I know -- it's a comic book character I'm about to bring up.
By their very nature, comic book characters defy conventions, timelines, physics, metaphysics, religions, common sense, and willing suspensions of disbelief. So I should just relax when I note an inconsistency in a comic book and move on. Right?
But this time I couldn't.
I was reading a Marvel comic book to my son, one in which the Avengers come across the Marvel version of Hercules. There's a misunderstanding of epic proportions because Hercules only understands Greek (helpfully translated by the editor), and the demigod ends up fighting the Hulk for a while before Captain America -- who understands a little Greek from the time he spent in the country during World War II -- convinces him that he needs to team up with the Avengers to stop a giant, rampaging Cerberus. An understanding is born, and the three-headed monster is defeated.
No problem there. Standard Marvel fare. But what bothered me just a touch was the language Hercules used. Rendered in [bracketed English] so you can tell it's a translation of Greek, the language was presented in mock heroic tones with Hercules speaking of great feasts and feats of strength and general pleasure in good fights. And what caught my eye was a mild oath uttered by the ancient Grecian.
It was zounds.
I remembered from my studies of medieval and Renaissance literature that zounds is an abbreviation of "God's wounds," an exclamation used to express suprise or anger. It was used in that sense by Hercules in the Marvel comic book, but "God's wounds" is an allusion to the wounds suffered by Jesus Christ during the crucifixion. It's an oath born out of Christianity, and one that would be familiar in Christendom, but hardly in ancient Greece. Even if Hercules were real.
I know, I know -- it's a comic book. I should relax. Actually I am pretty laid back about it. It really doesn't bother me that much, but it did give me a good prompt for a blog post.
What's next? Thor screaming "Gadzooks"?
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