Mad as Hellcow

Although I often find Twitter to be an overwhelming torrent of useless information, mediocre humor, and stupid comments, the odd gem does pop up once in a while, usually in the form of a link. Yesterday one such link appeared, and I simply could not keep myself from clicking on it. It was a top ten list (of which there are many out there) entitled "Top 10 Weird Marvel Comic Characters".

"Weird" is definitely the word. "Bizarre" fits as well. And you can also throw in a dash of "funny", because some of them are so ludicrious that you will not be able to keep from laughing. I know I got a giggle or two out of it.

There was one, though, that stood out for me, one in particular that just caught my attention and made my mind swim in its absolute absurdity. A character so deliciously unbelievable that I was left dying to know more.

That character was Hellcow.

Yes, folks, you read correctly. Hellcow. A supernatural cow with a grudge and a bad attitude.

Hellcow was originally known as Bessie, and she was a regular, ordinary cow. She lived in Switzerland some three-hundred years ago, on a farm owned by a fellow named Hans. (Let's face it, you can't have a story set in Switzerland without a character named Hans.) She basically had a cow's life.

All that changed, however, when Dracula came to town. Yes, Dracula. The vampire. The famous one. Yeah, that Dracula. Are you sitting down? Have you put down your beverage? Because this gets really good. I don't want you snorting liquids onto your keyboard.

According to what sources I've been able to find (and there aren't that many references to Hellcow on the internet), Dracula had searched through the little Swiss town, but had been unable to find anyone to feast upon. So, he set upon poor Bessie instead.

Seriously? There was no one? Not a single human to feed on? He had to resort to sucking on a cow? I mean, come on. This is Dracula we're talking about here. The greatest vampire of them all. The leader of the pack. The big Kahuna. The head honcho. He must have been having a really off night. Or else he had an aversion to chocolate. Or perhaps lederhosen.

So we shake our heads and move on.

The next morning, farmer Hans disovered Bessie's dead body out in the pasture. I'm sure he shed a tear or two, because if Hans was anything like the Von Trapp family or Heidi's relatives, he would have been the sensitive type. He was so senstive, in fact, that he buried Bessie.

This brings to our next WTF moment, hot on the heels of the last one.

Do people bury cows? I mean, I don't know. I've never lived on a farm. But for some reason, I had it in my head that farmers don't tend to bury their dead livestock. I would have thought that they would put the carcasses to good use, like for meat or something. Does that make sense? I've honestly never heard of someone burying a cow.

But Hans was evidently a very sensitive Swiss farmer indeed, one with a tremendous respect for the dead. So he buried Bessie.

Bad idea.

Three nights later, Bessie rose from the dead. And boy, was she pissed. Frankly, I don't blame her. If I'd been bitten by a really stupid vampire and buried in the ground by an equally stupid farmer, I'd have been pissed too.

But I have to pause again here for our third WTF moment. I'm no expert, but I've read and seen a few vampire stories, and any time I've ever seen a vampire "turn" a victim into another vampire, it was a very deliberate act. Usually, if a vampire is feeding from a human, he or she will drink all the blood, leaving the victim dead. In order to "turn" the victim, the vampire must only drink some of the blood, and then the victim must also drink some of the vampire's blood.

At least, that's the way I understand it.

But then, this is vampire mythology we're talking about here, and it's been interpreted in a myriad of different ways over the years. This could just be a different spin on things. Or maybe it was bovine physiology that made the difference.

Or maybe it was just really bad writing.

Regardless, Bessie was now risen from the dead, hopping mad, and ready to wreak vengeance upon Dracula and all of his kind. Which brings us to WTF moment number five: Bessie was now possessed of self-awareness and sufficient intelligence to understand the concept of vengeance.

Holy Frack, Sonny-Jim! What's in that there vampire juice, anyway?

I have no information about what happened to poor old undead, vengeful, bovine Bessie in the intervening three-hundred years, but we have it on good authority that she ended up in Cleveland, Ohio in the 1970s. How she managed that little trick is beyond my ken. Perhaps she turned into a cow-bat and stowed away on a trans-Atlantic cargo ship. I dunno.

Though she lived a fearful long time, Bessie's story is ultimately a short one. In another of a great growing litany of WTF moments, she mistook Howard the Duck for Dracula and attacked him. This led to a mighty conflict in an auto-body shop, during which Howard warded off Bessie with a cross-shaped lug wrench. At the end of one of her mistimed lunges at the confused duck, her fangs became embedded in a whitewall tire. This gave Howard enough time to grab a wooden stake and a mallet and bring to end the puzzling afterlife of Bessie the Hellcow.

Only something this stupid could inspire me write this much inane drivel and have such blasted fun doing it.

Thanks for the diversion, Marvel. I hope to read the actual comic someday.

And RIP Bessie. The Hellcow.

Gesundheit.

(What better way to end a post about a demonic vampire cow, than with a symphonic rendition of "I Am Cow" by the Arrogant Worms?)