r/respectthreads • u/ya-boi-benny • 2d ago
comics Respect Flex Mentallo (DC Comics, Post-Crisis)
All this time and I had the answer to that man’s question. It was staring me right in the face. “Who’s going to save the world?” It was so simple. Who always saves the world? The superheroes, that’s who… It was like a light going on in my head, dispelling the shadows of the long, dark night we’d found ourselves in. I remembered the way it used to be. Remembered when we turned the world on its axis to save the life of one child. Remembered how we flew to the limits of unknown, titanic galaxies to petition the gods for humanity’s survival. Remembered when we rescued kittens from trees and asked for no reward. It all came back to me in that place.
There once was a nerd who got sand kicked in his face day after day by the local beach jock. One night while walking down the street and complaining about his lot, a man with a television in his forehead and three cigarinos in his mouth offered the nerd a way out. By mailing a coupon into the third mailbox he sees on the ninth day of the month, the TV-headed man promised a way to change the lad’s body, soul and brain for free. After fulfilling the instructions, the nerd received a self-help book in the mail that contained techniques that built muscles and changed reality when he flexed. Not only did he become the buffest cat on the beach, but Flex Mentallo became the buffest superhero the world had ever seen.
A short while into his career as a crimefighter, Flex received a tip from a reporter into a conspiracy at the Pentagon dating back to the 1940s. He stared too deeply into the abyss and was met with the dark eyes of the Men from N.O.W.H.E.R.E., quasi-undead government stooges committed to the eradication of all things abnormal or irrational. They stole Flex’s memories and powers, leaving him as one of the many vagrants wandering Danny the Street.
Years later, the Doom Patrol reminded Flex of who he was and returned to the Pentagon with him. There he’d learn the shocking truth. Flex wasn’t a man but an idea, a hero imagined by a boy named Wally Sage, a concept given form through sheer belief. The revelation only served to strengthen Flex’s muscles once more, allowing him to help his new friends fight back against the rational Men from N.O.W.H.E.R.E. and their government owners.
Physicals
- Floors the beach bully with a punch to the jaw
- Tears the porthole cover off of Wally Sage’s containment pod
- Hurdles over a table
- Fights on while bruised and bloodied in a fight with the Mentallium Man
Muscle Mystery
Force
- Throws his bully a few feet away with a bicep flex
- Shatters a wine glass with a bicep flex
- Floors three humanoid monsters with a concussive blast
- Causes the concrete floor to rupture at the feet of a fleeing man
- Knocks the Man in the Moon out of his throne
Other
- Summons his “hero halo”, floating words above his head that read “Hero of the Beach”
- For two months, Flex does nothing except flex his entire body, attempting to turn the Pentagon into a circle. It does, however, effect every other person in the building, giving them random orgasms, strange visions or dreams, breaking their glassware and turning their paintings negative.
- Walked into the Pentagon, clouding the minds of the the guards with his biceps so that they didn’t notice him
- [Limit] The original Men from N.O.W.H.E.R.E. were completely immune to Muscle Mystery and took away his memories and his superpowers
- After Crazy Jane destroys the Silver Sugar Tongs and weakens the Avatar under the Pentagon, Flex successfully turns the Pentagon into a circle
Miscellaneous
- Flex Mentallo is actually just a mental construct from a boy named Wally Sage, who thought up Flex as a new comic book character. As Wally dies, his belief in Flex restores the hero’s stolen Muscle Mystery powers.
- Black Mentallium is Mentallo’s weakness and just being near the mineral makes Flex fall to his knees, helpless
Wally: Look at you! A half-naked muscle man in trunks. What’s that supposed to signify? What are you? Do you know what you are?
Flex: Sure. I’m a superhero. Being clever’s a fine thing, but sometimes a boy just needs to get out of the house and meet some girls. Gamble a stamp. I can show you how to be a real man!
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u/Mobile-Albatross-427 1d ago
God Doom Patrol characters are so good