10 Heroically Terrible Superpowers Writers Should Feel Embarrassed They Invented

6. 3-D Man

Proof that not only can you not keep a good idea down, you can't do much to stop a bad one either, 3-D Man is actually a homage to the Joe Simon and Jack Kirby character Captain 3-D. Another product of jumping onto a fad -albeit a little too late - Captain 3-D lasted just one issue, with a story that's basically 80s John Carpenter film They Live, only with cat people (arguably the one thing missing from Rowdy Roddy Piper's magnum opus). Like Cap, 3-D Man has the standard powers of increased strength and agility - three times that as a normal man, in fact - but he also...exists in a 3-D world! Like we all do without even trying, and which we have to take the comic's word for since, duh, they're still flat funny books, not pop-up style. The thoroughly-average superpowers weren't the main draw to 3-D Man, though. It was more its critique of 50s culture from a 70s perspective courtesy of Roy Thomas, and the mind-boggling backstory. Not only does his hero have underwhelming powers, but they reveal themselves in the most convoluted way possible. Two brothers; Hal and Chuck Chandler, were injured by an exploding Skrull ship. After that, whenever Hal squinted at the image of his brother imprinted on his glasses - which no doubt made driving, reading, and basically every day-to-day activity difficult if not dangerous - he could summon up Chuck's new heroic alter ego, 3-D Man! Also when that happened Hal would pass out, with 3-D Man, a "synthesis" of the brothers' brilliant minds, could only be 3-D for three hours. So not only does somebody have to be comatose for him to power up, the powers suck and only work for the length of a Hobbit film.