Friday, October 08, 2004

What the hell is a cave merman?!?

I've got this shoebox full of trading cards that I've had since I was a kid. There are all sorts of things in there: besides the usual Wacky Packages and "Star Wars" cards, I've got cards commemorating "The Six Million Dollar Man," "Welcome Back, Kotter," "Good Times," "King Kong" (the crappy remake), "KISS," "Battlestar Galactica," "Moonraker" (!) and assorted scattered cards devoted to vans, monsters, funny cars, CRACKED magazine, "Happy Days," and the like. Yes, it's quite a time capsule for all the crap a kid could accumulate in the mid '70s.

There's also this card, which, as the former writer on AQUAMAN, I felt I should share with you:


That’s the back. The front is a fairly generic picture of Aquaman swimming toward the viewer, those damn gloves he used to wear sticking out in front of him. (Incidentally, if you’re gonna wear gloves underwater, would you really choose gauntlets? Seems a bit impractical, but what do I know? I always liked his orange shirt, and jeez did I get flak for that!)

Anyhow, I’m only posting this for your entertainment and to ask one question: WHAT IS GOING ON IN THIS COMIC? I’ve been looking at the thing for an hour or so now, and I can’t make any more sense of it than when I was seven years old. Here’s what I can figure out:

PANEL 1: Aquaman, our hero, stumbles onto a three-headed monster that eats both sharks and giant squid. To no one in particular (and using both an exclamation point and an ellipses) he declares it “until today living only in the mind of man!” (Whatever that means.)

PANEL 2: He tells the monster to cool it.

PANEL 3: Now he suddenly realizes that the monster is the product of the “prehistoric mind” of a “cave merman.” Huh?

PANEL 4: Finally, he… well, I’m not sure what the hell he does. I think he forces the “cave merman” into his, well, his cave, apparently, then the monster vanishes with a big “POOF!” But really, it’s anybody’s guess what’s going on in that last panel.

Any ideas? Anyone?

Next, if you're all real good, I'll post the Robin card that ends with Batman beating an old man!

6 comments:

Mark Hale said...

This probably isn't going to help anything...

Will Pfeifer said...

Now THAT'S funny! Squirmy the ass eel! Oh, if I were only still writing the book!

Rob Haney said...

Ass-eels! I think maybe Peter David had talked about experimenting with that at one point when he wrote the book... Seriously though I read it like twenty-five times now and I still am dumb-founded! I mean what the heck is going on there? By the way Will, why the aren't you on Aquaman anymore? Did DC want to take the book in another direction or something? (If they do they are fricken idiots! Your run has probably been the best I've ever read of Aquaman!)

Chris said...

I'm still waiting for an answer on why you're not writing Aquaman anymore, also!
Your work and unmitigated excitement for the character was what made me pick the book up in the first place, and your departure is what's made me drop it.
It was nice while it lasted.

Will Pfeifer said...

OK guys, here's the last word on why I'm not on AQUAMAN anymore, and then can we please get back to the topic at hand, namely, cave mermen?

After my first several issues, DC wanted to get a new voice on the book. The Sub Diego plot was up and running, and though we had a nice bump in sales at the beginning of my run, they'd started to go down a bit. So John Arcudi is coming in to tell his stories. Don't drop the book on my account, -- John's a fine writer and Patrick's art keeps getting better and better. Hell, I'll keep reading it. And don't worry about me -- I've got the DEMON thing coming up and I've got another monthly DCU book right around the corner, but I can't talk about it here. OK? OK.

Rob Haney said...

From 'Webster's Dictionary':

mer'man', n., pl. -men. (in folklore) a marine creature with the head and torso of a man and the tail of a fish.

Now I don't know about you but I don't believe it looks like the head and torso of a man, and the tail looks more reptilian than fish-like. Any idea who the artist or writer on this card is? He needs to be smacked around a bit I think. If the merman was the only problem with the card it would be forgiveable but that plotline deserves a good thrashing!

Also, do you really have a card with Batman beating on an old guy? Please, I beg of you show us more!