The episode "Mermaid Man Begins" reveals that, through a series of meticulous and intricate events, he and his friend were suddenly equipped with aquatically themed superpowers in their youth, and chose to dedicate their lives to brawling undersea crime as a result (it is implied that the backstory behind the duo's powers as described in Bikini Bottom media was in fact far different from the presumably actual backstory Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy remembered from differing perspectives).[6]