Captain Forever and the Yesterday People

I wrote a comic book in the not too distant past. I reworked a flash I really liked and made a story board. There was even an artist lined up, but things got weird. It was not called Captain forever and the yesterday people. Though I’d probably pick that up or watch the video, my expectations would be low. I’m thinking something like Bubba Ho-tep meets Doctor Whom.

Captain Forever, the protagonist of the comic I did not write, has an arch nemesis, Chairman Cow. Chairman Cow’s tag line is “I’m gonna need to see some ID.” It endears him to the yesterday people, that’s how he gets them.

Captain Forever’s power is the superhuman ability to wait things out. The comic book would have page after page of him looking inscrutable. There’s a reason why I didn’t write that comic book. If you think hard, there’s a reason why you didn’t write it either.

Sure, when we think of the things we didn’t do, it’s often with some regret, from wistful to furious. Think of all the things that were a great idea not to do. An extreme but obvious example would be all those motherfuckers we didn’t kill that deserved it. Captain Forever and the yesterday people is a more sublime example of taking pride in not doing something.

And, yes, now that he’s out of the closet, I am deliberately not writing his comic book. Um, I didn’t know he was in a closet until about a half an hour ago. I was thinking about Free Form TV shows and Bond titles. I think CW does that too; puts out like fifty shows a season that all sound and look like one another. Though, maybe, on the CW he’d be sergeant forever and on free form she’d be Colonel Tomorrow.  Wait, no, that kind of obscures the superhuman ability.

Captain Forever and the Yesterday people has to be obvious to be sublimely glad not to be created. If it were seditious or obscure I’d be doubting the wisdom of not writing it, and now that I’ve let him or her out of the closet how can I be sure that anything I write isn’t some version of Captain Forever? Shit.