A Closer Look at Superman’s (Internal) Anatomy
Superman #656 “Men and Monsters”
Kurt Busiek, writer
Carl Pacheco, penciler
Interesting scan of Superman’s internal anatomy, courtesy of Subjekt-17. For some reason, I always assumed Superman had a more human arrangement of organs.
That certainly looks like a large heart in the center of his chest, though with more blood vessels entering/leaving than a human heart — but I have no idea what the small red organ just over his heart is. The lungs appear to be behind the heart, but again have many more vessels coming off that human lungs. Speaking of blood vessels, those are some freakishly large vessels looping in the abdomen and going down the leg. There appears to be a small liver or a kidney in the chest. There is some large yellow spiculated organ where I’d expect his bladder to be. The rest of the chest and abdomen seem to be a random assortment of organ and blood vessels.
Superman is an alien, so it would be unlikely for him to have the same anatomy as us, though we know it’s close enough for heart monitors and other medical equipment to work. Still I always pictured it as a little closer to human than this.
I’d love to know what Pacheco used as his reference ot if he was just winging it.
November 2nd, 2006 at 3:51 am
You know, large vessels like that seem counter-intuitive to me. I remember the episode of Farscape (I dunno if you ever watched that) when we first met the striking Sikozu. She was commenting to John that his veins and vessels were larger than she’d expect, and seemed to offer that her special “abilities” (like gravity shifting, for one) came from the fact that her internal anatomy was smaller and more efficient.
I suppose the obvious analogy is computer processors. Modern day processors are about the size of a postage stamp (maybe a bit bigger) and do the work of what computers that once filled rooms did.
But, then again, calling BS on one form of science fiction based one what I heard in another form of science fiction is pretty suspect anyway . . .
November 3rd, 2006 at 11:21 am
Considering he’s survived surgery by human MDs, I’m surprised the innards were drawn to differ that much.
November 4th, 2006 at 1:36 pm
> but I have no idea what the small red organ just over his heart is
Its probably one massive adrenal gland :)
March 8th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
There’s a four parter that ran through all the books in 2001 (I Think) about Superman being poisoned. Atom and the Super-Family shrink down to attack the living cancer that’s eating Superman alive.
They mention a few specific differences between Kryptonian and Earthling anatomy if you’re interested.
Leave a Reply
Contact Me
About
Subscribe:
The Best Of...
Special Topics
Archives
Categories
Twitter
Comic Blogs
Medical Blogs
Currently Reading
Arbitrarily Interesting Medical Condition
The Net: