Aw, geez, man. Here’s the thing: I don’t like the Avengers. I haven’t seen a single one of their setup movies. Not even the Iron Man flicks, and that’s in direct violation of a personal blood oath I made to Robert Downey, Jr. in the 1990s. (Chances Are, Heart and Souls, Only You? — totally irrestible.) I can’t help it: I just don’t care about the danged Avengers. On the plus side, I can finally see the viewpoint of all those good but non-dorky friends whose sphincters clench when I start in on Batman.
In the investigation of a neurotic style of life, we must always note who suffers most because of the patient’s condition. Usually, this is a member of the family.
…To injure another person through atonement is one of the most subtle devices of the neurotic.
(Dr. Alfred Adler. Problems of Neurosis. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, Ltd, 1929.)
I’ve loved him since we were kids, six years old. We worked together, fought together, stole together. Oh, I’m not blaming Rocky for what he is today. But for the grace of God, there walk I. I’d do anything for him, Laury. Anything in the world to help him. I’d give my life if I thought it would do any good, but it wouldn’t. You see Laury, there’s all those other kids, hundreds of them, in the streets and bad environment, whom I don’t want to see grow up like Rocky did. I can’t sacrifice them for Rocky. You see, Laury, they have lives too. I can’t throw them away. I can’t.
(Father Jerry, Angels With Dirty Faces (Michael Curtiz, 1938).)
Perhaps all you know of the movie Angels With Dirty Faces is the clips of the faux gangster movie Angels With Filthy Souls featured in Home Alone (I have talked to people who seem to think these are the same film, when in fact the latter does not exist), but Angels With Dirty Faces is beautiful and important and complex and funny and heartrending and I highly recommend it, and if you do watch it and come back here and say otherwise I will slap you in the kisser because it is you who are the “filthy animal.”
To impose one’s A.B.C. is only natural — and therefore regrettable. Everyone does it in the form of a crystalbluff-madonna, or a monetary system, or pharmaceutical preparations, a naked leg being the invitation to an ardent and sterile Spring.
The love of novelty is a pleasant sort of cross, it’s evidence of a naive don’t-give-a-damn attitude, a passing, positive, sign without rhyme or reason. But this need is out of date, too. By giving art the impetus of supreme simplicity — novelty — we are being human and true in relation to innocent pleasures; impulsive and vibrant in order to crucify boredom.
Is a drawing from a comic printed on underwear anti-art enough to be Dadaist? Oh, but how angry the capitalist product tie-ins might make them. Best not to ask.
Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion. I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward.
(Kurt Vonnegut.)
Shared the Batgirl photograph in this series in July and thought it was a goodly time for the Catwoman shot. I had a little bit of a weepy day, just kind of processing recent events which I’ve of course been dodging because it involves difficult introspection about Big Shit vis-a-vis life and death. But my chin’s back up and I look forward to a lot of laughter tomorrow as the Cappy comes in to town on a use-it-or-lose-it leave for a Very Special Episode of “How E. Got Her Groove Back.”
Special thanks again to Gordon Fraser for the heads-up on the article from which the pictures come.
“Draw Batgirl” meme result by Jennifer Wang, aka mao on the lj.
We must not allow ourselves to be deflected by the ‘feminists,’ who are anxious to force us to regard the two sexes as completely equal in position and worth.
(Sigmund Freud.)
Asphinctersayswhat? Yeah. Thanks for the warning, coke-addled misogynist.
Since Batgirl’s a superhero and librarians are perceived as being innocuous, there’s no way that any of the other characters are going to be able to make the connection, right? And if the opposite of Batgirl is a librarian, what does that say about librarians? That in order to be a bad ass, they must literally transform themselves?
Regardless of whether or not Batgirl was reinforcing popular stereotypes about librarians, she was definitely empowering a whole lot of young girls. In 1998, Yvonne Craig talked about the role that her character played in young girl’s lives:
I meet young women who say Batgirl was their role model. They say it’s because it was the first time they ever felt girls could do the same things guys could do, and sometimes better. I think that’s lovely.
In the 60s and onward, Batgirl became a symbol of women’s empowerment. In 1972, she appeared in a public service announcement for the United States Department of Labor, in which she advocated for equal pay for women.
(“From the Library: Batgirl!” McAllister, Ashley. Bitchmedia Community Learning Library, Bitch magazine website. August 15, 2010.)
And here is that PSA:
Dig Robin’s “Holy Discontent!” exclamation.
I am for accepting equality and undenigrated respect for all. But it is true that there have been men I’ve met who do not share my view and to whom I do not consider myself equal: in those cases, I consider myself infinitely their superior.
There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief…and unspeakable love.
(Washington Irving.)
Special thanks to Gordon Fraser for sending me the link to the article from which this picture comes.
Batman Confidential, No. 18. “The Bat and the Cat, Part 2 of 5: ‘Insanity Claws!'” by Fabian Nicieza and Kevin Maguire (Aug 2008).
