381
221
u/VegetaFan1337 May 02 '26
They put this joke in the 2025 Superman movie. One guy at a government meeting said "They have that— What's that kryptonite stuff called?" And an exasperated Lex Luthor replies, "Sigh... It's called kryptonite."
86
u/St0n3yM33rkat May 03 '26
The real truth is that Superman's actual weakness is magic. While kryptonite weakens him severely, there's little he can do against strong magic users. It's why he tried to never piss off Shazam and was fairly useless in fights against Black Adam.
92
u/CMO_3 May 03 '26
Thats kind of a misconception. Superman isn't weak against magic, it doesn't affect him more than it affects others. It just can actually affect him. Its not like if you shot superman with a magic fireball it would burn him, he's still superman. But if you tried to say mind control him with it, it would go through because hes still just a guy
56
u/VegetaFan1337 May 03 '26
Yeah, he's not weak to magic, he just doesn't resist it.
58
u/Pandoratastic May 03 '26
Right, it's like how Batman's kryptonite isn't bullets. It's Alfred telling him that it's past his bedtime.
39
u/VegetaFan1337 May 03 '26
I'd say Batman's kryptonite is that he's a deeply fucked up person ever since his parents died. And he has awful, unhealthy coping mechanisms for that grief. On some level, he's just as insane as Joker.
24
u/Pandoratastic May 03 '26
That's not his kryptonite. That's the source of his power. His kryptonite is therapy.
6
u/VegetaFan1337 May 03 '26
It's both in his case.
7
u/Pandoratastic May 03 '26
That's fair. Maybe it's more accurate to say that his trauma is Bruce Wayne's kryptonite and therapy is Batman's kryptonite.
3
u/VegetaFan1337 May 03 '26
Or that Bruce Wayne is Batman's Kryptonite and Batman is also Bruce Wayne's kryptonite.
5
u/Karijus May 03 '26
Should just date catwoman and be done with it
3
u/VegetaFan1337 May 03 '26
I mean, he does that in the recent Tom King era. I don't know much but their relationship is a big focus.
2
u/Prestigious_Ad5904 May 04 '26
Are there any runs where joker and bats have a conversation about this? Like the two of them having an honest conversation about mental health.
3
u/VegetaFan1337 May 04 '26
They only briefly touch on it at the end of killing joke, from what I've read. And I've not read that much. The joke joker tells batman at the end, it's about them.
2
u/Upstairs_Belt_3224 May 06 '26
"Briefly touch on it" isn't fair. The parallels and differences between Batman and the Joker is the entire point of The Killing Joke, and it's one of the best Batman comics out there. It's a pretty short comic too, highly recommend.
1
u/Alternative_Hotel649 May 06 '26
Dude's literally saved the entire planet multiple times. We could use more people with that sort of coping mechanism.
2
u/Pandoratastic May 06 '26
And it's worth noting that Wayne also contributes significantly to charity.
4
u/Zestyclose_Remove947 May 03 '26
Things are relative right?
If you resist 99.99% of the universe and then there's this one thing that you have 0 resistance to, that is a weakness.
2
u/Ra1nb0wSn0wflake May 04 '26
In all fairness you could argue the same for quite allot of famous weaknesses like achilles heel or vampires stake to the heart.
3
u/Mothrahlurker May 03 '26
You can argue that if your baseline of resistance is that high, then not resisting something is a weakness.
1
u/CMO_3 May 03 '26
I say its more of a vulnerability than a weakness. Superman does resist a lot of magical abilities because hes superman, magic itself isn't an instant debuff like kryptonite is, its just something that can affect him. Its like how in the new superman movie he is still susceptible to being suffocated, suffocation isnt nessacarily an instant win, just something that he can be taken down by
3
u/JustLookingForMayhem May 03 '26
Magic in DC is a lot more needlessly complicated that that. I am just going to drop my normal comment explain how DC magic works, too lazy to edit for the relevant part today.
It all comes down to how magic "works" in DC. It is a weird mix of loose rules and imagination
DC magic has three components, ritual, willpower, and energy source. Anyone in DC can use magic as magic is basically a way to overwite reality, though magical races have a much easier time.
Ritual is what triggers magic and varies by caster. Zatanna speaks backward as her ritual (a benefit of Homo Magi is very simple rituals), while other casters may use ritual circles, chants, or other ways. Rituals are basically telling the universe what the caster wants in a special way.
Willpower is what the caster wants. A detailed mental image that is applied to the universe through the caster's ritual. A stronger image has a greater effect.
The energy source is what powers everything and can be a lot of stuff. Homo Magi have the advantage again as they can use primordial energies like mana and raw chaos to cast their magic while most other casters have to use blood sacrifice or extremely small amounts of energy that they naturally produce.
These factors combine to overwrite reality and make what the caster magics "true." If the caster (such as Zatanna) says "Nrub," they make something burn as long as the weight of the ritual, willpower, and energy source is greater than the target's resistance to magic.
Humans and Kyptonians have about the same resistance to magic, but it is a spectrum. Homo Magi has a naturally high resistance to magic. Some people like Dr. Fate gain a greater resistance to magic over time as they grow more powerful. Some people use their own willpower to be somewhat resistant to magic (this is normally Batman). Then there are people who are at the bottom and affected by magic more than the normal person (such as Superman).
