mirrorfalls: annotated-dc:mirrorfalls:annotated-dc:While considering what is increasingly beco
mirrorfalls: annotated-dc: mirrorfalls: annotated-dc: While considering what is increasingly becoming a series of posts about people’s in-universe attitudes towards Batman and his villains, I remembered 1989′s Secret Origins special, a 60 plus page special issue with wrap-around segments written by Neil Gaiman about this exact topic. The framing device is about a group of journalists who come to Gotham to make a tabloidy documentary about Batman and his villains, interviewing people who were previously in relationships with villains (Gilda Dent), former henchmen, former villains (the then retired Riddler), and finally the general public for their opinion on Gotham’s costumed crowd. Notably, this issue was published in the aftermath of the Killing Joke and Death of the Family storylines (the Joker attacking the UN being a reference to the latter), with the Riddler’s segment being a monologue of his bafflement on how supervillainy has shifted from being fun, pseudo-performance art in the Silver Age to actual murder in the present. Within the segments with the journalists, however, are presented as being a lot less meta, with them seemingly being newcomers to the city wishing to cover Gotham’s unique crime scene in the same way they’d cover a new subculture or something (albeit in a kind of trashy, late 1980s manner). Their lack of concern over how dangerous it is to, say, literally ask the Joker to come talk to them is what leads to Batman breaking into their hotel room (referenced in the main images) in the introduction to warn them off in a firm but direct manner, implying knowledge of how dangerous the supervillain community is doesn’t really extent far outside the city, at least in these pre-internet days. The story culminates in the journalists just interviewing people on the street, giving a fairly clear idea of what regular folk think of Batman and his villains. Also Constatine’s there, hi John! Kind of a broad selection of views there, interesting idea the Penguin might have a reputation amongst some as being the “good“ kind of gangster because he might tip people well occasionally, much the same way people look back in fondness at Al Capone because of his reputation for being “generous”… despite, you know, being a mass murderer. Ditto the idea of the Joker sliding into playground folklore as a kind of boogeyman figure is interesting and probably somewhat true to life. The special itself is in the DC Universe by Neil Gaiman collection if you’re interested, and is currently avaliable on Comixology. There’s a ton of material that I’ve not included here, such as Gilda Dent’s segment, which is really good but not really relevant to the topic being discussed here. Side Note: The Doctor Chilton reference in the main images may be a reference to Frederick Chilton, the corrupt and incompetant psychiatrist from Thomas Harris’ Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs novels, the latter being published the year prior to this story being published. Ironically the activities undertaken by Chilton in the novels, films and Hannibal TV show are pretty much the same kinds of antics performed by doctors in Arkham Asylum (using famous patients for financial gain, exacting petty revenge on them for making him look stupid, a general lack of interest in actually treating the people assigned to him etc.). The extent where Harris’ work influenced the depiction of Batman’s rogues could itself be interesting to cover in more depth at some point, the imagery from the 1991 film adaptation of Silence of the Lambs has certainly become engrained in versions of Arkham Asylum, particularly in the mid to late 1990s. Additionally, the Future!Joker’s appearance in Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker was explictly stated to be based on Harris’ description of Hannibal Lecter within his novels, according to the film’s audio commentary. The Joker having red eyes and slicked back hair, for some examples, are cues taken from book!Hannibal. Ooofff. I know nobody’s career can be 100% hits, but it’s recently struck me that the Secret Origins Special framing device is literally just Gaiman trying to ape Frank Miller as hard as possible (down to the Stupid Liberal Media getting a well-deserved murder from the Joker), and it’s downright painful to read. Although it’s possible that if Gaiman had that opinion in the past, chances are it’s changed, I would also argue that the portrayal of the journalists here isn’t really a case of “liberal media is bad“ or “exploitative tabloid journalism is bad“, which is a different thing. One is a talking point of conservatives, the other is often where conservatives draw their support (the Murdoch outlets, for example). Besides the “main“ journalist (the guy who dies), the rest are shown as hardworking and sympathetic to various degrees. The main journalist, however, is portrayed as the least sympathetically, he’s having an affair, he refers to the Arkham patients with ableist slurs, and is generally flippant and disrespectful of the people he’s covering. In his case, him eventually getting killed by the man he foolishly attempted to exploit for capitalist gain (he doesn’t care that the Joker tried to murder the UN assembly in a chemical weapons attack, he just wants to interview him for the ratings) I interpreted as more a EC Comics, Tales from the Crypt ironic ending than a commendation of the liberal press. Heck, you could publish a version of this today and these guys could easily be working for Fox or something. I… don’t buy that, personally. The whole thrust of this “documentary” is that they want to prove Gotham’s supervillains are sympathetic “victims of the system” (as that last page there puts it). Whether they actually believe it or not - and remember, the lead journalist argues as much to Batman’s face, when there’s no public around to hear - that’s not a take Fox News-types would try to sell their Tough On Crime viewership. Personally, I find it more than understandable from a Doylist perspective. I believe Gaiman’s pre-comics journalism career ended on a very sour note, which is the reason he turned to writing fiction in the first place. (Also, I think it’s the woman who’s cheating, not the lead reporter. The dialogue seems more like she’s talking about her husband - not that that makes the lead reporter a better person, since he’s implicitly her boss, which is a whole ‘nother level of wrong.) (An additional twist I just noticed - this news-crew is from Galaxy Broadcasting, the Metropolis outfit that gobbled up the Daily Planet back in the Bronze Age. I think that post-Crisis they were separate entities again, but if not there’s a whole new layer of Batman-Beats-Superman Commentary™ to be found.) Hm, if I remember Galaxy Broadcasting was kind of a take on Rupert Murdoch/Roger Aisles’s kind of journalism (complete with sexual harassment suits), but yeah, you’re most likely right. -- source link