Showing 11 - 20 of 40 posts found matching keyword: seduction of the innocent
Tuesday 6 March 2018
Another advertisement also spotted in the March 1, 1918 edition of The Newnan Herald:
Pay close attention to that last part:
"THESE CALENDARS WILL NOT BE GIVEN TO CHILDREN."
Why not? Kids love cola. Kids need to know the days of the week.
What "special pose" could sweet, dear Hollywood darling Ruth Roland, star of The Matrimonial Martyr, The Devil's Bait, and The Neglected Wife, be showing that's so inappropriate for the little tykes of Newnan?
Well, I never! Get that thing out of your mouth, you floozy! Scandalous!
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| Leave a Comment | Tags: advertising coke history movies seduction of the innocentFriday 22 September 2017
DC Comics has declared tomorrow, September 23, 2017, to be Batman Day 2017. (In 2016, Batman Day was September 17. In 2015, it was September 26. Seriously, DC, can we settle on one date already?)
This year, DC is cross promoting the event with Harley Quinn, a character celebrating her 25th anniversary. Harley was introduced in Batman: The Animated Series in 1992 as a comedic Joker henchwoman with romantic delusions. These days, she appears in comics and movies (but not television) as a psychopathic mass murderer who dresses like a stripper. Hooray for progress? (Thanks, feminism!)
It's probably not a coincidence that DC is combining the celebration of these two characters now considering that the company released a direct-to-video movie titled Batman & Harley Quinn late last month. Despite being made by the same people responsible for the all-ages Batman: The Animated Series, B&HQ is adults-only material. At one point, after mistaking him for a homosexual, Harley seduces Batman's adopted sidekick, Robin Nightwing. Personally, I don't need that much sex in my cartoons. That's why I have the Internet.
Anyway, if you go to your Local Comic Shop tomorrow, you can get your own free copy of Batman Day 2017 Special Edition #1. It's mostly reprints, but a free comic is a free comic.
And if that's not enough Bat-fun for you, you can download the official Batman Day Kit (including mazes, games, and sweet, sweet Terry Dodson and Jose Garcia-Lopez coloring pages) from dccomics.com. At least there's no creepy hero-on-villain sex in there. I promise.
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Monday 13 June 2016
Today in Superman's library we see a demonstration of Superman's least known power: super-alphabetization. Let's see what's under the letter "n":
DC Comics Presents #18 (1980)
I appreciate that a good crime fighter has to keep informed of the criminal mind, but what is Superman doing with a copy of the Necronomicon in his Fortress of Solitude library?
No, Superman. Just no.
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| Leave a Comment | Tags: comic books seduction of the innocent supermanMonday 14 March 2016
It's pretty common for modern comic book fans to decry Fredric Wertham's seminal Seduction of the Innocent as a knee-jerk response to a misunderstood medium. But the more comics I read from the so-called Golden Age of comics, the more I think Dr. Wertham might not have been quite the wacko that the revisionists would have us believe.
Hit Comics #22, June 1942
Said the good doctor:
The injury-to-the-eye motif is an outstanding example of the brutal attitude cultivated in comic books -- the threat or actual infliction of injury to the eyes of a victim, male or female. ... The children of the early forties pointed out the injury-to-the-eye to us as something horrible. The children of 1954 take it for granted. A generation is being desensitized by these literal horror images.
It doesn't look so bad to me.
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| Leave a Comment | Tags: comic books death seduction of the innocentSaturday 23 January 2016
I hate myself for watching the Suicide Squad trailer.
I hate myself more for liking it.
Sigh. 2016 is going to be a long year.
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| Leave a Comment | Tags: comic books movies seduction of the innocentMonday 11 January 2016
From the We've Been Here "Bee"-fore Department:
As America entered WWII, Hit Comics cut back to a bi-monthly schedule. It also cut back on it's villains. In issue Twenty-One, Red Bee shows up to confront yet another in a never-ending string of protection rackets. Apparently, the shops in Superior City were very, very fragile.
Hit Comics #21, April 1942
If there is a highlight in this adventure, it's "gun moll" Mae Floss. She doesn't get a lot of time on panel, but she does makes the most of it. Smooching, feigning distress, knocking the hero out with her purse: she squeezes more into her four panels than most Red Bee antagonists get in an entire story!
Since Miss Floss isn't seen after the Red Bee steers her getaway car into a brick wall, I like to think she escaped and will return to menace him again in the future. She'd make a good recurring villain for the Red Bee. It takes a special kind of man to train bees to sting on command, and that kind of man has no use for women. Who can blame him? We all know it's impossible to train a woman to do anything on command.
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Monday 21 September 2015
From the Because Red Credit Hog Was Taken Department:
Hit Comics #17, November 1941
This story starts with a punk assaulting Superior City Assistant District Attorney Rick Raleigh in the showers of the local gym. Believe it or not, the motive of this attack is not explained. It has only the most tangential link to the adventure. Just a random assault on a naked superhero. That Dr. Wertham failed to mention this issue in Seduction of the Innocent must have been a clerical oversight.
Over the course of the rest of the adventure, Red Bee convinces a minor to join the mob, murders a man with a car, and then runs away from the police. Oh, and he's also a Peeping Tom. I've said it before: the Red Bee is my kind of hero.
This story makes it explicit that Michael, the Red Bee's bee, has been "trained to help in any emergency." I guess that means he can put out a fire by flapping his wings, defuse a bomb with his antenna, or dial a rotary phone to call a cab when the boss loses his keys.
Ah, the good old days. If the world of 2015 worked like the world of 1941, every teenager with a smartphone would be a costumed crime fighter. Come on, Siri, we've got work to do.
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Thursday 11 September 2014
Who would have guessed that Batman's favorite movie is The Deer Hunter?
Elsewhere in this story, Batman uses his "tremendous powers of calculation" to win at roulette. I know Batman's secret system: always bet on black!
These panels are from "Killer's Roulette" published in Detective Comics #426 in 1972. If that were republished today, there'd be no suspense, just panels of two men sitting at a table covered in blood and brains. Kids these days.
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Saturday 14 June 2014
I'm not the only one who seems to be celebrating Superman on his blog this month. The following images came from posts at other blogs I regularly visit.
The first panel comes from DC Comics Presents #61 (1983) by way of Mike Sterling's Progressive Ruin. It really does sum up everything else I love about Superman.
Meanwhile, Siskoid's Blog of Geekery shows the other side of Superman, Superman #109 (1956), which I also love.
That's right, Clark Kent and Lois Lane are out for dinner at the Gay Metropolis Supper Club. (I've discussed my affinity for Superman's adventures at Gay places before.) The Silver Age was a different time.
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Monday 15 April 2013
First of all, Editor — if that is your real name — inherited color blindness is sex-linked, and although more common in men (who have only one X chromosome), it can and does affect women. It's not like, say, prostate cancer, which only affects men because women don't have prostates.
Secondly, wouldn't it be far easier for the "Japs" to create a disease that only affected men, since only men have a Y-chromosome? And why would anyone need to create a disease that drove women crazy, anyway? Every woman I know is already crazy! (Am I right, guys, or am I right?)
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