Superman Through the Ages! Forum

Aquaman was created by uncle Morty and was featured in many Sliver Age Action Comics back-up stories. It become famous with the show Superfriends, which gave him a mainstream cult following to this day. Now I know it's hard to have both a mainstream and a cult following, but it's true, non comic readers love Aquaman a lot more than people who buy comics. That's how :)

Lately like most heroes he not been doing too well, and Dc was going to cancel his book, so who could save good old Aquaman post IC?

Kurt Busiek :)

who else?

Read his interview here:

http://www.newsarama.com/dcnew/Aquaman/swordofatlantis.htm

Wow that Kurt's a busy guy! Congrats!

You know, I should have started a thread that said "Who can save Aquaman now? ...SEAN McLAUGHLIN!" on the DC message boards, see if that got any attention. That guy wrote some of Aquaman's best moments in his 1991 Miniseries, the only time besides his backup days that the character was treated with any dignity. I sent an email to Tegan Gjovaag, the internet's premiere Aqua-fan, about this, and I have yet to get a response. Rick Veitch, bless his soul, decided that the most interesting thing that can be done with Aquaman is give him new powers - which never works (although POWER OF THE ATOM *was* pretty interesting). It doesn't matter if one gives a character with a gimmick like Aquaman or the Atom "new powers;" what is important is taking the character and his world seriously.

That said, although I was initially resistant to the concept of making Aquaman Conan at sea, Busiek's using Killer Shark, and THAT sounds pretty cool. Really, all one needs to set something apart is a gimmick and the water gimmick is as good as any. Remember all the "animal hero" cartoon shows of the 1980s? SILVERHAWKS, THUNDERCATS, TIGERSHARKS, NINJA TURTLES, BUCKY O'HARE AND THE TOAD WARS (a Neal Adams creation, I believe). TIGERSHARKS could hardly be a THUNDERCATS-clone...because everybody was a FISH!

At first I was hoping for a reboot. Usually I'm against reboots as being pointless makeovers that fix something that ain't broke...but an exception can be made for Aquaman: if there was EVER any character that called for a reboot, it would have to be Aquaman, whose previously straightforward concept (son of a surface-dweller and a mermaid) was eliminated, and I don't blame Busiek at all for not putting his foot in the sinking quagmire that is Aquaman history post-ATLANTIS CHRONICLES and post-TIME AND TIDE. While I admire Peter David for his work elsewhere, his Aquaman was so titanically labyrinthine that it was nearly impenetrable: the "curse of Koryak" that gives Aquaman his powers, the various other Atlantean Cities...Kurt Busiek himself once said that there are some things that call for a retcon story and some things that aren't worth it, and it seems Peter David was dead set on answering questions nobody asked. "How does Aquaman tie into WARLORD continuity?" I don't know, but I'm betting the answer will be REALLY complicated!

Though Busiek's praise of Dan Jurgens's AQUAMAN run has to be a very sly joke. Dan "I created Electric Superman" Jurgens, instigator and participant of the two nadirs of comics history of the 1990s: the Spider-Clone Saga and Electric Superman, followed this up with an Aqua-run where he had the "shy, quiet Garth get Dolphin pregnant white-trash style," in the words of Tegan.

She's been discussing it in her blog and her Aquablog...



King Shark, actually.  But glad you're intrigued.



Nope.  Loved it.

kdb

Where is Aqualad in all this? :)

Last seen married and raising a son, right?

kdb

What happened to that Aquaman movie they were making?  I heard all about it on some tv show.

What non-comics fans love about Aquaman  (and didn't he star in a cartoon show before Superfriends?) is the simplicity of the concept: he's a superhero who lives under water and talks to fish.  That and maybe his perpetual also-ran status.  Everyone loves a loser and a loser who seems stuck in a squeaky-clean superhero time-warp is irresistable.

Wow.  What a different concept for Aquaman.  A different guy as Aquaman?  A sword carrying Aquaman?
I don't know about this one either.  I know Aquaman hasn't been a best seller for decades now but still.

I feel your pain. However, once you get over the initial suspicion of having another person as Aquaman, I am optimistic about the series for two reasons:

1) It's exploring the undersea regions, a very interesting and underused part of the DC Universe. Please, please, PLEASE tell me they're using the Fire Trolls somehow! Those were some great bad guys. Ditto for those monster jellyfish creatures seen in the Curt Swan-drawn 1989 Aqua-miniseries. Where DID those creatures come from? Inquiring minds want to know! King Shark also is a character with an intriguing Polynesian magic cultural connection that has yet to live up to his full potential to arouse interest. Though primarily I am a "classic" Superman fan (it is Superman's past history I find most interesting and not his current incarnation) there are five or six things about the post-Reboot Superman that ought to be kept around, and King Shark is one of them.

2) Two and a half words: Guice the Juice. In another thread, I praised Guice for his stylish art in the Baron FLASH right after CRISIS. His "Savage Speedster" story qualifies him for Sword n' Sorcery work: for one thing, look at all those foxy cave girls who lived inside that fat man.

