Gosporn: Finding Pneuma

Sep 22, 2012

Finding Pneuma

I'm reading The Mediterranean Caper, 1972, by Clive Cussler - one of those old paperbacks you find at beach cabins. Dirk Pitt and his merry band of oceanographers is a guilty pleasure, I guess I always liked the idea of a hunky all-male crew out saving the oceans and the world. Apparently, so do erotic comic artists Patrick Fillion and Jacob Mott, who have created the gay version of Dirk Pitt: Mako Finn!

MAKO FINN was born of Patrick Fillion’s love of the ocean and appreciation of the life that resides beneath the waves – especially Sharks. A sexy hero with an ecological slant, Mako is the champion of the Seas, sworn to protect the ocean at all costs.

Hey, I ALSO love the oceans, sea life, and even sharks, especially after going down the Shark God of Molokai rabbit hole a few years ago. Of course, I figure that any true eco-warrior would be labeled an eco-terrorist soon enough by the PTB, which would lend a swash-buckling, piratical flavor to the operation - a queer Captain Nemo!

Even though Dirk Pitt and Mako Finn are both handsome and daring defenders of the seas, there is one rather huge difference between them. This is a steamy sex scene from The Mediterranean Caper:

He lifted her in his arms and kissed her. Her lips were warm and moist.
"When was the last time had a man?" he whispered. "Not since..." Her voice trailed away.
Pitt took her as the long shadows of the rocks crept upward over the beach, shielding their bodies from the sun. A flight of sandpipers circled overhead and descended upon the damp sand at the water's edge. They scurried back and forth, playing tag with the surf. Every so often one of the birds would cast a beady eye at the two lovers in the shade, staring for a fleeting instant before returning to the chore of stabbing its long curved beak in the sand for food.

Wait.... what? This, on the other hand, is a sex scene from Mako Finn:

NOTES:

Jules Verne was very likely gay, so it may well be that Captain Nemo is a subconscious queer character from the get go.

Mako Finn's organization is the Oceanic Research & Conservation Agency, or ORCA. Orca whales, sometimes called "killer whales", are the top predator of the seas (behind man). Being enormous and clever black and white creatures with many sharp teeth, they symbolize inescapable justice, much like Moby Dick and Kauhuhu, the Hawaiian Shark God.

Dirk Pitt's organization is the National Underwater Marine Agency, or NUMA. Pneuma (πνεύμα) is an ancient Greek word for "breath," and in a religious context for "spirit" or "soul."

The "connate pneuma" of Aristotle is the warm mobile "air" that in the sperm transmits the capacity for locomotion and certain sensations to the offspring. These movements derive from the soul of the parent and are embodied by the pneuma as a material substance in semen.