My Sidekick Has a Mustache: EW's Top 25

Click here for the completion of Entertainment Weekly's 50 Greatest Sidekicks (Everrrrr). It's not their best list ever; pretty standard, pretty 'meh', and I'm far too young for their number 1 pick to be in any way meaningful...which is ironic, in a way, seeing as how I was able to grin and nod at their inclusion of Barney Fife (Andy Griffith) and Tattoo ("Da boat!"). Ah well, I guess you can't really re-run no.1's show for us young un's to see. Some of my favourite sidekicks, the sort who don't get on official lists, and not ordered in any preferential way:

• Zeus Carver, sidekick to John McClane, Die Hard 3
• Mr. Bingley, sidekick to Mr. Darcy, Pride & Prejudice
• Morgan Grimes, sidekick to Chuck Bartowski, Chuck
• Vir Kotto, sidekick to Londo Mollari, Babylon 5
• Al Giordino, sidekick to Dirk Pitt, Sahara
• Martha Jones, sidekick to the Doctor, Doctor Who (series 3)
• Sherif Ali, sidekick to T.E. Lawrence, Lawrence of Arabia
  
• Fezzik, sidekick to Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride
• Cosmo Brown, sidekick to Don Lockwood, Singin' in the Rain
• Dr. McCoy, sidekick to Captain Kirk, Star Trek
• Binabik, sidekick to Simon, The Dragonbone Chair (Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn)
• Sandy "Mac" MacDonald, sidekick to Roger Bartlett, The Great Escape
• The Littlest Hobo, sidekick to all in need, The Littlest Hobo
• Hank Yarbo, sidekick to Brent Leroy, Corner Gas
• Cordelia Chase, sidekick to Angel, Angel
• Millie Thompson, Meryl Strife, and Nicholas D. Wolfwood, sidekicks to Vash the Stampede, Trigun
• Radar O'Reilley, sidekick to Col. Potter, M*A*S*H
• Jet Black, sidekick to Spike Spiegel, Cowboy Bebop
• Bishop, sidekick to Ellen Ripley, Aliens
• Archie Kennedy, sidekick to Horatio Hownblower, Horatio Hornblower (TV only)
  

But my favourite sidekick of all? Gordito Delgado, pre-pubescent gunslinger extraordinaire and sidekick to Dr. McNinja, Dr. McNinja. New on the scene and relatively obscure - it's only a three-year old webcomic, after all - Gordito is a boy with the mustache of a man, sprouted by the sheer stregnth of his will so that adults would respect him after his trapeze-artist single father was assassinated by PETA. After throwing in with a gang of raptor-riding banditos, Gordito was so impressed by the doctor's mad ninja skills that he assigned himself as sidekick, thus helping to fulfill another chapter of the doctor's quest to be more like Batman. What makes Gordito my favourite sidekick above so many classic and excellent sidekicks? He is an excellent mirror and foil to Dr. McNinja - and I really do mean excellent. His twelve-year old boy sensibilities, ludicrous as they are, hold up perfectly agains the doctor's straight man sensibilities - which, in the case of Dr. McNinja, are equally if not more ludicrous than Gordito's. It's a truly masterful take on the odd couple/Abbot and Costello archetype, and hilarious to boot.

Click here for the introduction of Gordito's character in Dr. McNinja #3, "There's a Raptor in my Office", and pop ahead to #7, "Spooky Stuff", for a backstory unashamedly ripped from Batman and Stephen King's Dark Tower series. All the usual warnings about toned-down Shaun of the Dead-esque zombie etc. violence prevail.