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What Good Are Super Powers If You Can't Shack up with Elizabeth Taylor?Jan 27 '01 (Updated Jan 29 '01) Write an essay on this topic.
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The Bottom Line Kellydeal and company are mucking up the "Five Gifts I'd Like" category by posting their thoughts on which five super powers they would choose for themselves as superheros.
And I'm not talking about any 2001 Elizabeth Taylor. I'm talking about Liz circa 1960, the Liz that we know from Butterfield 8 and Cleopatra. Choice #1: Good Guy or Bad Guy? or What's in it for me? When I received an invitation from Kellydeal to participate in a super powers write-off, the first question that occurred to me was whether I wanted to be a good guy or a bad guy. After all, the good guys tend to have all the really nifty powers, but the bad guys are the ones who have all of the fun. So for a while I toyed with the idea of being a bad guy. I tried to become excited about the concept of taking over the world, enslaving humanity, etc. But it turns out that I can't get very excited about taking over the world because I have a very precise imagination, the kind of imagination that reminds me that people who take over the world just get stuck taking care of it until they die. And that doesn't sound like any more fun than being a good guy. Running the world is probably even more work than holding down a job as a reporter and moonlighting as the guy who protects humanity from Lex Luthor. I say to heck with good guys and bad guys. If I'm going to have super powers, they had better be the kind of powers that make my life more enjoyable, not the kind that force me to let my spaghetti get cold while I redirect asteroids headed straight for Kansas. So after having tried my very best to choose between good and evil, I've decided to go for plain old selfish. Maybe that makes me evil, but not evil in the kind of way that makes it necessary for any of the rest of you to use your new-found super powers against me. You know what they say: Live and let super heroes live. Choice #2: Gimmicks or Mutation? or Dude, Don't Be Stupid! Godzilla Breathes Fire Like any other American male born in the late 60s, I grew up having to endure endless verbal sparring between my friends concerning two very annoying questions: 1) Who would win between Batman and Superman? and 2) Who would win between Godzilla and King Kong? The questions irritated me not because they were irrelevant or grounded in fantasy, but because they were both so painfully easy to answer. Beware of those who say that they do not deign to answer questions as silly as these; stay clear of such folk, my friends, for they are merely afraid to choose sides--probably because they do not wish to alienate the winners of the inevitable contests. There is no reason to be afraid of choosing sides, however. You don't need to be a Las Vegas handicapper to know that Superman and Godzilla are the clear-cut winners here. I mean, duh. Sure, there are those who maintain that the Batmobile is actually built out of Kryptonite--or that apes are higher on the evolutionary scale than lizards. But the important thing to remember is that Godzilla can breathe fire and that Superman can fly. Batman isn't even a legitimate superhero in my book; he's just some bored millionaire with an incredibly industrious butler. I was not surprised to find myself leaning toward being one of those mutant superheros. I figured I would much rather have my powers woven into the fabric of my being than engineered into the gadgetry attached to my bat-belt. But then I stepped back and realized that if I had refused to choose between being a good guy and being a bad guy, I might as well refuse to make this choice as well. I'm not saying that Batman is any match for Superman, but I guess I wouldn't mind having a few nifty gadgets to go along with my freakish powers. Hooking up with Liz--or How Long Before You Get on with It, Man? So I had decided that my powers could take any form that I wanted and that I would use them in the interest of--for lack of a better word--self-interest. But what was in my interest? I mean, what good would all of these super powers be to me? I asked myself what I really wanted. Usually when I ask myself what I want I don't even think about things that are impossible. I guess I want to be the first man to climb Mt. Everest, but there's no point in wanting that without having some idea how to flout the laws of time and space and reason. And what, I ask you, are super powers for if not for flouting the laws of time and space and reason? As it turns out, I don't want all that much--just the adoration of the rest of my species and an ongoing romantic commitment from the Liz Taylor of the early 60s. To that end, I give you my super powers: #1: The ability to make any Hollywood prop actually do whatever it was supposed to be able to do in the movies How would I get back to 1960? Would I go into outer space and circle the earth at faster-than-light speed the way Superman did to rescue