Sidewalk Superheroes

I need to hurry up and get to the present! Stuff keeps happening, but if I don’t post chronologically, nothing will make sense. So I’ve discussed two weekends ago, our first as Catwoman and Padme, and the week leading up to this past weekend, where the Batdrama began. Let’s go to Friday, where things began to pick up again.

By this time Bat M was truly insufferable. We would somewhat work with him — well, he hovered near us all the time, so we couldn’t really help it, and even when he was mad at us, he couldn’t stay away for more than five minutes — but as soon as Bat A showed up, we were off. We began to be less subtle about it too, which may sound mean, but if no one catches that you’re being subtle, why bother? Besides, he kept following us anyway. It got to the point where Bat M would corner us somewhere and be so involved in whatever it was he was talking about — his past life as a well-paid mechanic, his hatred of Bat A, how he and Bat T were cool with each other, even though we’d never seen them exchange a word — that we began to text each other. He didn’t even notice. I even managed to shoot this with the camera on my phone and send it to Catwoman right in front of him:

shoot me now

She snorted, but he didn’t even notice. “Remember that pic every time he starts talking,” I texted her.

Around lunchtime Superman showed up. An Armenian guy had approached him the night before, after we had gone for the day, and wanted to shoot a local commercial using some of the characters. While the man had wanted the more brightly coloured costumes, Superman had apparently fought very hard to get monochromatic Catwoman in on the shoot. (I learned later from Storm Trooper that Superman had pretty much insisted that Catwoman be used, and Storm Trooper said, “He has to have a thing for your friend to be pushing that hard for her.” Hmmm…) Superman had to call the Armenian at 2, and wanted us to be there for the call. He had been trying for days now to get us to his apartment, and we were reluctant to go. We’d heard from various characters what it was like, but didn’t feel the need to see it up close and personal. Still, Catwoman wanted a smoothie and Superman knew where to get one, so we set off.

I guess it was good that we did, because we were stopped for a picture that we would have missed otherwise, and we each got $10 off of it. Not bad! We went up a level and passed by a small jewelry shop, and Bat M glanced in and saw someone he recognized. He and Superman conferred and both of them recognized the guy, but couldn’t place which movie he was from. Some action film, they knew that. Never one to miss an opportunity, Superman said, “Well let’s go talk to him!” and marched off. The man was just stepping out of the shop and seemed surprised to be met with four lunatics in costume. The boys chatted with the man for a bit, and Superman asked for some pictures:

l-r: me, Brian Thompson, Catwoman, Superman

I knew he looked familiar, and I wanted to say he was the Alien Bounty Hunter from The X Files, but he looked different. Granted, 10 years had passed, but he didn’t look nearly as scary as the guy in the show. He still creeps me out, and I still watch that show. God, I love it. Anyway, when I got home I looked up the credits for the show, and it was him! He just looked different because he was kind and smiling, and he really was about the nicest guy ever. His name is Brian Thompson, look him up. He talked to us for quite a while and even took down our contact information, “if I ever need character actors for one of my projects,” he said.

Happy at how this field trip was going, we got our smoothies and headed off to Superman’s abode. I had wanted to beg off of this part, but I couldn’t get away, and morbid curiosity is a weakness of mine. He really does live just across the street from H&H, too.

The apartment . . . was . . . wow. I call it the Fortress of Solitude as a joke, but I can’t really do justice to just how Superman’d out it was. He couldn’t even open the front door all the way because the place is so crammed full of stuff. There’s shelves everywhere, and piles of stuff on top of the shelves, and every square inch of wall and ceiling is plastered in stuff. Action figures in their packaging dangle from the ceiling by fishing wire. And every single item is Superman, no exaggeration. The only things that aren’t themed are the two chairs and deflated sofa, the lamp, the TV, cable box and computer. That’s it, honestly. I wanted to take pictures but I was afraid of offending him. Instead, Catwoman snuck a cameraphone picture:

chillin' in the Fortress

I know, it’s not much, but it’s bad enough. At that point we were waiting for the Armenian guy to come back, and since I was sitting where I could see the TV, I decided to start watching The Reaping. It wasn’t very interesting, but it was still better than sitting in awkward silence. Superman lit up a ciggie, and Catwoman said, “Um, should you be smoking around collectibles?”
“It’s okay, I wash them down like once a week, and all the papers are sealed,” he said. Bat M lit up, obviously having been there before, and they shared an ashtray that I’m fairly sure wasn’t intended to be an ashtray. I don’t know what exactly it was, though it looked like a car part. After his cig Superman sent Bat M to get the mail, and he had gotten an old TV magazine in the mail with Christopher Reeves on the cover. With the haze of cigarette smoke still in the air, he began flipping through it. Catwoman and I exchanged looks.
“Maybe you should call that guy back,” she suggested, obviously restless. We’d been waiting nearly an hour for the guy to call back, and we were missing work. Superman finally called the man back, and the shoot had fallen through. The restaurant they were supposed to be filming at was giving him a hard time, so the filming would be rescheduled for after the holidays. We headed back out.

“Oh my god, guys, you missed it!” Cheetah Girl gushed as soon as we walked up. She didn’t seem to show up regularly, and seemed to always have a different costume that involved a steering wheel cover, but she’s sweet as hell, so I don’t care. She had been talking earlier in the day about possibly getting a reality show, and promising that we would be in it because she liked us, so I was wondering if we’d missed the big news.
“Tom Cruise was just here!” Storm Trooper cut in.
“What?!?” Catwoman and I were suddenly pissed at Superman. Not that we’re Tom Cruise fans by any stretch of the imagination (though my first boyfriend looked like him), but still, it’s that weird mentality where you want to meet a big celebrity even if you don’t care for them.
“Oh, man, I’m still freaking out over this! Oh my god,” Cheetah Girl said, and had to sit down. Storm Trooper took over.
“I guess he was filming something for Jimmy Kimmel,” he said, pointing across the street to Jimmy’s building, “and they wanted to use all the characters. So they lined us all up and Tom Cruise jumps out of his car, runs by tapping us all on the head, and then took off.”
“What?”
“I dunno, I think they were trying to see how many heads he could tap in a minute. But he was right here, man! Afterwards he was standing right next to me, and I was like, ‘How you doin’? It was crazy.” We were jealous. After Superman had bragged about how many times he’d been on Jimmy’s show and how he could get us on, he’s responsible for us missing our first appearance. We glowered.
“Fucking Dollhouse Guy had to ruin it for everyone, though,” Storm Trooper continued.
“What happened?” I asked.
“You know how it is; some big celebrity shows up and all the crazies have to get in on the action. So he shows up and gets too close to Tom, yelling, and his bodyguards have to step in, and then they shove him in the car and drive off.”

About half an hour later, Dollhouse guy shows up.
“Fucking Tom Cruise, had to go and ruin it for everyone,” he said bitterly.