digital_eraser: "Cripple The Bitch!"

Kate Willært (

digital_eraser) wrote,
@ 2007-08-16 13:05:00

Current location:	Madtown, WI
Current music:	Presidents Of The United States Of America - "Twig In The Wind" [Live]
Entry tags:	comics, gender in comics

"Cripple The Bitch!"
I was just reading the three Batman: The Killing Joke-related entries on When Fangirls Attack.

I am so honestly torn when it comes to that book. The controversy, for those who are unaware, is that this is the story where Barbara Gordon was crippled by the Joker. The problem being that it's done in a way that doesn't deal with or address what Barbara has to go through because of this. Instead it focuses solely on what it does to Jim Gordon. Another case of using a woman in a book as expendable fodder to motivate the male characters, a theme that would sadly become more common in later years (likely inspired by this exact story, in fact).

And not only that, but how does Batman react to the whole thing once he has the Joker captured? By sharing a laugh with him.

So what's to be torn about such a horrible story? Well, it's Brian Bolland beautifully illustrating a story by Alan Moore. And that little point makes me want to turn around and defend the book, because I'm a big fan of the genius work of both.

For example, that it lead to the creation of Barbara Gordon as Oracle, probably the coolest handicapped superhero ever. Well, except that Oracle was pretty much created primarily out of John Ostrander's complete disgust with The Killing Joke.

My overall stance on the book is that it has pretty, pretty art which I still enjoy looking at, but that the story was a mistake. In fact, Alan Moore openly dismisses the story nowadays, though I've never seen him give specific reasons (or, at least, specifically address the victimization of Batgirl).

I think it's pretty obvious that his reason at the time for asking to be able to cripple Batgirl was because he wanted to write a story that would have long-term ramifications -- something fairly rare in the DC universe -- as well as to shock and disgust the reader. The problem being that, nowadays, it disgusts for the wrong reasons -- because it was one of the earliest instances in comics of violence against women used to get a reaction out of a male character (the whole theme of the putrid Identity Crisis), a cliche that today is called Women In Refrigerator Syndrome. I'm kind of curious what Moore's reaction would be if asked how he felt about inspiring this tired cliche...I wouldn't be surprised if it ended up just one more reason he dislikes the story himself.

But I don't think the Women In Refrigerator Syndrome aspect is even as offensive as an anecdote I've heard regarding the making of the book. Brian Bolland tells this little story in his recent book The Art Of Brian Bolland:

"Back in Northampton, Alan had to check with editor Len Wein how DC would feel about him crippling one of its key character, Batgirl. Len phoned back. His precise words are not printable here, but the gist of it was that it was okay. The Joker had, after all, to be shown to be a seriously nasty piece of work."

The words that Bolland is too much of a gentleman to reproduce, but which have been retold in various circles, were: "Cripple the bitch!"

And that pretty much sums up the attitude that allows female characters to continue to be mistreated in comics (at DC in particular, it seems).

(Post a new comment)

	wiccabuffy 2007-08-16 08:01 pm UTC (link)
	I actually like how DC is moving in a better direction with women these days. Am I in the minority as a woman thinking that? (Because Marvel is the one currently pissing me off...) (Reply to this)(Thread)

digital_eraser
2007-08-16 08:25 pm UTC (link)

I don't read a lot of DC myself, but it seems sometimes to me that the majority of women readers on WFA are more into DC than Marvel. I'm not more into Marvel so much as more into X-Men, and so have an automatic bias towards Marvel, heh.

So I'm not sure if DC is getting better with their treatment of women yet, other than that they seem to be honestly trying to make Supegirl less alienating now. But I've heard so many more complaints about DC's treatment in the last five years versus Marvel's...introducing a new female Robin, just so she can be colorfully tortured and killed, and then dismissed altogether...the pornstar Supergirl we've had until late...Identity Crisis, etc.

But it's weird, Marvel and DC seem to be on a pendulum, where anytime one of them makes efforts to get better, the other gets worse...and then it's the reverse five years later.

(Reply to this)(Parent)

Alan Moore? Really?

philippos42
2007-08-16 08:02 pm UTC (link)

What gets me is that Alan Moore could write The Killing Joke, could turn a cute kid's comic like Marvelman into the vile horror story that he made it, could spend much of his career making his name by doing unspeakable things to other people's characters, especially children's pop literature characters, & people still defend him, still think his name on something is an inherent plus.

OK. I can hear people saying, "But the revisionist Marvelman was Dez Skinn's idea, & The Killing Joke was part of the editorial 'darkening' of Batman after they sacked Mike W. Barr. This is editorial fiat, surely?" Even if it were, that doesn't explain Watchmen (his baby, his pitch), or the rejected Twilight of the Gods pitch (more of the same), or his return to the cynical reinvention genre in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. There's a pattern here. And note in the story that Moore & Bolland were asking permission from DC editorial to cripple Barbara Gordon. There's clearly a lot of this violence coming out of Moore himself.