Finally finished up that comic I mentioned buying and starting around a month ago. Things have been hectic lately and I kept forgetting it was in the garage. Like I said, I jumped in mid-series, but I think I can provide a little backstory you will enjoy to explain this panel.
As this issue begins, Batgirl (Barbara Gordon) is hunting down Catwoman (Selina Kyle) because she suspects Catwoman stole her father Jim’s notebook, which doubtless has sensitive personal information, drawings of dalmatian puppies in sunflower fields, and confidential case notes and grocery lists in it — Gordon loves dalmations.
The intrepid Spunky McCheeseball manages to run the kitteh-lady to ground by following her to a scandalous private club meeting. It turns out to be the Gotham Hedonist Society, where everyone goes around nude but for masks and indulges in safe, supervised, kinky insane sex with multiple partners. (Are you surprised in a city known for disguised superheroes and villains that this would become a fetish?) They let Little Red keep her hood but make her lose the clothes. Rules are rules!
She gets the notebook away from her target, and, after some naked wrestling, escapes the club and sadly dresses again, thus ending the one interesting and unpredictable thing she has done for me so far. Luckily, good ol’ loveable Catwoman stalks the drippy gingersnatch to a junkyard and steals the notebook back.
A lively fight and footchase ensues, ending on a rooftop, where the always-misunderstood kitteh-lady reveals begrudgingly that she needs to decode the information in the notebook, which Pippi Purplestocking has discovered is encrypted (thanks a lot, Daddy!), in order to save someone’s life — then promptly gets shot off the roof by a sniper that Batgirl can’t see.
Now I’m looking for the next one in the series. I’ll keep you posted.
Giving the people what they want: in which I glance over my blog stats, spot the trends in what brings you party people of the internet sliding on down to my place, and accordingly and with mutual thanks throw you some bone(r?)s.
Farewell and adieu to you fair Irish ladies.
First, a shocker. With mixed emotions I must report that the rack of Miss Megan Mullally is no longer the sheriff of Googlesearchy Town.* The first two editions (1, 2) of “Giving the people what they want” were dominated by amused-but-puzzled nods to the bafflingly large number of searches for the diminuitive Will and Grace star’s cleavage which lead droves of folks to my door. Megan held her own, beating out for many months running distant contenders such as “Drew Barrymore naked,” and “lesbian kiss,” which I would have thought any such phrases would easily eclipse “Megan Mullally’s breasts,” her “boobs,” her “topless” and variations therein and they never did. Until now.
*(By Googlesearchy Town I mean the searches that people enter in google to land on this journal — wordpress keeps track and ranks the most popular for me)
Top searching honors now rest in the tiny but mighty vintage hands of busty, bespectacled aspiring astrologer, the lovely and talented Fran Gerard — Playboy’s Miss March 1967, the self-help loving little looker whose cups runneth over.
The lovely and etc Ms. Gerard. For Science.
With 5,909 searches since her relatively recent appearance on the journal in March, Ms. Gerard beats out Megan at 2,503 since her inaugural boob-airing last September. Well-played, Ms. Gerard!
Sweet, lovely and talented heiress to generations of hot Italian culinary genius, Amber Campisi.
Rising Star Awards must go to three special up and comers. First, the talented family gal Amber Campisi (Miss February 2005); next, beautiful and tragic playmate and poet Marlene Morrow, aka Persephone (Miss April 1974) — whose gripping story has justly been getting attention from a number of outside sites linking in, enough so that her sister Landi was able to find this blog and send us an optimistic update on Marlene’s present condition about which I’m thrilled, check that post’s comments to get the latest — annnnnnnnd Yvonne Craig, BATGIRL!; all of whom are beginning to trend up the stats list with great and deserved speed. I look forward to what the next edition of “Giving the people what they want” will bring!
The very special Marlene Morrow/Marlene Pinckard/Persephone. Please, please read the account of how Paul Zollo found her with notebooks of poetry and an envelope holding her centerfold photo, living on the streets in L.A., and consider following the non-profit links which follow the write-up?
Finally: Quick note to the person who has found this blog by searching google three times in the space of the last two weeks — with “only assholes” in quotes so’s as to make maximal use of boolean exceptors — for the exact phrase “‘only assholes’ fall for me“: In case you ever come back a third time, I’d like to hope you hit this entry.
Vintage hottie Yvonne Craig has suited up!
First, you probably keep landing here because I frequently tag what I consider to be interesting graffiti with the words “only assholes write on walls” a la cult classic Rocky Horror. So I am sorry for the “only assholes” mix-up. But, more importantly, I am genuinely really sorry that you feel like only assholes fall for you and I wish I could make it better. I’m sorry that you’ve felt that way strongly enough to search the phrase three different times recently. I hope the next person you date is not an asshole. I hope that he or she is really nice to you — no, not just nice, because that is mealy-mouthed and hollow. That is a bullshit expression of my actual sentiment and is weak tea compared to the depth of my empathy, here. Okay:
I hope that that next person you date is genuinely amazing to you, like I pray that their very existence makes you believe in a loving God and you see the echo of your love for them in all the shapes of nature, and you don’t just love him or her but admire and value them, and that you curl your toes when you think of him or her even while driving and that they fill you with so much passion and love that you would kill tigers for them without a blink and you stay together until you die in each other’s arms after fantastic geriatric sex.
