So Ant-Man has come to town, I’m told. Small is the new beautiful.

We’ve had Batman, Superman, Spiderman and now Ant-Man. So what exactly is it, I wonder, that makes these ‘men’ succeed? What is it about them that holds us spellbound? Why have they caught our fancy? Not mine of course, but our dashing youth who turn out in their millions to see these films, collect figurines and read comics about them.

Sometimes I fantasize about creating the next ‘man’. Who or rather what could it be? What is common between all these successful ‘men’ who have done so much to divert money from tens of millions of tiny pockets into a handful of very large ones? Just think! One solitary successful ‘man’ and we could chuck our jobs and travel the world.

One thing is for sure. It can’t be a domestic animal. A Cowman or Dogman can never click, surely. It has to be uncommon, preferably a little bit weird. The name has to be catchy, too. You can’t have a Hippopotamus man or some such. Ratman? Nah, no sex appeal. Mouseman? I don’t think so, it sounds wimpish. Snakeman? Well, a bit creepy but do I see some potential here. One moment the villain is pointing a gun at the hero; the next, the hero is crawling between his adversary’s legs. Catman? A man with nine lives? He gets killed eight times but he trumps the bad guy in his ninth. How ‘bout that, huh? Let’s work on this, guys and gals. I think we may have something really big here. Let’s do this together. We can share the booty.