# How does Superman fly
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [November 25, 2014, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556 "2014-11-25T03:28:02Z")
**Posts on this page:** 12
**Page:** 6
### Author:  [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2015, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/101 "2015-11-11T18:34:59Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#):
>
> Belt, wasn’t it?
Actually, Hawkman’s boots, belt, and wings all contain the Nth metal, which allow him to use his mental abilities to get him off the ground.
> **[Hawkman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawkman)**
>
> Hawkman is the name of several superheroes appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Created by writer Gardner Fox and artist Dennis Neville, the original Hawkman first appeared in Flash Comics #1, published by All-American Publications in 1940.
> Several incarnations of Hawkman have appeared in DC Comics, all of them characterized by the use of archaic weaponry and by large, artificial wings, attached to a harness made from the special Nth metal that allows flight. Most incarnatio...
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2015, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/102 "2015-11-11T18:43:28Z")
I just watched [The Death of “Superman Lives”: What happened?](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2753778/). Luckily it died.
> [@](#):
>
> The thing I personally found amusing was how almost everyone involved with Superman Lives had so little knowledge on the characters, mainly from producer John Peters who had the most insane, outlandish ideas that made little sense to not only the actual movie, but to the universe established in the DC comics. The movie truly felt like like it was doomed from the start.
It almost didn’t get made without Superman flying at all, then it didn’t get made with Superman jumping instead of flying under control which wouldn’t have been that bad except for everything else it didn’t get made with.
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### Author:  [@Corner\_Case](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corner_Case)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2015, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/103 "2015-11-11T19:24:01Z")
Superman flies exactly the way bricks don’t - _Douglas Adams_
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### Author:  [@Dante\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dante_G)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2015, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/104 "2015-11-11T19:49:58Z")
The Earth knows that Superman sucks, so it only allows him to touch the ground when it wants to. It’s the whole “don’t tread on me” thing.
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### Author:  [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2015, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/105 "2015-11-12T03:32:21Z")
> [@TriPolar](#):
>
> I just watched [The Death of “Superman Lives”: What happened?](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2753778/). Luckily it died.
>
> It almost didn’t get made without Superman flying at all, then it didn’t get made with Superman jumping instead of flying under control which wouldn’t have been that bad except for everything else it didn’t get made with.
The Kevin Smith script had him flying, you just never saw it. It was just a red/blue blur.
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### Author:  [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2015, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/106 "2015-11-12T13:08:16Z")
A three-page thread about how Superman flies and no one has mentioned the thing every 10-year-old kid intuitively knows:
it’s his **cape**.
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### Author:  [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2015, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/107 "2015-11-12T13:09:21Z")
How does Superman fly?
He flies very well, thank you. Next question?
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### Author:  [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2015, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/108 "2015-11-12T13:21:52Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#):
>
> When the comics have characters “leap tall buildings” they tend to forget that there is an equal, opposite reaction. If one could leap tall buildings, one would leave a big hole in the ground at takeoff and landing.
Oh, come on! The Earth weighs 6.6 septillion tons! How much could li’l ole Supe affect it by leaping just one tall building in a single bound?!? :dubious: 😕 :o
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### Author:  [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2015, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/109 "2015-11-12T21:38:15Z")
> [@terentii](#):
>
> Oh, come on! The Earth weighs 6.6 septillion tons! How much could li’l ole Supe affect it by leaping just one tall building in a single bound?!? :dubious: 😕 :o
No, that actually makes sense. The immense acceleration needed for humanoid legs to bend and then stretch out, fast enough to propel a humanoid body the height of a (let’s say) 20-story building would, in fact, buckle any concrete sidewalk. It would leave small holes, not global-scale holes.
Marvel comics show this when the Hulk leaps. He leaves little craters behind him.
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### Author:  [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2015, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/110 "2015-11-13T05:41:43Z")
He naturally has the ability that was later produced artificially in “Legion flight belts” (and later rings).
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### Author:  [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2015, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/111 "2015-11-13T05:46:05Z")
He farts vigorously.
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### Author:  [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)
#### Post date: [April 1, 2016, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-superman-fly/705556/112 "2016-04-01T01:12:44Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#):
>
> A possibility. Mandrake started in 1934, and apparently originally deceived people hypnotically, although he later had telekinetic powers. :
>
> [Mandrake the Magician - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandrake_the_Magician)
> The operative question – was he hovering before Superman was doing it?
Just to expand on my earlier answer: it wasn’t until this month that they republished the Mandrake full-color Sunday comic strips in hardcover – but republish 'em they **did,** and I have 'em here, and in 1935 the caped do-gooder on the wrong side of a locked gate was all _“when you can’t go through, you have to go over”_, since Problem Illusions Can’t Solve equals _“Rise In The Air And Float Over The Wall”_.
And in 1936, our hero was still at it: a sabotaged trapeze act sends an innocent circus acrobat plummeting to his death – until _“Mandrake instantly shoots up into the air with bullet-speed … and meeting Tim in mid-air, carries him to safety!”_
(In between those strips, he rescues a kidnapped woman with some flying-carpet magic: _“Mandrake, we’re – we’re in the air!”__“Yes, Jana. This is much easier than fighting all of Indus’s soldiers”_ – but I’m not counting that; and, of course, he does a bunch of stuff with invisibility, and bright flashes of light, and making things seem to turn into gold – and I’m not counting that, either; I’m just saying, the man could fly; how? Magic!)
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