Marvel announces the new smartest person in the universe

[lordultimus]

Source: newsarama.com

Marvel Comics has demonstratively pushed to diversify their superhero line the last couple of years - a push that seems to continue to gain steam. Now the publisher is seemingly making a point to call attention what they announced somewhat innocuously at Comic-Con International: San Diego on Sunday - that none of the usual braintrust of Reed Richard (or his daughter Valeria), Tony Stark, Peter Parker, Amadeus Cho, T’Challa, or even Doctor Doom for that matter, are considered the smartest person in the Marvel Universe. Instead, Marvel’s top genius is officially (or at least will be) little Lunella Lafeyette, the nine-year-old hero of Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur.

The announcement of Lunella’s status was made, somewhat off-handedly, in SDCC’s Women of Marvel panel by Marvel’s Director of Content and Character Development Sana Amanat, who may be best known as one of the co-creators of the current Ms. Marvel, Kamala Khan, the character that may have been the flashpoint for Marvel's aggressive diversity push.

"Moon Girl will discover she's the smartest person in the Marvel Universe at only 9 years old," said Amanat Sunday, referring to an upcoming story in the planned relaunch of Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur as part of "Marvel NOW!"



Interestingly and importantly, Lunella isn’t just the smartest person in the Marvel Universe, she’s also black and female – two characteristics not typical for the Marvel’s usual cast of super-geniuses. Female scienctific super-genuises are rare for either of the two major comic book publishers, relatively even more so, in fact, than black super-genuines. The role has been historically filled by males, a product of both major publishers' superhero lines' birth in the late 30s and early 60s, respectively.

Naming the smartest person in the Marvel Universe a nine-year-old black female is definitely grounbreaking, a fact that seems to have subsequently occurred to Marvel over the last couple of days. While not initially promoted by the publisher as a convention announcement, Marvel seems to be pushing the story through more 'mainstream' news outlets such as Buzzfeed and Teen Vogue over the last two days.

It was not made clear how Lunella earns the lofty status of being the smartest person in the Marvel Universe, whether it’s a product of great minds like Reed Richards, Tony Stark, and Bruce Banner potentially being off the table because of the events of Secret Wars or the possible outcome of Civil War II, or if she discovers she's just plain smarter than everyone else.

Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur will relaunch as part of Marvel NOW!, likely with an added emphasis on the pressures of being the smartest person alive.

Comments

[burkeonthesly]

whether it’s a product of great minds like Reed Richards, Tony Stark, and Bruce Banner potentially being off the table

Oh, don't let it be that. Don't let it be, "the white male top tier were out to lunch, so she was the best by default." Let her be brilliant in her own right.

And let's not forget that Devil Dinosaur built one hell of a company back in Nextwave, so he's got to be a decent lab assistant, at least.

[tigerkaya]

Okay cool I guess. Should be interesting.

[thanekos]

Intelligence- completely and totally an objectively measurable metric that means something by having a higher point value of it than everyone else.

(Simplified measurements are handy, certainly, but forget to take into account so many things that it doesn't seem like anything more than a " yeah, okay " to define a character.

Plus, if we're arguing at the levels of the characters cited, the difference is probably whole tenths or even ones in points. Riveting.)

[balbanes]

Not really a fan of having a ranking of intelligent people in Marvel-- or IRL for that matter. They ran this concept with Amadeus Cho back when, and too many plotlines were wasted on the nerd version of chest-thumping.

What I like is having characters with demonstrated areas of expertise: Richards at physics, McCoy at genetics, Pym at bioengineering, etc. And I really like when one of the big brains realizes he's veering into another brain's area and calls for a consult. That's how actual research works: no one has time to become the top expert on *everything*.

So hopefully, Lunella will become the designated expert on some useful STEM-y field. I'd like to see the other brains happily coexisting and deferring to her in that area, without everything devolving into a nerdy pissing match.

[matrix_dragon]

So, where will she be getting the education needed to take advantage of that genius? Or will it be like what happened with Valeria, where she somehow magically knows most of it beforehand?

[scorntx]

If she was the smartest person in the Marvel Universe (not, frankly, a great title) then first order of business should be getting the hell out of there.

Otherwise she's just going to either be eventually shuffled off to the side, or like all intelligent characters in Marvel, her purported genius will be used to prop up some writer's poorly thought-out storyline.

Y'know, like Reed Richards in Civil War. Or Tony Stark in Civil War. Or Tony Stark in Avengers Vs. X-Men. Or Reed and Tony in Jonathan Hickman's Avengers run.

(Meanwhile, Peter Corbeau sits on his yacht, enjoying the refreshing salty breeze, as he commits acts of impressive science, blissfully unencumbered by being in any comic ever.)

[reveen]

With how people act in Marvel you could have shown any 9 year old and it wouldn't actually matter.

[doctor_spanky]

Sure but I wanna see it in action in a comic not read it in a news story. Show don't tell and all that

[lieut_kettch]

I suddenly want a "science bros" montage of her with Valeria Richards. Well, given their ages, more like a "science playdate." With Amadeus Cho as chaperone.

[dr_archeville]

So I'm guessing they'll reveal that this is what Terrigenesis got her.

Which may cause some to say she's not "really" smart b/c she "cheated."

(Forgetting that the Cosmic Rays that made Reed all stretchy also boosted his intellect -- they've shown non-Cosmic'd Reeds from other realities and they were nowhere near as clever as 616!Reed -- so by that logic his intellect's just as much a "cheat.")

[donnblake]

"I'm the ninth smartest person in the world."

"Who told you that?"

"... Game show sponsored by a soap company."

[deh_tommy]

Having not been following this series (or being unfamiliar with the duo until this series appeared in previews), whatever happened to Moon Boy and why did he and Devil Dinosaur separate?

[silverhammerman]

This reminds me of something which occurred to me years ago, and maybe doesn't stand up to analysis: It seems like the cultural perception of intelligence has shifted over the past 20 years or so to it somehow being an intrinsic thing. Like, the smartest person in the room used to be depicted as some old, learned professor type (almost always a white dude of course) but now the resident supergenius is almost always a young person who seemingly just gets things and is too smart for normal institutions. I always wondered if it said something about the changing views of institutions and the popularity of fantasies of being special and unique, if that makes sense.

I was like, 17, so it probably doesn't hold up, this just reminded me of it.

[remial]

well, being the smartest person in the Marvel universe isn't saying THAT much if everyone else is constantly playing catch with the idiot ball...