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Travis McGee Versus Doc Ford – Fictional Fight to the Death

Am I the only one to notice that Randy Wayne White’s recurring character, Dr. Marion Ford, bears a slight resemblance to the classic Florida ship tramp character, Travis McGee, created by John D. MacDonald and depicted throughout? of 21 novels? Or maybe it’s such an obvious observation that no one else believed it was worth the energy effort to bring it up. Regardless, we have two middle-aged men with military / covert ops experience in their early adult lives, athletic in their youth, able to handle themselves well in a fight, and somewhat obsessive with their routine to get back in shape once they spot the problem. trouble. beers are starting to outnumber push-ups.

Let’s take a look at the cohorts.

So many excellent fictional creations have a second fiddle to play with, a trusted companion freely orbiting the same planet, yet staying at a distance, who can be counted on to skip the day and save the day from time to time. when. Where would Batman be without Robin ?. Ernie without Bert? Butch Cassidy without the Sundance Kid? Travis McGee was accompanied on his adventures by a short, stocky man named Meyer. An economist by profession, a fellow shipmate by nature, Meyer was covered in a thick “black skin” of hair. On the other hand, Doc Ford’s partner was a scrawny, psychic hippie wearing sarongs named Tomlinson. If you judge a man by the company he keeps, I’m going to have to call it a draw when choosing which man would be preferable to back your back when you know what he hits and you know where.

Women. You can’t truly talk about Travis McGee or Doc Ford without mentioning the parade of the female company in their lives. All have loved and lost viciously, although Ford seems to intend to leave a trail of illegitimate children across the planet. So far, he has one in Central America and one in Iowa. In both cases, fate intervened, as it often does in fiction, to thwart our hero’s best plans. He really wanted to marry each other’s mother, but the first did not want it and the second returned to his lesbian roots. Oh! You can’t say that Travis McGee has fared much better. Although she is apparently more knowledgeable in the area of ​​birth control, she loves and loses with equal abandon.

Physically, McGee is taller and, as a former college football player, he’s ready to take on the best. Ford was a high school fighter and fights with a grim tenacity derived from his psyche and military training as a “special” agent. What if you threw them into the ring together and put a damsel in distress in the middle? Interesting question. One that we leave to MacDonald and White fans to work out in their own minds. As for me, I’m going with Travis for a pinch in this contest.

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