The furtherance of employment by moving up the corporate ladder is common place theses days. In a down economy qualified individuals strive to outreach one another by acquiring new skills, dressing fancy, and bribing ferry operators. Forge the river? No way. I'll just slip the ferry operator an 8x10 glossy of Kathy Coleman posing with that lizard creature. Trust me, it works. I'm digressing. Here are some individuals that got premium positions for less than stellar reasons. Let us examine their career paths.
Dr. Mario
Mario's skills as a Princess Retrieving Technician can not be disputed. However every time he would save up 100 coins doing so, he would immediately blow it on an "extra life". He should have invested those coins in a 401k. At some point he must have sought higher education. Soon he was slinging pills at little nasty viruses and making a Doctor's salary. Unfortunately a Dr's. lifestyle is not cheap. Mario soon found himself paying out the nose to host sporting events like Tennis and Golf. He also threw lavish party's for his friends on a regular basis. The party's included mini games with requirements like giant cakes and the Statue of Liberty. Needless to say Dr. Mario had to resign from the medical field and go back to the boring life of being an intergalactic plumber hero.
Norrin Radd - The Silver Surfer
The Silver Surfer began his life as Norrin Radd, a pacifist astronomer from the planet Zen-La. At some point the cosmic garbage disposal they call Galactus came calling to destroy Norrin's home planet. You see Galactus needs to feed and so he goes around munching planets for the sustenance they provide. To prevent Galactus from destroying his home Norrin agrees to become his 'herald', or shiny naked man servant. Bestowed with a portion of the power cosmic Norrin Radd is promoted to Silver Surfer, Herald of Galactus. Another title could be Cosmic Being Nutritional Supplement Advisor. All the Silver Surfer really did was fly around looking for planets for Galactus to consume. He wasn't on the job for long before he got into a dispute with management. You see Galactus wanted to eat earth, but the Surfer's new friends The Fantastic 4 lived there. So he decided to assault his employer. After the assault Galactus removed his title of Herald and was confined to Earth.
Sheriff Bart
In the movie Blazing Saddles, Bart starts off as being a slave that works on the railroad. After hitting one of his masters on the head with a shovel, he is dubiously given the position of Sheriff in the city of Rock Ridge. The villains who put him in charge hope that the sight of a black man as sheriff will enrage the inhabitants of Rock Ridge to the point of abandoning the town. To their chagrin Bart outwits the town by holding himself hostage. Later with the help of Gene Wilder he uses all manner of slap stick gags to defeat the villain. Bart is proof that you can succeed regardless of racial prejudice. He got that promotion even though his great grandmother was Dutch.
Emergency Medical Hologram (The Doctor)
Whoa! What is the good doctor doing in that red command jumpsuit? When the starship Voyager was transported to the Delta Quadrant by the omnipotent yet powerless Caretaker, many of the ships personnel were killed. This included the majority of the medical staff. In times of duress the EMH Mark I could be activated to serve as a temporary replacement to a Chief Medical Officer. The balding, sheepish program served well in the capacity on a necessary permanent basis. However, the Doctor had begun to explore the subroutines of his programing that included a Emergency Command Hologram function. He day dreamed about taking command of the Voyager and would live out these fantasies on the Holodeck. Twice in the 7 year voyage of the Voyager the crew had to abandon ship and the now promoted ECH got to take over. During this time he would ditch his acerbic personality for a more grandiose one. Sadly, he only got to do this twice. What kind of promotion is that? Either you qualified or you aint.
James Bond
In the prequelesque Casino Royale, we get a taste of what James Bond was before becoming 007. We also get the details on what it takes to become a Double-0 agent of Her Majesty. The first thing Bond had to do to move up the espionage ladder was to beat the living crap out of some dude in a dirty European bathroom. You have to break a few eggs and put their heads in a toilet to make an omelet. After knocking the crap out of the guy Bond tries to compose himself. That's when the jerk gains conciseness and goes for his gun. Bond shooting the dude in the head takes us to the famed opening Bond kill-shot. I would think that by itself would get you Double-0 status, but nooooo. You also have to shoot some corrupt old MI6 agent while he sits in a chair. It's hard work, but it does get easier. Considerably. Once he got his promotion though he got in trouble for the way that he murdered people and blew stuff up. I thought that's why they liked him so much. That stuffy old M needs to make up her mind.
Kyle Rayner
Kyle Rayner was a young ambitious artist. Everyone knows that artists are dirt poor dreamers. So when Hal Jordan lost his marbles and went on a modest killing spree (all the Green Lanterns and the most of the guardians) Ganthlet (Aforementioned last Guardian) gives Kyle the remaining power ring and lets him know that he's in charge now. What? Talk about an unbalanced workload. There are 3600 sectors that the Green Lantern Corps patrol and they were patrolled previously by about 7200 Lanterns. Now they expected Kyle to take care of all that by himself. I'm sure Kyle appreciated the vote of confidence, but that's one heck of a torch to carry. Fortunately Kyle did have the willpower to carry through his new assignment. It helped that a previously near infinite number of conflicts had somehow been reduced to only about two per month, and usually around earth. Wacky universe aint it?
Admiral Piett
Probably the most well known promotion in all of Nerdom. Piett was a captain aboard the Executor, flagship of Darth Vader. His militaristic approach was to go off of leads left behind by fragmented Probe Droids. Admiral Ozzel took the opposite approach and wanted proof. When Admiral Ozzel comes out of lightspeed too quickly he proves that he is indeed as clumsy as he is stupid. He soon gets a video-chat from Lord Vader. Lord Vader is sitting in his meditating spherical bath tub and doesn't like to be disturbed by bad news. It isn't surprising then that he chokes the life out of the Admiral and immediately promotes Captain Piett to the rank of Admiral. Judging by the look on his face it is clear that Admiral was not the position he had interviewed for. Then again, declining a job offer from the Lord of the Sith isn't a good career move. Piett kept his nose clean and did not alert the Rebels to the presence of the Imperial fleet during his term as admiral. Even so a failure by his staff to increase forward fire power cut short his military career and his life. I guess that's how the majority of battlefield promotions work out though aint it?
This is really funny
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