Thanks, Ed!

“Realism” is a pretty relative term when it comes to superhero comics, but we are trying to keep things more grounded than many other comics, so it’s good to hear that it seems to be working!

We probably have made things harder on ourselves, but if we can pull it off, it will be worth it!

If this were a comic like most, it wouldn’t have even merited a notice – easily hand-waved away. Batman, a completely ordinary human, suffers blows by superstrong robots trying to kill him, and 30ft falls onto pavement, and being thrown 50ft into a concrete wall 100 times a day, any one instance would kill a real person instantly 99% of the time, and he suffers nothing more than a bruise. It’s the realism of the Specialists that even made me notice her lack of defensive ability at all. That’s a good thing – I like that. I suppose it just makes it harder for you guys when you don’t have the option of hand-waving stuff like that.

(I will assume that Hartmann’s primary defensive ability is that when the armed enemy sees Hartmann tearing towards him, he drops his gun, pees his pants, and runs away. Call it “induce terror-level 2”)

It’s a good question. Superheroes tend to be pretty resilient, even if they don’t have any specific powers that protect them from harm. Or, they have the G.I. Joe-like ability to stand in a hail of gunfire and somehow never get hit.

Neither of those would fit in The Specialists very well. Figuring out how to have the more vulnerable members of the team play a believable role in combat is going to be a bit of a challenge. I have considered having Kate use her lightning abilities defensively somehow, but I’m not sure whether that will happen.

(For the record, Hartmann is tougher than most, but he’s not bulletproof, and he doesn’t have super-healing.)