I used to have a quasi-phobia of drowning that hung around until my early twenties. Funny enough, it never stopped me from swimming, diving into water and especially hangng in the Atlantic Ocean for hours at a time. Even when my parents took me to see Jaws in 1977 at the Edmondson Drive-In near Baltimore, Maryland. I’d slept in the back seat through some of it, but what I caught wouldn’t leave me for life.

Today, I am still found in the ocean with my kid, who can’t get enough of it himself. I love water and the undine elementals always call to me in contest with the earthen gnomes already captivating me whenever we’re hiking. Water calms me, moreover, it soothes me. I’m at peace next to a body of water. I laugh at my younger self, since I’d foolishly cheated death climbing mountains without ropes during my college years and would’ve fallen to my death once had there not been a branch within reach to save me.

Water is a safe haven for me these days, since I’m not on a commercial freighter facing down the raging tempests they do. However, within the span of a few months, I’ve seen two of the most terrifying images from pop culture I’ve seen in ages, both lurking from the depths of the unknown.

I’m talking about Godzilla’s petrifying glare of vengeance from the fathoms in Godzilla: Minus One and also from last week’s release of Batman # 143, part two of an abbreviated three-part interlude story, “Joker: Year One.” I don’t think I’ve ever seen the Clown Prince of Crime so damned frightening.

Comic fans, however, have been absolutely geeking about the page which follows this horrific image. The next one bearing a gaunt, naked and beyond creepy Joker striking a garish Jesus pose sure to unsettle comic geeks and non. I have only been reading Wonder Woman, Catwoman and Justice League vs. Godzilla vs. Kong from DC these days, but as a longtime Batfan who’s taken a break due to the gross (and expensive) saturation of the character by the imprint, these images have already scarred me for my remaining days.

I’m still trying to decide if the undines are equally mortified or pleased as hell.

–Ray Van Horn, Jr.