So, when I remember that Alan Moore claimed to have threatened Julie Schwartz's life in order to write the last Schwartz-era Superman story (instead of handing it to somebody who'd worked so hard to build that character, like Elliott S! Maggin), it no longer seems like cute exaggeration. I actually visualize a young, manic Moore threatening an old man about to retire.

Alan Moore is the king of the clever little British comics monkeys. I think his Swamp Thing was well-done, I seriously love some of his Green Lantern Corps stories, I think The Ballad of Halo Jones is at least pretty good space fantasy. He seems to have done all right with Supreme. He had some real skill. The pity is that he kept going back to that violently iconoclastic well, & editors kept hiring him to do it. More the pity that he now casts a long shadow over comics, surpassed only by a few with names like Neal Adams & Stan Lee. Because what is now imitated is the destructive, careless side of his art.

So much for Moore.

I would also mention that The Killing Joke is probably part of the reason that Bolland's art now almost always looks creepy to me.

In any case, I'm very much on John Ostrander & Kim Yale's side in this. Not that they never killed anyone off prematurely & brutally; I have a complete run of their Suicide Squad, & there are parts of that that still bring tears to my eyes. But it was a story they wrote in a Batman Family book (Batman Chronicles?) that really brought home how betrayed Barbara must feel. The Joker gut-shot her, tortured her, kidnapped & tortured (maybe even raped) her father. She asked Bruce to kill the Joker, & when Bruce tracked the Joker down, he...hugged the Joker.

Bruce chose the Joker over Barbara Gordon. He chose the serial killer who attacked his friends over his friends, over the girl who had idolized him. Let me point out here that contrary to later retcons, Barbara wasn't originally Robin's girlfriend; she had a thing for Batman. He chose the red-lipped sadist over her--the child who emulated him, the woman who loved him.

This eventually convinced me that in Moore's interpretation, Dr. Wertham was right about Batman. Bruce was not only gay, but gay in the worst possible way, for the worst person. Batman as a concept plumbed the depths of immorality & misogyny in that story, & what's worse is that a lot of us, on first reading it, didn't even notice. It was easy to be distracted by all the other stuff. Maybe Bruce was distracted. But it's not OK.

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Excuse me, I wrote a book in reply...

philippos42
2007-08-16 08:32 pm UTC (link)

Expanded on (really) here.

This is an old pet peeve of mine. Actually two pet peeves: Alan Moore, & Batman since the late 1980's. Actually three pet peeves: Alan Moore being a self-important destructive twit, the influence of said twitty Alan Moore, & Batman since the late 1980's. Actually four pet peeves: Alan Moore being a self-important destructive twit, the influence of said twitty Alan Moore, Batman since the late 1980's, & poorly thought-out moral standards in superhero comics. Actually--no that's it.

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Re: Alan Moore? Really?

digital_eraser
2007-08-16 08:37 pm UTC (link)

I love deconstructionist comics with certain characters, and Moore was one of the first to do it, and do it well. And when superhero deconstruction started becoming a cliche, he dropped it and went onto other things. I still appreciate aspects of his 80's stuff when read in the context of what comics were like at the time, but he does different things now. Granted, I don't entirely dig how often he enjoys using public domain characters he didn't create while simultaneously complaining about DC doing things with his own work he didn't intend, but whatever. I quite enjoyed a lot of his ABC things (Top Ten and Promethea in particular).

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Re: Alan Moore? Really?

strannik01
2007-08-20 10:05 pm UTC (link)

Allow me to digress for a bit.

I have problems with many things Alan Moore has written. Marvelman/Miracleman is not one of them.

I have no sentimental attachment to the original version, mostly because I (or my parents, for that matter), weren't even alive when the original stories published. Moore's version was my first exposure to the character. Because of this, I learned to appreciate it on it's own merits, not on the merits of the stories that preceded it.

I liked it. The plot was involving and genuinely gripping, the characters were engaging, the themes were powerful and evocative and the art aided the narrative in all sorts of brilliant ways. This was one of the few cases where I cared about the heroes and villains as characters rather then the archetypes they embody. It's a haunting, devastating story, to be sure, but ultimately, it's uplifting, because it embodies the very hope the entire superhero genre is built on - a belief that humanity can overcome it's limitations and change the world for the better.

I like Moore's incarnation of Miracleman. I do. I'm sorry I don't feel bad about it ;)

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Alan Moore? Really? richiejohnston 2007-09-17 05:20 pm UTC (link)
	But is it better? Moore presented the most idealised and perfect form of fascism, in a way to entice the reader. But Liz Moran didn't want a part of it. (Reply to this)(Parent)

Re: Alan Moore? Really?

uniquecrash5
2007-08-29 03:24 am UTC (link)

Got directed here by a friend; interestng stuff.

