Sockman & Fish at the 2025 European Gull Screeching Championship: A Tale of Feathers, Fury, and Fermented Herring - Sockman & Fish: Satirical Superheroes

Sockman & Fish at the 2025 European Gull Screeching Championship: A Tale of Feathers, Fury, and Fermented Herring

If you thought underwater rugby was the weirdest sport Sockman and Fish would waddle into, think again. This summer, Europe’s most unhinged heroes took to the skies (and the docks) to attend the 2025 European Gull Screeching Championship—a competition so loud, chaotic, and confusing that it’s sponsored by both an earplug company and a seagull therapy hotline.

“We were told it involved passion, feathers, and chips,” Fish explains. “I naturally assumed it was a Whitesnake tribute night in Blackpool.”

Instead, they found themselves in the seagull-stained heart of Oostende, Belgium, surrounded by hundreds of screeching hopefuls in white feathered costumes, flapping and shrieking with all the dignity of a food fight at a pigeon convention.

Sockman, ever the prepared superhero, wore his patented Anti-Caca Cloak™ and brought a sack of stale fries for motivational bait. Fish, meanwhile, showed up shirtless with sardines in his pockets and a kazoo between his teeth “just in case things got musical.”

HOW DOES ONE SCREECH COMPETITIVELY?

With gusto. And very little shame.

Each competitor must mimic the calls of the European Herring Gull, competing in three categories:

Volume – Can you drown out a ferry horn?
Accuracy – Does it sound like a gull or like your uncle stubbing his toe?
Theatrics – Are you just screeching, or are you becoming the gull?

Sockman leaned into method acting, delivering a performance described as “hauntingly avian” and “like a sock possessed by coastal rage.” Fish, on the other hand, entered the freestyle round with an impromptu power ballad called “Wings of Mayonnaise.”

A local judge said Fish’s performance “transcended bird,” though it was later disqualified for “accidental summoning of maritime spirits.”

THINGS THAT WENT HORRIBLY WRONG:

Sockman attempted to take flight using a DIY glider made of chip shop menus. It did not fly, but it did start a small fire.
Fish tried to court an actual seagull mid-screech, resulting in a pecking war and a lifelong ban from Belgian boardwalks.
A rogue competitor, known only as “DJ Beaky”, unleashed a remix of seagull sounds over dubstep, causing mass confusion and three spontaneous flockings.

THE WINNER?

Some lad from Rotterdam who ate an entire hotdog while screeching and never broke eye contact with the judges. Terrifying. Majestic. A true gull whisperer.

Sockman and Fish placed 47th and 88th, respectively, but earned the coveted “Spirit of the Squawk” award, along with a free seafood platter and a year’s supply of anti-seagull umbrella hats.