Golden Age Aquaman is a nightmare

Given my fondness for Golden Age comics and for all things Aquaman, it might seem odd how little I have covered the stories of the Golden Age Aquaman.  Today, you'll see why.  It's because most of them are in the same vein as

from Adventure Comics #130, July 1948.

In which Golden Aquaman goes insane for some starlet. Specifically:

Esther.
Grable.
Just shoot me NOW.

It begins with Aquaman going to the movies.

"Went overboard"?
Typical Jameson-style pap from the Bugle; more interested in the pun than in the point.

This start highlights one of the annoying features of Golden Age Aquaman; he was pretty much raised in the ocean and lived there exclusively.  This rendered him an innocent on dry land and too many of his stories have a 'fish out of water' hook.  "I'll find out how the movie stars swim!"  Yeah, that sounds like useful research, Art.

Perfect example: Aquaman being a goober who gets yelled at for blocking the film.
Try this on modern Aquaman and he'll use his mind-powers to make you punch yourself in the face.  Repeatedly.

Naturally, Art falls for "Esther Grable" in a wildly disproportionate way.

Get some help, Art.

So, the obvious thing to do is to contact her agent or publicist and to arrange a meet-up, since they are both well-known celebrities.  Therefore, Aquaman does nearly the opposite: he boards a train for Hollywood.

I choose to interpret that white halo as Aquaman using his mental powers to make everyone around him treat this as perfectly normal.

Aqua-stalker's mania even bubbles to the surface of his sleeping:

How comforting to know in the Golden Age, if you made strange noises in your sleeping berth, kindly attendants would pop their heads in to watch you sleep.

Note that the continued halo indicates that, even in sleep, Aquaman's mental powers are so strong that they continue to force others to act as if this were all perfectly normal.

The next scene is Art descending upon Esther Grable at a strange, lonely spot.

Pretty sure you're the only thing making it "strange", Art.
Also: is it NOT a Strange, Lonely Spot for ... a boy?

Suddenly, Esther is attacked by a gorilla in pegged chinos.

I agree, Caption; that is definitely unbelievable.

Aquaman waves off the promise of a reward. Mostly.

"I don't want any reward --
I just want you to be my wife."
Smooth, Art.

I'm kind of curious what would constitute a "special autograph", but we'll never know since we move right to Our Hero demanding to Prove His Love through a series of Ridiculous Tasks.  

For a Golden Age Aquaman story, this reads a lot like a Silver Age Superman story.

Fortunately for Art, Esther Grable is every bit the equal in terribleness of Silver Age love interests and has no trouble conjuring up absurd feats by which Aquaman can prove himself worthy by expending incredible effort to satisfy her smallest whims.

And I do mean "incredible".

Aquaman dissing the utility of icebergs amuses me.  "If only all this stupid ice would MELT, raising sea-level and expanding my kingdom enormously!"

In Aquaman's dream, St. Louis is renamed "Otisburg".

Next up: pearls.  I mean, surely you saw THAT coming.

Eventually, Esther wound up the lesbian love-slave of a gang of Japanese Ama divers.  I learned that from Biography on A&E.

Of course, this is little challenge for Aquaman (who took a panel out to explain that removing the pearls is a favor to the oysters, since pearls are like kidney stones to them).

Esther then demonstrates powers of free association as mighty as those of Adam West's Batman while deciphering a supercriminal's clue.

Jump. Over a rainbow.  Okay, Esther, whatever.

But nothing is impossible for the man who can command sealife!

AQUA-FACTS

Writers of old comics LIVED for these moments.  Before the internet came along to ruin everything, COMICS were the source of most interesting knowledge for youngsters.  I remember a psychologist trying to test the limits of my vocabulary at age 12 (perhaps that was considered a proxy for intelligence at the time?). The last two words he threw at me, in near desperation, were "homunculus" and "ambergris", both of which I knew. When he shook his head and said, "how on earth do you know those?", my answer was obvious.

"You haven't read a lot of Vigilante stories, have you, doctor?"

"Or watched a lot of Batman?"

This last Aqua-stunt sells Esther who agrees to marry Art; but there's a glitch!  

<comedic brass instrument sound effect>

Art is so sheltered he has no concept of stunt doubles.

And he faints. As heroes do.

But, wait! What's THIS? A wavy border to the right-side of the panel? What could this mean!?

IT WAS ALL A DREAM!

A nightmare. Well, that does explain the oddity of the events and why a gorilla would wear chinos rather than capri pants at the beach.

Then it's all wrapped with a denouement of Art being a deluded **** to real-life Esther Grable for not living up to his parasocial concept of who she is.

Golden Age Aquaman is a real drip.

