Nerding Day: Kidz Water Hydrators (Patreon)

Children love comic books and also need water to live. Maybe that’s a controversial stance, but it’s one I’m willing to stand behind. Hi, I’m Robert Brockway and I’m here to talk to you about proper hydration and unleashed capitalism. It’s a ringing endorsement from me on both! Here’s my favorite comic book.

Kidz Water is exactly what it sounds like, water for kids. Now with extra fluoride! A bold twist in 1999, when the main market for bottled water was conspiracy-brained survivalists prepping bunkers for Y2K. It’s like booking flights to Orlando with the promise of extra colorful chem trails. Your demographic ain’t gonna love it.

But at first glance, the Kidz Water Hydrators comic book isn’t too crazy. Branded content and comic books go together like The Incredible Hulk and delicious Hostess Fruit Pies. Some maniac has already documented those extensively, it took most of his life and all of his sanity. I’m just saying that if this was an established practice - and Captain Citrus promises me it was - why then did Kidz Water Hydrators have to be launched under its own line: Marvel Custom Comics?

No other sponsored content title had to be distinguished from the Marvel brand, much less quarantined in its own publishing line. Marvel Custom Comics never published a single title before Kidz Water Hydrators, and never published one after. A whole separate imprint that existed just to clarify “this Kidz Water piece of shit does not represent us.” In an alternate timeline where Marvel never took that step, Kevin Feige is kicking off Phase Six of the Brandedverse by announcing Jojo Siwa as Crystal and Michael B Jordan as Tooth Decay.

“Haha,” you’re saying. “Classic Crystal burn from Brockway. I love this guy. He’s my best friend, I’m going to trust him with my house for the weekend.” Most of you are saying that, but I’m sure there are a few younger readers who don’t get our off the cuff Kidz Water Hydrators references. Let’s fix that.

MEET THE HYDRATORS!

Hydro! He can shoot water and is strong, like water is!

Crystal! She can turn invisible and has a crystal shield! She protects teeth! Any teeth!

Misty! She creates mist! Let’s check the next sentence for the rest of her powers! Thanks, Misty!

Ice! Ice!

Vapor! He can shoot water and is strong, like water is! Whoops that’s Hydro, thank god I caught that error in time, unlike Michael Stewart, the writer of Kidz Water Hydrators!

X-Stream! He can shoot various forms of water and is strong, like water is! Haha, you’re fired Michael Stewart!

Together they are the Hydrators, here to promote proper childhood hydration on their gleaming hovercycles, the sales of which could provide clean drinking water to all of Africa for the rest of time!

I have worked in branded content. It’s part of the only reason I’m so filled with crippling hate. I can tell you this: You do not put your A Team on Kidz Water Hydrators. Trust me, I’m a B Team Motherfucker. Yet those Hydrators bylines are not all struggling interns about to wash out of the comic industry. All of them are seasoned pros with big titles under their belts, and Al Milgrom was an actual editor at Marvel during this time. Not a well liked one, we can deduce from this job. But still, it’s wild how much money and effort was put into this. I’m only lying about one of those things.

Ha, “wash out.” I just got it. That’s why they pay me that B Team money.

The first issue - I’ll repeat that, the first issue - of Hydrators is about a villain named Chill who’s here to ruin a child’s snowboard race. In terms our younger reader can understand, in the ‘90s this was akin to inciting a violent political coup to overthrow a democratic election. It was a big deal, very frowned upon, but ultimately not punished.

I’m not going to sit here and spend my day spotting errors in the plot of Hydrators, because I have self respect but it is not unshakeable. I just want to point out that in the beginning, our heroes don’t know Chill’s sinister plan. They only know Nicole crashed one time in an active snowboard race, which made them bummed, so they gave her a flying hoverbike ride all the way back to the lead position. In terms our younger readers can understand, it’s like that election thing again.

That’s it. That’s all Crystal needs to hear. Nicole, a teenage snowboarder in the 1990s, is feeling a bit dizzy and flushed. To super-detective Crystal that’s evidence of a sinister plot, and not a Jetta full of half-crushed Sprite cans with little holes poked in them.

Ice, with his Bachelor’s degree in ice, knows that children’s water bottles do not naturally freeze in a perfect rectangle. Vapor, with his Associate’s degree in HVAC, knows the best solution is to fire scalding water at it. The kids replenish their bodies with warm water in heat compromised plastic. AHHH!

