Comments to Cage: Strength

Questions about the strength level of Luke Cage go back to his earliest days fighting crime. The "Comments to Cage" letters column from Hero for Hire #4 incuded the following discussion about the topic..

Dear Stan, Archie, and George,

Luke Cage—no alien being, android, or superhuman do-gooder. No acquired-through-years-of-training acrobatic feats. No power to change himself into fire or ice or even emit dazzling energy bolts. NO—nothing but an honest down-to-earth person who got unexpectedly dipped into a tub of radioactive bath oil beads.

Actually, our new idol has not extra powers of strength than he normally had before. His skin cells were simply altered by an electro-biochemical system which went berserk (more probable than the majority of superhero origins) and caused his outer skin layers to harden to an immensely dense degree—much like a certain blue-eyed Benji we all know and respect.

Logically with normal strength, if you slammed your fist into a concrete wall, your fist will give out first since the concrete is stronger. On the other hand, if your fist was as hard as steel, the concrete would give out first; and therefore, no real super-strength is needed. Luke age doesn't seem to have any super-strength and neither do most people, so I can believe in him a great deal easier.

I will now say the same of LUKE CAGE, HERO FOR HIRE as I did about CONAN—"You've got a winner on your hands now, people!" So keep on truckin'—you can't afford to slow down now!

Jeff Young
Plantation, Fla.

The letter received the following reply:

Right now, Jeff, Mighty Marvel is movin' too fast for slowing down even to enter our minds! So, hang on, believer; there's much more magic to come.

About Luke Cage's strength: we think it was increased somewhat by his chemical sauna, just by virtue of the fact that his muscles, like his skin, increased in density. Whether or not this qualifies as "super-strength" is another matter, one we'd prefer to leave up to you readers. We'll just add that, while Luke isn't in the same league as Thor or the Hulk, he's probably at least as strong as, say Ka-Zar, who, in turn, is "stronger than mastodon—stronger than giant boar—" etc., etc.

"Comments to Cage" first appeared in Hero for Hire #3 (October 1972).