She asked Bruce to kill the Joker, & when Bruce tracked the Joker down, he...hugged the Joker.

Bruce chose the Joker over Barbara Gordon. He chose the serial killer who attacked his friends over his friends, over the girl who had idolized him.

Well.. yeah. Batman may be "cool" and a "hero", but any time I've tried to think about him seriously, as a real person, I've concluded that he is clearly insane, or at least exceptionally damaged. Batman is not the loving father figure that Barbara Gordon might have been thinking he is. He's a psycho. I think that's the point that Moore is making. At least, I'd like to think it is, becuase the alternative is that Moore is kind of a psycho himself (which I'm not ruling out).

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Alan Moore? Really? philippos42 2007-09-01 03:05 am UTC (link)
	Well, the "Batman is really a psycho" meme was going around in the 1980's. I'm not sure, but I think Denny O'Neil was one of its drivers. (Reply to this)(Parent)

Re: Alan Moore? Really?

richiejohnston
2007-09-17 05:08 pm UTC (link)

Lost Girls is the most pacifist comic I've read in a very long time. The entire book is basically "Fuck, Don't Fight".

In Killing Joke, there is something wrong with Batman just as there is something wrong with the Joker. Normal people don't react to the death/GBH of loved ones like they did. They react like Jim.

The few times I've met Alan, he's come over as an intense, passionate man of conviction, but a very gentle person and incapable of violence.

If anything, his violent superhero comics showed the kind of violence that would happen in a world of superheroes. It's a pacifist message, showing the the horror of violence, rather than presenting in its standard sanitised form. However, it's very easy to go from that to wallowing in it, and Moore has certainly tipped the balance on occasion.

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Re: Alan Moore? Really?

vardulon
2007-11-12 05:04 am UTC (link)

No argument that Batman should be killing the Joker, but if you look at the text, Barbara Gordon does not ask Batman to kill the Joker. They talk for seven panels, and Barbara is horrified, and traumatized, and her key concern is where her father is and what's happening to him, but she never asks Batman to kill the Joker. Probably because Moore knew that if Batman were asked by Barbara then and there, he'd have to do it, or it would destroy the character.

Oh, and while I love Maggin, he never would have delivered "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow" - that thing was perfect.

(Reply to this)(Parent)

Hmmm

richiejohnston
2007-09-17 02:51 pm UTC (link)

Alan Moore didn't create Killing Joke as a piece of in-continuity work. It was a stand alone like Dark Knight - there's even a reference to BatMite.

The story was totally about the impact of Barbara Gordon's assault on Jim Gordon. The point being that, unlike Batman and Joker, normal people don't react to such an event by dressing up in colourful costumes. The Batman and the Joker are bound by something more. Which is why they share the joke.

But more importantly, it's also metatextual. Barbara Gordon doesn't actually exist, no fictional character does, and so what happens to them doesn't actually matter, neither does the impact on her. So the Joker's continual survival and escape from Arkham is part of the game, what's necessary to propel the story. It's no more real than being able to walk across a beam of light.

And when you turn off the light, you close the book.

That's how I read it originally , and a recent re-reading hasn't changed that.

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Re: Hmmm

digital_eraser
2007-09-17 04:51 pm UTC (link)

Well, so when Moore was asking permission to cripple the character, he was only asking for that one story rather than for a permanent thing? Is this an assumption on your part, or have you found info elsewhere?

As far as your take on the joke, it's nice to actually hear a possible explanation like that. I admit that the whole joke and them laughing together over it was completely over my head...I started wondering if the "joke" was on the reader, with such a confusing seemingly out-of-character (for Batman) ending. ;-P

So, starting up a Livejournal, eh? ^_^

(Reply to this)(Parent)

richiejohnston
2007-09-17 05:00 pm UTC (link)

The out of continuity thing was definitely something I read at the time of publication. Probably in Fantasy Advertiser or Speakeasy or some such. I remember the existence BatMite being cited as evidence of that by either Bolland or Moore.

Next time I meet either, I'll ask.

The joke, yes that was my reading, but it's a subject Moore has revisited. Killing Joke for me is very much a metatextual piece, about fiction, fictional characters and the way we relate to them. The choice of joke is evidence of that, how we believe in fictions and their existence - but what happens to the light bridge when you turn the flashlight off?

And now, I think I started an LJ account to reply to someone else... and then this came along! I've already had a request to post my reply elsewhere too...

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	digital_eraser 2007-09-17 09:49 pm UTC (link)
	Well, glad you found one of my blog posts interesting enough to sign into LJ to respond to...I read your CBR column every week. ^_^ (Reply to this)(Parent)

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