The Knight After 1: Since U Been Gone

Regular readers of this blog (keep those e-mails and IM's comin', gentlemen) may be wondering what has happened to my batself after the "Knightfall" saga ended. The short answer? After a lapse of several months, it resumed and heated up again a while ago. I've been debating whether to continue writing about it here, or not--and, believe it or not, one of the main things that held me back was the absence of a good name for those adventures. I had already decided to retire the "Knightfall" title for entries on that subject, because that referred to a very specific era of my "career" as a masked (and then unmasked) crimefighter. I liked the idea of changing it to reflect a new chapter of my life, much as multi-part storylines in comic books now present themselves as miniseries. I just couldn't come up with the right one.

And then, a few days ago, the new series title presented itself to me. Welcome to the first installment of "The Knight After." And that pretty much sets the tone for the current era: like the hero of my "Beginnings" saga, I am rebuilding my career after a major blow that nearly ended it altogether. That process was quite slow at first, but after a few months back on the job, I can now say things are as busy as ever. The current cast of characters is larger, or at least different. Some familiar faces remain: a Tim Drake-styled Robin, a Dick Grayson-ish former sidekick who has changed his alias name and continues to work primarily on his own, and various superhero colleagues who still drop by from time to time. (Hello, Superman! Greetings, MotorMan!) But there are new arrivals, as well: on the hero front, we have a handsome Batman/Flash whose collection of superhero suits is truly astounding, sundry villains who pop in with threats every now and then, and one Jervis Tetch (batfans will recognize that as the nom de chapeau of the Mad Hatter) who is obsessed--like so many ne'er-do-wells before him--with capturing, unmasking, and enslaving me.

He'll have to take a number, though, because a relatively minor character from the Monk days (it was M who first introduced us, in fact) has come to play a relatively major role in the new era. Let's call him "the Ranger"--a name that reflects his past as a Good Guy, perhaps bearing a family resemblance to the Lone Ranger. If I remember correctly, M had assigned me to help him lead the onetime hero down the path of Eeeeeevil--and in the months since we'd last tangled, it looks like my old nemesis's mission was a roaring success. When we remet, the Ranger assured me he had cleaned up his act, gone straight, returned to the crimefighting biz...

... but this turned out to be a ruse designed to re-earn my trust. Once he had it, he mounted a fullscale attack on me involving an extraordinary arsenal of poison darts, mind-altering/will-demolishing gases, and the like. I fought back with every resource at my disposal, but he proved too smart for me. The turning point came when he captured me and worked me over during an on-camera session. I thought fast and used all his own weapons against him, ostensibly making him as submissive to me as I was to him. Moments later, when he ordered me to unmask, I resisted and made the same demand of him--and to my great surprise, he did as told. It was a brilliant strategy on his part: seeing my adversary remove his most treasured defense caught me off guard, and I was putty in his hands. More drugs came my way, and in no time I found myself unable to resist his next command to expose my face to him.

The rest, as they say, is history: a history of servitude to the Ranger. Whether I like it or not, I am his to be "milked" (easily the sexiest verb in the entire lexicon of superhero roleplay) whenever and however he pleases.

Okay, I realize this is all going to sound suspicious to longtime readers, but you'll have to take my word for it when I say this was not a fate (however temporary) that I freely chose for myself, but one that has been thrust upon me.The situation may similar to that with the Monk, but--and here's what makes this a worthy sequel--the circumstances are different enough to hold my interest. With apologies to Rod Stewart, the first cut really is the deepest, yet this new descent into enforced submission bears a couple of distinctive traits:

1. The Ranger has allowed me to continue to operate as Batman, and to make contact with other heroes and villains even as I agree to serve as his secret lover, and
2. He does not have the kind of taste restrictions that kept the Monk from interacting with my two key sidekicks (past and present).
Both of these cases mean that the situation will likely play itself out quite differently. (If it plays out at all--the Ranger has been mighty quiet of late, and it's possible he's lost interest in the scenario now that he seems to have won for the time being. Sometimes the battle is more exciting than the victory, you know.)

That's the backstory--what has happened between "Knightfall" and "The Knight After." I just wanted to get all that out before I discussed its significance, which I'll do soon. Meanwhile, you have my word that I'll keep you posted on future develoments as they occur.

To the batpole!

What if Batman were one of us? Just a slob like one of us?

This is how we do it around here: I don't post a damn thing for weeks, months, and then it's bam bam bam, one entry after another...

Just got an e-mail alert from the ever-reliable Batman Fan Filmssite about the latest completed project featured there. (Seems like every day there's a new teaser, trailer, or script, but those usually just don't cut it. I want the real deal in all its full-length, batsuited glory, not some promise of things to come!) It's a movie called The Bat Man--and the space between the words turns out to be very important indeed. It's not a flawless work by any means, and not the best fan film I've ever seen, but it's well worth a viewing.

The premise tosses out one of the most fundamental aspects of the whole Bat myth: that Bruce Wayne is an enormously wealthy man with no day job who can afford to take years off to train his body and mind, and to purchase all those gadgets that make up for his essential mortality. In this version, things are very, very different, and the result may well be the most "realistic" (if that's the right word) spin on the story I've come across (aside from my own sordid fantasies, that is). It's actually scary, in the sense that you realize just how dangerous this guy's obsession really is, and how vulnerable it leaves him. (He's more like Peter Parker than the Bruce Wayne we know and love--only he's got no spidey powers to protect him from the gun-wielding bad guys.)

