Friday, August 19, 2005
Batman's Home --It's A Cave, Not A Closet!
DC Comics, not surprisingly, objects to a gallery exhibit of Batman and Robin in various homoerotic poses.
What is surprising is that it took seven months to find out about the exhibit!
This isn't just a simple case of copyright infringement that has gotten DC/Time Warner exercised. This is the comic book equivalent of the "blood libel."
Comics nearly went out of business in the 1950s, partly because of the charges of one Fredric Wertham in the book, Seduction of the Innocent: Wertham claimed that comics caused juvenile delinquency, that Wonder Woman was a lesbian and, of course, that Batman and Robin were gay.
Wertham's book led to congressional hearings, the industry's creation of a self-censoring "Comics Code" detailing what was considered appropriate -- and the demise of the still-influential crime/suspense/horror line, EC Comics. Sill influential? Yep, as can be gleaned from a glance here and here.
It's also surprising that DC never objected to that leather-with-nipples fetish-y outfit that George Clooney wore in Batman And Robin (an endeavor that did to the Batman movie franchise what Wertham's book did to the entire comics industry, i.e. nearly killed it).
UPDATE: The offending prints can be seen here. DC apparently has demanded that artist Mark Chamberlain turn over the originals and the invoices of those already sold.
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What is surprising is that it took seven months to find out about the exhibit!
This isn't just a simple case of copyright infringement that has gotten DC/Time Warner exercised. This is the comic book equivalent of the "blood libel."
Comics nearly went out of business in the 1950s, partly because of the charges of one Fredric Wertham in the book, Seduction of the Innocent: Wertham claimed that comics caused juvenile delinquency, that Wonder Woman was a lesbian and, of course, that Batman and Robin were gay.
Wertham's book led to congressional hearings, the industry's creation of a self-censoring "Comics Code" detailing what was considered appropriate -- and the demise of the still-influential crime/suspense/horror line, EC Comics. Sill influential? Yep, as can be gleaned from a glance here and here.
It's also surprising that DC never objected to that leather-with-nipples fetish-y outfit that George Clooney wore in Batman And Robin (an endeavor that did to the Batman movie franchise what Wertham's book did to the entire comics industry, i.e. nearly killed it).
UPDATE: The offending prints can be seen here. DC apparently has demanded that artist Mark Chamberlain turn over the originals and the invoices of those already sold.
