Dear comic book artists...
Aug. 17th, 2018 11:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bjornwildePlease be more consistent when you draw powers? And maybe refer to the official description of powers before drawing things? A photo essay behind the cut.
In playing Viv Vision, I need to have her powers and what she can do pretty much down. There's always wiggle room for a fun narrative, but it's still a good idea to have basics down.
Viv is described both in comic and on the Marvel wiki's as basically having her father's powers, i.e. the Vision. People seem to forget to mention the holographic projections she does, or have decided that's not really a power, despite how often she uses it on page, but whatever.
Mostly, I have two gripes. First, flight! Vision's and Viv's description of flight is as follows:
- When at a minimum mass, Viv could fly through the air weightlessly.
That to me says they more glide than fly, like a hot air ballon. Vision's entry does state Vision has control over his flight "by unknown means" and speculates he interacts with the Earth's magnetic field, sort of pushing himself off the magnetic waves, but I'm not sure of that. I guess it works? I'd be tempted to say something like they have a low powered gravity drive that also helps them walk and maintain balance, and they need to be weightless to fly with it. I don't know.
The other problem I have is that if they can only fly while weightless, than how do they pick up people to play transport?
OK, Vision's entry says he keeps his outer layer solid while the inside is intangible to carry people....I know this is comic books, but that is making no sense to me. There is one panel that suggests Viv can make others intangible, so maybe I'll just run with that; that she makes passengers intangible as well as herself.
Another thing with the intangibility, in one comic, she causes a bomb to malfunction by allowing it to pass through her while she's intangible, but I can find no mention of it anywhere and I believe Kitty Pryde is the only one who officially causes havoc with electronic things passing through her.
OK, next, Viv's ability to release solar radiation. Viv, like her father, collects ambient solar radiation and stores it, using it to power herself. She is always gathering and so ends up with extra usually. Like her father, she can expel this energy as something like a laser. Her father has only been shown to shoot it from the gem on his forhead...but Viv? (This is my real gripe and the cause for this post)
OK, good examples of her using the gem (although it's worth pointing out she can use it as a flash light and/or hologram projector, as well as the destructive beam.)
Wait...eye beams? Okay...I guess that can work.
wait...what?
Oh, come on!
Future issues don't have her doing energy beams very much, so I guess I can decide how things work. I have two ideas:
1-She can shoot energy beams out of any part of her body. This works as she can create a hologram that makes her look human and it's effective enough it fooled airport security (does Earth 616 have TSA?). I already kind of imagine she does this by direct projections of light from her skin, rather than an overlay from the gem on her forehead. Support for this comes from her using her palm as the screen for a smart phone.
2-Ignore the hand beam and just go with forehead and eye beams. I'm leaning towards this as hand blasts doesn't seem to fit the Viv in my head.
Actually, I'm going with option 01 but saying that the hand beams burn through the energy store quickly, so she saves it.
Also that barrier she makes in the last image, I'm deciding is a pin point barrier (ala "Robotech") and she's basically projecting a disc of super heated energy about the size of a dinner plate which she moves about to catch the bullets. Computer brain moves quickly, as does energy, so it appears to be in several places at once.
Lastly, the panel that gave me her journal name...(the woman being head butted makes people experience their greatest fears and nightmares)
In playing Viv Vision, I need to have her powers and what she can do pretty much down. There's always wiggle room for a fun narrative, but it's still a good idea to have basics down.
Viv is described both in comic and on the Marvel wiki's as basically having her father's powers, i.e. the Vision. People seem to forget to mention the holographic projections she does, or have decided that's not really a power, despite how often she uses it on page, but whatever.
Mostly, I have two gripes. First, flight! Vision's and Viv's description of flight is as follows:
- When at a minimum mass, Viv could fly through the air weightlessly.
That to me says they more glide than fly, like a hot air ballon. Vision's entry does state Vision has control over his flight "by unknown means" and speculates he interacts with the Earth's magnetic field, sort of pushing himself off the magnetic waves, but I'm not sure of that. I guess it works? I'd be tempted to say something like they have a low powered gravity drive that also helps them walk and maintain balance, and they need to be weightless to fly with it. I don't know.
The other problem I have is that if they can only fly while weightless, than how do they pick up people to play transport?
OK, Vision's entry says he keeps his outer layer solid while the inside is intangible to carry people....I know this is comic books, but that is making no sense to me. There is one panel that suggests Viv can make others intangible, so maybe I'll just run with that; that she makes passengers intangible as well as herself.
Another thing with the intangibility, in one comic, she causes a bomb to malfunction by allowing it to pass through her while she's intangible, but I can find no mention of it anywhere and I believe Kitty Pryde is the only one who officially causes havoc with electronic things passing through her.
OK, next, Viv's ability to release solar radiation. Viv, like her father, collects ambient solar radiation and stores it, using it to power herself. She is always gathering and so ends up with extra usually. Like her father, she can expel this energy as something like a laser. Her father has only been shown to shoot it from the gem on his forhead...but Viv? (This is my real gripe and the cause for this post)
OK, good examples of her using the gem (although it's worth pointing out she can use it as a flash light and/or hologram projector, as well as the destructive beam.) Wait...eye beams? Okay...I guess that can work. wait...what? Oh, come on!Future issues don't have her doing energy beams very much, so I guess I can decide how things work. I have two ideas:
1-She can shoot energy beams out of any part of her body. This works as she can create a hologram that makes her look human and it's effective enough it fooled airport security (does Earth 616 have TSA?). I already kind of imagine she does this by direct projections of light from her skin, rather than an overlay from the gem on her forehead. Support for this comes from her using her palm as the screen for a smart phone.
2-Ignore the hand beam and just go with forehead and eye beams. I'm leaning towards this as hand blasts doesn't seem to fit the Viv in my head.
Actually, I'm going with option 01 but saying that the hand beams burn through the energy store quickly, so she saves it.
Also that barrier she makes in the last image, I'm deciding is a pin point barrier (ala "Robotech") and she's basically projecting a disc of super heated energy about the size of a dinner plate which she moves about to catch the bullets. Computer brain moves quickly, as does energy, so it appears to be in several places at once.
Lastly, the panel that gave me her journal name...(the woman being head butted makes people experience their greatest fears and nightmares)
no subject
Date: 2018-08-17 07:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-08-17 09:23 pm (UTC)*hands*
They're never going to be Team Rigorous Standards over in comicbookland. Not ever.
*sends tea*
no subject
Date: 2018-08-17 10:12 pm (UTC)(I think i am just paranoid about going munkin with powered pups.)
ETA: And I am both tempted and frightened of Viv meeting Sombra...just saying. =)
no subject
Date: 2018-08-17 10:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-08-17 10:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-08-17 10:22 pm (UTC)Oh, pobrecita.
no subject
Date: 2018-08-17 10:26 pm (UTC)My father and I do not suffer financial difficulties.
no subject
Date: 2018-08-27 02:57 pm (UTC)I need to remember the pretendy happy funtimes mantra when I start doing that to myself. =D