First appearance: S7E1 — A Soup Served Cold — DeeDrah v Gazpacho Man Andy Gammage · watch it on YouTube
Andy Gammage, also Andrew, also the Gazpacho Man, is the Intercontinental Cold Soups Champion and the first victor of the Season of Vigilance. He came to the arena dead, stinking and short a few toes, determined to win back his full mortality. He fought DeeDrah with a steel chair, a barbed-wire two-by-four and pockets hidden inside his own skin. He swallowed a beam of magic, which the Grandmaster thought might be a first in the arena, and he walked away with the win, a sleeveless denim jacket and the Arbiter’s blessing.
Story
S7E1: A Soup Served Cold
Andy stepped through a portal into the Dread Fortress and introduced himself in full: “My name’s Andrew. My friends can call me Andy. Andy Gammage! Gazpacho Man! Intercontinental Cold Soups Champion.” His mission was personal. Twenty years earlier, his best friend Mean Gene had literally stabbed him in the back over the gazpacho pot and killed him. Andy wanted his mortality back so he could take on Mean Gene for the world title, become the Gazpacho King, and make his Miss Elizabeth “Queen Elizabeth.” The Grandmaster had put her money on DeeDrah before Andy even spoke, and she found his collection of names greedy next to DeeDrah’s single one. The Arbiter backed Andy, reasoning that a man “confident enough to give himself several nicknames… screams winner.”
The fight took place on the blood-soaked ramparts of a dreary castle under a giant full moon. Andy struck first. With a heavy heart, he pulled a steel chair out of his elbow crease “like a clown’s pocket,” explaining that cold soup shows don’t pay, so a man has to earn on the side. He smashed DeeDrah with it, knocked her skidding back and charged again. Then a pack of children in the stands began hurling insults. Among them was Thea, a tiny pink imp who seemed to have it out for him, and her laser-beam eyes made the insults hurt more. “Cold soup sucks! Hot soup’s better!” cut deepest, along with a jab about his toes. “I am sensitive about the number of toes I have,” he said. “It’s not my fault. It was a cold soup accident.” He flew into a rage, his face going red to the forehead and steam shooting from his ears. He locked DeeDrah in a headlock and pulled a barbed-wire two-by-four from his bicep, at which point the Arbiter realized the man had skin pockets. With it he gave her “the worst noogie of your life,” wrecking her hair. DeeDrah answered with an eldritch blast straight up his nostrils. When her second blast came, Andy opened his mouth and swallowed it in two gulps. The Acolytes went “fucking ape shit,” having never seen anything like it except on HBO, and the Arbiter noted, “Some people pay extra for that though.” The Grandmaster said, “I think that might be a first here in the arena.”
The chaos only escalated. Both champions rode out a mechanical bull, beers and cigarettes in hand, with Andy surfing its back. He grappled DeeDrah again, talked her down with cutting words about the “big time,” unfurled a heavenly aura of golden wings and flew her a hundred feet into the sky. “Look kid, I really like you, but I gotta get to the gazpacho king status. I’ll see you at the bottom,” he said, and let go. Unfortunately for him, she had wings too. When The Box of Chaos arrived, Andy swallowed Gerald’s shadowy fingers (Gerald was not pleased). Deciding the future Gazpacho King had to leave the past behind, he dropped his Intercontinental Championship belt into the box. In return he got a sleeveless denim jacket that fit perfectly and made him much harder to hit. The Acolytes immediately ripped the sleeves off their own jackets. “Gotta abolish that sleevery,” said Andy.
His luck turned ugly from there. His chair dented on DeeDrah’s head, and on the next swing it unfolded, bounced off the ground and went “straight for the taint,” hitting Andy in his own taint. A hellish rebuke from DeeDrah would have been far worse, except that as a gazpacho chef and a raging “bear” he shrugged off half of the fire. DeeDrah then traded her chinchilla to the box for a dragon slayer, which counted Andy as a dragon. It carved into him, and an exhausted Andy missed his final ladle uppercut. With the Acolytes trampling each other to death and stabbing each other with broken bottles in the stands, the Arbiter’s roll brought on what the Grandmaster called “the most deadliest game in the world”: rock, paper, scissors, where the loser dies. DeeDrah threw paper. Andy threw scissors. “Look kid, you put up a good fight,” he told her, and said that in another life they might have been tag team champions. “But my Miss Elizabeth is waiting for me.” He drove the handle of his soup ladle through her eye. The Grandmaster poured a bowl of gazpacho over the body and raised Andy’s hand to the crowd. In the after-show he added a parting shot for DeeDrah, and reported that Gerald’s fingers taste like black licorice.
Personality and Abilities
Andy is a big-armed, hip-gyrating showman with the swagger of a wrestling legend and the heart of a man who just wants hugs (“Don’t you fuck with hugs. That’s all I’m trying to do”). He signs off his best lines with “Oh yeah.” He hasn’t showered in “probably 30 years,” and he calls the stink his “heavenly aura.” He loathes hot soup and makes his gazpacho in the X-Men’s danger room, with no stove, since the soup is cold. His motto is “Gotta prepare when you’re standing ready,” and his self-described skill set is “throating magic and frustrating folks.”
In a fight he grapples, charges and bludgeons. When angered he rages, turning red with the spice of the gazpacho. In that state he resists fire, because “in some of the clubs around LA” he is known as a bear. He uses cutting words “from my bard side,” fires finger guns, can sprout big golden wings, and can swallow magic, which heals him. His arsenal lives in pockets in his biceps, elbow crease and vest: a steel chair (now dented), a barbed-wire two-by-four, a maul and a soup ladle. The sleeveless denim jacket from Gerald joined the collection.
Relationships
- DeeDrah: His opponent. He grudgingly admired her, then killed her with his ladle.
- The Arbiter: Bet on him and took a shine to him: “You can stay. I hope you win… you’re chill.”
- Grandmaster Elusia Skypiercer: Bet against him but crowned him victor, and said she might have her first cup of gazpacho if he won.
- Thea: Heckled him from the crowd and made the insults sting.
- Gerald: Had his fingers swallowed by Andy, then traded him a sleeveless jacket for his championship belt.
- The Acolytes: Pelted him with blue slushies, cheered him as their soup king, and abolished their own sleeves in his honor.
Memorable Quotes
- “I’m here to win back my full mortality so I can take on Mean Gene for that world title.” (S7E1)
- “Well, I’ve been dead for 20 years, so probably 30 years.” (S7E1, on his last shower)
- “I see the turntables have turntabled.” (S7E1)
- “You think that’s the worst thing I’ve snorted?” (S7E1)
- “The gazpacho man promises nothing.” (S7E1)
- “You can call me Andrew because you’re not a person anymore.” (S7E1, to DeeDrah after the fight)