Also, it's been a few decades now...don't you think it's time we got a new Aquagirl? There have been something like four or five Batgirls and it's a name that can't be kept down.

Superheroes that go in a Sword n' Sorcery direction CAN work; look at how interesting SWORD OF THE ATOM was; superheroes can actually be improved by the addition of adventure-fantasy elements. The Atom wielding a sword and kicking tiny keyster in a lost city of tiny people...strangely enough, it worked: it allowed the Atom's shrinking, which ordinarily is felt by many writers to be an unimpressive power, to be a "gateway" into telling different kinds of stories. The same is being done for Aquaman (turning his limitations into strengths), and it MAY work. That said, some characters, however, may not work given the Sword n' Sorcery context: Superman doesn't work without science fiction elements, and Batman with a cutlass is a little goofy.



Really? I just tore her blog apart tonight looking for a response and I couldn't find one. If she did, I feel vaguely guilty for thinking she had ignored me.



What about the Jurgens Aquaman appealed to you, what did you think "worked" about it? Granted, it's been years and years since I read the comic, however, my principal memories of it involve a shotgun wedding for Aqualad and Dolphin, Mera wearing a nonexistent bikini, Lagoon Boy, and a king from a "hidden" city below Atlantis coming up because Aquaman's birthday party made a lot of noise.

Interestingly enough, it's not suprising Busiek was chomping at the bit to write Sword and Sorcery type stuff; we can see signs of that all the way back in his AVENGERS run: look at the prevalence in the first issue of Thor and Asgard villains, the appearance of magic and wizards in the next one.

Was he ever?

Sword of the Atom was great fun.  Swashbuckling Gil Kane art and a competent, adult melodrama from Jan Strnad (sp?).  It would have been horrible with Jackson Guice.  Luckily there is an inventive, knowledgeable  writer attached to this Aqua-project.  What's Ramona Fradon doing?  I'm sure she's available.

You bet.  Heck, we'll even use the Flame-Haired Karla, in time.



I didn't mean she'd been discussing you e-mail, but rather the new Aqua-direction.



I thought it had personality, majesty, a strong sense of identity and gorgeous art.



I believe all those things were in the Larsen Aqua-run, not the Jurgens one.

Remember, when you think it's Cary Bates, it's Len Wein.  Maybe that same syndrome causes you to switch Erik and Dan, too.

kdb

Oh hell yeah.



Wait...which was the one that wrote the Cerdia story arc? Because I liked that one. The fantastic wraparound covers were the icing on the cake.

That was Len -- I mean, Dan.

And at this point, it probably won't surprise you that the covers -- which were very nice Kaluta pieces -- weren't wraparounds.

kdb

Maybe it's time that poor Julian invest in some Ginkgo Biloba or something ;)

Ah! In that case, I retract my statements about my distaste for Jurgens' Aqua-run. Actually, I rather enjoyed his issues and not just for the covers, either, though they were, like you said, very nice. Ocean Master was a wonderfully ruthless foe that was titanically clever, and the moment where Aquaman leads Aqualad in a charge against him in a deep cave (especially that splash page where he says something like "And from here on, WE CALL THE SHOTS!") gave me goosebumps. Jurgens took Aquaman seriously as an important superhero. Aquaman was written as competent, and this is important: the center of action, the prime mover of the events of the story.

As an additional aside, I have for years, been upset with Jurgens because of his participation in the Spider-Clone Saga. However, recently, when reading the online comments by one of the Spider-Clone writers (whose name, unfortunately, escapes me at the moment but it's online) he pointed out that Jurgens was one of the voices of reason through the entire thing, stating very emphatically something to the effect that "the only solution that I am happy with would be if Peter Parker was the true Spider-Man and Reilly was a clone, period."

If someone writes a similar memoir that states that Jurgens was "just dragged into" Electric Superman and THOR: LORD OF ASGARD, I would not only apologize to him, but buy him roses and give him a big wet Bugs Bunny smootch.

I stand by my view of Peter David's run, however. My admiration for Peter David's other work is endless (especially his Star Trek novels and SPACE CASES: a cute, wonderful show), however, Aquaman's concept was fundamentally muddied by his run on the series. David does this quite a bit. Supergirl's concept previously, was a direct one: Superman's cousin from Krypton. Then, we get to Peter David, and she becomes part Earthbound Angel or something.

How is underwater swordfighting going to be handled? Hopefully, it ought to be very different from land swordfighting. I think the guy that wrote that AQUAMAN issue of LEGENDS OF THE DC UNIVERSE or whatever where Aquaman fights the Joker put it best: "use water wrong and it stops you...use it right, and you fly!"

Cary Bate/Len Wein - funniest thing I read all day! :)

Yep.  I'm not worried about the water-resistance -- after all, it's just as hard to throw a haymaker underwater as to swing a sword, but Aquaman's been doing that for years, too.  The undersea races are strong enough to overcome it.