I didn't find the movie in any way erotic, mind you (and I admit that's normally a big part of the appeal for me, as you've prooooooobably noticed by now), but it's certainly thought-provoking--sort of in the way that The Last Temptation of Christ tweaks its core material just enough to make you look at the story of Christ through new eyes. I had a socialist friend once who turned his nose up at the Bat-saga because it revolves around a rich capitalist, but I've always seen the hero as more politically complicated than that. He can be embraced by the left as well as the right--and written off by both camps, too.

Normally I would post a link to the film and you'd click on it and be directed to some other site to watch it, but through the magic of the internet, or at least the magic of vmix.com, you can watch it right here. Enjoy--and please post your comments on the movie below, if you're so inclined. (If you want to reach writer/director/star Oliver Ferrasci with your feedback, head to the main BFF site.)



Videos by vMix Member:
oliverferrasci


Moral of the story: who needs years of study in the Mysterious East when you've got Google?

Men without shirts

When it rains, it pours, batfans. Follow the ongoing trail o' links in its latest twists and turns:

First, a return visit to Man's Adventure yielded only one new illustration, but one of the homo-licious links to the right of the main text brought me to ...

Brian's Drive-In Theater, a spiffy site packed with tributes to B-movie stars and character actors, beefcake and cheesecake shots, film noir stars, beach movie cast members, and so much more. We're talking lavishly illustrated filmographies and links to DVDs, batfans. Pure gold! I dove straight into the section devoted to "Low-Budget Superheroes", where I found shots of Tom Tyler (the Phantom in the 1943 serial) and Reb Brown (Captain America in two low-budget 1979 movies), among others. Re Reb, if you love the lycra and the Cap as much as I do, you owe it to yourself to rent (as cheaply as possible) at least the first of his CA films. (I thiink the first one is the, ahem, "better" of the two, and features a nice bondage shot or two, but then it's been over 10 years since I saw either one). Come on: it may not exactly be standard issue, but how can you resist this... package...



... especially when you know this is what lies beneath that tight-fitting uniform:



And speaking of beefcake (and the bare flesh of superheroes), the same section of Brian's Drive-In also features a tribute to Van Williams, the very Green Hornet whose praises I was singing just two entries back. Here I found not only a dense collection of GH/Lone Ranger stuff but the first shirtless shots of Van I've ever seen; bear with me if I go overboard on posting these, but I'm beside myself with joy. Let us begin with a technicolor treasure in which not only the backdrop but Mr. Williams' entire body appears to be 100% airbrushed for your viewing pleasure:



Next, here he is doing a bit of yardwork. That's right: no matter how pumped you may be, you still have to break out the lawncare implements every now and then. May I fetch you a glass of iced tea, Mister Future Green Hornet, sir?



Finally, say hello to Captain Van (and his treasure of a chest):



I'll stop there, but trust me: Mr. Hornet seems to have been called upon to remove his shirt at least as often as Jim "Wild, Wild" West (though not in his crimefighting days, alas).

There are several other low-budget superheroes on the site, but we must move on to the obvious piece de resistance. In case you're wondering, there is a shirtless shot of Adam West, but to be honest, I've always been a little disappointed by that particular hairless wonder ever since I first saw it exposed in the final episode of the Batman series. No, the real treat on West's page is a link to video footage of a 1977 showdown between the (un)caped crusader and Jerry Lawler (in one of the least erotic Superman-based outfits of all time). Adam is wearing a bizarre but sexy all-black variation on the batsuit that seems to foreshadow the sort of ninja get-ups favored by Christian Bale in early sections of Batman Begins:



Okay, time to wrap this up before I sacrifice an entire evening of my life to photos of manly men baring their hairy, muscular chests.

All right, so it wouldn't be the first time. But still...

Bruce Wayne, Lapsed Episcopalian?

While doing a little background research for a certain supporting character whose easy-to-guess alter ego was just revealed in my Beginnings story, I came across this site devoted to "The Religious Affiliation of Comic Book Characters." (That link takes you to a page of text; if you want to make a more dramatic entrance, check out this far more visually interesting one, which groups the gang by faith, making for some wacky juxtapositions, like Black Lighting, Rogue, and someone named Playback as part of the "Legion of Baptist Superheroes.")

There is a voluminous amount of information and speculation here, both about the fictional characters and the real-life religions they may or may not be affiliated with. Needless to say, I had to check out the entry on Batman right away. Evidently the big controversy is: lapsed Episcopalian, or, in the webmaster's words, "an exquisitely bad Catholic"? Along the way, there is talk of the character's creator's Judaism and the years that young Bruce Wayne spent studying Eastern religion. Much is made of panels like these:




which I, of course, include here not for their theological content but for their depictions of the sexiest man on Earth in his Tibetan skivvies.

I've long contended that there is a strong spiritual dimension to my own bat-centric fantasy life, so it's interesting to see someone devote so much time to actually mapping out the beliefs of these characters. It's a variation on those "Superhero Science" books and TV shows, and it reminds me that I've seen a couple of books on the philosophical and religious lessons of comic book heroes that I mean to pick up some day. I'd provide links to them on Amazon, but the last time I set out to do that I got distracted by a bunch of other fascinating-looking volumes and never quite found the ones I had in mind.

And that's a lesson I've already learned.

Follow that bat-link...

It's been a great evening for bat action on the web! First, my British batfriend told me about this Yahoo group devoted to the Adam West batsuit. Photos, links, trivia, audio clips, the works.

From the links page there, I came across this message board devoted to the 1966 show. Too much stuff to mention here, but I must call your attention to two items of interest:

1. Green Hornet fans will want to check out the section of the Bat-board devoted to GH. From there I learned--be still, my beating heart!--that Starz's ACTION channel is currently broadcasting the TV show. Hip, hip, hooray! The last time I am aware of that this was on the air, more than 10 years ago, I didn't have cable, and couldn't lure my friends into taping every single episode for me. But the TiVO era changes everything. Word is, the episodes are uncut and (I think) shown in original sequence. (The board also led me to this nifty site devoted to the costumes and weaponry from the GH series.)

