Saturday, January 13, 2007

Ripples Through Time - 057

I'm reading every Aquaman solo adventure in publication order, one per day. After I read each story I'm going to post the cover/splash page and a few thoughts on the story.

Adventure #124 Aquaman Splash Page
Adventure #124 (January 1948) - The Sea Serpent!

Professor Ness, studying giant turtles on Galapagos, discovers a growth serum... but his assistant becomes greedy.

If you are a Golden Age scientist, you simply cannot trust your assistant. You are fated to die by your assistant's hands. If you discover anything whatsoever of value, you won't make it past the second page.

Jack Leach, the assistant, is smoking in the second panel as he asks Ness about the giant turtles. Ness explains that he thinks the secret of why they grow so big is in their food, and follows the turtles around to see what they eat. He finds a type of moss and eventually extracts the growth serum out of it. Leach kills him over it, but the initial sample is spilled, which leads to a water snake getting some and becoming ... a sea serpent!

Aquaman finds Ness's body, and goes to question Leach. He's attacked by a giant bunny, which he distracts with a pile of carrots, No, I'm not making this up, and Leach falls off the bunny and breaks his neck. Aquaman then oils himself down to face the coils of the sea serpent. I have to admit I wonder what happened to the Giant Galapagos Bunny.

Finny Friends Report: Aquaman gathers an army of fluorescent fish to attract the sea serpent, then is carried away from the corpse of the serpent by dolphins.

Captured/Knocked Out report: Aquaman is knocked out by the grenade he feeds to the sea serpent when it explodes.

Quotefile: Aquaman, "A GIANT RABBIT!"

Have you read this story? What do you think?

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