Radioactive Diaper Rash, Anyone?

 Right. Today we are here for one thing and one thing only: To discuss Hyperion’s huge atomic diaper.

When Hyperion first made his appearance way back in Avengers #70 (ok, technically it was the last panel of #69) he was your typical Superman rip-off - super-strong, invulnerable, powers of flight and so-called ‘atomic vision,’ etc. And I couldn’t help but think that writer Roy Thomas and artist Sal Buscema were trying their level best to make him look utterly ridiculous. I mean, they forced Hype to wear a huge metallic diaper.

The story of his first appearance was told in a serious tone with the very cosmos hanging in the balance, but here we have this clearly ridiculous fashion choice which boggles the mind. Usually Hyperion is portrayed as wearing tights, but when you display him bare-legged he immediately loses his threatening appearance and  becomes what Rick Jones would have labeled in those days as uncool. I can only posit that this was a slam at DC’s Superman 'underwear-over-tights’ look, but it served only to rob an otherwise frightening character of any Marvel street cred. 

When I first encountered Hyperion it was in the pages of Mark Guggenheim’s excellent Squadron Supreme miniseries in the eighties. And Hyperion was cool, man. Way cool. And I kept reading about him as time went on. Busiek’s Avengers. Winick’s EXiles. Straczinsky’s Supreme Power. Jason Aaron’s Thunderbolts. And, most recently, Jonathan Hickman’s Avengers. Hype continued to bring the power and the pain. 

And then I encountered Avengers #70.

Since then, things have never been the same. 

I find it fitting that in his very first battle in what I now refer to as “Thor’s encounter with Atomic-Diaper Man” the God of Thunder defeats Hyperion by reducing him to the size of an infant. The baby-sized Hyperion mewls and complains as he is trapped in the orb-shaped crib Thor has contructed for him. Thor proceeds to tell him that he will only let him out if he learns to play nice. Reading this, my mind rang with the possible thoughts of the Thunder God as he ignominously disposed of Hyperion - “The Son of Odin hath little time for warriors sporting poopy-pants. Have at thee, foul infant!”