2. The cool comics blog DIAL B FOR BLOG did a six-part retrospective on the "Secret Origins" of the legendary series a couple of months ago to mark the--gulp!--40th anniversary of its premiere on January 12, 1966. It begins here, and is a profusely illustrated, trivia-packed account that actually taught me plenty of stuff I didn't already know. (Were you aware, for instance, that the Batmobile actually appeared in this movie before it was transformed into the vehicle we all know and love?)

Somewhere in there, I came across...

...this shot of Lyle Waggoner in an early version of the batsuit, from his screen test. (Heretical though this may sound, I wouldn't have minded him in the part. I always enjoyed him on Wonder Woman, which also called for lots of bondage fun. Plus, come on, he's just fucking handsome in that shot.)

Finally, from the final installment of the DIAL B six-parter, I discovered this site where you can buy all 120 episodes of the series on DVD for $36. They are bootlegs, of course (from the TV Land airing of the series, which I think may have been edited a bit as I recall), and the packaging is ultra-minimal, but the episodes are presented in sequence, and I can finally get rid of the endless half-labelled VHS copies I made of random episodes. Besides, at that price, if an official version EVER comes out, I won't mind shelling out a second time if there are any worthwhile extras. So, needless to say, I bought 'em immediately.

And set my TiVO for Tuesday morning's 6 a.m. airing of The Green Hornet. Life is good, batfriends, life is good. (Thanks again, BritBat--I owe ya one.)

Hooray for superheroes!

Talk about answered prayers: Just as I was trying to think of something quick and simple to write about here as a subtle way of pointing out that I still exist, along comes Johnny Bacardi directing my attention to the artist Bone's blog called "Man's Adventure". All drawings of manly men, all the time. Lots of superheroes lately. And I was delighted to learn that Bone was responsible for this funny yet sexy satire about Batman's penchant for getting into bondage-y situations. (It's all the bad guys' fault.) I hope Mr. Bone will forgive me for infringing copyright and reprinting a panel:



"Fruit-Bat" appeared in a copy of Love in Tights, an indie comic whose other contents also pulled off the difficult feat of juggling amusing satire with hot imagery. I gather it no longer exists, and I treasure the lone copy I managed to find a few years ago.

You can be sure I'll be revisiting the Bone Yard often, especially if he continues those discussions about superhero chest hair and drawing JLA members like Tom of Finland models. To the batpole, indeed.

More sickboy TV talk

Still under the weather, still finding my share of kinky stuff to watch:

•Finally caught Blade: Trinity after hearing that Ryan Reynolds spends a significant amount of the movie shirtless in chains. It's true! It's true! Behold:



Oh, hell: here's a whole page of stills from the film. I actually fast-forwarded through a lot of it, since I'm not a big fan of ultraviolent vampire flicks and wisecracking heroes, even if they are embodied by the recently beefed-up Mr. R.

•Also fast-forwarded through Hostage. I think I only really watched about 15 minutes of the movie at its intended speed before jumping ahead to see Bruce Willis (in uniform) handcuffed, and later stripped naked. You get two Bruces in this thing: first, with full bushy crazy-person beard in the preface, then with shaved head in the body of the movie. Neither one quite does it for me, but they're still nice looks. I admit I have this major Bruce Willis problem, ever since Moonlighting: He's got a whole lot of physical features I find really appealing, but he's also incredibly obnoxious. (A common problem with men, come to think of it.) The whole macho Republican fratboy vibe is a major turn-off. And yet, tie him up and I tune in. (Trying to remember what early-90s movie has him handcuffed and bound to a chair at the climax... Surely more than one. And Moonlighting had no shortage of bondage scenes, as I recall.)



•Looks like I'm not the only horny gay guy looking for still photos of Matt Lauer in a luge suit. (Damn, first he's Batman, now he's squeezed into skintight lycra--I have got to start watching the Today Show!) There seems to be video footage here, but once again I doubt I can see it on my Mac.

All quite enjoyable to watch, but I'd really rather feel good again than lie around filling my head with such sights.

Make it work, slave

Been home sick all week, which has meant lots of sleeping, not much bat-activity, and a HUGE amount of television, including two mini-marathons of season two of Project Runway. Okay, I know what you're saying: "All well and good, Batfan60, but what does this have to do with the stated mission of your blog?" It's true, Runway is simply not about cops or costumed crimefighters--well, unless you count the passing mention of superhero-themed lingerie in one episode, but the proposed relaunch of Underoos for adult women (emblazoned with words like "BAM!" and "POW!" on the crotch) did not make it too far.

No, the thing about the show that I want to mention here is the strong undercurrent of SM in pretty much every episode. In the fantasy dynamic of the series--a multicultural dream world that seems to consist entirely of heterosexual women and gay men--everything revolves around dominance and submission. Sure, the contestants are competing against each other, which involves the usual amount of reality-tv gameplaying, but more interesting is the way they have to answer each week to dominatrix Heidi Klum, prissy taskmaster Tim Gunn, and a revolving panel of hard-to-please celebrity judges. At the same time, each contestant has an accompanying "muse"/model, and these lovely ladies are at the very bottom of the pecking order, who suffer the injustice of being traded in slave-auction-style rituals. (We hear them speak when they're kicked off the show, or--very rarely--when they get up the nerve to complain to their Masters about some especially uncomfortable or humiliating outfit.) Much of the show is devoted to people getting chewed out by their superiors, their faces charged with silent shame or suppressed rage. All that's missing is the "sir, yes sir."

