Today I’ve got to pop off for a bit about Marvel Comics’ Infinity Gems.

For those who don’t know, the Infinity Gems are 6 fictional gems (duh!) in the Marvel Universe. They are very powerful, and can be used in unison to make anyone who wields them omnipotent, basically a god who can control time, space and reality and generally be a really bad muchacho.

Each gem is small, smooth and oblong (basically Magic Skittles) and each performs a particular special power:

• SPACE: Allows the user to exist in any location (or all locations), move any object anywhere throughout the universe and warp or rearrange space.
• MIND: Allows the user to boost mental power and access the thoughts and dreams of other beings. When backed by the Power Gem, the Mind Gem can access all minds in existence simultaneously.
• SOUL: This gem is sentient and allows the user to steal, manipulate and alter souls, living or dead. This gem is also the gateway to an idyllic pocket universe.
• REALITY: Allows the user to fulfill wishes, even if said wishes are in direct contradiction with scientific laws.
• TIME: Allows the user total control over the past, present and future. It allows time travel, can age or de-age beings and can also be used as a weapon by trapping enemies or entire worlds in unending loops of time.
• POWER: Accesses all power and energy that ever has or will exist, and can back the other gems and boost their effects. It also allows the user to duplicate almost any superhuman ability and become invincible.

-In addition, each Gem is a respective color:

• Power=Red
• Time=Orange
• Reality=Yellow
• Soul=Green
• Mind=Blue
• Space=Purple

When Thanos of Titan first popped up in The Avengers, it became obvious that the Infinity Gems were going to be the all-powerful MacGuffins that would permeate throughout the Marvel Universe (MCU), (though in the movies they’re called Infinity Stones–I think Gems sounds better, but whatever), and that’s all well and good, fine and dandy, BUT……

For some reason, Disney/Marvel decided to switch the Stones’ colors around!

To be fair, this isn’t the first time this has happened: as Jason noted in his Videots of Marvel Super Heroes, for that game Capcom mysteriously changed the colors of 2 of the Gems (they changed the Time Gem from orange to magenta and the Reality Gem from yellow to orange) while leaving the other 4 Gems intact, but the MCU swapped the Gems’ colors completely.

In the MCU as well as the video game Marvel VS Capcom Infinite, the Stones’ colors are now:

• Reality=Red
• Soul=Orange
• Mind=Yellow
• Time=Green
• Space=Blue
• Power=Purple

And this is my reaction to this.

Why you do this thing, Disney?? The Gems’ colors were fine the way they were, why switch them around? Why make the Reality Gem red? Red is traditionally the color of strength and power, making the Power Gem red is therefore a no-brainer. And the Mind Gem is yellow? No! Blue is often associated with the mind, but here the Space Gem is blue. And the Power Gem is Purple? Double-No! The inky abyss of space is often purple, the SPACE Gem should be purple!

What I find particularly jarring about this is that there doesn’t seem to be any reason for the change; Disney/Marvel Studios just wanted to do this for some reason, maybe to establish that the Marvel Movie Universe is different from the Comics’ Universe, I don’t know. I realize this is a little thing that bugs me more than it should, but it still bugs me. It took me long enough to memorize the Gem colors from the comics, now I have to memorize a whole new set of colors!

*Side Bar: I can’t believe it took us this long to make a Tommy Wiseau joke!