I was a big fan of Sergeant Demetrio Lopez Garcia (who was played by Henry Calvin, that's him on the left in the uniform), though the poor fellow was stuck as the comedy relief. He was a favorite target of Zorro when it came to leaving his mark, whether it was on the wide belly of Garcia's shirt, or the equally wide seat of his pants. I have to imagine that Garcia caught a lot of grief from his various commandants for that. Thanks heaps, Zorro.The rough thing for Garcia was that he wasn't a bad person. In fact, I think he was actually a nice guy. Unfortunately, he found himself taking orders from evil guys, and I imagine the idea of the firing squad (or whatever the punishment would have been for insubordination in early 19th Century Spanish California) did not appeal. And sadly, I can't see Garcia being successful at many other walks of life. He doesn't seem industrious enough to make it as a farmer or merchant, and he'd drink up all his wares if he was an innkeeper/tavern owner. Can't see him entering the church either. So probably not a lot of options left.
So the commandant comes up with his latest brilliant scheme to capture Zorro, usually involving rounding up the peasantry on spurious charges, but who has to carry it out? Sergeant Garcia. And so who gets spit at, and called names by imprisoned peasantry? Sergeant Garcia. And who always seems to be the first guy that has to try and duel with Zorro, when "the Fox" arrives to right some wrongs? Yep, Sergeant Garcia, along with Corporal Reyes (Don Diamond), who probably has it as bad as Garcia, because the Sergeant did tend to take out his frustrations on Reyes, usually right after the Commandant had taken his frustrations out on Garcia*. Though Garcia's anger was typically limited to calling Reyes a 'bobozo', or however you'd spell that.
What's sad is that as inept as Garcia and Reyes apparently were, they always did seem to be the guys who came across Zorro in the middle of one of his, hmm, what would you call it? Missions, rescues, I kind of like "capers", since he takes a rather light-hearted attitude to the whole thing, and it was technically illegal what he was doing.
Whatever, they always seemed to come across him, especially since they always seem to be patrolling at night. Now, if they were really as bad at their jobs as the commandant thought, wouldn't you assign them duties during the day, so they'd be off-duty at night, and someone more competent would be around when Zorro was likely to come a-callin'? Dude is pretty nocturnal, you know. From this, I think we can only conclude that Garcia and Reyes were the best soldiers present in the 'pueblo Los Angeles'.
Really, it's probably the same for them as it is for a lot of comic book villains. They fight top-notch heroes and always lose, so we think they're a joke, but pit them against someone more second-tier, and they could probably be fairly dangerous**. OK, it didn't usually work out that way for Garcia and Reyes (though I recall a few times where Garcia helped Zorro with some random bandits or whatever), but I'd imagine they actually became fairly adept swordsmen, just from having to fight Zorro multiple times a week, and they probably figured out a few things about teamwork. OK, probably not, but ya never know.
I wonder about Garcia's friendship with Zorro's alter ego, Diego de la Vega. Diego certainly seems to act as though he likes the Sergeant, and I imagine Garcia appreciates that there's someone in the pueblo who seems to understand that whatever order he's carrying out this week really isn't his choice, and he'd really rather not be doing it. Given the chance, he'd rather sit in the tavern, drink some wine, maybe chat with people a bit. And I'm sure Garcia appreciates that Diego is seemingly always willing to share a bottle of wine with him. The trick is, Diego is sharing the wine to get Garcia to loosen up and explain what's going on, not just what Garcia's doing, but why he's doing, and how it relates to whatever cockamamie scheme the commandant has cooked up to catch that blasted Zorro this time is. He's using Garcia as an unwitting informant***. It's for a good cause, enabling Zorro to free the unjustly imprisoned people, and remain free so he can continue to defy the corrupt commandant (or whoever he's up against at the moment), still, he's playing on Garcia's love of wine, and probably the fact that Garcia doesn't have a lot of friends.
I guess Diego must consider Garcia a friend, because I'm pretty sure I remember Zorro mortally wounding at least a few people in the series, but Garcia was never one of them, which, considering the number of fights they had, has to suggest something. Whether it's that Zorro likes Garcia too much to actually hurt him, or that Garcia simply isn't a considerable enough threat, I don't know.
* Which reminds me of Corporal Klinger's line about Major Winchester and how he believed the chain of command was for beating enlisted men with. It's an ugly ladder of mistreatment.
** I'm thinking of Captain Boomerang in Suicide Squad as one example here. Yeah, he always loses to the Flash, but that's The Flash, the Fastest man Alive. Who he's fighting with nothin' but boomerangs. Give him someone not quite as overwhelmingly powerful and he could do some damage.
*** As much as I like Sergeant Garcia, and think that against someone other than Zorro, he'd probably be more effective, I'm not operating under any illusion that Garcia has figured out Diego is Zorro, and is just playing along. He's no Commissioner Gordon.
3 comments:
I loved the old Zorro show!
You're probably right, that as henchmen they were probably superior to the ordinary guys they fought in their duties.
It reminds me a bit of the Stormtroopers from Star Wars. They really were some of the best trained soldiers in the galaxy. But they were up against Jedi, and highly trained rebels.
Against regular troops they would have destroyed any equivelent force (as they proved at Hoth). But all we remember is guys ambushed by Ewoks.
seangreyson: Yeah, the Stormtroopers never seem to be able to live the Ewok thing down. But really, who among us could easily slaughter a horde of little furry critters on their home turf, when they're working as a team? Can't underestimate the advantage of home court.
I think Zorro actually liked Garcia as well. There was a story in the comic book where he manipulated events to make Garcia look good. Granted, there's some self-interest involved too because Zorro would rather fight Garcia then someone more competent ... but there was a genuine recognition that Garcia was inherently a good guy.
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