I've come to detest 98% of the "reality" shows that have sprung up in the wake of the first season of Survivor ( a show I did think was amazing for its time), but this one really is pretty addictive. Of course, it helps that I find a lot of the male cast members fairly sexy in one way or another (including the aforementioned Tim), but the appeal is greater than mere cuteness. The kinky dimension doesn't hurt, either.

Bonus TV talk: As I type this, Bravo is airing what I assume is one of many endless rebroadcasts of its 3-part Ultimate Super Heroes, Villains, and Vixens mini-series, narrated by Adam West himself. Not very informative (Stan Lee saying what he always says, plenty of clips for recent movies spun off from DC and Marvel characters, and lots of those ubiquitous talking-head interviews with people who do nothing but provide commentaries like this for cable channels), but it's yet another pleasant distraction from sniffling and sneezing. If you've ever wanted to know what Dee Snider has to say about Batman, now's your chance.

Next up: the Winter Olympics, every lycra-lover's dream. 400+ hours of luge and "skeleton" suits. Hallelujah!

Jack U Off

Not since the Oliver North hearings have I been this turned on by a real-life creepy political bad guy. (Okay, so there's my thing for Ari Fleischer, but he wasn't really the bad guy so much as the mouthpiece for the bad guy.) It's true: I have the hots for Jack Abramoff.

I love that trenchcoat, and I'm nuts about this shot of him in a full beard. Or (in case you don't want to bother clicking the links) this one, which is not as cute as the other one, but will do in a pinch:



Just thought I'd share. After all, that's what blogging is for, ain't it? If you can't anonymously confess embarrassing attractions to objectionable individuals, why bother, right?

Cleaning out my closet

Today's one of those days to sort through stuff I've bookmarked to write about here and have forgotten for months, sometimes years:

This AlterNet story on gays and comics dates back to 2003, but if you haven't seen it, it's still worth checking out.

An insanely detailed guide to the '66 TV show and accompanying movie, listing clues, gizmos, Robin's "holy" expressions, trivia, and so much more for every single episode. (And people call me obsessive...)

The Land of Nod is a site devoted entirely to images of characters who have been chloroformed or gassed by members of the opposite sex. (Of course there are Batman shots! Need you ask?) Hasn't been updated since 1999, but if you go for this sort of thing, you won't leave disappointed.

Beauty in Darkness is a blog on the history of BDSM, in conjunction with a work-in-progress book on that subject. I found it, oddly enough, through a Google search long ago for "Batman + Midnighter" (the Batman-esque leatherman hero of The Authority), and that reference does indeed appear, but I think I will be exploring the rest of the site in more detail, so I'm adding it to the links list on the right.

More to come, but surely at least one of the above will float yer boat in the meantime.

Oh, and you'll be happy, if not shocked, to learn that I've actually updated my "Secret Room" website for the first time in over a year. It's mostly just adding the above, and I certainly have much more to add and subtact, but at least it's a start.

Officer, arrest this man!

Fellow cop-lovers may want to join me in viewing Sheriff, a new documentary in the PBS series Independent Lens, which follows a small-town sheriff through his daily routine. While I'm looking forward to the film for its insights into law enforcement and its cinematic qualities, I confess I have another investment in the show. I mean, take a look:



It's hard to properly assess the hotness factor from one b&w photo, but I've got a good feeling about this.

Airs at 11 p.m. tonight in my area, but the series tends to run on different days and nights around the U.S., plus there are rebroadcasts, and you can even purchase a copy if you're that into it. If I remember, I'll post a response here after I've actually seen it.

Back in action

Guess I'd better get busy and post something pronto lest you all think I've thrown in the towel, or the cape, or what have you. Alas, daylight-world responsibilities keep rearing their ugly heads, though I've managed to keep busy on the bat-front as well. To make up for lost time, here's a big string of stuff I've found online of late that may be of interest to some of my fellow perverts--and regular old comics fans, too:

Lycra Sites
www.lycrasuit.nl/lycra-sites.htm
Found this through my new automatically generated list of sites that link to this one, near the bottom of the sidebar to the right. Months can-and probably will--be devoted to exploring the treasures these lycra-lovers have cataloged. Several of the next few entries come from the list, either directly or indirectly.

League of Heroes
p086.ezboard.com/btheleagueofheroes
This bulletin board contains vast amounts of info about making and buying superhero costumes, with photos of completed suits, consumer advice, even workout suggestions so you'll look your best in your new suit. I think this led me to...

FanBoy Theatre
www.fanboytheatre.com
News about upcoming fan films, many of which look promising, including...

Captain America: Freedom's Fight
www.fanboytheatre.com/id49.html
Stills from an upcoming fan film about Captain A, with a nice (non-spandex, but still hot) costume.

The Death of Hero-Man
www.manta-ray-productions.com/heroman.html
Here's a short film I found through FanBoy Theatre, featuing a hero in an INCREDIBLY tight, attractive outfit. (I like the villain, too.) Wordless, which gives it the feel of a silent movie.

Heroes Alliance
www.heroesalliance.com/
Wish I'd had this idea myself--or had the nerve to pull it off. This is a group of folks who own and wear superhero suits who have found a way to turn their ... hobby into actual good-guy work in the daylight world by making public appearances for sick kids, at fundraisers, with local police and fire departments, etc.

That's it for now. Soon as my schedule clears up, I"ll try to get back in blog mode again. In the meantime, the links above should keep you busy for a while.

Knightfall 23: The end of an era

It's over.

I honestly never thought I'd say this, but the saga of Batman and the Monk, or at the very least this particular manifestation of that saga--this specific graphic novel or multi-issue comic series, if you will--has reached its logical conclusion.

