Why Can Everybody Heal Now?

Back when Larry Hama wrote Wolverine comics in the early nineties, it was very surprising that Sabretooth had the same healing power as everyone’s favorite Canadian superhero. So that meant it was easy fodder for him to make the connection that the two were related. Around the same time, poor Peter Parker was still adjusting to married life with Mary Jane, and readers saw her wrapping him in bandages and covering for his injuries to conceal his identity as Spider-man. It was clear, Wolverine’s healing factor was unique and rare: it was what made him such a world class tough guy.

But for some reason, comics characters all seem able to go toe to toe with their worst nightmares, have their teeth realigned, and then go about things as if it was no big deal. Everyone seems to have a healing factor.

In 1986, Frank Miller created the epic The Dark Knight Returns miniseries, which saw a 55-year-old Bruce Wayne return to his career as the Batman. During the course of events in the four-issue arc, Superman was caught point blank by a nuclear explosion. His withering near-corpse flew high into the earth’s stratosphere, and the yellow sun completely healed him back to normal. Since then, heroes who have not had a healing factor have somehow found a way to move in on Wolverine’s shtick.

Under sci-fi mainstay Orson Scott Card’s watch, ultimate Iron Man was blessed with a healing factor before he even developed the tech to create the suit. Captain America has been revealed as the first in the Weapon program that laced Logan’s bones with adamantium, and the connection has somehow been made that scientists duplicated Wolverine’s mutation in Steve Rogers (nine stages in the program prior to Logan’s involvement). Thanks to some Scarlet Witchery, Dr. Doom has even somehow become healed enough that the mask is no longer necessary.

At some point, someone must have surmised that the healing factor was the greatest of all powers. And either through retconning the narrative or creatively re-engineering our favorite heroes’ power set, ridiculous regeneration powers have become standard issue for nearly every superhero. It probably won’t be long before a Spidey sense is just part and partial to the whole shebang.

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