# Can somebody fan-wank some nagging questions about superhero movies, comic books & TV? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 3, 2014, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180 "2014-12-03T00:37:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/21 "2014-12-03T15:44:56Z")
> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#): > > Although when he travels to Germany, they call him Herr Doktor Fantastisch. I once worked with a man whose actual last name was Doktor. Think of the possibilities! ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/22 "2014-12-03T15:56:26Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > I once worked with a man whose actual last name was Doktor. Think of the possibilities! Dr. Doktor? Please! ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/23 "2014-12-03T16:06:17Z")
Doc Dok and his sidekick, Goose. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/24 "2014-12-03T16:08:19Z")
> [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](#): > > Because characters with “Doctor” \*noms de guerre \*are usually evil (Drs. Light and Strange notwithstanding). They didn’t go to six years of evil medical school to be called Mister! > [@Trinopus](#): > > The major comic-book logic hole for me is why super-science hasn’t proliferated down into everyday consumer tech. Why aren’t we using Hank Pym’s shrinking rays to store our cars in shoeboxes, rather than having to park in garages? Why aren’t we teleporting around the world, instead of having to get aboard jet aircraft? Why hasn’t a time-travel commission not been established, at very least to go back in time and observe historical events, if not to interfere with them? Why are we still launching satellite probes to Jupiter on rockets, and not paying the Starjammers to whip them out yonder FTL? The movies _Westworld and Futureworld_ had this problem for me as well. If you have computer technology to create realistically behaving human personality replicas, that you can interact with (and have sex with!) that can easily pass for normal humans, and have technology that can create realistic human bodies that look, move and feel like humans (including having sex!), why aren’t there self driving cars, complex PDAs that have useful AI, and artificial limbs? Seems like the tech should flow out into more than just elaborate role playing sexbots. Same with the Six Million Dollar Man. if you did a realistic “where are they now” movie about Steve Austin, the entire world would have 6MDM-tech artificial limbs, eyes, ears, etc, plus cheap nuclear power packs for home use. And, every army in the world would have powered armor suits for all their troops. ---
**Author:** ![Doug\_K](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b5ac83/32.png) [@Doug\_K](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doug_K)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/25 "2014-12-03T16:08:20Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Dr. Doktor? > > Please! No worse (or better) than Major Major Major in Catch 22. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/26 "2014-12-03T16:23:37Z")
> [@Doug\_K](#): > > No worse (or better) than Major Major Major in Catch 22. 1. [Doctor Doctor lyrics](http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/ufo/doctordoctor.html) 2. > [@Lucifer's Hammer book discussion (OPEN spoilers) \[edited title\]](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lucifers-hammer-book-discussion-open-spoilers-edited-title/706155/26): > > Now if I could only get you all to agree how bad Catch 22 is! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/27 "2014-12-03T16:37:31Z")
[Doctor! Doctor! lyrics.](http://www.oldielyrics.com/lyrics/thompson_twins/doctor_doctor.html) ---
**Author:** ![Knowed\_Out](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/knowed_out/32/7380_2.png) [@Knowed\_Out](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knowed_Out)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/28 "2014-12-03T17:15:32Z")
My fanwank conundrums: Why is it so easy for HYDRA and SHIELD to infiltrate each other? In the TV series, SHIELD accepts Agent Ward, even though he fell off the grid after he got sprung from jail, spent a few years isolated in the woods, and got in only through Agent Garrett’s say-so. No background checks, no interviews, no physicals. Easy! Then, SHIELD sends Agent Simmons to work for HYDRA. HYDRA has her resume, knows she used to work for SHIELD, and includes her in top-level conferences anyway. They proudly display their evil-looking corporate logo for all to see. The only person who raises doubts is a double agent secretly working for SHIELD. Aren’t spy organizations supposed to be clandestine and overzealously suspicious of everyone they encounter? ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/29 "2014-12-03T17:52:38Z")
> [@Don\_Draper](#): > > On any “Star Trek” TV show or film, when the crew talks to an alien species via the bridge view-screen, the aliens are (presumably) speaking their own language with the ship’s Universal Translator turning it into English. So why do the non-human words the aliens speak always manage to synch up perfectly with the English words the Universal Translator interprets? Shouldn’t seeing the view-screen be like watching a badly-dubbed foreign movie? If they ever put me in charge of a Star Trek series, I’d totally do this. In any situation where the Universal Translator is supposed to be involved, the actor playing the alien/non-English-speaking person would say something totally random, like lines from a Harry Potter book or a Bible verse. The relevant diaologue would be recorded separately and applied to the scene in editing. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/30 "2014-12-03T18:34:35Z")
Mr Freeze is another example of the wrong-honorific syndrome in comics. It’s amused me for a while that in a genre where there’s legions of people who stick unearned terms like “Doctor” and “Captain” and so on in front of their names, you have Mr Freeze and Mr Fantastic, who \*don’t \*use the honorifics they _actually are_ entitled to. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/31 "2014-12-03T18:36:47Z")
> [@Don\_Draper](#): > > In “the Legion of Super-Heroes”, does Bouncing Boy’s marriage to Triplicate Girl / Duo Damsel make him a bigamist? If I could have a three-way with my own wife I’d be bouncing, too. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/32 "2014-12-03T18:37:40Z")