I've spent one day short of 5 weeks avoiding any contact with M--a struggle that felt sometimes like it would tear me apart. There were days when I wanted more than anything to turn myself in and return once again to his clutches, but somehow I always held out. This meant that Batman was effectively forced completely underground, able to go visible in Yahoo Messenger only in the very late hours of the night, for more than a month.

Believe me, this is a very, very odd way to maintain a "friendship." And ours has been a most unusual friendship from the get-go. (This might be an appropriate place to note the distinction between the virtual friendship of two real people, chatting in cyberspace, and the epic struggle between the two mortal enemies we played. Those lines get fuzzy sometimes, which is partly what this entry is about.)

Tonight--feeling empowered and not at all ready to succumb--I signed on to Messenger (that is, Batman walked into the familiar alley where he knew his enemy would find him), and within two minutes he pinged me (that is, the Monk made his presence known). It was quite clear that, while the last several weeks had been every bit as charged for me as when we chatted on a daily basis, my silence had not carried the same intensity for him as it had for me. Far from it: he'd lost "the spark" and had moved on to other victims, other interests, and assumed I had done the same.

We spent the next two and a half hours chatting, not as Batman and Monk, but as the two real people beneath those guises. I think we both, fairly quickly, understood the other person's perspective--and we both acknowledged that our story had come to an end, at least for now. (As I noted in my last entry on the subject, the beauty of an adversary in the comics is that he never really goes away, just gets sent to jail for a few years and then resurfaces, sooner or later--or could, at any minute. Keeps the hero on his toes, which is always a good thing.)

And as Ii wrote in the very first chapter of this "Knightfall" saga, I hit a point a few years ago when my solo "batplay" reached a dead end--there was only so far I could go, playing both villain and hero, tying myself up and breaking free. That was fun and/or enlightening for a good ten years, but I needed to explore territority I couldn't cover by myself. I craved an element of surprise, a real sense of an adversary outside myself. The Hub was more than willing to suit up and play good guy or bad guy for a night, which was/is always fun and sometimes remarkable, but for the most part the whole business does not carry the same intensity for him as it does for me. So I turned to the online community to deepen my bat-adventures. Problem was, I've never been in this simply to jerk off. (When I want to get off, it's way less work to grab a video or even a comic book than to have to type a scenario for some horny semi-literate guy I'd probably never want to talk to if I met him in real life.)

Enter the Monk, who seemed to grasp exactly the kind of longterm 24/7 fantasy I was into and who was more than willing to create it alongside me, enjoying it as fully as I did. As I've documented here in great detail, that ultimately involved my being unmasked, broken, humiliated, and transformed into a lowly slave he dubbed "Ratman"--until I eventually came to my senses (or, to hear him tell it, fulfilled the destiny he had always had in mind for me)--and broke free of his clutches, reclaiming my old costume and mission once more. All of this unfolded on a more-or-less nightly basis over the course of a year and a half, and it was one of the most powerful experiences of my adult life. That is to say, the fantasy taught me as much about myself as any real-world experience.

Alas, "powerful" does not always mean "pleasant," and there were times when being beaten and broken just made me feel ... beaten and broken, or, at the very least, like I was conducting some kind of torrid affari behind my Hub's back, even though that was clearly not the case. I wrestled with my attraction/repulsion to the Monk, and weighed my major options:

*I could return to him and surrender forever, which did not feel like a wise thing to do on any level (given how crappy my earlier subservience had me feel), or
*I could leave the online world altogether, never to return, which also did not seem like something I really wanted to do. (For one thing, I've made some really nice friendships in that world, and I didn't want to leave all of them behind.)

Between those two extremes lay a middle ground: I could go cold turkey and wait out my "addiction" to his charms until he no longer held such force over me. Thus the 5 week hiatus. Alas, the real person behind the Monk persona was not privvy to any of this, and simply lost interest in waiting for me to resurface. In short, we'd both reached another dead end: I couldn't defeat him or reclaim the secrets he'd stolen from me (my unmasked face and identity), but neither did I want to continue living with the less than pleasant feelings this whole saga conjured up for the real-life me, and the Batman in me was similarly left in limbo, unable to fight other villains and unwilling to submit to the one who had defeated him. In the course of our discussion, we mutually agreed that our adventure, or at least this version of it, was over. I called it a victory,he claimed it as a draw. And we both expressed our high regard for each other, as adversaries and friends alike. As he put it, "Monk found Batman to be the ultimate prize...and ___ found ___ to be the ultimate roleplay chat bud." (The ____s being real names, of course.) I couldn't say it better myself, and the phrasing makes the stalemate clear: it's hard to keep the "ultimate" going continuously for an unbounded amount of time. Again, a dead end--which is in no way a complaint or shortcoming.

He asked if Batman would seek out other villains, and I reminded him that that's what Batman always does. I just can't say whether those will come from the online world (not too likely, since I really do find the vast majority of opponents from that realm are not into the same thing I am), from my own imagination once more, or from some as yet undiscovered realm. I only know that I treasure the saga that unfolded and the friendship of the man who helped unfold it, and I'm happy to move on. After our talk tonight, I feel pretty certain that the friendship is still intact, even if the circumstances that first brought us together have now changed. Until this evening, I had not figured out a way that could happen--so, for me, the "battle" is over, and both of us have won.

It's thrilling to me on some deep level to fantasize that the Monk could resurface at any time--online, on the phone, even in person. Like any great archenemy, he's always out there, plotting his next move. And it's also exciting to realize that, like any hero, my own work goes on--on other fronts, in other battles, against other adversaries.

