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Marvel Universe Is Almost Like *Real Life* Society

Posted by Hemos on from the scary-as-heck dept.

TheMatt writes "Scientists at the University of the Balearic Isles have analyzed the Marvel Universe and found that it is almost like real society. The team studied the statistical properties of each character, the books they were in, and who else appeared in them (through resources like the MCP). While there were some similarities to real society, a close look revealed the artificiality. For example, the MU isn't very clustered, only 1.5x that of a random network; real life is about 10x more clustered. Of course, the realities of comics (the business) are why this occurs. Also, they found the most networked of all Marvel heroes was Steve Rogers, Captain America himself."

2 of 218 comments (clear)

  1. Missing something? by ThePlague · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Maybe I don't quite understand the research, but it doesn't seem that surprising that the Marvel Universe does not follow real-world clustering patterns: many of the characters have dual identities, which I would think throw off the usual associative relationship of friends.

    As an example, consider this scenario:

    Jane Goodcitizen is friends with Peter Parker.
    Spiderman is friends with Captain America.(?-don't know, but let's just say)

    In the real world, there would be a high correlation of friendship between Jane and Captain America, while the whole secret identity thing puts a monkey-wrench in the comic universe.

    The closest real-world model would probably be the network of say traveling salesmen or spies.

  2. Re:explanation by NecroPuppy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There is, of course, the Marvel First Meeting Corollary, which states that,

    "No matter how many friends/associates they have in common, the first meeting between two heroes commonly results in them fighting."

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