Bulloxed? What the hell is Bulloxed?

Ever notice that sometimes when you're reading you encounter a word you've never heard of before? Usually you get an idea of what the word might mean just because of the context it's used in. But sometimes you encounter something like this...

This piece of narration is from Alpha Flight #95, written by Fabian Nicieza and drawn by Michael Bair. The narrator is the Alphan known as Windshear. Let me quote the specific section:

"Unless they're INSIDE of you, then you're bulloxed."

Bulloxed? Bulloxed? What the hell?


Now some of you have already worked out what this word is meant to be, but for me it was a bit confusing. The context wasn't much help either. Then I remembered something -- Windsheer is meant to be British, or at least he's a Canadian who grew up in England.

Did writer Fabian Nicieza mean... bollocksed? It is sometimes spelt "bollixed". You see, "bollocks" means "testicles" so when you are "bollixed" you are in the middle of a balls-up. You're dicked over.

This isn't really a big thing, but it is funny the way that writers struggle with writing foreign slang. Clearly Fabian Nicieza had heard that British people talk about their bollocks, but didn't really know how to get it right. So he cocked it up.

Windshear is the guy in blue and green. The one
with the... uhh... huge bollocks

Okay, yes, this article has no substance. I just wanted to talk about the word 'bollocks'.

--Andrew S.