Scroll to bottom for caption.*
I hope that the grace of his or her presence in your life is like a lightning strike that inspires you forever after always to strive to be a better person, to laugh with surprise at an unexpected joke they make when you are having an argument, to give new ideas a thorough-think-through and peek behind closed doors; I hope in short that he or she deserves every drop of the deep well of love you were created to share and renews your faith in all the anonymous fellow upper primates all over our world with whom we must trek in our stewardship of this nutty mudhole in order to improve our karma and with every go ’round perfect our souls.
ByTim Weber and Sue Noble via environmental graffiti.
Good luck to you.
*Long caption to second to last shot: The dish ran away with the spoon but what can you do? They have opened a comic book store in the City and on rare nights off they like to order dim sum and watch TVLand; the comic shop is honestly not doing so well, their apartment is super-tiny, the bride’s mom won’t take their calls, their used car’s a/c is on the fritz, and they have never been happier.
Publicity still: Adam West and Yvonne Craig read Detective Comics #359, “The Million Dollar Debut of Batgirl.”
With her role as Batgirl, Yvonne Craig’s own place in pop culture is secure. “There was no stigma to my having been Batgirl,” she notes. “No typecasting whatsoever. People really like the character. I was in a supermarket once, and a little girl came up to me and said, ‘I know who you really are!’ Then she said, ‘Barbara Gordon!'”
(Jankiewicz, Pat. “Recalling Batgirl.” October 2002. Starlog 303: 38-41.)
The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary; men alone are quite capable of every wickedness.
(Joseph Conrad.)
In many ways it is like the Slaughter of Innocents or Rape of the Shire. It is no kind of lesson to those experiencing it, not in the heat of the moment. Rather, it is a warning to those who read, and, as Scott McCloud justly points out, tacitly and with secret relish add their knives to the resultant “blood in the gutter.” Murdering the Object: it is still a Thing.
l to r, top: Batman and Robin; Wonder Woman, Batgirl, and Supergirl; Logo and utility belt; “Femme Fatale” 70’s Catwoman tee; Batman. l to r, bottom: Logo on black, Robin (the back says “Boy Wonder”); Logo on heather grey.
Really busy day today, but I was doing the laundry and set out some of my Bat Couture. There was more in the dryer, so I’m at over a week’s worth of wear. (Still not enough.) Also, earlier in the day I took kidlet to pick up a bathing suit for the summer and snagged myself some sweet and cheap new Star Wars shirts from the little boys’ department at Target. What is the opposite of haute couture? Because I’m pretty sure whatever it’s called, I am its poster girl.
Yoda rocking Wayfarers.
It was cool because I don’t think I’ve picked up any new stuff for myself like that since my Star Wars sweatshirt haul from a November trip to the mall with Miss D. She knows how to get me to spend money on much-neeed clothes and is happy to share her strategy: I have many times heard her tell our friendohs, “With E—, you just take her somewhere with beer first. Relax her.” Works for me.
“That R2-D2 is in prime condition: a real bargain.” Wow, I quoted C3PO — I think I need to go rinse my mouth with whiskey now to get my cool back.
It’s just very hard for me to buy clothing for myself, even basic stuff. I start feeling wormy and uneasy about it and hang stuff back up before I even get to the register. (You can forget the fitting room, those things are for chumps. I want in and out of the store with maximum efficacy. Only ballast, no drag.)
Doing laundry and cutting tags off of new garments, I feel practically like a self-respecting adult!
Well, except that I bought all children’s clothes …
PSA: This arcade belongs to the fucking Batgirl!* And none of you cockmongering assmunchers best forget it. She will mess the shit of all you ne’er-do-well cuntnecks** the fuck up, but proper!!
Ohhh, DC. You and your “leaks” and “apologies” for/of cusswords. Your lust for sales will slay us all.
*Is that anything like “the goddamned Batman?” you wonder. Mmm. Not yet. But delicious, memey-riffic time will tell.
**What is a cunt neck? I don’t know, it just came to me as a good insult. Like it seems it is a comparison to the neck of someone plump and vital in youth but maybe now gone to seed that has become all wrinkly and fleshy and vag-y? It is an insult that I think invites understanding of repulsion and distinct un-sexiness. Not sure exactly. I just know I am being vulgar as all kinds of heck in this post and I am (clap-clap, criss-cross-gesture with hands) ALL DONE for the day! King-size cusses. So done. SeaQuest out!
The Thought Experiment 