> [@Knowed\_Out](#): > > Why is it so easy for HYDRA and SHIELD to infiltrate each other? In the TV series, SHIELD accepts Agent Ward, even though he fell off the grid after he got sprung from jail, spent a few years isolated in the woods, and got in only through Agent Garrett’s say-so. No background checks, no interviews, no physicals. Easy! > > Then, SHIELD sends Agent Simmons to work for HYDRA. HYDRA has her resume, knows she used to work for SHIELD, and includes her in top-level conferences anyway. They proudly display their evil-looking corporate logo for all to see. The only person who raises doubts is a double agent secretly working for SHIELD. Aren’t spy organizations supposed to be clandestine and overzealously suspicious of everyone they encounter? You’ve explained the Ward one yourself. Garrett sprung him from jail and then carted him off to the words for two years. What they tell SHIELD after that is unknown, but presumably it was something like, “I mentored this completely non-homicidal young man who I did not force to kill his beloved canine companion just before this interview began.” Why wouldn’t SHIELD want to hire him? As for HYDRA, it was established in the show that a lot of SHIELD agents willingly went to work for HYDRA because they either A) believed in HYDRA’s peace through dictatorship motto B) wanted to stay in the spy business or C) really wanted to play with super-science stuff like flying helicarriers. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/33 "2014-12-03T18:38:58Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > **Star Trek viewscreen:** Real-time 3d CGI modifications to what is shown on the screen. Does the UT literally translate other languages, or does in enable people to _understand_ other languages? If the latter, it would make sense for the words to sync with their lips. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/34 "2014-12-03T19:09:09Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > It’s amused me for a while that in a genre where there’s legions of people who stick unearned terms like “Doctor” and “Captain” and so on in front of their names, you have Mr Freeze and Mr Fantastic, who \*don’t \*use the honorifics they _actually are_ entitled to. Mister Terrific likewise has a whole bunch of doctorates. (And, as he puts it, a natural aptitude for having natural aptitudes.) ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/35 "2014-12-03T19:11:54Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Mr Freeze is another example of the wrong-honorific syndrome in comics. On top of which, he ends up with a name that sounds like a guy who drives an ice cream truck. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/36 "2014-12-03T19:19:39Z")
Rex Tyler (the original Hourman) was a research chemist but didn’t use any titles at all. Not even “Mister.” ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/37 "2014-12-03T21:25:58Z")
> [@Knowed\_Out](#): > > My fanwank conundrums: > > Why is it so easy for HYDRA and SHIELD to infiltrate each other? In the TV series, SHIELD accepts Agent Ward, even though he fell off the grid after he got sprung from jail, spent a few years isolated in the woods, and got in only through Agent Garrett’s say-so. No background checks, no interviews, no physicals. Easy! > > Then, SHIELD sends Agent Simmons to work for HYDRA. HYDRA has her resume, knows she used to work for SHIELD, and includes her in top-level conferences anyway. They proudly display their evil-looking corporate logo for all to see. The only person who raises doubts is a double agent secretly working for SHIELD. Aren’t spy organizations supposed to be clandestine and overzealously suspicious of everyone they encounter? Hydra infiltrated Shield after WWII. I’ve speculated in the past that they were able to do so because everyone had thought of Hydra as a branch of the Nazi government like the SS. People assumed Hydra no longer existed as an organization after 1945. Once Hydra was able to get some agents inside Shield, these insiders were able to provide cover for bringing more Hydra agents in. A Hydra agent like Ward could get in because the Shield agents that were supposed to be doing background checks on him were themselves Hydra agents. It wasn’t that they missed his suspicious background - they knew all about it and helped conceal it. In my opinion, Hydra’s attitude towards former Shield agents like Simmons is based on pragmatism. They’re aware she wasn’t a Hydra sleeper. But she’s an excellent scientist. So she’s essentially on probation. Hydra will use her skills while seeing if she can be recruited to the cause. Even if they end up not being able to trust her, they can still use her. I will concede the Hydra logos on display makes no apparent sense. I’d be interested in seeing the show explore more of how the situation looks to people outside of Shield and Hydra. We’ve seen there’s been an effort to have Shield labeled as a rogue terrorist organization. What’s the public perception of Hydra? ---
**Author:** ![GoodOmens](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@GoodOmens](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GoodOmens)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/38 "2014-12-03T21:32:03Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > **enalzi** : I sometimes wonder if Dr. Strange is a villain. He cuts a lot of moral corners. From my limited knowledge of him, I think it’s best to think of Dr. Strange as an anti-hero. He’s not always a nice guy, and he’s even cooperated with Dormammu, but always with the intention of preventing an even greater disaster. ---
**Author:** ![FordTaurusSHO94](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f07891/32.png) [@FordTaurusSHO94](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FordTaurusSHO94)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/39 "2014-12-03T23:20:51Z")
I can’t add anything to the conversation, but Dr. Doom referring to Cyclops as “Mr. Clops” is funny. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180/40 "2014-12-03T23:53:41Z")
> [@GoodOmens](#): > > From my limited knowledge of him, I think it’s best to think of Dr. Strange as an anti-hero. He’s not always a nice guy, and he’s even cooperated with Dormammu, but always with the intention of preventing an even greater disaster. Over the years, everybody has cooperated with everybody to combat worse villains or situations. If that makes Strange an antihero, then there are no heroes. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-somebody-fan-wank-some-nagging-questions-about-superhero-movies-comic-books-tv/706180.md?page=3)