It's funny: in the daylight world, I have all kinds of problems with endings. (I could devote an entire blog to that last sentence, but then you'd want to charge me for your services, and I already pay a shrink.) This one, while hard won, feels exactly right. I have a feeling I'll have more to say about the Monk in the future, and our paths may even cross again, but at the moment it feels great to close the book on this particular case. I can even call it a happy ending--something Batman seldom allows himself to do.

In case you were wondering...

The fact that I've taken another couple of online personality profiles can only mean that I have work to do in the daylight world that I'm avoiding. But here goes:

Imaginative, erotic, passionate You prefer to have one partner and to try everything with them. You have an enormous sexual appetite, and you often create sexy scenarios to play out with your significant other.

Take this quiz at QuizUniverse.com

Truth be told, the questions in this quiz were annoyingly simplistic, as they so often tend to be--WAY too binary, no room for any gray areas, multiple answers, etc. Even so, I'd say the capsule summary of me was fairly accurate. (Unfortunately, it doesn't appear properly onscreen above for some reason.)

From there we turn to...

The Assertive Sub You scored 57

You are assertive, yet still maintain some level of submission. You stand your ground firmly most of the time, and are fairly level. You may not identify with being submissive or dominant, and it's possible that you're a switch (someone who alternates between the two depending on circumstances and/or mood).

My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 28% on domsub

Link: The Are you Dominant or submissive Test written by nahemah on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

("Assertive sub," eh? Sounds like somebody putting a positive spin on the dreaded "pushy bottom" category.) Once again, infuriating questions, although this time there were at least more options than two for most of them. The problem was, lots of them were based on assumptions that were completely off base.

Finally, lest there be any doubt whatsoever...

You scored as Batman, the Dark Knight. As the Dark Knight of Gotham, Batman is a vigilante who deals out his own brand of justice to the criminals and corrupt of the city. He follows his own code and is often misunderstood. He has few friends or allies, but finds comfort in his cause. Batman, the Dark Knight 100% James Bond, Agent 007 71% Neo, the "One" 71% Lara Croft 58% Indiana Jones 50% Captain Jack Sparrow 50% The Amazing Spider-Man 50% William Wallace 46% The Terminator 46% Maximus 38% El Zorro 29% Which Action Hero Would You Be? v. 2.0 created with QuizFarm.com

(Re my runner up identities, I'm flattered by 007, mildly appalled by Neo and Lara, and surprised to find my Zorro Gene was practically nonexistent. In any case, I'm delighted to have this particular bat-pic on my blog now, since I've always liked it.) For the record, I found all of these elegant time-wasters via this blog by a like-minded stranger (friend of a friend) I should probably contact sometime.

Odds 'n' ends

1. This interview at COMICON.com with Paul Pope about his BATMAN YEAR 100 project makes the book look mighty interesting. Batman looks pretty hot, and I am intrigued by Pope's comments, some of which sound just as fetishistic as stuff I would probably say:

To me, the classic Batman is the most visually interesting and the most believable - the little gloves, the gray jersey, the mask with the severe 'V' shaped design cut across his cheekbones - the strange, scary slits for eyes - that kind of thing from his original appearances... He has real boots on. There's no generic foot shape on my guy. a Ken doll foot, you know. Generic superhero foot. ... I don't know how others draw Batman's boots, but mine look like actual boots.

My other pet peeve has always been his utility belt. It seems like it's often portrayed as kind of this Deus Ex Machina thing with everything in it. I want to wipe that campy Batman shit off the board. There's no Bat Shark Repellant in here. He just has a few essentials in this utility belt. Since it's the future there are some tricky weapons like this sonic dog whistle thing, a machine that confuses people, rope, a torch cutter, lights, and a few other simple devices.



2. I've been TRYING to remember which comics blog did a tribute to Dorian's semi-regular "Subtext? What Subtext?" feature (which I dearly love) sometime last month, but I can't find it. In the process of trying to track it down from Dorian's own site, I came across this brilliant and hilarious entry about "How To Get Your Boyfriend To Read Comics." It's great, although I don't think I'm ever gonna try it with the Hub. I've already got him dressing up like comics characters and doing various kinky things with me in costume, which is way more fun, so why put him through actually reading real live, ahem, "monthly comics periodicals"?

3. To make up for not finding the item I was looking for in #2, here are two of the pics in that entry I was gonna link to. I won't even bother to come up with smirking text to accompany them, since that's been done by minds far wittier than mine. (I just can't tell you where.) Me, I just want to enjoy the pix. Click on 'em to make them--and maybe yourself--get bigger:



and



4. I still have more to say on that SuperDickery treasuretrove, but it will have to wait. Ah, how I tease...

Knightfall 22: Enemy mine

I can't tell you how cool it is to have an archenemy.

One of the main things that has always appealed to me about the comic book and tv-series versions of Batman, as opposed to the films, is the fact that the villains stick around for years--decades, even. Oh, they may be sent off to jail every now and then, but their time in the stir only hardens their resolve to break out and return to their work destroying their nemesis with a renewed sense of purpose. The characters have a history together, a shared language. They're like forces of nature. And the intensity of their battles grows stronger with each encounter. Because Batman's moral code does not permit him to kill his enemies--and because I suspect they don't really want to do him in, either--they're stuck with each other for life.

Likewise, I've always been intrigued by the element of time in SM (or whatever you want to call it) roleplay: the longer the better, if you ask me. While it's not really in the cards for me, I'm fascinated by the prospect of a longterm master/slave relationship, or something similar. It's definitely the same in my solo batplay: when I get a weekend, let alone a week (or, on one glorious occasion ten years ago, an entire month) to myself, time to suit up and go wherever my imagination takes me for hours and hours at a stretch, I'm ecstatic--literally. There may be forays into the outside world now and then, but it's immensely comforting to know that I can return that night to an extended fantasy of my own design, and even more satisfying to know that I've been spinning an ongoing, albeit deeply private, saga for more than ten years.

