A human man, named Ernie, was once a regular human living a normal life, until he was then washed into the ocean and sucked into a whirlpool. Before he was about to drown, mermaids came down to save him, and gave him a magical starfish that allowed him to breathe underwater. Shortly afterwards, Ernie, now by the name of Mermaid Man, saw a lad named Tim, scraping some barnacles off a ship's hull, but Mermaid Man thought that he was drowning. So he used his newfound powers to draw barnacles into Barnacle Boy's lungs, allowing him to breathe underwater as well. As Tim then named himself Barnacle Boy, they then decided to become a crime-fighting duo, to protect Bikini Bottom from various foes.
