As Science Marched On and it became increasingly difficult for readers to accept this trope straight, Bruce and other Gamma mutates were Retconned to have inherited a special genetic trigger.

And then later, he gets turned into a gamma-powered superhuman for real.

Subverted when Rick Jones exposes himself to gamma rays to try to develop Hulk-like powers and gets cancer instead.

Combining gamma radiation and cosmic power will let you do that, apparently.

There's also the Red Hulk, who even absorbs radiation.

Most of the Leader's schemes revolve around trying to mutate humanity with gamma radiation, most recently in Fall of The Hulks.

The Hulk comics have seen a whole horde of people mutated by gamma radiation over the years. However, She-Hulk didn't get her powers from direct exposure to radiation, but rather a transfusion of radioactive blood from Bruce Banner, her cousin.

She-Hulk: Apparently deadly radiation can turn you into a 6'7' green supermodel who can bench a train.

The Incredible Hulk, as well as his foes the Leader and Abomination.

However, this was later Retconned so that the dolls' properties are due to actual magic, instead of their negligible radioactivity. This was clearly inspired by Hollywood Voodoo, making it arguably the most blatant example of 'radiation = magic' in comics.

The Fantastic Four recurring antagonist The Puppet Master had dolls made out of 'radioactive clay' which allowed him to control the person the doll resembled.

This was later deconstructed when it was revealed several (both in-series and meta) years later that she was terminally ill due to the lingering effects of the radiation.

In the late 1960s, Black Canary gained her iconic supersonic scream due to radiation.

In Patalliro!, Patalliro tries to hatch a 'super duck' by irradiating a duck egg, but what hatches is just a rather large duck.

In JoJo's Bizarre Adventure it is eventually revealed that the apparently mystical Stands were somehow created by an ancient artifact created from a radioactive meteorite.

A chapter of Black Jack features another aversion with an artist who is slowly dying of radiation poisoning due to nuclear fallout.

Less probably, it makes people look like they're part-dog. Irradiated water causes gradual, painful, and horrible death.

Ode to Kirihito, on the other hand, is almost realistic about this.

Guess what happens? Well, here's a hint: The episode is called 'The Gigantic Grasshopper.'

Also, in one episode of Kimba the White Lion, there's a grasshopper mutated by radiation.

One story 'The Coral Reef Adventure' for example, involves nuclear testing in the Pacific and features animals & people who are hideously deformed & dying due to radiation. The effects of nuclear energy on humans however are portrayed fairly realistically. The hero still got his powers from atomic energy (and even played the trope literally once in the 80's anime, with Astro falling for a sentient atomic bomb called Nuka) but that's because he was a nuclear powered robot. Oddly enough, nobody ever got cancer or radiation sickness.

Nextworld features various bizarre mutants created by nuclear testing including the superintelligent Fumoon who may or may not have been created from humans.

Metropolis featured a radioactive metal called Omotanium that could cause animals to grow to giant sizes, create artificial sunspots and helped create a superpowered Artificial Human.

Many of Osamu Tezuka's early sci-fi manga had radiation doing strange things:.

Sometimes overlaps with Toxic Waste Can Do Anything when we're talking about nuclear waste. One of its successors is Quantum Mechanics Can Do Anything. The predecessors to this trope are Lightning Can Do Anything and Chemistry Can Do Anything before the discovery of nuclear power, electricity and chemicals were the go-to source for magical do-anything phlebotinum. Frequently this trope needs Radiation-Immune Mutants as a Required Secondary Power. Compare Freak Lab Accident.Ī Super-Trope to Nuclear Nasty, which specifically talks about monsters created by radiation.

See also Phlebotinum du Jour (for more unlikely things that promote superpowers) and Deus ex Nukina (for more things that nuclear power can arbitrarily solve). In fact, the Japanese Kaiju genre (which includes Godzilla) was known for highlighting the negative effects of radiation, rather than the positive effects often seen in American fiction of that era. Godzilla movies aside, this is not a particularly common trope in Japan as, due to World War II, the Japanese are much better acquainted with the effects that atomic radiation has on human physiology than most.

Nuclear throne together big dog race