2) I remember the McLaughlin run. It seemed mediocre, until PAD took over. Suddenly it seemed like the greatest run ever.

3) I hate every page of the PAD run. The changes to the character were absolutely unnecessary. Just another crappy trendy change in an era overrun with crappy trendy changes. Bah.

4) With all the robotic/cybernetic technology in the DCU, it is IDIOTIC that Aquaman wear a frickin harpoon.

5) Which is only slightly more pathetic than depowering Aquaman just so pirahna can chew off his hand (for the purpose of the aforementioned idiotic harpoon).

An interesting comparison to make is PAD’s Aquman as King not hero to Priest’s Panther as King not hero.

I do love sticking up for the McLaughlin series, mostly because so few people remember it existed– and because it served as my introduction to the character way back when, and now I won’t shut up about Aquaman without a sedative.

I’ll be honest when I say I haven’t read too many consecutive David issues; I pick up pretty much all of my Aqua-books out of the cheapie bins, so what I get is what I get (and that practice has given me a bit of a renewed appreciation for Busiek’s Sword of Atlantis series). David likes to change things, usually in an organic manner, and once you buy into his portrayals of the characters and his revamped environment, you really start to see all the cool stuff. I still resist the uber-90s-reworking of Aquaman here, though; the long hair, the beard, the constant irritability, the harpoon (I don’t think piranhas should even be able to pierce Aquaman’s skin, dammit!) It feels like overkill. It feels like Namor. But, you know, it was the longest-running Aquaman series and the height of his post-Superfriends popularity, so what are ya gonna do?

The Comic Treadmill just put up a post on the early part of David’s Aqua-run this week, as well. Synchronicity!

I’ll be honest when I say I haven’t read too many consecutive David issues; I pick up pretty much all of my Aqua-books out of the cheapie bins, so what I get is what I get (and that practice has given me a bit of a renewed appreciation for Busiek’s Sword of Atlantis series). David likes to change things, usually in an organic manner, and once you buy into his portrayals of the characters and his revamped environment, you really start to see all the cool stuff. I still resist the uber-90s-reworking of Aquaman here, though; the long hair, the beard, the constant irritability, the harpoon (I don’t think piranhas should even be able to pierce Aquaman’s skin, dammit!) It feels like overkill. It feels like Namor. But, you know, it was the longest-running Aquaman series and the height of his post-Superfriends popularity, so what are ya gonna do?

The Comic Treadmill just put up <a href="http://www.comictreadmill.com/CTMBlogarchives/2009/2009_Individual/2009_09/001987.php"a post on the early part of David's Aqua-run this week, as well. Synchronicity!

What I found interesting was that David didn’t fall into the trap of having Aquaman become Stabby-Man even with the harpoon. Instead, it was a way to first bring in some versatility — the STAR labs gadget-laden version — and other than that it was what kept him at a distance from everyone around him, that distancing being one of the major character flaws on display in the run.

#14 is one of my favorites; it’s a shame only David and Mark Waid seemed interested in writing this version of Major Disaster, a human butterfly effect who could topple the world if he weren’t a fundamentally lazy and unambitious punk. I suppose the contrivances his new, less physical powers relied upon were too much for most writers, because he was back to a diluted version of his old powers rather quickly as I recall.

The Ocean Master stuff deserves some special mention, too, given how well David uses the character as a dark mirror for Aquaman, in such a way that we see a lot about Orin/Arthur because the story’s telling us all about Orm. Like Aquaman, he’s become a ruler when we see him; he even has a dangerous, distancing accoutrement in the form of a magic staff that fries everything around if he loosens his grip on it. But Orm’s taken that burden on entirely by choice, and he’s singularly incapable of the responsiblity of dealing with it.

As a king, he has no answers when his people are threatened; as a man, he foolishly enters a relationship with one of his subjects and constantly ignores the dangers of his new mystical abilities, scarring hismelf and her physically and metaphorically. And finally, when Aquaman shows up with real and global problems in search of help, Orm’s pettiness and irresponsibility end with his blowing up his own kingdom, his lover, and his subjects as he snaps under that pressure.

It’s telling us, in effect, what Arthur/Orin might become, is close to becoming, and ultimately can’t become…far more than the Kordax stuff in the same run, as Orm is closer to what Orin is than Kordax. It’s a clever use of the “dark mirror” kind of character, by ignoring the parallels but lettinbg the reader see them, and then by focusing on Orm and letting that focus suggest — but never explicitly state — the brighter parallels in Aquaman at a point in the narrative when the hero isn’t displaying much of that underlying “right stuff.”

I should note that Neal Pozner deserves a lot of credit for introducing some of those character ideas in the great little 1987 mini he did with the gorgeous Craig Hamilton art. (Peter David explicitly references that with his take on Ocean Master and Hy-Brasil, even allowing a little violation of the Pre-Crisis memories ban just to give us some flashbacks to it.)

But I can’t stand that whole harpoon-for-a-hand bit he did with Aquaman. It was just the most illogical decision ever. When fans complained Peter said it was because they’re so resistant to change but … PETER. COME ON NOW. You go replace your hand with a sharp knife and tell me what it’s like after a week. For someone who’s such a brainy and entertaining writer, that one little decision stood out like one big sore thumb. I mean harpoon.