Mostly not – although I haven’t read any of Man-Thing’s starring appearances, I’ve seen him in a handful of other books. Primarily he’s a shambling mound who exhibits essentially no intelligence at all.
Man-Thing was written by Steve Gerber for quite a while in the 70’s and I understand the book was highly regarded at the time (although not as highly as Gerber’s idiosyncratic Howard the Duck). The back issues are surprsingly expensive, moreso than most of the Marvels from that era, but that may be because of the presence of a Howard back-up strip.
(Giant Size) Man-Thing was Ted Salis (or was that Swamp Thing)? Regardless, he was a scientist working on reproducing the super-soldier serum in his lab in the Everglades (where all good super soldier serums are developed.) Anyhow, accident ensues (invaded by govt., explosion, someone will correct me soon enough, I’m sure) and he stumbles out into the swamp where he becomes a…thing.
He’s not so much sentient as he is purely empathetic. He’s drawn to emotions. Happy thoughts, love, kindness feel pleasurable and he longs to be near them. Hatred, greed, fear cause him pain and he lashes out at the source, which tends to generate more fear.
Whatever knows fear burns at Man-Things touch! I don’t think Howard the Duck ever burned; he’d seen too many weird things to be phased. And I don’t know if they ever met, but I doubt Hulk would be afraid of Man-Thing so the burning touch wouldn’t affect him. Be interesting to see how Daredevil (The Man without Fear) would handle himself.
It used to burn when I touched my man-thing, but the doctor gave me a shot for it.
Man-Thing was a scientist named Ted Sallis who was working on a re-creation of the serum that created Captain America. When some…uh…evil guys (were they Nazis? Thugs?) broke into the lab he was working at, Sallis fled and injected the serum into himself to prevent its capture.
This all happened in a swamp that was the “Nexus of All Realities”…apparently some place where different dimensions linked together. The mystic energies in the swamp water mingled with the formula and turned Sallis into…well, a big, scary, pile of moss. There’s not much of Sallis in there; the classic versions had the Man-Thing portrayed as a mindless shamble that acted on instinct only.
There’s a great parody of Man-Thing in CEREBUS #19-20, by the way, in which a mad sorcerer (named Charles X. Claremont, of all things) summons a familiar creature, and can control it with a spell, “Whomever knows _____ shall burn at the creature’s touch.” There’s a hysterical discussion of the various words different sorcerers used, my favorite being “me.”
Max and I are on the same page, it seems. The Hulk DID fight Man-Thing on several occassions, including one in which Thingy grabbed him by the head. Hulk got nervous, and burned (although all it really did was burn off all of his hair).
Also, I just remembered an occassion where Thingy HIMSELF became afraid. His reaction was, I’m not kidding, to stick his hand on his face and torch himself.
Both Man-Thing and Swamp Thing were based on The Heap, who shambled through Hillman comics from WWII until the Comics Code kicked in. Solomon Grundy is also in the family.
I seem to recall that there was a proto-“elseworlds” book where Batman was chosen as the next Green Lantern. I’ll try and find the link, but don’t get your hopes up-my files are pretty disorganized.
I have some Frank Miller Daredevil issue where he’s laying in a cheap motel and decribing all the horrible things he can hear around him and can’t shut out. Good stuff.
There was a movie called “The Trial Of The Incredible Hulk” where the Hulk teamed up with Daredevil and DD was lured into a trap where he was disabled by loudspeakers.
On another note I love the way they did DD’s costme in the new movie, the red leather is much more “him” than spandex would be and it looks more like the way his costme was shaded in the comics.
And now a question, WHY are so many super-heroes and villans shown in the shorts-over-tights look? It’s been that way since the golden age. It makes it look like everyone is saying “hey lookit my colorful crotch!” What did the comics code say about it back then? BTW what was the heap?
I mentioned Sol as being in the same family through the corpse+swamp connection. The Heap was dead for quite a while before he (it) shambled forth, and I don’t recall any fire involved in his (it’s?) origin.
Fenris: If I recall Vietch’s Sprout story line correctly from Swamp Thing, the Parliament of Trees considered Solomon Grundy a candidate for the next incarnation of Swamp Thing, and,indeed, helped Grund try to kill Swampy. That would seem to imply that Grundy can be considered a member of the family of icky swamp creatures that we love.
Fenris: You might be thinking of the Veitch time-travel story where Swampy did indeed take over? possess? the body of an aviator who crashed near the Hammer of Hell’s castle.
As for the rest of your post, eek! there’s a fungus among us.
Cold swamp water rather than fire seems to be the main ingredient. Not much at all like the “chemicals+fire/doused in the swamp” of Swampie and Man-Thing for my money.
…You know, in real life I hardly ever get into conversations about swamp creatures, nor do I find I get an opportunity to use the word “shambling” very often…
