If you had asked, I would have told you that I didn’t read comic books when I was young. I would have been wrong. Recently, after a long day of doing not much, I decided to watch JOKER on the Covid-active lower-level television. As you probably know the seriously dark movie is based on the ‘comic’ character’s Gotham City hero, Batman.
Now I remember. My favorite character was the Penguin, if only because he used words with such superlative precision. For example, “Egad, by Jove and other exclamatory ejaculations.” Already, a word nerd, I seem to have used the phrase as the beginning of a life-long practice of pedanticism. Yes, I know, that’s not a compliment.
Of course, there was Superman who needs no introduction. After all these years, I often think of his rescuing a formerly frightened man in Mexico, who happily addressed our superhero with, “Up, up and away, señor”. Try it. You’ll like it.
As I recall, I even sent a dime along with a piece of cereal box for a much-needed Captain Marvel decoder ring. The impatiently awaited mail brought the secret of a simple substitution cipher and SHAZAM, I could keep all the secrets I had. Is that why barely ten years later, the government drafted me to be a cryptographer, a one-time “top secret” I suppose it’s now safe to reveal.
But really, let’s not leave out the father of my friend on the island. Yes, even Harry Blackstone had, that is to say, was the star of, a comic book. And yes, I personally owned and operated a copy of the issue featuring the Hindu Rope Trick. I also climbed the outside fire escape stairs to peer in the window as he performed the famous illusion at the Opera House in Colon, Michigan.
In a recent survey 59 percent of adults say they have never read a comic book. Maybe they need the JOKER to remind them. One thing is certain. Somebody out there likes comics. In 1938 Superman kicked off the genre with a price of 10 cents. In 2014 it sold for $3.2 million. EGAD.