So you can imagine how thrilling it is to realize that I now have a longterm cast of characters on my IM buddy list: the Monk, of course, but many others as well--fellow superheroes, current and past sidekicks, lesser villains, and a troubling number of "shifters" who tend to slide from good guy to bad guy without warning. Most of these characters know each other and have their own adventures that don't necessarily include me; sometimes two or more of them work in cahoots either with or against me. I'm not really interested in the brief encounter with a passing stranger, though there is certainly a place for those in the comic book world, too: the petty thieves and crossover cameos that add texture to the main storyline (or storylines, since my online saga is sometimes a bit different than the private one I conduct by myself, in the way that, say, Legends of the Dark Knight varies from Detective). The same is true of my Beginnings serial--unlike your average slash fiction, it goes on and on, with characters dropping out and returning from time to time, and having interconnected lives, just as real people do. I enjoy being able to incorporate the passage of real time as often as possible (and to imply that various things have taken place without my having to spell them out.) That's also been the appeal of soap operas as a narrative form for me--except in that case, the content is totally uninteresting. I just like the potential for a tale to span years, in the writing/telling/performing as well as in the reading/viewing.

As for the Monk, he's still out there, and resisting the sometimes burning desire to return to his clutches has become the struggle of my bat-career, the year-and-a-half-long battle that defines my very (fictional) character. He has long insisted that he is no mere outside force by this point but a part of me, and I'll be damned if I don't believe him sometimes. (And, er, perhaps I'll be damned if I do believe him, too.)

So stay tuned--the worst (or best) may be yet to come.

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a DICK!

I don't remember how I came across it, but I found myself with a copy of the August 19, 2005 issue of The Comic Book Network Electronic Magazine, which led me to Superdickery.com, home of Superman is a Dick, an extensive gallery of comic book covers and panels demonstrating just how often the Man of Steel behaves like a complete asshole. (Obligatory side note: I've always been slightly bothered by the slang use of words like "dick," "asshole," "pussy," and the like--or the phrase "that sucks"--to denote something negative, since it just perpetuates our culture's general hatred/fear of the body. But saying that, I realize, makes me sound like a total pussy.) Here's one of the less dick-ish examples of Superman's behavior, which I've obviously picked for the cameo appearance of another famous jerk:



Oh, wait, here's an even better one (as in hotter, since I believe "brainwashed killer" is a bit different than "dick"):



Believe me, there's plennnnnnty more where these came from (and I'm not really giving you the clearest illustration of the "dickery," most of which involves Lois or Jimmy--who totally deserve it, if you ask me). The pages take a while to load, but it's worth the wait. I'll be back with more highlights from another section of the site in a future post--but you really need to check this one out yourself.

My Son Calls Another Man "Daddy"

(Somehow, I don't think this is what Hank Williams had in mind with that song title.)

Dorian at PostModernBarney.com has a nice appreciation of Tom of Finland on his blog, as part of a mini-series on "Objectifying Men." Not only is the writing interesting, but I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've ever seen Tom's--er, Mr. Finland's--work discussed by someone I associate with comics (gay or otherwise). Here, allow me to post a JPEG from my own collection that we may all enjoy:



Given my interest in cops, real and otherwise, I keep meaning to write more about Tom's stuff here, but I never quite get around to it. I've read portions of Micha Ramakers' book Dirty Pictures: Tom of Finland, Masculinity, and Homosexuality, a fairly academic tome peppered with, well, dirty pictures, and many years ago I saw the documentary Daddy and the Muscle Academy, both of which I'd recommend to fans of the artist who are interested in the deeper implications of his work.

Oddly enough, I first heard about Tom from a heterosexual woman artist/curator (with lots of gay friends), around the time of one of his first gallery shows in NYC in the mid-80s, just as the post-modernists were starting to discover him. So, hey, let's hear it for universal appeal!

--Wayne of Gotham

Peek into the box...

I'm still not crazy about any of the Burton/Schumacher Bat-movies, but that hasn't stopped me from coveting the new boxed set of them, mainly for the voluminous extras, and the ability to freeze-frame those one or two images from each film that floated my batboat, like Michael Keaton literally tearing the mask off his face near the end of Returns, or this nice little moment from the movie everyone hates so much:



Somehow today I found myself at this Warner promotional site, which contains snippets of some of the featurettes, a trivia quiz (in multiple versions, though my score was always the same dismally low one since I honestly don't give a shit how many hours it took Danny DeVito to apply his makeup or how much Chris O'Donnell's outfit weighed), desktop themes, (slightly) interactive photos, and other goodies.

Like everyone else, I wish the TV series would get this sort of treatment (even though it seems like we'll never live to see it). Oh, to behold behind-the-scenes footage of Adam and company, in and out of costume! After all, if photos like these exist,







then is it too much to hope for moving images of this kind of thing, too?

Begins, again

Yes, yes, of course I picked up the DVD of Batman Begins right away, and of course I got the 2-disc version with bonus bat-goodies.



I headed straight for the extras, and enjoyed them all. Nothing spectacular, mind you; I wish there'd been a commentary track (I'm a sucker for those), and the "Interactive Comic Book" menu makes for an annoying interface (it is kinda hot, but it's a pain to have to navigate through it to get to a conventional menu). The hard-copy comic included in the package reprints one chapter of The Long Halloween (gotta push that back catalogue) and two origin/early-days stories I didn't have. All in all, I gained a lot of insight into the making of a blockbuster circa 2005, and I saw just how seriously the writer and director take the Bat-mythos and their part within it. (Sorry, I hate that word "mythos," but what the hell.) And let me just say there are some migh-tee hot men involved in the making of that mythos.