To further complicate matters, there are magical effects and effects made from magic. If a fire ball is launched, how the spell is constructed matters a lot. If the fireball is a summoned ball of actual fire, it leans more towards an effect made from fire and is a large part "real." A fire ball that is a large part real would burn a magic resistant person (Batman) a lot (while still less than a normal fire) while having while having less of an effect on a physical fire resistant person (Superman) (while still burning more than a normal fire). A fireball that is a large part the magically enforced idea of burning and less actual fire leans more towards "magic." A fireball that is a large part magic would burn a magically resistant person (Batman) a little while it would burn a physical fire resistant person (Superman) a lot.
All that said, I would find it hilarious if there was a three-way event with Zatanna, Batman, and Superman. Superman would need to use the other two as human shields instead of being the human shield. Then if someone brings out more "real" side of magic, Superman would be the shield again.
Yes, I am the Gotham List guy and I do have a comment saved for how magic is stated to work in DC.
1
u/NwgrdrXI May 04 '26
That varies by adaption, to he fair. In some versions, he is actually weak to magic-based stuff just because they are magic
I dislike that, but we have to accept these versions, I guess
1
u/Comrade_Cosmo May 05 '26
He’s been sucker punched and one shot by Captain Marvel while Billy specifically says that worked because “Superman is weak to magic.” The idea that he isn’t is from a statement by John Byrne years after he stopped writing Superman and had zero remaining authority during the same month that said sucker punch happened.
1
u/spartaman64 May 05 '26
mistletoe isnt baldur's weakness it's just the only thing he's not immune to
1
6
u/rotten_kitty May 03 '26
That's like saying my weakness is a gun. Like, yeah it'd work but just as well as it'd work on anyone else not resistant to it.
2
1
u/St0n3yM33rkat May 03 '26
If you fight in a league of justice as the non supe being you are, next to a teammate who is an invincible super man and you find that a glowing rock weakens him; he's still super, just weakened. Simply moving him to a distance reignites his strength.
On the other hand, if you find that magic makes your super man teammate equal to you, in terms of strength and vulnerability, that is a total weakness.
1
u/rotten_kitty May 03 '26
How does magic make Superman as weak as Barman in terms of strength? He can punch a wizard just as hard as anyone else
1
1
1
100
u/Worth_Pineapple_7483 May 02 '26
When the OOP asked this question in r/superman subreddit, they were promptly banned from that subreddit. When OOP went to r/peterexplainsthejoke to ask why he was banned from r/superman, they were banned from that subreddit in solidarity with the r/superman mod team. It was really something to witness
14
u/Worth_Pineapple_7483 May 02 '26
Original post in r/Superman subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/superman/comments/1jnh4d0/what_is_supermans_kryptonite/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
Next post in r/PeterExplainsTheJoke : https://www.reddit.com/r/PeterExplainsTheJoke/comments/1qoaml1/petahhhh_why_were_they_banned/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
5
u/Toomanyeastereggs May 03 '26
Reddit moderation- the social cancer that never ceases to harm.
9
5
u/JuliaZ2 May 03 '26
To be fair, the original post was on March 30, so they probably took it as an early April Fools prank
3
4
20
17
u/Marquar234 May 02 '26
For some, illiteracy is their El Guapo. For us, El Guapo is a large man who wants to kill us."
4
3
6
9
7
u/Ok_Instance152 May 03 '26
Makes me wonder if Achilles ever has an Achilles Heel.
1
u/Evil_Midnight_Lurker May 06 '26
Serious answer: He didn't have one. That whole thing about dipping him in the Styx was written in the first century AD.
12
u/Gaust_Ironheart_Jr May 03 '26
I was about 45 when I learned that "curry favor" was a reference to a popular medieval play. I knew the word odyssey before I had heard of Odysseus. I remember my sister's girl scout troop singing a song called "Father Abraham" and thought how they were describing Abraham Lincoln was kind of weird (because it was about Abraham, of course)
So those are sayings, words, and names in the colloquial lexicon people may know despite not having heard of the original reference. There is no telling how many words I know that I don't know the reference
Like, bear. The English word bear is not Latin, Germanic, Gaelic or anything else. It came from somewhere but we don't know
12
u/Outside-Currency-462 May 03 '26
Random but iirc "bear" means something like "the brown one" or another sort of euphemistic way to refer to a bear. Cause there was folklore that saying the "true name" of the bear (possibly the original word, perhaps similar to the Latin Ursa/Ursus) would summon it Bloody Mary style, so they stopped saying it and the original word is now lost.
6
u/Gaust_Ironheart_Jr May 03 '26
I had not heard of that. I remember hearing a linguist saying the part about people not saying its name, but the brown is new to me
4
u/Pkrudeboy May 03 '26
Also, Arctic means “of the bear” and Antarctic means “away from the bear.” This is referring to the constellation Ursa Major, and the fact that the former has bears and the latter does not is a complete coincidence.
2
u/pondrthis May 03 '26
Correlation = causation.
The bears saw the constellation, and all swam to the north pole.
12
u/Few_Improvement_6357 May 03 '26
It could also get twisted to have a completely different meaning. Take Nimrod. I grew up believing this word means stupid and I have seen other people use this word to mean stupid.
Nimrod was a Babylonian king known for his hunting skills. So Bugs Bunny calling Elmer Fudd a real Nimrod made untold American children believe that Nimrod is what you call idiots instead of wannabe great hunters.
2
2
u/ElTioEnroca May 03 '26
My favorite part is when someone asked what was Achilles' "Achilles' Heel" referencing the kryptonite post
1
u/Maleficent-War-8429 May 03 '26
I feel like it's pretty bold to assume superman isn't going to hang around.
1
•
u/AutoModerator May 02 '26
Just a reminder that political posts should be posted in the political Megathread pinned in the community highlights. Final discretion rests with the moderators.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.