Schrödinger’s cat

I’ve been thinking about Aquaman
a lot lately. Now for the six or seven of you who haven’t immediately
gone to another blog after reading the previous sentence, let me
explain why.                                       

Aquaman’s
been getting a bad rep recently. Many people have taken to publicly
humiliating the guy by laughing and making jokes at his expense. No, I
cannot provide any concrete examples offhand, because due to computer
sabotage, all my internet links have mysteriously vanished (that’s my way of
saying, "I think I may have just dreamed that people were making
fun of Aquaman last night. Nothing I deem as true is ever based in
reality"). I believe this recent negativity is due to a general
societal ill sweeping through the country, something that has been creeping
up along the spine of collective Filipinos like a poisonous
tarantula. I’m not really sure why a tarantula would bother crawling up
somebody’s back, but for the sake of my analogy, let’s accept that one
would.

First
off, the country has been brainwashed into thinking Aquaman just can’t "cut
it" with all these new and exciting superheroes coming out every other
day. If you were to walk into a comic book shop and find the strength
to push the 400-pound man in a black Top 40 shirt out of the
way, you would see shelves and shelves lined with hundreds of brand new
glossy comic books. Superheroes these days are full of glitz, flash,
and a dark, brooding edge. They’re mysterious, complicated creatures
that lurk in the shadows and crawl through the night like a…
tarantula down your spine. This contrasts greatly with how superheroes
were back in the 40’s and 50’s. For example, back then it was perfectly
acceptable to wear skintight outfits which would fit in with a Gay
Pride parade or drug-induced rave. Costume designers at the time
thought each superhero’s outfit had to contain every primary color or
villains just wouldn’t take them seriously. These festive and pretty
colors were quite the rage back in the day, but now they just create
the impression that old school superheroes would be better suited in a
Mexican wrestling league than fighting crime. There’s not much one can
do about this outlook; I can’t even stay in fashion, much less dictate
it.

All
recent comics books revolve around guns and missiles and blowing up a
quarter of the world in every issue of every series. If there isn’t
wanton destruction and an orgy of violence every page, the comic book
probably won’t sell. However, back in the 40’s, villains didn’t want to
blow up the world or anything horrible like that. No, criminal
masterminds back then were happy with idiotic penny ante schemes like
turning all the street lights in their city red, which would cause the
city mayor to get stuck in traffic while the villain’s henchman breaks
into the guy’s office and steals the mayor’s really nice gold pen.
Villains didn’t care about blowing stuff up in the 40’s; if they could
get through an entire issue without locking themselves out of their
house they were happy. That’s why Aquaman fit in so well - he didn’t
carry guns or bombs or any cheap stuff like that. For God’s sake, the
guy had a harpoon instead of a hand. Have you ever tried to stab
somebody with a harpoon? It’s not easy, especially if you’ve been
drinking. This make’s Aquaman’s superhero-ness even more impressive,
since the fact that he has no left hand qualifies him as being a true
handicap.

Aquaman
also had the ability to communicate with almost any underwater
creature. While the comic regularly featured him "speaking" to giant
seahorses, dolphins, and whales, one can only assume that he was also
able to speak to less mobile creatures like sea cucumbers, starfish,
and that poisonous plankton that shoots spores everywhere. He probably
preferred not to talk to them because they never had anything to say. I
mean, if you were a big sea cucumber on the bottom of the ocean floor,
what would you say? "Hey Aquaman, it’s really fucking dark down here
and I haven’t moved since the late 1800’s so no, I’m not having a nice
day." If I lived in the sea my whole life and suddenly found some guy
with no hand swimming around in tights and asking me if I could help
him save the world from an evil genius who was using kelp to fuel his
army of Nazi robot zombies, I would ignore him. Hell, I’d probably try
to bite the guy. Since Aquaman was never killed by a pissed off
swordfish, this is a true testament to his psychic abilities.

The
most important limitation Aquaman had to work with (and, as a result, I
feel was his biggest claim to fame) was the fact that he had to do a
majority of his fighting underwater. Being an underwater superhero
isn’t very flexible, and I’m sure Aquaman really had to perfect his
persuasive speech techniques in order to lure bad guys near his
territory.

                                        

Bad guy #1:
"This coastal shipping yard looks like a great place to set up our
illegal black market wax mustache trade."
Bad guy #2: (laughs evilly. The second bad guy always laughs evilly)
Suddenly,
a loud horn sounds and Aquaman rises up from the depths of the ocean.
Aquaman:
"Hey guys, why don’t you come a little closer to the ocean?"
Bad guy #1: "Why would we do that?"
Aquaman:
"All the really cool bad guys do illegal stuff by the ocean."
Bad guy #1: "Really?"
Bad guy #2: (to Bad guy #1)
"Hey, I think this is the Aquaman guy we were warned about."
Aquaman:
"No I’m not, my name is Steve and I’m with the oceanfront tourism
board. Although I may be wearing the same top as Aquaman, I can assure
you that I’ve got on khaki pants, something Aquman never wears. That is
how you can tell us apart."
Bad guy #1: "I can’t see no khaki pants."
Aquaman: "Well come closer and I’ll show you."
Bad guy #1: "Okay."

                                                                                                                

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 26th, 2006 at 1:17 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.