MONDO EXTRAS

A.C. walks behind the very spangly bar, which has lots of colorful trinkets strung up, and which I hope he wasn't responsible for. Let's hope he was out saving some manatees or something when the décor was being chosen. Just then, Ving Rhames sits his hulking frame down and says, deeply, "I'm getting tired of staring at these bottles." It's enough to take you right out of the show because it's Ving Fucking Rhames! Wearing the world's dingiest sleeveless undershirt and some gnarly neck scars (plus a thick moustache), he is authority personified, and if it were me, I would just start chucking liquor bottles into the sea just so he wouldn't have to look at them a second longer. Command me, Ving!

"Anyone around here wanna pour me a drink?" Ving asks, as the camera comes in close. Say what you will about Al and Miles, but they know how to fill out a supporting cast. Great Rhames! A.C. says it's a little early for happy hour. Motherfucker, did you not just hear the man? Get him a motherfucking drink before he motherfucking smacks you! Motherfucker! "You're Tom Curry's boy. I've seen you diving Mercy Reef," Big Ving says. I almost feel it necessary to type everything he says because it all sounds so damn good coming out of his mouth. And, oh yeah, Mercy Reef. Wasn't that the horrible, awful name this show was supposed to have instead of just Aquaman? I mean, come on, guys. Mercy Reef? Did you really think it was gonna get picked up with a name like that? Why not just call it Compassion Cove or Humanitarian Peninsula? How about The Isthmus of Caring? Like a smartass of massive proportions, Aquaman says, "I didn't realize I had a fan club." "You don't," Big Ving tells him. He says he runs the lighthouse at Atlas Point and you can sort of see the strain in having to say that name. "The gulls got nothing on my view," Ving tells him. And if they try to go any higher he rips them wing from wing. Aquaman pours him a shot and says it sounds beautiful.

With no preamble, Ving says to A.C. that he remembers the day his mom's plane went down. "That cloudless Caribbean sky. God couldn't have painted a prettier picture." Ving toasts the big man upstairs, possibly the only man bigger than him. "Then out of nowhere came the storm." He finally downs his drink. A.C. is sweaty, but intrigued. He asks for this guy's name. "Name's McCaffrey," says Ving, who is probably not Irish. "Keep the change." A.C. grabs the bill on the bar and Ving puts his hand on his. Whoah, buddy! "If you look hard enough into the deep," Ving says, and I am terrified, "something's going to start looking back." Please don't be talking about body parts...please don't be talking about body parts...A.C. gulps. "Watch yourself," Ving says. Surely he'll be watching, too. Ving moves out of frame. The camera turns to look at A.C.'s no-longer-cocksure face. He just pooped himself a little.