Real quick note: Can we find a way for the teens to drink water without saying the words “the kids replenish their bodies?” No? Kidz Water isn’t paying enough for a second pass? There’s barely enough money in the world to pay for this first pass? Human dignity does have a price, but you can’t buy it twice? That’s fair. B Team solidarity, Kidz Water Hydrators writer Micheal Stewart.

If we were accepting notes, I’d say it’s a little weird that the villain also loves water, but it worked for Hostess Fruit Pies and Nestle so let’s roll with it.

Hey, Michael Higgins, you’re the letterer of this issue. We need you to figure out a good sound effect for a snowboarder wiping out. It’s basically your one job.

You’re right, Michael Higgins: little rebellions keep the soul alive.

But look at that! Nicole is back in the race! With only substantial hoverbike assistance from a billion dollar superteam. We’d root against her for that back in the ‘90s. She was decades ahead of her time.

Chill isn’t out of the running yet, he’s come to this child’s snowboard competition armed with a high tech freeze-ray because he really, really wants that Personal Pan Pizza.

Whoops, you blinked and you missed it. The only thing X-Stream did in this, the team’s debut issue. He missed a flying dive tackle. Not a superpowered one at hyper speed. A normal dive tackle aimed at a teenage snowboarder off his board. At a kid wearing clunky snowboard boots in deep snow, who has just been knocked totally off guard by an invisible karate kick. I know I said I wasn’t here to poke holes in the plot of a sponsored content comic book for dehydrated children, but I also said I have self respect. We tell all sorts of lies to get through life. Right, Michael Higgins?

Holy shit, Ice. You should not be on this novelty corporate water team. You just flew in on an ice slide you made by flash freezing the ambient water in the air, then shaped a ski resort’s powder into a perfect loop to paralyze a snowboarding cheater. Even Chill could only freeze small blocks of water, and he needed a special gun to do it. This is a wild escalation, Ice. The person who did second most on your team high kicked a wrist.

Shit like this is why we needed Affirmative Action. Those are Iceman level powers. He’s an Omega threat now. Ice, you turned in a resume explaining how you’re the master of one of the fundamental elements of life and they put you on a team with the dipshit failcousin of every voting board member. That’s pure injustice. The only minority done dirtier in these pages is Misty (not pictured).

This is the whole comic so far, every page. Misty is not in it. The one panel where she helps a snowboarder stand up doesn’t count. She could’ve been replaced by a sturdy branch. Maybe “makes fog banks” isn’t exactly a universal screwdriver, but low visibility is famously the enemy of mountain sports. Ask Sonny Bono’s ghost, and while you’re at it, have him explain who he is to the younger readers. I don’t have a cynical analogy for that.

Wait, he’s like if Paul Walker was K-Fed.

Wait, that’s somehow even older.

Hold on, is that supposed to be a twist? That Chill brought a freeze ray AND a trick snowboard? And THE SNOWBOARD is why he was disqualified? Is this an Air Bud situation, there’s nothing in the rules about freeze-blasting teens and weaponizing dehydration?

Actually, let me check the handbook for the Mountain Creek Winter Fundays Downhill Play Race (Junior Division), yep it definitely says here you can’t be ferried down the mountain on the hovercycles of corporate shills. Actually, let me check the penal code of the United States of America, yep says here you can’t paralyze a teenager for cheating at snowboarding.

I can’t believe Chill brought the GDP of Indonesia in high tech weaponry and he’s not even going to get those two free passes to Snow Problem: Vernon, New Jersey’s hottest and only snowboard halfpipe for ages 18 and under. Those were the only stakes of this issue!

This is such a failure on every level that I can only assume it bankrupted the company. But there’s so little evidence Kidz Water even existed I can’t be sure of that. Hold on, there’s a website address here in the back. Let’s check Kidzwater.com on the Wayback Machine.

Huh, that was the same month the comics released. Even back in 1999, companies knew not to print their website address if they didn’t have a website. Let’s check back a year later.

Oh, man. Construction.jpg was the digital tombstone of the 1990s. So it never existed and skipped straight to limbo. Just an unbaptized baby of a business. RIP Kidz Water, the only unflavored fluoridated drinking water for children, aside from tap.

Special thanks to Mo for the Hot Hot Dog Tip!

This article was brought to you by our fine sponsor and Hot Dog Supreme: Brian Seiler, also known as Fluorider! He can shoot water and is strong, like water is!

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