u/Blackassum

You watched The Six Million Dollar Man every Saturday in 1974. You know Steve Austin had a bionic right arm, both legs, and one eye — total cost: $6 million. You ALSO know the rest of him — shoulders, spine, tendons, that very 70s chest hair — was still 100% discount human.

So please, I need the official Nerd Council to explain to me: In "The Pal-Mir Escort" (and literally EVERY other episode), how does Steve grab the back bumper of a 4,000-pound purple van with plate 1X-0737 and LIFT IT... without his bionic arm just ripping clean off and staying attached to the van like a very expensive hood ornament? See Exhibit A vs Exhibit B. Was it: A) Secret bionic superglue in his shoulder? B) 1974 TV physics? C) The writers just hoped we were too distracted by the slow-mo "na-na-na-na" sound? Drop your most gloriously nerdy, pseudoscientific explanation below. Bonus points if you use the words "torque," "tensile strength," or "Oscar Goldman signed off on it."

Fala, pessoal do r/quadrinhos. Ou melhor, aqui é o Visconde Quaresma (…ou Mani🤔) falando em nome de uma HQ que nasceu em 2016, hibernou, e agora quer conversar de verdade com quem faz e lê quadrinho no Brasil. A ideia nasceu de um incômodo. Todo mundo conhece a Bruzundanga do Lima Barreto, aquela república fictícia de 1922 que era só o Brasil com o espelho na cara. Sátira genial, mas sempre nos colocando como caricatura do atraso. Em 2016, durante uma pop-up de 47 dias no Espaço Como Assim em Pinheiros, a gente lançou o primeiro fascículo na Livraria Cultura da Paulista com uma pergunta oposta: e se, em vez de rir da nossa desorganização, a gente mitificasse ela? Daí nasceu "Os Heróis da Bruzundanga". Não é super-herói com capa americana pintada de verde e amarelo. É Tupi Pop. É herói com traço de toy-art indígena, com axé de orixá, com gambiarra de periferia, com humor de quem já foi chamado de "país do futuro" tantas vezes que resolveu construir o futuro na marra. O primeiro número ficou meio sumido, circulou em exposições, virou quadro, virou estampa. Nunca teve distribuição grande. E a culpa é nossa. A gente tratou a HQ como obra de galeria, não como quadrinho de comunidade. Por isso estamos abrindo a casa agora. Criamos o r/heroisdabruzundanga como arquivo vivo, mas queríamos primeiro passar aqui, pedir licença e ouvir quem entende do riscado. O que a gente quer trocar com vocês:

1. Processo. Temos páginas originais feitas em nanquim e esferográfica (herança do tempo do jornal mimeografado "Aula Vaga" nos anos 80), depois coloridas digitalmente com paleta Tupi Pop. Vale postar making-of aqui?
2. Roteiro. Bruzundanga é sátira, mas queremos fugir do didatismo. Como vocês equilibram crítica social e aventura sem virar panfleto?
3. Universo compartilhado. A proposta é que cada região do Brasil tenha seu herói bruzundanguense. Se você é do Norte, Nordeste, Sul, que poder nasceria do seu sotaque, do seu mito local? A gente não está aqui para vender nada, o fascículo de 2017 está esgotado mesmo. Estamos aqui para reativar. Se a comunidade curtir, a gente solta PDF de algumas páginas aqui no sub, abre votação de personagem, e quem sabe faz uma antologia colaborativa. Deixo uma pergunta para começar a conversa: qual foi a HQ nacional que te fez acreditar que dava para criar super-herói brasileiro sem parecer cópia? Para mim foi o trabalho do Flavio Colin e depois o "Holy Avenger", cada um à sua maneira. Valeu pelo espaço. Bruzundanga agradece.

