Gloria Grand in Simpsons Super Spectacular #2.
Gloria Grand is a fictional character and the love interest of Radioactive Man.
Fictional Biography[]
Glenda Grand[]
Glenda Grand is Gloria Grand's predecessor from the 1940s. She works as a news reporter for radio station WZEN, owned by her father. She has an infatuation for Radio Man, but she barely seems to know his alter-ego Clarence Kane, even though they work together.[1]
Gloria Grand[]
For the Radioactive Man comics, writer Morty Mann simply took Radio Man and Glenda and retooled them, turning Glenda into Gloria. Gloria still works as a reporter for WZEN in Zenith City, and Glenda's feelings for Radio Man parallel Gloria's feelings for Radioactive Man.
Throughout the comics, Claude Kane III—Radioactive Man's civilian identity—constantly tries to win the affections of Gloria. Gloria loves Radioactive Man, but she dislikes Claude (a relationship inspired by such Silver Age love interests as Lois Lane and Carol Ferris). As a running gag, Claude keeps coming up with new ways to wear hats so that Gloria won't notice the lightning-bolt shrapnel sticking out of his head. This, combined with Claude's bumbling manner, makes Gloria see him as an idiot.
Unlike Claude—who remains fairly static both in and out of costume throughout the comic's run—Gloria's appearance and job change over time. She starts out as a radio reporter[2] but by 1984 has become a television news correspondent.[3] As Claude's complete opposite in work ethic and political leanings, Gloria stays very socially conscious throughout the comics, from trying to get Claude to help a juvenile delinquent[2] to questioning then-president Ronald Reagan's policies.[4]
Despite Gloria's intelligence and journalistic acumen, she never puts together that Claude and Radioactive Man are one and the same. In Radioactive Man's Girl Friend Gloria Grand #9, she does in fact come to that conclusion, but Claude successfully uses a Radioactive Man decoy balloon to trick her into disbelieving her conclusion.[5]
Radioactive Girl[]
Gloria Grand as Radioactive Girl, recounted in Simpsons Super Spectacular #2.
In Radioactive Man's Girl Friend Gloria Grand #9, Dr. Crab builds a robot to destroy Zenith. During the robots rampage, it fires an isotropic ray at Gloria, which she reflects just in time with a compact mirror, which then bounces off another mirror and hits her in the back. The twice-reflected ray beam and the makeup on the compact somehow react to imbue Gloria with superpowers matching those of Radioactive Man. Calling herself Radioactive Girl, she defeats the robot (rescuing Radioactive Man in the process).
Now that she has superpowers, Gloria feels ready to marry Radioactive Man. She nearly does, but she loses her powers again when Dr. Crab smuggles an iso-fissional reactor into her bedroom—under the guise of an anonymous wedding present—and it siphons away her powers. She and her fiancée defeat Dr. Crab, but Gloria breaks off the wedding.[6] By 1968, according to Gloria in Radioactive Man #160, she and Radioactive Man "accidentally" married several times, but never actually dated.[7] This spoofs the Silver Age trope of superheroine love interests such as Supergirl and Batwoman.