Thursday, June 12, 2008

Marvel introduces the Triumph Division- a Filipino Superteam...HEY WAIT!

I'm still pretty much a comic fan and I do have a weekly pull list from my Local Comic Shop. Well, I missed last week's pickup which included Invincible Iron Man #2. I don't read the comic rumor boards so I was thrilled when I saw this:


Omigod, it's an actual Filipino Super Team! The Triumph Division! It's like my childhood dreams come true, except for my team consisted of a strong man the Mighty Caribou, a commander of angry gamefowl named Cockfighter, Tinikling, an agile fighting dancer who couldn't be touched, a colorfully dressed speedster named Jeepney, and TubigMan which was the Filipino version of Aquaman. Looking back I should have named them the Stereotype Squad, but in my defense I was ten. Is it any worse than Apache Chief of the Super Friends?

Still, it's 2008 and Marvel Comics finally has a Filipino Super Team! Sweet! I turned into a ten year old again trying to imagine them in battle, making up their powers, and coming up with an imaginary mythology which made them much cooler that they actually were. Kinda like what the Star Wars nerds did with Boba Fett. I couldn't wait to see what the future had in store for the Triumph Division. Well, I only had to turn the page ...



Oh! Not good.



Sigh. Did they have to go out like that? So, this Wishing Man apparently has sufficient wishing powers to save the day? He couldn't say "I wish these fools would quit trippin," in time? If I had Wishing Man's powers, in the time it would take me to type this, I would already be laid back in my Malibu Beach house, floating in a pool full of Krispy Kreme donuts while Megan Fox was slowly fondling my 38-inch wee wee. Gah! Does the writer have a grudge against Whilce Portacio or something? I mean it's one thing to kill superheroes for dramatic effect, it happens all the time. I get it. It's another thing to stir up ethnic pride and lifetime fanboy wish fulfillment for a segment of your audience and then quash it two pages later.

Oh well, maybe I'll have to settle for seeing Cockfighter in print some day. I thought I saw a movie named Cockfighter. Maybe I'll go rent it or something. I dunno why it was in the adults only section though.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm sorry Paj.

I can't really imagine how you feel. Being a home grown white american I really have a banquet of real american heroes to pick from. I would like to think that if one of my american heroes got shot in the stomach or some such silly death I'd be upset. But luckily that will never happen, right?

Paj said...

Well, even if it does happen, you'd still have American Heroes to pick from like...almost every hero in existence.

I think when I read comics now I'll just add Pinoy or Filipino to the names of all the characters. So next week I'll have my reviews of the latest issues of Pinoy Superman and Filipino Spider-Man. I think I might go international as well with Pinoy Captain Britain Filipino Alpha Flight.

Anonymous said...

At least they weren't skrulls.

Don't forget to review Captain Filipino-American, the Fantastic Pinoy Four, and of course the Mighty Pinoy Avengers will be crossing over with the New Filipino Avengers. Good stuff.