There are only so many ways in which you can say ‘old man’. None of them entirely inoffensive. Alezor had an extremely eventful century and a half behind him. He had stood up for truth and justice and things like that. He had battled whatever forces had appeared evil to him in their time. He was an inspiration to good beings in his world and beyond (or so he liked to believe).

The Hero laid his sword down on the pier and looked westward. He had learnt long ago that looking at the sunset helped nothing except his image in the eyes of the obsessive admirers standing behind him. Although in pressing times, obsessive admirers were often the only thing standing between him and a future without a decent pension. They spelled votes.

He grew tired of looking at the sunset. So he sighed audibly and slowly turned towards the temple. The Sorceress stood in the hallway.

“How much longer?” he asked.

Calling everyone who watched The Incredibles more than once. Personally, I saw it twice in a theatre and plenty more times on DVD. There is just so much between the lines stuff in it that re-watching becomes essential. So much that could go into the sequel to the mock-superheroic.

No, I am not ignorant to the infamous likeness to the Fantastic Four. That’s just something we all will have to live with (Pixar sure did. Nobody sued them. Miracles still happen!).

So in Freenagar, young Chakram Shastri decided to be a superhero. He gathered together resources, built a secret hideout, figured out custom catch phrases, worked on those facial expressions, trained hard to be able to fire quick witty comebacks to supervillains’ dangerous threats, and a lot of other superheroic stuff.

Then he got to the identity part. He had a name in mind. He was sure it would work. The name was Batman.

He groaned. Apparently, a self righteous do-gooder had already taken it. Chakram wasn’t one to persevere. But he had a way to make the name his. And it wasn’t entirely impossible. His uncle, a scientist of no repute, had once made a time machine that worked.

Technically, there can’t be a mad mad scientist. But I am sure you realise that. Now that we are past that tiny issue, let’s come to think of his appeal as a motif in modern myth of the corny variety. Having appeared extensively in comic books and movies over decades, his characteristic nuances are unmistakable.

He operates on a grand scale. He is driven by overpowering ambition. He has a thing for monologues (this also goes for super villains and evil overlords) that frequently end with, ‘…once and for all’ or ‘…mine, all mine.’ More often than not, he breaks into manic laughter that echoes in his innermost sanctums or his courthouse (if he is the court-holding type).

I’ve got lice in my head (that’s part of the myth). Suppose its an advanced and evolved civilisation of parasites. There must be intellectual lice who warn their folk of the ill effects of sucking too much blood off me. They tell them that if I die, they all die.

And there are the evil corporate lice. They work at advancing a head-wide empire of commerce. They make products from my blood and market it all over their world.