The Mixed-Race Storm Family

The reboot of Fantastic Four is here! From its first announcement the movie been surrounded in controversy. Some fans think the Fantastic Four rights should return to Marvel so they can be implemented in the Marvel Cinematic Universe while others are ok with it being under Fox as long as they give it the love and care its pedigree deserves. Yet one thing they both sides seem to agree on is that the race difference between Johnny and Sue storm makes no sense, making that issue more controversial than it really should be in the 21st century. I'm not going to delve into whether we should be re-racing, is that a word, classic characters. Instead, I'm going to focus purely on the science behind how Sue Storm can be White while Johnny sports a cocoa complexion. Keep in mind I haven't seen the movie yet, so it's entirely possible the movie has explained it and this video will be 100% useless as opposed to just being mostly useless right now.

Anyone who's taken a Bio 100 class should remember how dominate and recessive genes work. For those of you who don't, I'm here to explain everything with a simple table called the Punnette Square.

Lets say that a black man and a white woman have a child together. What skin color would that child have? If you said brown, you're right. But it's a bit more complicated than that. See the father had two dominate genes while the mother had two recessive genes. So, that would give their children both a dominate and a recessive gene. Even though they're half and half, the dominate gene is just that, dominate. So, the child is mocha, instead of being looking like a S'More.

These genes do come into play when that offspring decides to have offspring of their own. Lets say this person decides to make it a family tradition and marry another Caucasian. What color will their children be? If you said brown, you'd be half right. In reality, it's a coin flip. Remember that recessive trait? It's still there. And, using the Punnette Square, you can see how half their children would have brown skin, while the other half would be white. It's not just theory, it's how my family is and lots others, like this family here. Really interesting stuff and, considering how mixed race marriages are rising, you'll see more mixed race kids.

So you can see how this fits in with the rebooted Storm family. Clearly one parent must be mixed race and another white. Assuming they're biological siblings with the same mother. Who knows, maybe they're step siblings or one or both are adopted . But, considering how confused the general public is regarding this, I really hope they are biologically related. It could prove to be an interesting teaching moment for everyone. And that would be great. Oh and it would be great if the movie didn't suck like the last two Fantastic Four movies.