Who's This? A mute swimmer.
The facts: After her first appearance in Showcase #79 (December 1968), Dolphin isn't seen again until she gets a cameo in Showcase #100, then the Forgotten Heroes story in Action and DC Comics Presents (1985). Not an immediate sensation! Her Who's Who entry - called the sexiest in the series by many - may have changed her destiny. Or Peter David was always going to include her in his popular Aquaman series. Though Arthur's lover, she ended up marrying Tempest. She dies off-panel according to One Year Later, and is then raised from the dead in Blackest Night. She did not surface (see what I did there?) in the New52, but in Rebirth, once again started appearing in Aquaman.
How you could have heard of her: She appears in Young Justice: Outsiders, but was also rumored to be in the second Aquaman movie for a while. Jodie Comer was linked to the role, but director James Wan allegedly was looking for an Asian actress.
Example story: Aquaman #27-28 (October-November 2017) by Dan Abnett and Stjepan Sejic
Pickings are SO slim prior to her Who's Who appearance, that I decided to go in the opposite direction and look at one of the Rebirth issues. The context: Aquaman and Dolphin have been captured by undersea crime boss Krush - a big crab-lookin' dude - and his sorcerous henchman (lieutenant? partner?) Kadaver. These guys obviously bonded over their love of the letter "K". Yes, Dolphin is a captive...
As you can see, this version of Dolphin has scales on her limbs and webbed fingers - the criminals are "taint-bloods", Atlanteans who have mutated from living at such depths for generations, might tie into Dolphin's transformation as well - but her cellmate is susceptible to Aquaman's powers.
And that's about as much dialog as you're gonna get from Dolphin. One of the questions a writer has to ask themselves when using her is how to handle the fact that she's mute. Does she know sign language? Does she just look at you and you just know? Do caption boxes do the heavy lifting? Abnett and Sejic have opted for strong facial expressions. I like it.
And a new power? Bio-luminescence?
Another great expression. In the next issue, she actually does use that
power on Kadaver, and it's a bit more intense than I expected.
Good, because I feared she was just a damsel in distress (she's that too in her first appearance!), but she can handle herself if need be. And she's trying to recruit Aquaman to a cause, and that's the other thing that makes Dolphin, Dolphin - her allure. Like the mermaids of old, there's something seductive about her, even without a singing voice. Aquaman doesn't want to save Atlantis, but she knows he'll do the right thing, and he allows her to lead him by the nose. She's so damn enigmatic, he can't help it.
When they tried to make Dolphin her own thing, it evidently didn't make the comic book world catch on fire. When they associated her with Aquaman, she slotted pretty easily into an "Aquaman Family", but some readers took exception with making her a love interest to the Aquamen (some because Mera should be the true match, some because female characters deserve better than be used as accessories to male ones). This more modern rendition has some legs, but DC has too many undersea characters to ever really raise Dolphin to a top tier. I know it's hard writing a mute character as the lead, but I'd love to see it.
Then again, maybe that Who's Who entry gave me a false impression of her potential...
Who's Next? DC's weirdest team.
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