Wednesday, March 18, 2015

Great Fictional Sidekicks

There are so many great sidekicks in literature. I guess this is one of my favorites. It's not always easy to get it rights. Emma Peel may have been too divertingly pretty in THE AVENGERS. Iago might have been a lot more interesting than Othello.  Same for Lady MacBeth. Hap and Leonard (Lansdale) might be too evenly balanced to consider one a sidekick.

Who are some of the other great ones?

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13 comments:

Rick Robinson said...

For me I think it's Watson as Holmes' sidekick, so I agree. Bill Pronzini edited a good collection, DETECTIVE DUOS that has a lot of great sidekicks in it. Recommended.

12:27 PM
Randy Johnson said...

Joe Pike with Elvis Cole comes immediately to mind.

Hawk and Spenser.

12:29 PM
Dana King said...

All of the above are great choices. I have a couple of lesser-knowns i like a lot: Gravedigger Peace from Sean Chercover's Ray Dudgeon books, and Tommy Owens from Declan Hughes's Ed Loy series. Both are not the usual, and their off-kilter relationships with their respective heroes makes them all the more endearing.

2:02 PM
Anonymous said...

re: Hamlet
Poor Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.
With friends like that, who needs enemies?

re: Colin Dexter's novels
Morse and Lewis were quite a team. (Poor Lewis.)

2:37 PM
seana graham said...

Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. Not crime fiction of course, but might even be the prototype of the whole sidekick thing. I agree with Dana that Tommy Owens is an original. Although come to think of it, there is a passing resemblance to Magersfontein Lugg in the Margery Allingham Albert Campion books. And yes, I had to look up Magersfontein.

3:36 PM
Gerard said...

Dan Rhodes has Speedo.

5:20 PM
Jeff Meyerson said...

He also has Seepy Benton, Gerard, whether he wants him or not, generally the latter.

Watson has to be #1.

7:48 PM
Anonymous said...

I always liked Xena and Gabrielle. Until the show changed from a tongue-in-cheek action-adventure-fantasy to a depressing soap opera.

Sticking strictly to crime fiction, I'd say Dr. Watson. But his sorta-kinda reincarnation, Jason Wilder, deserves a mention, too.

Does Mike Hammer's girl Friday, Velda, count? How about Della Street?

I always thought of Emma Peel more as an equal partner than a sidekick. Same with Nora Charles, Pam North, Illya Kuryakin ("The Man from U.N.C.L.E."), and Artemus Gordon ("The Wild Wild West"). Probably Tonto and Kato, too.

10:57 PM
Cap'n Bob said...

Gabby Hayes.

3:07 AM
Charles Gramlich said...

Meyer from the Travis McGee series.

10:54 AM
Barry Ergang said...

Before he became "Gabby" when he left Psramount to sign with Republic Pictures, George Hayes portrayed "Windy" Halliday in all but a couple of the Hopalong Cassidy films.

6:19 PM
Barry Ergang said...

Cisco's Pancho?

6:22 PM
pattinase (abbott) said...

Went to his ranch in CA last year. Lots of fun!

6:48 PM

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