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THE LAW IS A ASS for 02/05/2002
DOCKET ENTRY
"The Law is a Ass" Installment # 131
Originally written as installment # 120 and published in Comics Buyer's Guide issue # 725, October 9, 1987 issue
Okay, admit it. You didn't really believe a man could fly, now did you?
Yes, I know it looked pretty cool. Christopher Reeve swooping around darting in and out of buildings, pirouetting in the sky in a zero-G double axel. It beat all hell out of George Reeves hanging from wires with a fan blowing in his face and a movie playing behind him. But as good as it looked, I still didn't believe for one second that a man could fly. I knew better
Just like, several years earlier, I knew better than ever to believe, Speed Racer. Yes, I know it--along with Astro Boy; Kimba, the White Lion, and Eighth Man--constituted an early Japanese anime invasion on these shores. And, yes, I know the show was immensely popular. Still doesn't mean I liked it, which I didn't for the reasons I establish in the column which follows.
Nor does it mean that I bought the premise, which was as flawed as Enron's investment strategy. Nope, not even as a kid did I accept a kid race car driver again, pretty much for the reasons I mentioned in the column which follows.
Sorry. Didn't like the show, didn't buy the premise. Still, all told, we probably weren't too different. You sang the theme song to Speed Racer and urged the hero to, "Go, Speed Racer. Go Speed Racer, Go Speed Racer. Gooooo." Well, I also wanted him to go.
Away.
******
"The Law is a Ass"
Installment # 131
by
Bob Ingersoll
According to my Bartlett's Familiar Quotations Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." I never met Emerson, so I can't verify whether he really said it or whether it was one of those famous quotes that the person to which it was attributed never actually said; kind of like "Play it again, Sam." However, it's far too good a line for no one to have said it. And, as no one has ever disputed Emerson's claim to it, Emerson it is.
However, if Emerson was concerned with foolish consistencies, what would he have made out of the monumentally stupid inconsistencies found in Speed Racer # 1? I don't know about Emerson, but I stand to make a few bucks out of them by writing this column.
Speed Racer is a Now Comic based on the Japanese animation TV series of the same name, which was first syndicated in the USA some twenty odd years ago. (Well, I don't know how the last twenty years have been for you, but for me they've been real odd!) It was, if memory serves correctly, the story of a fifteen-year old boy named "Speed" Racer, who drove on the professional race car circuit using his father's car, the Mach 5. The Mach 5 was a very fast, computerized car with "optional extras" to make James Bond and Q green with envy. It was not, I must confess, a show I watched often. In the first place, it was about auto racing--cars going very fast in a big circle. Then, as now, I find watching auto racing approximately as interesting as watching meat rot. In fact, if, under penalty of death, I had to choose between the two, rotting meat would win hams down.
In the second place, Speed Racer, the TV show, had this supporting character named Spridle, Speed's kid brother. Spridle was typical of young children in Japanese animation; he made hyperactive children look like Valium abusers, he had the IQ of sorghum (in fact, he had a chimp named "Chim-Chim" who could master the Theory of Relativity next to Spridle), and, finally, Spridle had a bone-decalcifying, ear-piercing, deafness-inducing screech which masqueraded as his voice and which could defoliate rain forests. I can only read Speed Racer, the comic, because I don't have to hear Spridle's word balloons. I give fair warning to Now Comics: if this book ever comes out with one of those flexi-discs you can play on a phonograph so that its sounds come alive, the Interstate Commerce Commission will investigate you for transportation of hazardous materials.
Speed Racer # 1 was supposed to answer lots of the questions, which the TV series never answered like 1) what was "Speed's" real name; 2) what did the G on his shirt stand for; and 3) why would the professional auto racing circuit would allow a fifteen-year-old kid, who might not even have a license to drive yet, compete. The answers are 1) Greg; 2) Greg--what did you think it was for, "G Force"?; and 3) they didn't, Speed is seventeen.
Hmmm. I'll admit trusting things to my memory is about as safe as flicking your Bic in a fireworks warehouse, but I could have sworn Speed was only fifteen in the TV series. Maybe Now Comics boosted his age by a couple of years, because it was hard enough to explain how a kid could become authorized to race cars professionally, let alone a kid who was too young to get a driver's license.
One question the comic book didn't the comic answer the question was how come Speed's girlfriend, Trixie, has an M on her shirt. She's a mackerel? Actually, the question about Trixie isn't the only thing Speed Racer # 1 doesn't answer. See, just because Speed wasn't really fifteen, still leaves one very important question unanswered: how and why the professional auto racing circuit in the comic--or any professional auto racing circuit, for that matter--would allow a seventeen-year-old kid to compete on their circuit? I mean, driver's license or no, it's just not going to happen without a real good reason. And, while the comic tried to explain this, but I'd buy Ethel Merman's disco album, before I'd buy the explanation from Speed Racer #1.
But I'll let you judge for yourself, here's the reason.
