Titan Dreams
Saturn's largest moon has a special place in our imagination, and there is little wonder why... Not only is it the only moon in the solar system with a dense (aka mysterious) atmosphere, it also has the grand, spectacularly ringed gas giant as a rather stunning backdrop. Imagine the view! Well, on a clear day, which technically never happens on Titan, but let's gloss over that...
Titan was discovered in 1655 by the Dutch astronomer Christian Huygens, and in 2004 the Huygens probe landed on the surface, sending back data and images. It was discovered that the moon has lakes of liquid hydrocarbons (the only other body in our system apart from Earth known to have lakes) and cryovolcanoes.
But long before 2004, human imagination was more than ready to fill in the gaps...
Science fiction has used the moon as a base for many scenarios over the decades, usually re-inventing it as having a very Earth-like environment; comfortable gravity and a breathable atmosphere clear enough for Saturn-gazing. Real Titan has 0.1g and an atmosphere much denser than that of Earth, with thick, opaque clouds of toxic methane. But artistic licence finds a way...
In 2000AD's Judge Dredd, Titan is a penal colony, which would be very appropriate in reality due to its extremely inhospitable conditions. Much like Botany Bay, Riker's Island, etc... put the undesirables far away in a place which is very difficult, if not dangerous, to escape from. Space prisons are a recurring theme in sci-fi for this very reason. There was just one problem with this version of the moon, however; the original writer placed it in orbit of Jupiter.
Oops....
But, worry not! This is the arena of sci-fi where ANYTHING can happen, so ANY mistake can be rectified with just a little creative retroactive continuity (retcon). (Especially when one has to answer to Tharg Almighty) ... Aha! Yes, actually dear readers, that was NOT a mistake; Titan was hurled into Jupiter's orbit during a freak teleportation accident, don't you know...
In Marvel comics Titan is the home of the the Titanians (or Titans), a god-like race of humanoids led by the tyrant Thanos. They are descendants of the Eternals, a genetic offshoot of humanity created by the alien Celestials. The colony was founded 750,000 years ago following a civil war among the Eternals. It was a frequent arena for the adventures of the Captain Marvel of the 1970s.
In DC comics it gets a little confusing. The moon is home to a race of humanoid Titanians with superhuman powers akin to those of Superman. Not, of course, to be confused with the Teen Titans, a group of teenage superheroes, comprising of young sidekicks of the more well-known DC heroes, plus some younger relatives: Robin, Aqualad, Superboy, Wondergirl, etc. etc... the line-up changing over the decades as the original members grow up (and, in one case, become 'the Titans', just to add more confusion)... We are none of us getting any younger, not even a bunch of kids named after primaeval Greek gods...
In the DC universe the most famous Titanian is the 30th-century telepath Saturn Girl. She never wielded an Infinity Gauntlet, but she made her mark in other ways, being the first ever female leader of a group of superheroes (the Legion of Super-Heroes in the 1950s)...
The ability to snap your fingers and give Superboy orders.... That's up there with dissolving half the universe, surely?
Comments
Post a Comment