Post by Bethany J. on Jul 14, 2012 22:13:01 GMT -5
Today my husband and I came up with what I feel is a unique approach to superpowers in a story.
What got me thinking was - usually with superheroes, the hero can do something unique (i.e., levitate/fly), it's cool, end of story. Aside from the basic explanation of why they have superpowers at all, it's rarely questioned HOW they fly, unless it's in relation to a more general ability they have, like control over the wind or something. I'm writing a story right now in which a protagonist has the simple power of flight, and it occurred to me to wonder HOW he was doing it. It turns out, there are a number of different scientific ways to make something levitate - magnetic, acoustic, electromagnetic, electrostatic, aerodynamic, etc. He could be doing it any of these ways, and theoretically he might have other connected abilities he doesn't know about!
So I thought to myself, what if every superhero within my story-world drew on a particular element or "force" (i.e. magnetism). With this element/force, they can theoretically do a whole host of different things, but it might only manifest in one way at first. Perhaps they can fly from childhood, but it takes them a long time to figure out what force they're drawing on, and then even longer to understand any additional powers they might have. And sometimes different supers have the same ability, but perform it by drawing on completely different source elements. Some never learn the full extent of their abilities because it requires a ton of scientific study and hard practice. For example - per my husband's suggestion, maybe there's a mind-reader who started out with the simple ability of X-ray vision (not sure how that's from an element, though...). By observing the human brain and with a TON of medical study, he gradually began to understand what brain activity meant what, and slooooooowly learned to understand how other people are thinking and even anticipate their next moves. It would take YEARS of study.
In this story-world, then, any superhero with extensive abilities would likely be highly intelligent and self-educated. (Of course there are others who are content with the one or two abilities they've mastered, and don't delve deeper, mainly out of laziness or lack of time to devote to study and practice.)
I'm just curious to know if anyone has heard of another story where superpowers were handled this way? It feels very fresh to me, but then I'm not familiar with everything within the genre.
Does this approach sound similar to anything anyone here has read or watched?
-- Bethany J.
What got me thinking was - usually with superheroes, the hero can do something unique (i.e., levitate/fly), it's cool, end of story. Aside from the basic explanation of why they have superpowers at all, it's rarely questioned HOW they fly, unless it's in relation to a more general ability they have, like control over the wind or something. I'm writing a story right now in which a protagonist has the simple power of flight, and it occurred to me to wonder HOW he was doing it. It turns out, there are a number of different scientific ways to make something levitate - magnetic, acoustic, electromagnetic, electrostatic, aerodynamic, etc. He could be doing it any of these ways, and theoretically he might have other connected abilities he doesn't know about!
So I thought to myself, what if every superhero within my story-world drew on a particular element or "force" (i.e. magnetism). With this element/force, they can theoretically do a whole host of different things, but it might only manifest in one way at first. Perhaps they can fly from childhood, but it takes them a long time to figure out what force they're drawing on, and then even longer to understand any additional powers they might have. And sometimes different supers have the same ability, but perform it by drawing on completely different source elements. Some never learn the full extent of their abilities because it requires a ton of scientific study and hard practice. For example - per my husband's suggestion, maybe there's a mind-reader who started out with the simple ability of X-ray vision (not sure how that's from an element, though...). By observing the human brain and with a TON of medical study, he gradually began to understand what brain activity meant what, and slooooooowly learned to understand how other people are thinking and even anticipate their next moves. It would take YEARS of study.
In this story-world, then, any superhero with extensive abilities would likely be highly intelligent and self-educated. (Of course there are others who are content with the one or two abilities they've mastered, and don't delve deeper, mainly out of laziness or lack of time to devote to study and practice.)
I'm just curious to know if anyone has heard of another story where superpowers were handled this way? It feels very fresh to me, but then I'm not familiar with everything within the genre.
Does this approach sound similar to anything anyone here has read or watched?-- Bethany J.
