Susan Storm of the Fantastic Four, a.k.a. the Invisible Woman has just been given a strange, new, and totally incredible superpower. These are exciting times for fans of the Fantastic Four, with the characters becoming increasingly prominent in the Marvel Comics universe even as Marvel Studios openly discuss their plans to incorporate them into the MCU. Marvel even recently announced a major X-Men/Fantastic Four event, incorporating them into Jonathan Hickman's relaunch of the X-Men franchise.
The Invisible Woman is playing a particularly exciting role in the current comics, with a new ongoing series reinventing Susan Storm as a super-spy who used to work for Nick Fury and SHIELD. Her powerset has been subtly expanded to help boost her espionage skills; as if invisibility wasn't enough, she's also demonstrated the ability to bend light around her, essentially changing her skin and hair color at will. The latest issue of Mark Waid's Invisible Woman series adds another new trick to her armory as well.
Invisible Woman #4 opens with Sue Storm apparently defeated. Her enemies have come up with the perfect way to stop her; they've implanted a device in her eyes that effectively blinds her. They believe this renders her powerless, unable to navigate the area around herself, unable to know whether there are booby-traps or hostages should she try to use her force-fields. What they don't know is that the Invisible Woman's entire optic structure, nerves and all, is unique. Ordinary retinas register objects using reflected light; Sue's also interpolate shapes based on reflected cosmic waves, that naturally occur in the atmosphere. This is how the Invisible Woman can "see" her own force-fields, or even anything else that would otherwise be invisible. By concentrating, she's able to read the contours and shapes around her in order to figure out how to fight back.
It's a fascinating extension of the Invisible Woman's powers, and it makes perfect sense; it's always been clear that Sue can perceive her own force fields, while there have indeed been occasions where she's been aware of invisible intruders in the Baxter Building. It had previously been explained away with throwaway comments about Sue being quite used to the idea of invisibility, and thus able to pick up on the presence of concealed people and objects; but Mark Waid has provided a neat, pseudo-scientific exploration.
The Invisible Woman is becoming the most interesting of all the Fantastic Four members. It's fascinating to see her character added into this new espionage context, and it works remarkably well. Meanwhile, a dedicated series is giving a creative writer like Mark Waid the perfect opportunity to explore and even redefine her powerset.
Invisible Woman #4 is on sale now from Marvel Comics.
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