Polite Dissent

Strange #2
J. Michael Straczynski and Sara Barnes, writers
Brandon Peterson, penciler

This review relies fairly heavily on the anatomy of the hand. I’ve included several anatomical drawings — click on the smaller images for a larger annotated version.

Strange #2 was much better than the first issue. The story and art were improved (though not as good as Lee and Ditko’s original), and the medical aspect was better thought out. My only major medical gripes were a couple of typos due to poor editing. There were some smaller nit-picks too, of course.

First, Brandon Peterson does a very good job with the art (from the medical perspective at least). His drawings of Stephen Strange in the ICU are nearly perfect. All the tubes and wires are accurate. My only nit-pick is why is Strange in a halo brace? A broken neck was never mentioned.

The broken leg, the fractured hip, those will keep you in a chair for a couple of months, but you should recover fully.

He should be restricted to a chair for a couple of weeks, not a couple of months. On the other hand, it could be a very complex fracture.

The right palmar carpal ligament was torn. Three fingers on your right hand were broken, with two on the left seriously dislocated. Two broken metacarpals in each hand, a communited [sic] fracture of the right index metacarpal, and - -

To begin with, it’s comminuted, not communited. (A comminuted fracture is one where the bone has been shattered into small pieces.)

The doctor is saying that Strange tore a superficial ligament on his right palm and broke two of the hand bones (or maybe three, is the comminuted metacarpal in addition to the “two broken metacarpals?”). Three fingers were broken as well. Figure 1 shows the bones, and Figure 2 shows the ligament. As a nit-pick, a doctor — especially when talking to another doctor — would say where the finger was broken (i.e. “shattered distal phalanx” and not just “broken finger.”

- - the median nerve and flexor tendons in of your right hand were both transected. Practically shredded.

There’s some poor editing here. Is it “in” or “of”? Either would make sense, but not both. The median nerve travels down the middle of the wrist (see Figure 2). There are ten flexor tendons in each hand — two for each digit. Is he saying that all ten were cut, or just a few? If all the tendons and the median nerve were severed, then the injury most likely happened at the wrist crease on the palm side. This is consistent with the fact that his palmar carpal ligament was ripped. As a nit-pick, there are also many important blood vessels there. It seems unlikely that Strange would “shred” tendons and nerves but not permanently damage the arteries.

The doctor goes on to say that Strange should be able to regain the use of 50 -60% of his hand function with therapy, and that therapy will start as soon as the stitches are out. The median nerve innervates some very important parts of the hand (see Figure 3). Small nerves that are severed can regenerate, but not one as large as the median nerve. A fifty to sixty percent recovery is overly optimistic.

The only stitches Strange would have would be non-removable sutures used to repair the cut tendons. His hand wounds themselves would not have been stitched closed. Hand wounds are not closed if more than six hours have passed since the time of injury because of the high risk of serious infection. Since nobody knows how long Strange had been lying injured in the snow, no physician would take the risk to sew his wounds closed. He should be able to begin therapy ASAP (or at least as soon as the swelling goes down).

Finally, I’ve taken a piece of classic Ditko Dr. Strange art and indicated on it where his injuries most likely were located.

Anatomical drawing are by Frank Netter and from Netter’s Atlas of Human Anatomy. The image of Dr. Strange is by Steve Ditko and from Strange Tales #137 (this black and white image is from Essential Doctor Strange Volume #1)