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ron bailey
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Posted: 23 March 2025 at 7:45pm | IP Logged | 1 post reply

Interesting. I always thought of them as some sort of inhibitor, like in the proximity of the ruby quartz the optic blasts shut down and don't emit past his pupils.
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Matt Hawes
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Posted: 23 March 2025 at 8:25pm | IP Logged | 2 post reply

Here's an article at CBR I've just found as I was looking for a more or less official explanation online that explains that the lenses absorb/cancel out the optic blasts:  LINK!

"...The material used was revealed to be a translucent mineral called ruby-quartz that nullifies the optic blasts, absorbing the energy constantly emitting from Scott's eyes...."

"...While a similar pair of sunglasses with the lenses made from ruby-quartz simply cancel out the optic blast, the visors contain various sets that allow Cyclops to adjust the intensity, size, and shape of his optic blasts to varying levels of pinpoint accuracy and devastating effect. Monitored constantly by neutron detectors and regulated with powered microchips installed within it, the visor allows Cyclops to project a blast small enough to fire through a standard coin or wide and powerful enough to punch through an entire mountain."


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Josh Goldberg
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 1:09am | IP Logged | 3 post reply

JB, what's your take on how the ruby-quartz works, both visor and glasses?

Heck, what's your take on how Cyclops' optic blasts work?  How big and far can he go?  How small and near?  Can he over-use it and run out?  If so, how long to re-charge?
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Mark Haslett
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 3:02am | IP Logged | 4 post reply

Matt: Here's an article at CBR I've just found...

**

If Mark Gruenwald didn't write the overly complicated explanation of ruby-quartz than it isn't real!

At least I can't let CBR go unanswered without pushing my glasses up my nose and saying, "Actually..."

Here's what the Handbook had to say: OHOTMU - Cyclops



That should clear a few things up!

Edited by Mark Haslett on 24 March 2025 at 3:10am
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Matt Hawes
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 4:41am | IP Logged | 5 post reply

Whew!!! That's a lotta gobbly-gook! 

Still, my complete quote was this:

"Here's an article at CBR I've just found as I was looking for a more or less official explanation online that explains that the lenses absorb/cancel out the optic blasts." 

I don't see any explanation of that in that OHOTMU text shared in your post, Mark. Admittedly, I mostly skimmed that text as between the low res and pseudo-techno-jargon, my eyes were getting crossed.


Edited to note:


Ok, trying my best to read the full description from OHOTMU as presented on the site Mark linked to in his post above, here is the part that actually comes closest to addressing what I wrote in my post, as opposed to all that other stuff in the section Mark shared:

"...(Cyclops's) body is protected from the effects of the particles [i.e., his optic blast], and even the thin membrane of his eyelids are sufficient to block the emission of energy. The synthetic ruby quartz crystal used to fashion the lenses of Cyclops's glasses and visor is resonant to his mind's psionic field and is similarly protected...."


I read that as the lenses doing what I wrote, and CBR also seems to agree, in that the lenses can absorb or prevent the progress of the optic blast, not that ruby quartz negates Cyclops's ability to project the beam from his eyes. The ruby quartz resists the blasts and acts as a barrier that Cyclops can control.

The ruby quartz is, in effect, like a second pair of eyelids,  only he can see through them as they are acting as a shield to his optic blasts.


Edited by Matt Hawes on 24 March 2025 at 5:07am
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Mark Haslett
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 10:57am | IP Logged | 6 post reply

It’s all very simple. Due to genetic mutation, he was born with two portals to
a non Einstein universe where his eyes should be.

The ruby quartz simply has the same ionic vibration as the photon-like
particles of force that are constantly pouring through Scott’s dimensional
face portals. So it abdorbs the impact harmlessly.
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Brian Miller
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 11:52am | IP Logged | 7 post reply

Are Alex and Scott still immune to each other’s powers or have they gotten
rid of that?
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John Byrne
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 12:20pm | IP Logged | 8 post reply

That shot of Scott’s visible eyers skips the fact that his beams are constantly blasting out of his eyes. If it was possible to look at his uncontained eyes, they would be glowing.

As a teen, reading these comics, I didn’t give much thought to how Scott’s power worked. Like the Torch’s flames (that burned without consuming him) or Bruce Banner transforming into the Hulk (where did that extra mass come from?) WYSIWYG. Analysis can only lead to problems.

Like that time Chris raised the question of how Scott could see with those beams presumably preventing light from entering his eyes.

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Mark Haslett
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 1:57pm | IP Logged | 9 post reply

I remember feeling very smart and satisfied (and impressed) when I realized
Scott’s power was something different from Superman’s heat vision. (It isn’t
hot, it’s more about the power to blast stuff).

That’s about as far as I like to dig into it.
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Michael Penn
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 2:56pm | IP Logged | 10 post reply

When I was a little kid, I knew somebody who had the early issue when Cyclops blasted a charging elephant, and it was patently clear to me from the beginning that his power was force and not heat. For me, it remains the defining image too! (I'd upload it but, unfortunately, again I'm getting an error message preventing that.)

LINK

Back then, when anybody outside of cosmic or godly beings had, well, down-to-earth depictions of their powers, this kind of demonstration of what Cyclops could was impressive as anything! As time went on, I really missed that and eventually hated how Cyclops' power was devalued, made less and less impressive.
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Dave Kopperman
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 3:07pm | IP Logged | 11 post reply

There's some 'universes' where fan-think about the science and other rules governing it can be both fun and kind of useful. Star Trek being the most notable of those. And then there's some where the fan-wonk and the encouragement of it by the holders of the rights can be pretty bad - Star Wars being the worst offender on this front, where entire chapters cease to function as entertainment in their efforts to fill in what they see as those mysteries that need explaining, rather than just things it's okay to accept at face value to keep the story rolling.

DC has definitely fallen to this urge, but Marvel for a long time stood outside of it, even given the stats and such in the Handbook. For whatever reason - maybe it was editorial fiat or lack of fan pressure or what have you - there wasn't ever any huge effort that I perceived to hew to the Handbook as the One True Answer as to, say, who wins in Hulk v. Thing. And the comics were the better for that.


Edited by Dave Kopperman on 24 March 2025 at 3:08pm
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Joe Smith
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Posted: 24 March 2025 at 3:08pm | IP Logged | 12 post reply

Keeping me up at night:
A ‘mutation’ should be an ‘answer’ to an evolutionary’problem’?
Ex: The skin changing color according to equator proximity; the gene that
allowed humans to inhale wood smoke after we split off from the
Neanderthals.

So, what was the need that was so pressing for a pair of eyes that blast
non-stop! Was Scott born in space during one of Corsair’s most
treacherous battles?
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