Anatomy 3

== Anatomy of a Superhero==

Superheroes and Superheroines are unique as literary characters in that they are a based around a visual design as much as a literary design. Due to this fact, a basic anatomy for superbeings has arisen. They are fantastic beings, and it only makes sense that artists give them larger than life bodies. These bodies are hypersexual, yet somehow androgynous. Superman wouldn't be Superman without a chiseled jawline, and every male hero has a chest four times as broad as his head that compliments his rippling abdominal muscles nicely. Similarly, superheroines have perfect make-up that never smears, they never need to wear actual pants no matter what the temperature is, and it's safe to say that someone in the custom-made bra industry is making a large chunk of change from superpowered ladies. However, there is never any visual hint that any leotard covers anything but flat, sexless flesh in the crotch area. Superbeings are almost angelic. They seem to be immaculately designed everywhere except where it really counts.

Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral?
Another trait that detracts from the hypersexual appearance of a superbeing at face value is the super part in superbeing. Ben Grimm, The Thing, would have Charles Atlas eating his hear out if he weren't made entirely of bright orange rock. It's hard to catch a glimpse of the Flash's rippling pectorals when he's running so fast that he becomes a human blur. Even "normal" heroes like Batman have an implied element of strangeness in their design that doesn't exactly help get one's motor revving. Who knows what Batman's legs look like? His lower half is constantly melded into the shadows, not to mention the constantly glowing eyes. She-Hulk could be a Playboy centerfold when she's mild mannered single female lawyer Jennifer Walters, but that isn't a form she takes often. Seven feet tall and bright green are not common sex symbol traits.

That's Sequential, Not Pictorial

Readers get a full body view of characters very rarely. Comic artists are some of the few people that understand key concepts like the fact that Ms. Marvel's chest actually doesn't need to be in frame to show that she just decked a villain. In a comic, one gets a shot of a fist in this panel, a few faces in that panel, and the occasional full page filled with superheroes in their angelic glory. Nerds might be desperate, but they aren't stupid. At the going rate of $3.99 per comic, they're going to look elsewhere for their less literary needs. Heroes and heroines are perfectly formed because it's a fantasy world, and who would settle for less than the best if they could?

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