And, this, in short, is why I don't read more Golden Age Aquaman stories for you.

Some Thoughts on Batman #4

On the whole I have been enjoying the (ridiculously re-numbered) current Batman series.  

But it's occurred to me that perhaps the entire system for numbering comics should be rethought.  The "old" system, whereby one title would continue to advance numerically forever, was based on the idea that the LARGER the issue number, the more venerable and stable the title seemed; you were buying into a character with legs who wouldn't vanish after you've invested interest in them.  But then venerability became interpreted as stodginess and stagnation, and the default switched to re-starting the numbering on a title when it got a new creative team or the hero got a revised chest logo. That habit then necessitated categorizing titles into "volumes", a designation that exists ONLY in online cataloging and is marked nowhere on the comics themselves.  This benefits no one and confuses many.  Why not simply label each issue of a comic with its YEAR and a sequence within that year (#1-12)?  "Batman 2025 #4" is pretty easy to understand and is a unique identifier.  That said...

I have some issues with the current issue.  They aren't really BIG issues, but, somehow, that is what makes them more irksome.  They are minor issues that seem as though they could have been avoided and they mar what is otherwise an interestingly written (and VERY well drawn) run on the Caped Crusader's adventures.  

The issue introduces a new Gotham villain ("The Minotaur"), who is (another) baddie whose shtick is "But THIS time, I will ORGANIZE ALL of Gotham City's crime!"  It is BY NO MEANS an original schtick but it's not unwelcome or unworkable (obviously, since it's a repeated one).  And the Minotaur seems acceptably colorful.

He wears a bull-mask and has seven fingers on his right hand.

The bull-mask and matching suit is all quite sensible (as far as villains go), but ... seven fingers?  I can't think of anything that would make someone EASIER to identify than having seven fingers (given its rarity).  His hook is having made seven crime organizations interdependent. Fortunately for his theming, Gotham has EXACTLY the right number of crime organizations.  

Magic seven? Did Geoff Johns secretly write this?

Once again, the Penguin, a character with a rich 84-year-and-counting history as one of Batman's top five villains (and one who has had his OWN TELEVISION SERIES), is cast as Just Another Crime Lord (albeit one more recognizable and colorful than the others).  I'm done ranting about what an inappropriate waste that is; after all, whether I like it or not, this fact may be part of exactly WHY the Penguin is still around.  It's not a flaw, it's a feature; the Penguin can be SCALED to fit the situation.

The Penguin can fight Firestorm to a standstill, shoulder to shoulder with FREAKING VALIDUS.

Next week, he can get the snot beat out of him by Harvey Bullock.

He can also just BUY a super-robot to kick Superman's patootie in front of all his super friends.

Penguin aside, there are five other crime lords who are distinguished by name, location, style, and speciality. While I might not agree on the specifics of these choices, I appreciate that in one issue Matt Fraction has done more to give us a picture of Gotham and its crime environment than all of Batman's Bronze Age stories combined.  Matt Fraction, gods bless him, does NOT do "decompressed" story-telling.

But it's the sloppiness that Fraction needlessly introduces that irritates me.

Um.... that's not something you can guarantee, Minotaur.
What it is, the Amway of Crime?

You clearly don't know what "internecine" means.  
My version of the Penguin would shoot you for that alone

How miraculously tidy that the losses were distributed exactly evenly among all the crime groups. What are the odds?  The simple insertion of "an average of ... per" would have solved this.

How?  That seems to be the hard part in Gotham.  It's simply stated as a throwaway.
How exactly did you 'bring to heel' a panoply of costumed crazies, off-panel?

That's Lonnie "Anarchy" Machin. You remember him; his schtick was being a TEEN GENIUS. He wants "whatchallit State's Evidence".  I should think a criminal teen genius would not need to "whatchacall" that concept.

Really, now.  This is the name of your Italian crime lord?  What is this, Dick Tracy?  If "Roy G. Bivolo" is supposed to be amusing, don't expect me to take "Lupo Capitolina" seriously.

I love the touch that, while regular crime lords have people they care about, but the only thing The Penguin cares about is a pet penguin. HOWEVER.

The tallest real world penguin is 39 inches tall.  This monster towers over these seated humans, who are A MINIMUM of 48", seated.  If you are going to depict a penguin, don't be so lazy you don't check the internet to see how tall they are. There is no excuse for that.

NO ONE RUNS ON A TREADMILL IN CROCS.
Certainly not a genius like Dr. Zeller.  
Don't use shorthand like "Crocs means she's practical and not girly!" without thinking it through.

Is this sloppiness the fault of Matt Fraction? His artist? Their editor?  I don't know, but it's silly and it's distracting from the good work they are doing.  Get an editor, people.