Original Superman power-limits *attn: Al Schroeder III*

[alschroeder]

Waaaaaait a second. As I remember it, Superman ran after the car---roughly at the same speed....and then shook them out.  No indication how much time elapsed between the two, long enough for a "yeeowww" or two, certainly.  One can imagine Superman picking up the speeding car, and then slowly coming to a stop, while still holding it. Yeah, he has to deal with the car's momentum, but it might have been a (relatively) slow skid rather than standing stock-still as soon as he lifts.  So I'm not necessarily convinced...(I've often thought when he seemed to stop a car rushing at him, he dug his feet deep into the concrete, letting the concrete bed take the momentum...)

The Hulk could leap into ORBIT in the 80s??? I'm not doubting you, I just don't remember it. Do you happen to remember any issue numbers?  I do know even before his Tales-to-Astonish run in his original series, he could leap several miles---I want to say five miles---when he was fighting some communists---and I know during his Tales-to-Astonish run he easily leaped a thousand meters.

I'm not so sure speed is a direct correlation of strength---from the cheetah to the roadrunner, there are plenty of animals who are fast who aren't necessarily more powerful---although it's certainly a factor.  On the other hand, neither the Hulk nor the Thing are fast, which may be more a matter of reaction time and nerve speed being slower in their thicker skin.  Even if you could move your hands really fast, you'd be a fool to do anything more complicated than a clap (which the Hulk repeatedly does)  faster than your brain can tell your hands what to do.

---Al

[Captain Kal]

The actual pages of that car chase as follows:





Notice between chasing the car and hoisting it up, no intermediate panels depict any kind of slow, dragged-out braking process.  The intention evidently was this was an abrupt stop.  We have no indication of occupant reaction except for that screamed "Yeeow!".  Surely, a long slowdown over half a mile would illicit some kind of response instead of the passengers meekly, silently experiencing the impossibility of a mere man stopping their car.

How about the jarring effects of such an abrupt stop on the normal people inside?  Whiplash at the very least would be a certainty in the absence of Byrne's psionic effect.

Stephen Strauss once calculated that it would take Superman 14 miles to slow down a 55 ton truck travelling at 67 mph to a complete stop.  I suspect factoring in that 2 ton figure makes this a half mile slowdown if it happened in the real world.

Grabbing a speeding auto like that would likely tear the bumper or any other piece of the car Superman grabbed off even if he did a half mile slowdown esp. against the continued effort of a min. 100 hp engine fighting him.

Anyway, he really couldn't just grab any old piece of a car that weighed several times his own weight to hoist it up like that.  He'd have to find the centre of gravity of the thing then brace himself to push up against that.  That's not going to be an easy task when the car is actively running away from him.

My suspicion is the first AC #1 Butch car incident already defied the laws of physics and momentum so it has to be Byrned too to make it work.

[RedSunOfKrypton]

Or Waided/Wolvertoned....anti-grav network over psionics.