Reed Richards, Too Smart For His Own Good

THE TOP 10 GREATEST SUPERHERO INVENTORS

Superhero Inventor #3: Reed Richards

~FF #1 (2011)

Create a Cold Fusion Generator on Monday, solve Global Warming on Wednesday, and counter the Alien Invasion on Friday. Yeap, that's Reed Richards, high above in the Baxter Building, currently at work when most wish he wasn't. Nobody wants to hire him until there's a crisis; besides, usually it's his fault. (Heck, if he would take a break from all his inventing and gizmo-making, there might more left of the world to enjoy.)

The leader of the world-famous Fantastic Four, Richards is - oddly enough - one of the few superheroes to be known primarily for his brains and secondly for his super powers: the ability to stretch and contort his body to different shapes and distances. While elongating has served him on the field, his mind has always been his most powerful weapon, inventing complicated equipment to nullify and overcome their foes. Only recently, in Manhattan, he helped solved the mutating spider-man problem (Re: Spider-Island) by isolating the virus.

Okay. So there's smart, and smart, and then there's Reed Richards "smart"; we gotta give this brilliant physicist, also known as Mr. Fantastic, credit for his genius. At the same time, though, this shows us you can also be too smart for your own good. (Mayor Bloomberg is already trying to ban Reed's Fantasti-car and Negative Zone Portal.); Maybe you can whip up awesome devices - that's all great - but it doesn't mean we want and apocalyptic cosmic event in New York every week.

The Top 10 Greatest Superhero Inventors is a Countdown sponsored by The Superheroes List, giving you a look at some of the most brilliant minds, working their way with gadgets and innovations. It's also a tribute to the 2012 coming of Labor Day. If you like this kind of thing, head on over and check it out!