Invisible Woman

Susan Richards - The Invisible Woman

The Invisible Woman (real name: Dr. Susan "Sue" Storm-Richards) is the wife of Reed Richards and a member of the Fantastic Four.

History

When the Grey Gargoyle went on a rampage, turning people to stone on the Brooklyn Bridge, Sue—believing the Fantastic Four would need assistance—fired a flare into the air. The signal summoned Angela, Broadway, and Lexington of the Manhattan Clan of gargoyles to the Baxter Building. Recognizing the gargoyles for what they were, Sue quickly brought them up to speed on the Grey Gargoyle’s actions. The three gargoyles and the Four headed to the bridge to confront the villain. During the battle, the Grey Gargoyle threw a smoke grenade, obscuring everyone’s vision, but Sue managed to trap him within a forcefield. Unfortunately, he managed to petrify both Mister Fantastic and Angela. They were soon joined by Goliath and the gargoyle Isaac Christians, who deduced that Diablo was behind the crisis. The heroes flew to Diablo’s lair, where they were confronted by the Dragon Man. Diablo used his alchemy to summon Angela’s statue, but Sue turned herself and Broadway invisible and leapt through his portal. Diablo revealed his plan to drain Angela’s blood to power his Elixir Vitae—a ritual that would also free her and all the petrified victims. Before Sue and Broadway could stop him, Diablo used his dark arts to restrain them. They were soon saved by the arrival of Demona, who defeated the alchemist and left him to Angela, Broadway, and Sue. The trio chained Diablo, and Sue enclosed him within a forcefield to ensure he would pay for his crimes. Later, Sue joined her husband as he discussed restoring Dragon Man’s benevolent programming, confident that the children would be pleased. The evening concluded peacefully as the Fantastic Four and their extended family enjoyed a quiet moment together. ("Send Up a Flare!", "Both Alike In Dignity...")

Characteristics

As the Invisible Woman, Susan can render herself wholly or partially invisible at will by bending light around her. She can also render other people or objects fully or partially invisible too, affecting up to 40,000 cubic feet (1,100 m3) of volume. According to the Women of Marvel: Celebrating Seven Decades Handbook, Sue's retinas don't function conventionally and instead of just registering objects using reflected light, the retinas in Sue's eyes also interpolate shapes based on reflected cosmic rays, which in the Marvel Universe are always present in the atmosphere, granted usually only in small concentrations. This anomaly apparently allows her to perceive invisible people and objects, though she does not see them in color since the cosmic-ray reflections bypass her eyes' rods and cones; her vision may also be monochromatic when she herself is invisible since her eyes do not reflect light in that state, though she otherwise seems to possess a full range of vision while she is invisible. She can also sense people or objects made invisible by scientific means, and can restore them to a visible state at will.

Sue can also mentally generate a field of invisible psionic force (drawn from hyperspace), which she is able to manipulate for a variety of effects. For example, Sue can shape her fields into simple invisible constructs or generate a nearly indestructible invisible force field around herself or her target. She can vary the texture and tensile strength of her field to some extent, rendering it rigid as steel or as soft and yielding as foam rubber; softer variants on the field enable her to cushion impacts more gently, and are less likely to result in psionic backlash against Susan herself. She is also able to make her shields opaque or translucent like milk glass to effectively block variations of light such as laser beams, even using her shields to block out the sun for days at a time. She can make them semipermeable to filter oxygen from water though the latter is mentally taxing. She can generate solid force constructs as small as a marble or as large as 100 feet (30 m) in diameter, and her hollow projections such as domes can extend up to several miles in area.

By generating additional force behind her psionic constructs, Sue can turn them into offensive weapons, ranging from massive invisible battering rams to small projectiles such as spheres and darts. By forming one of her force fields within an object and expanding the field, Sue can cause her target to explode. She can also travel atop her animated constructs, enabling her to simulate a limited approximation of levitation or flight She can manipulate the energy of her force fields around other objects to simulate telekinetic abilities as well. She is capable of generating and manipulating multiple psionic force fields simultaneously. This power is only limited by her concentration; once she stops concentrating on a psionic force field, it simply ceases to exist.

Appearances

• "Send Up a Flare!"
• "Both Alike In Dignity..."
• "Clan and Family..."

Production Background

Susan Storm, and her younger brother, Jonathan grew up in the town of Glenville, Long Island, children of the physician Franklin Storm and his wife Mary. The parents left their kids alone one night to travel to a dinner honoring Dr. Storm. On the way, a tire blew out and Mary was injured. Franklin escaped injury and insisted on operating on his wife. He was unable to save her. After his wife's death, Dr. Franklin Storm became a gambler and a drunk, losing his medical practice, which led him to the accidental killing of a loan shark. Franklin did not defend himself in court, because he still felt guilty over Mary's death. With their father in prison, Susan had to become a mother figure for her younger brother.

While living with her aunt, Susan, at the young age of seventeen, met her future husband, Reed Richards, a house guest who was attending college. When she graduated from high school as the award-winning captain of her Girls' Varsity Swim Team, she moved to California to attend college, where she pursued an acting career and encountered Richards again. They began to become romantically involved with each other.

Reed Richards, working in the field of aerospace engineering, was designing a spacecraft for interstellar travel. Everything was going well until the government stopped the funding of his project. Richards, wanting to see his project through, decided to make an unscheduled test flight. It was only going to be Reed and his best friend, Ben Grimm, involved, but Susan was instrumental in persuading Reed in letting her brother and herself join them on the dangerous space mission. In space, the quartet was exposed to massive amounts of cosmic radiation. As a result, they had to abort the mission and return to Earth. After the crash landing, they realized that they gained superhuman powers; hers was the ability to become invisible at will. Realizing the potential use of their abilities, the four of them became the Fantastic Four, for the benefit of mankind. Susan adopted the code name Invisible Girl... and, eventually, the Invisible Woman.

See Also

• Invisible Woman at Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia