Hello and welcome to another edition of Marvel Snapshot! In this week’s spotlight, I’ll be taking a look at a rather strange being known as Impossible Man! This crazy little dude has a set of powers that makes him nearly invulnerable, and he can’t be easily swayed when he wants something. Impy was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby back in 1963 (FF #11).
Impy is from the planet of Poppup, which is a planet full of beings like himself. They all look the same, but have mental abilities that allow them to differentiate between each other. They can also shape-shift, and are very adaptive. Impy was bored so he went to Earth on a vacation, and ended up running into the Fantastic Four. They tried a myriad of different angles and plans, but couldn’t stop him. This is what lead to Thing saying that he’s “impossible.” The name stuck, and then Reed finally figured out his weakness – boredom. Reed instructed everybody to just ignore him so he’d lose interest. The plan worked, and Impy left the planet for a while. He next convinced the world eater Galactus to leave Earth and consume his home planet. This led to Galactus almost being killed, but eventually he was regenerated.
Impy then continued to have adventures centered around the Fantastic Four. One involved him impersonating the President of the United States, Jimmy Carter! He also got involved with a plot to kill the Fantastic Four that had Klaw and Molecule Man as the villains. After lying low for a while, Impy then decided to reproduce…asexually, that is. He made an Impossible Woman to clown around with, and that lasted briefly. Later on, Impy was seen heckling the Silver Surfer before his big battle with Thanos. He was trying to get the Surfer to see the humorous side of life, but his timing was a little off. Impy has had appearances with the New Warriors, Spider-Man, and even appeared during the Chaos War. In that last instance, he tried to sway Mikaboshi from his evil plans, but it was to no avail.
Where Impy will show up next, nobody knows, but rest assured, he’ll be up to his normal hijinx and nonsense as usual. Hopefully it will be in the Fantastic Four book, since that is where he got his start! As usual, check out my recommended reading list and some great pics below. See you next week!
Recommended Reading
Fantastic Four vol. #11 (1961)
Essential Fantastic Four vol. 8 – Tpb
Impossible Man – Tpb
Billy Dunleavy
billy@comicattack.net