I have been reading some old stories and noticing a one off decision a creator has made, that leads to suspension of belief issues or major plot problems. Some examples are Reed and Ben in WWII which they just conveniently forget ever happened, or Fred Davis (the second Bucky) still being around. Or even power related stuff. Why doesn't Superman just get Batman and his friends suits made from Kryptonian material? Why didn't they make more of an effort to disguise the follow up Robins, or even Linda Danvers better? Why doesn't every serum creator share it with multiple heroes?

What decisions have led you to think, "well if that's true then why doesn't"..........

Cyclops can't control his optic blasts, but every other X-Men villain finds some way to neutralize mutant powers. Why doesn't Cyclops just wear a bracelet made from some of the extant "mutant-power-neutralizing" technology?

This is a good one.

Also, if cosmic rays gave the FF powers then...how come? There was 'insufficient shielding' in their vehicle and they got powers and didn't die...and then the Red Ghost and his apes got powers the same way....and then the U-Foes repeated it and got powers...so if this has happened multiple times, why is it the case? It wasn't some freak one-of-a-kind incident because five other people (and three apes) have done what the FF did and gotten a comparable result. How is this possible? Also, why haven't more supervillains tried their luck in the cosmic ray lottery? You'd think a whole bunch of spaceship-equipped bad guys would be up for the challenge.

If it had only happened once due to a freak cosmic-ray storm or something...well, that'd be one thing. It's the fact that anyone who's tried it has managed to repeat what happened to the FF that confuses me.

In fact, Marvel created thousands of stories where characters went into space and were exposed to cosmic rays, but they received no powers. Feeling you'd be bored by the result, they didn't bother to publish them.

This is, I feel, a true fact.

I'm assuming, however, that those spacecraft had shielding that was 'adequate' and so the passengers and crew of these vessels were safe from becoming super-powered. Or dead.

The shielding on their spacecraft being substandard, and that being the given reason for the FF's exposure and subsequent super-abilities, is why I mentioned it - I'm not sure if it fits the idea of this thread...but as a kid, I did wonder why more people didn't take the same risk to become super-powered on purpose. Some people did so intentionally, repeating what the FF had done, and it worked - although the FF, the Red Ghost and the U-Foes had various issues regarding their powers, they still got powers. They weren't ever described as latent-mutants or anything, they were normal people who got zapped and got powers. It was just something that I noticed as a kid.

I know, I was just being a flippant jerk.

Well...aren't we all?

It's almost like these stories were written for children.

(Trying this out as a catchphrase. It beats the 'subtext' one, and the 'finish those book' is getting tired.)

Oh that’s a great one! Rogue could wear one whenever she wants to kiss or be with someone. Problem solved.

Yep. And also during the early days, no one thought the same fans would be reading them decades later. Either the books would have died off or like the 40s-60s, the next generation of kids would be the readers.

I don't like...
*Iris West being born in the far future.
*Peter Parker's parents being spies.
*the whole "Identity Crisis" mini-series.

Retcons that overload characters' histories with awkward coincidences.

* Young Bruce Wayne's father once fought crime in a Batman-like costume.
* Teenage Bruce Wayne once fought crime in a Robin-like costume.
* Kal-El lived an entire life on another planet during his journey from Krypton, before being rejuvenated to babyhood and sent on to Earth.
* Mopee.

There have been so many stories like that. I sometimes liked the individual tales, but they should have been "imaginary" because they water down the characters' simple, straightforward, powerful origins.

I think Hank Pym striking Janet Van Dyne was one of these things...it's now become a defining aspect of the whole character when it was meant to indicate the fact that Hank was going off the rails in a massive way. It's not like it was characteristic of him to behave like that. It was done to illustrate how far gone he was. It makes me sad.

Agreed on all of these, especially the last one, which is the worst abomination in comics history (up to where I stopped reading the big 2; now I think it's Alfred being killed off maybe...but I haven't read that, only saw the panel it happened in ).

*Wolverine's back story(s) being filled in.
*The secret origin of Barry Allen's bow tie.
Not everything about a character needs explaining. A little mystery is appealing.

The ones my civilian friends bring up is why Batman isnt and armored hero like Iron Man (at least in the comic books). He lives in a world where his battletech is sort of off the charts, but still operates without super powers or flight

All those, especially the last one, suck. Peter's parents being spies is exactly the kind of melodramatic crap that Ditko hated, the "coincidences", where even as a kid I knew were BS.



The first one was fun but meant for an audience that wouldn't stay forever. But I agree.



Another one I hated. And Secret Invasion was the perfect opportunity to fix this.



Amen!!!!! And it made Wolverine far less cool



Or wear Kryptonian cloth. But yes, which is why I always hate the swinging into a hundred machine gun scenes.

I'm prepared to suspend disbelief in any story if I think it's well-written or if it's written in a certain way - the right tone or style or whatever term you prefer to use. If the story strikes the right chord with me I'm more forgiving of certain 'conceits of the genre'.

If they're going for 'gritty realism' then I'm okay with it as long as they're consistent. If they go for tongue-in-cheek comedy then as long as they're consistent I'll accept stuff that seems weird or over the top.

Both these things can happen concurrently, also - you need comic-relief characters and situations even in a serious drama - but for me a lot of what makes me like or dislike something is the way things are approached. It's why I won't watch that Love & Thunder movie; based on what I've read it's just making fun of the characters (and, by proxy, the audience). If the writing is presented as being done in the right spirit or tone then I'll accept things more readily.

I've heard of that suggestion before, but for Rogue.

In fact, I thought maybe you coined it in responding to a subject just like this --

One for me is guys like Daredevil, the Punisher, or the Kingpin being able to provide any sort of physical challenge to Spider-Man at all.

Another is guys with super-speed only using it once in a while. This just happened in the Shazam: Fury of the Gods movie I watched last weekend.

At several points in the movie, Captain Marvel uses his super-speed to snatch stuff out of villains' hands, move objects around before villains can react, dodge attacks, etc. Then other times, people's lives are in danger or villains have some super-weapon in their hands or someone without super speed is attacking him... and it's like he suddenly doesn't have super speed. He eats devastating attacks, can't move people to safety, doesn't snatch the weapon out of the bad guy's hand when he can, etc.

Obviously, the reason is that he would have easily defeated the bad guys had he used his super speed consistently... but then why have him use it at all and create that noticeable plot hole? Just don't show him using it and act like the speed only applies to flying really fast or something.