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Monday, January 05, 2009

I Think Too Much About Stuff Like This

In the vein of every other "normal career person in a superhero universe" type comic book notion I've touted here, I've also decided that a comic book about crypt keepers and undertakers in a superheroic universe would be awesome.

Funeral directors too. I mean, what kind of coffin do you pick for the probably-apt-to-be-alive-again-eventually superhero? Do you take super strength into account? How do you handle Jean Grey's many many inscriptions? Do you just carve a line through the death date a.la

Jean Grey
1975* - 1992 2004 2008

Or maybe something like:

Jean Grey
1975 - 1992; 1994-2004, 2007-2008

(All dates made up because I have no idea how the rolling timeline works anymore.)

I'd guess the crypt keepers would need SOME superpowers if only to protect the graves from evil villainous graverobbers seeking to take magic artifacts and/or clone their favorite adversary. And to help the newly resurrected folks too weak to break out of their own coffins before they suffocate or something.

And dealing with vandalism and bizarre tributes and funerals in which people with hypersonic screams try to sing funeral hymns...

The gravestones for the oft-resurrected would be the best part of the idea though. Imagine the fun after the family gets utterly tired of the nonsense and starts getting really snarky inscriptions in the granite.

10 Comments:

  • At January 05, 2009 8:50 AM, Blogger Jer said…

    I actually like the idea of funeral directors selling caskets that are easy to get out of - just in case of resurrection. Kind of the opposite of what you'd want in a horror-tinged world where you'd want coffins made of iron with locks on them (or welded shut) - just in case of vampirism or zombiehood.

    I actually kind of chuckled a bit at the funeral scene in the second issue of Final Crisis where the eulogy/prayer included Superman saying something along the lines of "and we hope for a resurrection". Something not out of place at all at Catholic/Christian funerals, but with a totally different meaning given the revolving door the comic book afterlife has.

     
  • At January 05, 2009 9:55 AM, Blogger SallyP said…

    Ideally, they wouldn't bury super heroes at ALL, simply put them in a nice marble mausoleaum...preferably with a revolving door on the front, comfortable cushions in the coffins, and a snack machine inside.

    Can't you just see Jean Grey's headstone, as her family gets fed up with all the resurrections?

    HERE LIES JEAN GREY. FUNERALS ARE EXPENSIVE, PLEASE STAY DEAD THIS TIME

     
  • At January 05, 2009 10:19 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    "I actually like the idea of funeral directors selling caskets that are easy to get out of - just in case of resurrection."

    The real world saw "safety caskets" sold with signalling devices intended to let the victim of a premature burial indicate their "not dead yet" status to those on the surface. Victorian era technology, but I can find patents for more modern versions as recent as the 1990s. And we *don't* live in the comics.

     
  • At January 05, 2009 1:35 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Another question that keeps coming to my mind, regarding the deceased superhero loved one: Entombment or Cremation?

    Preserving the body seems at first glance the best choice, as it'd simplify your loved one's return.

    BUT, not all those returns are good! What if your loved one returns as a zombie, a Black Lantern, or some other shambling unholy mockery of a man?

    Funeral directors would probably have to give the mourning a lot of "straight talk" about the deceased. Was he/she important enough to be inevitably revived? Or would he/she be on the D-List of heroes nobody cares much about, and only gets revived periodically (in the "unholy mockery blah blah blah" category) when Marvel's doing a storyline about that Grim Reaper guy?

     
  • At January 05, 2009 3:41 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    If I recall correctly, that was the idea behind Skeleton Man (Tarot's boyfriend). Of course, being from Jim Balent's mind it sort of went south.

     
  • At January 05, 2009 5:12 PM, Blogger Mr. Bretterson said…

    I believe Jean's current headstone just reads "Jean Grey-Summers" followed by "She will rise again".

    So they aren't kidding themselves.

     
  • At January 06, 2009 10:11 AM, Blogger Ragtime said…

    Does the Marvel timeline actually roll? I just assumed that they are aged really, really slowly.

    The only Marvel that I am buying month-to-month is X-Men: Magneto, and its all about his origins in the Holocaust, and is clearly a teenager in the 1940s.

    Also, my word verification is "uppier," which makes me happy.

     
  • At January 07, 2009 1:46 AM, Blogger Ununnilium said…

    One recent Hawkman storyline had the JLA talking about the need to protect the bodies of dead heroes (this, at the end of a storyline involving superpowers genetically engineered off one such).

     
  • At January 07, 2009 4:05 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    That was in Nightwing. So long, Valhalla.

     
  • At January 07, 2009 9:45 AM, Blogger googum said…

    It's a tombstone and whiteboard.

    The JLA has those big, Legion of Super-Heroes style statues, but on easy-to-move wheels...Metamorpho's is usually kept right up front.

     

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