although why anyone would think that his invulnerability would make an egg invulnerable does rather elude me).
What they are is impossible to harm. Quite an important distinction. One which is important to know about this setting is that super powers work the way they are meant to. For the most part that means without nasty side effects (like super speeders burning up).
OK there may be some out there who didn’t make it to feature on Sydney’s radar. If someone burned up the first time they ran real fast, then she may have only read about it as an unexplained death, if it ever even came to her attention. And there are probably a lot of supers who have quite uninspiring powers.
Which is not to say that the author might have a reason to make Achilles infertile. But there is nothing intrinsic about his power, nor the setting, which would make that a given. To the contrary, supers get ‘perfect physiques’ as an automatic bonus. Which would imply fully functional reproductive capacity too, given that is what we would expect for someone who is ‘perfect’.
And now you have me envisaging closets full of offspring Vance colonies, hidden all over the Archon HQ!
Comparing this page to Grrl Power #163 – No one appreciates a good defense you can really see your art style evolution plus Achilles looks a bit longer in the face with a more prominent brow. And cheekbones. Really digging the design for him right now for some reason.
The true Hero Killer of the bunch, at least for any super that needs to breathe is Mr. Amorphous.
In fact all Stretch type heroes have never been used to their fullest potential in the comic genre. Mr. Fantastic, makes a bubble around Hulk or any other heroes head and and then basically smothers them. sure they grab him, but he’s a stretch they can pull him like taffy, but they cannot really hurt him and all he has to do is keep them from breathing till they pass out or die. you got power beams? good luck shooting your own head. god, immortals, supra glalactic life forms that dont have to breath are immune, but if they have to have blood to their brains they might still be in trouble. a stretch hero could do a wicked blood choke as well. and you cannot get him off, and they can conorm to you like a the worlds best blood pressure cuff.
The Hulk once pulled a reverse of that on Mr. Fantastic. Mr. Fantastic still needs to breathe too. The Hulk crushed him up into a ball and swallowed him, suffocating Mr. Fantastic in his indestructible so can’t be stretched through, throat and spit him out.
I just love this one and where he is choking her out. Man keep them coming!
bit supprised that achilles is being useful and not flung out of the fight in some manner like a joke
He seems to be useless against supers and mages, but very effective against aliens.
In the Vehemence fight he got thrown away as an irritating kid, because everybody had one ability they were super good in and could thus be moved to move human heavy objects, but in Sconia’s lair he disabled all the traps and forced Sconia to result to her ultimate weapon(blood magic) early.
These guys are so CLEARLY going off half-cocked. They didn’t investigate the situation, they didn’t get any intel. They don’t even really have much of a plan, they’re just going for it right out in public in a place they can’t have prepared or fortified. They have no idea what to expect from Max’s teammates.
I am becoming more and more certain that hiring these rookies are the “useful, disposable idiots” some *serious* mercenary contractor is using to get the intel needed to plan and bid the job.
I concur. but only if this comic gets a bit darker than it currently is. I can see it going that way. but I can also see the universe being populated with as many idiots as the earth is as well and it staying the same cool comic we know and love.
Hope there aren’t any sickos out there who can liquify like T-1000. Last thing he needs is a lungful of bad guy.
What part of ‘indestructible to the molecular level’ escapes you?
The last thing T-1000 needs, is to find out what Les’ colon looks like on his way out
Presumably he still needs to breathe, though.
Have the balls to use your own name, thank you
He was buried under a pile of rubble for most of the duration of the Restaurant Rumble, and was still able to talk, he also can’t be drowned
I expect him to eventually run into some magic or alien super-science that actually can hurt him, but not anytime soon: the author will probably continue to exploit the humorous potential of his “aggravating invincibility” for years to come.
A thought occurs…. does Achilles hair grow? is it also invulnerable?
According to the cast page he has an invincible hairstyle, so the answers seem to be no, his hair doesn’t grow and yes, his hair is also invulnerable.
Nope. From the cast page: Achilles can’t be poisoned, suffocated, starved, irradiated, crushed, cut, pierced, burned, frozen or injured by any method yet discovered.
How does Achilles get his hair cut?
He doesn’t, it’s been that way since his powers kicked in
So, I wonder why she does keep trying for non-lethal attacks…
You think a turbo sword to the head is non-lethal? For you and Achilles maybe, but I don’t think I could survive that.
The non sharp edge, compared to the flat side and pommel is comparably non-lethal. Since her sword arm is relatively free, the proper and lethal option here would be to slide the sharp edge of the blade across to slit the neck. or any other appendage. Since she has mobility enough for hitting twice with the flat side and pommel, she should have mobility enough for that too. Even a seesaw maneuver. And this is assuming she can’t bear the sharp edge of the blade towards her opponent somehow.
Achilles’s neck is suspiciously close to her neck I don’t think that is a smart idea.
Furthermore in the part she hits him with the lemmet we see different, because I thought she was hitting him once in a 45°/30° angle and uses a swarm attack later.