Could Reed Richards survive a point blank gunshot to the head?

Question

The image in this answer shows Reed's body stretching under a massive impact.

I'm wondering what sort of impact would be too much for him to sustain, that would overload his stretching powers.

A gun shot generates a huge amount of force over a tiny area, so I'm thinking that would be a good candidate.

Has Reed ever ever been shot with a gun at point blank range?

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The max Reed Richards can stretch his body to before it becomes too painful is about 1,500ft. A bullet from a 9mm can make it as far as 7217ft.

If someone could find an actual head shot, that would be awesome

Well, Skrull Pym (the asse) shot him with a Skrull gun in the face comicsrecommended.com/images/longform/secret-invasion-blam1.jpg — user16696, Commented Jul 6, 2015 at 21:08
A bullet from a 9mm might travel 7,000 feet through the air, but through water, it will run out of steam after only a few feet. Fired into ballistic gelatin, it won't go more than a foot or two. Reed is probably more like gelatin than water or air, so a 9mm round wouldn't go very far. — Wad Cheber, Commented Jul 6, 2015 at 21:11
@WadCheber ah but if he's so incredibly stretchy, he might not put up very much resistance at all. I mean you're probably right, but he is very stretchy. — Daft, Commented Jul 6, 2015 at 21:12
At the end of Civil War Invisible Woman is about to be shot and he dives in the way, resulting in injury. Not sure if that's just because of how he went about stopping the bullet though. — M_the_C, Commented Jul 6, 2015 at 22:10
@M_the_C: I thought about citing that one, but the art is ambiguous, and a number of descriptions of it talk about lasers, not bullets. — FuzzyBoots, Commented Jul 7, 2015 at 2:43

Community · Accepted Answer · 2020-06-16 09:31:17Z

Powers & Abilities

Dense Flesh: Due to the great malleability and elasticity of his molecular structure, Mister Fantastic is able to absorb the impact of any type of man-made ballistic projectile by deforming his body along the path of the projectile's trajectory at the point of initial impact.

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Contain Explosions: Mister Fantastic may use his elastic form to contain explosions by enveloping them and allowing their force to expand him. He can enclose and absorb the energy of a large explosive, on the order of 8 to 12 pounds of TNT (excluding exotic, high density explosives). Such shocks to his system are physically exhausting.
Redirect Projectiles: After his body absorbs the kinetic energy of a ballistic projectile's impact, Mister Fantastic can expel the object back along its trajectory by flexing his body like a trampoline if he is adequately braced.

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Reed has been shot by alien technologies which have overwhelmed his stretching powers, neutralizing his ability to control his malleable cellular matter.

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The Skrulls, possibly due to their own malleable forms, have technology capable of harming Reed Richards despite his plasticity. He has been a prisoner of the Skrulls on more than one occasion.

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The Super-Skrull has always had Richard's number whenever the two of them tangled.

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Holy crap, old comic book dialogue is soooooooo hokey. Also, if, in the first panel in your answer, he is speaking literally- that his body can catch bullets and fire them back with the same amount of energy as a slingshot would, that isn't very impressive. A bullet fired from a slingshot would break the skin, but not much more than that. — Wad Cheber, Commented Jul 7, 2015 at 2:23
He is implying he can return the energy with the same velocity they were fired with. Writing back then wasn't as clear as it could be either. — Thaddeus Howze, Commented Jul 7, 2015 at 2:45

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