Okay, Speed Racer nerds help me out. I've been redrawing the Mach Five (based on the original 1967 design, see my sketch below) and I got stuck on the one gadget that never made sense to me: Button D – the Deflector. In the show it's that clear bulletproof canopy that just whooshes over Speed's head to seal the cockpit. In canon it's described as "a hard plastic transparent covering that encloses the open cockpit".  In my drawing I tried to make it mechanically plausible – I put the stowed dome right behind the seat, hinged so it swings up and forward in one clean arc (middle image = open, lower image = closed, top view shows "CÚPULA FECHADA"). But the more I model it, the less it fits:

1. Stowed, it's in the way. The Mach Five is a tiny two-seater, left-hand drive with basically no rear bulkhead. If you park a full-size bubble behind the driver seat, when retracted the edges stick out past the seat bolsters. You'd see it from the side, and Speed would bang his elbows on it getting in. 
2. It steals legroom. To clear the headrest, the dome has to drop down first, then rotate forward. That sweep goes straight through where the driver's knees and the passenger footwell are. In the top-down view of my sketch you can see there's literally nowhere for that volume to hide.
3. The perfect arc needs a perfect void. For the "decreasing radius" swing to look smooth on screen, you'd need about 30cm of empty space inside the cockpit behind the seats. The Mach Five's tail is all engine and fuel – Pops didn't leave a garage back there. So... is this just classic 60s "rule of cool" anime engineering, or has anyone figured out a real packaging trick? If you had to build a working Mach Five today, how would you stow Button D? • Split the bubble into two clamshells that live in the side pods (like the fins)? • Make it a multi-panel iris that folds flat like a camera shutter under the rear deck? • Cheat and go full inflatable/memory-plastic so it doesn't need a hard storage space? • Or just admit that Pops Racer was a wizard and leave it magic?

This is not a popularity contest. The prize was created to point attention to people who are actually building more capacity, less waste, better governance, and higher quality of life. We pulled the shortlist from the official announcement. Now we want r/postscarcity to stress-test it. Vote in the comments, add data, call out who is missing. Top arguments get pinned.

1. CAPACITY GENERATION AND POST-SCARCITY who expands what humanity can produce • Wang Xingxing (China) – founder of Unitree, made quadruped robots cheap and scalable • Zhang Kejian (China) – leads China’s space program, Moon and Mars advances • Fredrik Asplund (Sweden) – KTH professor, safety systems that let automation scale Poll: Wang / Zhang / Fredrik / Other (comment)
2. WASTE TO RESOURCE (CIRCULAR ECONOMY) who turns waste into value • Boyan Slat (Netherlands) – The Ocean Cleanup, large-scale plastic removal from oceans • Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr (Sierra Leone) – mayor of Freetown, urban reforestation and environmental restructuring • Fionn Ferreira (Ireland) – microplastic removal tech using ferrofluid • David Katz (Canada) – Plastic Bank, turns plastic waste into social currency Poll: Boyan / Yvonne / Fionn / David / Other
3. INTEGRITY GOVERNANCE who makes institutions work • Maia Sandu (Moldova) – anti-corruption reforms and institutional strengthening • Fumio Kishida (Japan) – rule-based international stability and regional cooperation • Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala (Nigeria) – WTO Director-General, pushing balance in global trade • Lee Kuan Yew (Singapore, historical reference) – model of efficient, low-corruption governance Poll: Maia / Fumio / Ngozi / Lee Kuan Yew / Other
4. HUMAN AND PLANETARY QUALITY OF LIFE who upgrades health, peace, and discovery • Tatiana Lobo Coelho de Sampaio (Brazil) – neural regeneration research for spinal injury mobility • Jennifer Doudna (USA) – co-creator of CRISPR, opening path to eliminate genetic diseases • Abiy Ahmed (Ethiopia) – peace agreements and regional stabilization efforts • Demis Hassabis (UK) – DeepMind, applying AI to accelerate medical and biological science Poll: Tatiana / Jennifer / Abiy / Demis / Other  How to vote: reply with Category number + name + one concrete result (ex: "2 - Boyan Slat - 11,000 tons removed as of 2025"). No slogans, just receipts. r/postscarcity, you live in the implementation layer. Tell us who is real and who is hype. We will tally here on r/prospenomics and publish the community winners next week. These names represent real fronts of transformation. The prize does not aim to create popularity, but to direct attention toward those who are effectively building a world with greater capacity, less waste, better governance, and higher quality of life.