But swordfighting in a medium where you don't have to stay on the ground is cool.  Of course, if you aren't braced against anything, it diminishes the power behind blows, and "high ground" is a strength for cannon, not blades (in swordfighting, being on lower ground means you can go after the other guy's legs, while he has to reach farther even to get to your armored bits), but it's still got possibilities.

kdb

I love Aquaman.  I know he's the butt of all the jokes when Plastic man's not around & sometimes when he is, but he shouldn't be.
they say "Aquaman has the worst powers of the DC universe. "
I say: " He's the King. Long live the King, of Atlantis and the Seven Seas and he like Superman in water, a true champion."

comedy aside, if done seriously , Aquaman is both Noble and savage at the same time, a dichotomy akin to Samurai nobility who chopped off heads and wrote haiku poems all in the same day. Like King Arthur, Arthur Curry has a regal, braveheart, fearless, knightly air to him.
He's a ladies' man too, suave and good looking with oodles of charm and charisma.  A knight without shining armor.  A James Bond like classy fellow with a heart to protect his people and their homes.
He's also the enviro-friendly, green hero that stands for saving our spaceship earth from crashing from a trashing. He's anti-pollution and into the preservation of the environment.

Real world physics have nothing to do with comic book physics.
Resistance of water doesn't stop the dolphin for going almost 15 miles and hour.

I'd love to see a tv series of Aquaman but I am pretty sure if the same crew as does Smallville does it , it will be Arthur Curry without a costume and as a teenager.

I am looking forward to the Kurt Busiek version of Aquaman. I have been a fan for years of Aquaman and even enjoy reading his 1940's and 50's stories.
RE the JLA . Put Green Arrow or Robin or Hawkman against Aquaman in a battle near the ocean and Aquaman would smack them down.

Wow...  it's been several pages and no one has asked Kurt the question that is on everyone's mind here:  Is this new Aquaman gonna be more powerful than Superman?  :)  I'm sure if you model him after the Aquaman at:

http://www.seanbaby.com/superfriends/aquaman.htm

you'll do just fine.  <laughs>  But seriously... good luck with Aquaman, Kurt.

One question:  Will there be a particular reason for this new guy to be called Aquaman (as opposed to Glub Glub the Waterwonderwanderer, or whatever other name he might come up with on his own)?  Does having the Aquaman moniker have more to do with DC marketing, or will there be a good reason he'd want to take on that name versus a name of his own?

Yep.

kdb

See, with lookings:

http://www.dccomics.com/comics/cm_popup.php?i=4956

kdb

If this bloke is now Aquaman then what will Aquaman will be called?

Time will tell.

kdb

Or the Conan comic he was been writing for a while that he talked about here and was mention a few times in that link I posted to start the thread.

 :oops:

How about "King Arthur"?


Kurt, do you know if all your Conan work is going to be collected in trade paperbacks?

:s:

Ooooh, good point: will ecology be a major theme or plot point in the upcoming AQUAMAN series? It sounds like it, considering part of it will involve corporations and undersea resources and whatnot.

Here's a question for the forum: what characters would work in a Sword & Sorcery context a la SWORD OF ATLANTIS, and which ones would not?

I'd expect so.

kdb

"Ecology" as a theme in most superhero comics means "preachy anti-pollution story," rather than "the way the world works around us affects us."

I don't want to do any of the former, I have some ideas regarding the latter.

kdb

yeah, i hate preachy eco guys too.  There's more to Aquaman than that.

I'm thinking motivation here. A is about protecting the sea and the city of Atlantis.  Much like Bats is motivated to protect and clean up his city
gotham city.

I thought it would be cool if Aquaman got drunk sometime too. Who hasn't got drunk at least once in life. He's got enough problems to warrant tossing back a few. But you never see any body but Lobo and Bibbo getting loaded.  He wouldn't have to drink like a fish (ouch!), but at least once he might drink more than he could handle before he has realized he had too much.

Also, Aquaman needs a love interest.  Bats eyes Diana sometimes. Supes has Lois. But poor lonely Aquaman in all alone.

Does Aquaman have to launder his costume?

Well, Aquaman has his Princess Mera. She's more like Aquaman's Hawkgirl than his Lois Lane, and it takes one gutsy writer to give a hero's girlfriend better powers than he does.  :D  She had a fairly neat power that nobody has ever really made use of its full crazy, interesting potential: the ability to create hard water. Like the Asian Dr. Light, there's a neat power there that writers have yet to have them do anything truly cool with.  

Will we see the Elementals from Paul Kupperberg's JLA Atlantis story? (Man, Zatanna was one great JLA chairperson; she can boss around Superman and that's something.)

How about Tier Nan Oge from that eighties miniseries where Aquaman got his Sea World costume?

yeah I like Zatanna, now Aquaman and Zatanna exploring Ancient atlantis magic and tech, now that would be rad