If exposure to gamma rays, radioactive spiders and experimental serums doesn't result in hair loss or leukaemia, then surely a pack of fags might bestow superhuman gifts?) Armed with this new bone-crushing prowess and the eponymous vaporising ray gun, our hero proceeds to exact revenge on his tormentors.
But acts of God could not kill off Herbert's insatiable desire to create, nor his near-superhuman gift of gab.
Captain Marvel, a hero packing superhuman strength, the gift of flight, and the ability to shoot energy from her fingertips.
Dash (Spencer Fox), her younger brother, uses his gift of superhuman speed for low-level mischief.
The word implies, in fact, supernatural or superhuman power, like Beowulf's gift from God of "thirtyfold strength".
But the calm temperament is not so superhuman, nor is it entirely the gift of the chosen few.
Unlike other comic book heroes, he wasn't bitten by a radioactive spider or sent from a dying planet to discover he had superhuman abilities; he isn't blessed with a powerful gift that has to be used responsibly.
The celebrated likes of the kidnapped beauty Helen, her worthless paramour Paris and that fatal gift horse prove incidental to this account, which concentrates on the struggles between Achilles, the superhuman Greek warrior, and Hector, the noble Trojan prince.
Appropriate gifts other than edibles were also acceptable among them cylinder seals for the god's use, superhuman in size, and weapons for him, such as maceheads, also outsize.