Lois Lane from the earthquake that killed her? See, the thing is, I get dizzy. So I figure I would use the Delorian that Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd modified for time travel in Back to the Future. #2: Certain anatomical enhancements, but not what you're thinking Given the opportunity to lengthen any part of their anatomy, most men would make a pretty unimaginative choice. But you have to remember that Liz Taylor is a class act. You don't walk into a bar and drop your pants and impress her with some freakish package. But if you were to make conversation with her in a lisp that she couldn't help noticing was a result of the extraordinary length of your tongue, well then you might be able to work the conversation around to the sorts of uses to which such a tongue might be put. I'm just sayin'. #3: Etymological/Neologistic Perfection It would be important to me to know everything that there is to know about all languages used throughout history, so that when I got around to giving names to my various super powers, I wouldn't mix Greek roots with English terms, as in . . . #4: Pan-claimability As difficult as it is for me to accept the truth of what I am about to say, the simple fact of the matter is that a woman like Liz would probably not be impressed by my stories of how I came from the future, where I wrote 500-word product reviews that were regarded as "Very Helpful" by dozens of other reviewers. I imagine that Liz, like most women, is impressed by accomplishments. There are two ways to impress women with your accomplishments: 1) to accomplish something, or 2) to lie. I've always preferred lying because, in truth, I'm a terribly lazy person. I think it really must be very satisfying to direct a cinematic masterpiece or to write a soul-stopping play. But who has time for satisfaction? I'm afraid I have to insist on skipping straight to the accolades. I would like to be able to take credit for anything with the absolute certainty that history would rewrite itself to correspond with my version. Once I got Liz's attention, for instance, I would show her a stageplay that I was adapting to the screen and that I envisioned her starring in, a strangely brilliant little piece called Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. Then I would suggest that she and I read it in privacy on the top floor of the Chrysler Building, which I would describe to her as a piece of architectural whimsy that I had drawn up in one of my more extravagant moods. If she asked me how I had been able to afford building it, I would say that it had seemed to be a good way to use the funds that were given to me by the peoples of the Middle East, as a token of their heartfelt gratitude for my having brought permanent peace to their region. And voila! All of the history books would suddenly support what I had to say. The prime minister of Israel would have a first-hand recollection of having presented me with a check. #5: Super-Mega-Hypno-Mind-Control According to my wife, women and men have similar sexual appetites. It's just that women like seduction, whereas men tend to think of it as an unnecessary preliminary. I think she may have something there. But even though I might be a little too busy taking credit for everything cool in the history of the world to have time for a proper seduction of Liz, there's no reason that she should have to go without being seduced. That would be Sophia Loren's job. If either Liz or Sophia protested to the arrangement on the basis of some confirmed commitment to heterosexuality, I would simply look them both in the eye and say, "Pish posh! What a lot of nonsense. Now, kiss." And they would. They couldn't help themselves in the face of my super-mega-hypno-mind-control ability. I once read that Elizabeth Taylor said that Ava Gardner was the most beautiful woman in Hollywood. I don't see the appeal myself, but I figure what the heck. She could join in too. After all, I wrote Hamlet, built the pyramids single-handedly, and did all the essential work concerning our present understanding of quantum mechanics. I deserve as many starlets as I can send Liz out to bring home. #6: What, you mean I'm done already? I'm just getting started. Thanks a lot kelly. Now that you've started me thinking, it turns out that I consider life without superpowers to be a colossal gyp. I'm going to go take a cold shower now. Or maybe I'll make my wife watch The Love Goddesses with me, the one starring Liz, not the porno. Though, come to think of it . . . For other, less idiotic treatments of the superpowers write-off, check out the contributions of the following writers: kellydeal, jennifernorth, Gr8dane, phixed, c-option, sleestakk sundogg99, Mr.Eyore, Officer, aribuzz, st3on1ey1baby, Dlamarrx, herjazz, JennJoy, Liberator76, OdellBurgess, waltlockley, zenhues, Rhupea, vipvop, levda, Christoff. P.S. I'm sure I'm not the only contributor wishing for the most important superpower of all--the ability to bring back the feel of the old epinions. C-ya, Sloucho  |
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