In "When We First Met", we spotlight the various characters, phrases, objects or events that eventually became notable parts of comic lore, like the first time someone said, "Avengers Assemble!" or the first appearance of Batman's giant penny or the first appearance of Alfred Pennyworth or the first time Spider-Man's face was shown half-Spidey/half-Peter. Stuff like that.

Today, I pay off on something someone asked me in a e-mail from November...of 2008 (hey, I never said I would get to all of these things in a timely fashion, ya know?). Stephane S. wrote in to ask, "Where did the trope of “intense telepathy brings on nosebleeds” come from? It’s been appearing in coming regularly for years now, and strikes me as the sort of thing which might have originated there… or maybe some kind of 80s Sci-Fi movie. Any thoughts?"

It really is funny how some things pop up out of nowhere and then just become almost instantly ubiquitous and psychic nosebleeds are definitely a great example of this. You would be hard pressed to go past a couple of months' worth of comic books without hitting upon a comic book where someone was having a psychic nosebleed. Of course, it is not only used with regards to telepathy, as it also comes into play with anyone who has a power that is connected to their mind, as the nosebleed has become the go-to depiction of when someone is straining a lot to use their otherwise non-visible power.

Now, I am not 100% certain on this one, since there are so many different possibilities where this could have popped up, but I tend to think that the answer as to where this first showed up period was in the 1981 film, Scanners, which is famous for being "that movie where the guy's head explodes." In the film, which was written and directed by David Cronenberg, there are people known as "scanners," with telepathic and telekinetic powers and there is a corporation trying to control them and one rogue scanner who is trying to take the system down.

When scanners strain in using their powers, their noses bleed...

The 1984 film, Firestarter, based on the 1980 Stephen King novel by the same name, also has a psychic nosebleed in it...

This has led people to figure that the 1980 novel must be the first example of this trend, but in the novel, nosebleeds are not mentioned, simply mini-cerebral hemorrhages (which, true, ARE bleeding in and of themselves, but not specifically a nosebleed).

So, naturally, the comic book debut of the pyschic nosebleed would "have" to be after Scanners (quotes because, hey, maybe I'm wrong). This makes sense, really, as comic books tended to try to avoid blood as much as they could because of the Comics Code.

When Professor X and Dark Phoenix have a super-awesome psychic battle in X-Men #136 by John Byrne, Chris Claremont and Terry Austin, Byrne depicts the physical stress of the psychic battle through the use of tears instead of blood...

If psychic nosebleeds had been a "thing" by 1980, surely they would have been used there, right?

Similarly, earlier in the issue, when Dark Phoenix is messing with Colossus, nowadays there totally would be blood dripping out of Colossus' nose rather than tears dripping from his eyes...

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As I noted, the Comics Code was wary of blood, so sure enough, the first psychic nosebleed appears to be in the NON-Comics Code approved God Loves, Man Kills (by Chris Claremont and Brent Anderson), when a brainwashed Professor X uses his powers on Cyclops and Storm...

And later, Reverend Stryker gets Xavier to mess with the minds of every mutant in the world...

I believe that this villain in Adventures of Superman #427 (by Marv Wolfman and Jerry Ordway) is the first time we see someone have a psychic nosebleed from using their powers (and also the first time that we see the psychic nosebleed in a Comics Code approved comic book)...

There ya go, Stephane! 9 years and 11 months isn't too long to get your question answered, is it?

If anyone else has a comic book first that they would like to know, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com! You might get an answer before 2028! Stress might.