The Racer family--Pops, and his adopted sons, Rex, Greg, and Spridle--were race car designers and builders. They designed and built the Mach 5, the powerful, computerized race car I mentioned earlier. They borrowed money from the bank to do it, figuring that they could pay back the loans from what Rex won driving the car. Then Rex was murdered. (Okay, I know he wasn't really murdered, but only pretended to have been killed and disguised himself as Racer X, but that's way more information than we need for this discussion. Suffice it to say, The Racer family think Rex is dead and they don't have him to drive the Mach 5.) So, now, unless the Racer family could find someone to race the Mach 5 and pay off the loans, their live's work--the Mach 5-- would be repossessed. (I keep flashing on this image of Harry Dean Stanton and Emilio Estavez making off with the Mach 5.)
Greg volunteered. Pops said no. He pointed out such factors as Greg's youth, the fact that Greg hadn't even driven any qualifying runs let alone real races, Greg's youth, the fact that he had no training, Greg's youth, the fact that the racing commission would never allow a seventeen-year-old to compete, and, oh yeah, Greg's youth.
Oh, and did I mention Greg's youth? That's real important.
In Ohio, we have a statute called Endangering Children. Other states have similar statutes; Ohio didn't want a monopoly. Ohio's reads, in pertinent part, "No person being the parent... of a child under eighteen... shall create a substantial risk to the health or safety of such child, by violating a duty of care, protection, or support." Even Hamilton Burger, the long-suffering, perpetually-losing DA/victim of Perry Mason's theatrics could have secured a child endangering conviction against a parent who let his kid to drive in the Indy circuit.
When Greg makes his intention public, the other racers in the circuit--all of whom look younger than Greg, so what's the big problem about his age for crying out loud?--make fun of him and nickname him "Speed." We can only hope it's for his driving abilities, not his choice in recreational pharmaceutics.
Greg appeals his case to the racing Association officials, the head of which is The Colonel. The Colonel is an interesting study. His appearance not only proves cloning technology exists, it also proves that someone believed the perfect way to demonstrate that cloning works was to make a bio-engineered Xerox copy of the late Colonel Harlan Sanders. (I like Kentucky Fried Chicken as well as the next guy--assuming the next guy has no taste buds--but why would the bio-engineers chose as the subject of their first cloning someone whose major contribution to the world was a choice between "Original" and "Extra Crispy?")
The officials turn Greg down. They point out, among other things, Greg's youth, the fact that the Association rules forbid drivers under eighteen years of age, and, oh yeah, Greg's youth.
Undaunted, Greg makes an unauthorized entry into the qualifying rounds. It seems the Mach 5 has heavy-duty hydraulic springs built into it which allow it to jump several feet into the air. Speed waited until the qualifying rounds had started, jumped over the restraining wall, raced to the front of the pack--we're talking at least twelve cars in this qualifying round!--and set a new track record in the process. This proved both his and the Mach 5's ability to compete in the racing circuit. What skill! What daring! What utter nonsense!
Okay, I've already admitted I don't watch racing much, but don't the drivers in qualifying rounds race by themselves against only a stop watch, not against other drivers, so as not to run any unnecessary risks? And even if they don't, I am sure that no professional racing circuit would permit the use of a car which could jump over a restraining wall. If it could do that, it could also jump over the cars in front of it, instead of having to pass them the ordinary way. That would be cheating. It could also jump over the wall to keep from crashing into it. That wouldn't be cheating, but it would cut down on the crowds who only come to the races to see the crashes.
So Pop Racer changes his mind. His son proved he could drive defensively, competitively, and knew how to push the right buttons. Either the ones on the Mach 5's steering wheel or some personal ones that Pop has that I don't even want to think about. Anyway, forgotten is any concern of Pop has that what he's going to let his son do is against the law. After all, Speed proved he could do it, so why should silly consistencies like continuing to follow the law stop the Racer family?
And, if that weren't enough inconsistencies for you, the racing officials change their minds. Speed proved that he had the skill and courage necessary to drive a professional racing car. So they let him race. Besides, as the Colonel points out, "It's the possibility of death that brings in the crowds. The fans live for the crashes!... [Speed] will pack 'em in!" (See? And you thought I was just making a cynical joke a paragraph ago.)
But wait a second? What about those noble Association rules cited earlier which forbid minors from racing? They get forgotten, because attendance will skyrocket as morbid fans flock to the track to watch a kid turn himself into road kill? As I said before, a monumentally stupid inconsistency.
Not stupid because it's so disgustingly greedy as to be obscene--that's normal. No, it's stupid, because it's so damned counterproductive. Just what size crowds does the Association think it's going to pull in, after every child welfare organization in every county where Speed tries to race enjoins it from operating as long as it permits minors to compete in its field?
Really, the Association wasn't thinking. It's just asking for lots of child welfare agency suits, at a time that all of its resources are going to be tied up fighting other suits. What other suits? Remember, when I said the Colonel looks like Harlan Sanders? Well, if memory serves Kentucky Fried Chicken has trademarked the Colonel's likeness. The Association's going to have to defend itself on all the trademark infringement suits.
Bob Ingersoll
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