In one of the featurettes--maybe the one on the fighting technique Batman uses--there's a note of explanation that the notorious/controversial quick cuts in the combat sequences are meant to convey what an encounter with our hero would look like from the perspective of a bad guy: lightning-fast, impossible to follow, and then it's over. Makes sense, but this and some other passing comment made me realize that, once again, filmmakers feel that Batman himself is not interesting enough to hold a film. In the Burton/Schumacher era the emphasis was on the villains (in ever-increasing numbers each time), and for Nolan it's Bruce Wayne in his pre-Bat days. And I just don't agree. Both classic tv incarnations--the 60s show and the 90s (?) animated one--place Batman, AS Batman, at the center of the story, and that's just where he belongs. Wayne and the baddies need to be there, but they're not what have kept me transfixed for the last four decades.

Sermon over. DVD good. Waiting on pins and needles for the next installment of the Nolan/Goyer saga. Here's hoping they're both along for the long haul, too.

Skin Tight and ready for action

Just got an e-mail alerting me to this entry from the Terminally Single blog about the SkinTight (formerly HardComixxx) parties in NYC, which I'm passing along because there are some nice photos, and the blogger has some good stuff to say about the events, too.

I've never been to one of these parties, but man oh man do they ever look tempting.

Bat-sightings

1. I tell you, I am kicking myself HARD for not being a regular, or semi-regular, or even occasional, Today Show viewer. Matt Lauer is my kind o' cutie any day of the week, but the thought of him in a batsuit on Halloween is too much for my poor heart to bear. Here's one teensy taste, in case you missed it, too:



That outfit borders on the freakish--believe me, if Batman really wants to strike fear in bad guys, maybe he should go for the steroid-abuser look on display here--and I shall hold my tongue regarding the matter of Al Roker as Robin. But the idea of Bat Lauer has me all atwitter--hottest of all for me would be a shot of him in the suit but unmasked, and I haven't come across that yet. There are a whole bunch more images here, and maybe you will have better luck than I did viewing this video clip. (Ah, how painful it is, knowing there is footage out there and not being able to see it!)

2. In the course of finding the links above, I stumbled upon this page of photos from a San Francisco stage show with the somewhat unwieldly name Batman!!! The TV Show: The Play. Here's an unauthorized sample (the best image for my twisted purposes):



The show itself (which apparently just closed) looks like a spoof of a spoof, which is very hard to pull off. (I'll never forget a painfully unfunny "parody" of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman I saw during the run of that classic series, created by folks who were far less clever and creative than the show's creators.) But the villains in particular look great, and I'm sure I'd have paid the bucks to see the show if I'd been able to go.

3. Oh, and here's a personal Halloween update, in case you've been hanging on the edge of your seat waiting to find out: dreary daylight-world obligations kept me from doing the bat-thing this year for the trick-or-treaters, dammit. I was also surprised to find only one pint-sized Dark Knight at my door. No other superheroes that I recall, which was a letdown. Costumes tended to be surprisingly old-school: your ghosts, your witches, your fairy princesses. Here we are in the golden age of comic book movies (well, maybe not so golden, come to think off it), and none of the kids in my little corner of suburbia can be bothered to rise to the occasion? Holy letdown!

'Tis the season

Jeepers, how can it possibly be Halloween again? Time is flying a bit too fast these days--but no matter, for this is indeed the most magical time of the year for superhero fetishists, lycra lovers, cross dressers, furry friends, and all manner of other kinky freaks. All sorts of outfits are commonly available, and you can purchase weird clothing without the usual self-consciousness.

I had high hopes this season, what with the recent bat-movie and such, but the Batman Beyond-inspired costumes tend to be cheesy stuff like this, clearly left over from the last wave of films without any drop in price. Why, why, why do manufacturers think anyone would want to don a bunch of spongy fake muscles and drawn-on features, particularly when spandex-y apparel is readily available in your average sporting goods store? It makes no sense to me. (Exceptions: this utility belt and these gauntlets, which may not be leather but are actually quite comfortable and useful. Both of these items were the stuff of wet dreams in my youth; I'm just happy I've lived long enough to actually be able to get my hands on them.)

By coincidence, sort of, I just purchased and received a new batsuit from SpandexMan. The timing is pretty much by chance, because I've had my eye on this thing for about 3 years now; kept telling myself I'd buy it once I'd paid off some outstanding debt, and I finally did that a couple of weeks ago. It arrived tonight, and needless to say I've already begun to break it in.

Funny thing: a year ago I was strolling the aisles of seasonal costume shops searching for rat-related items. I'd been stripped of my mask, and then my costume, by the Monk and honestly thought I might never wear the uniform of Batman again--a prospect which made me sad, even though I was willing to make that sacrifice if need be, in the interest of discovering where my new circumstances might lead me. Instead, here I am, back in the (bat-)swing of things, even contemplating another Halloween-night appearance in costume (probably not the new grey one, which at the moment feels a little dorky to me, perhaps because I've grown so used to an all-black ensemble), handing out candy to the kiddies.

It'll be interesting to see how many of them show up at my door dressed as the Caped Crusader this year. Funny how, in this era of annual superhero blockbuster movies, there's a continual cycling in and out of characters: Spider-Man's come around twice already, but will probably take a back seat to Bats this year--only to return yet again when his third movie comes out. I'd love to find an adult Mr. Incredible this season, padding or no padding, but I kind of doubt it'll happen. And it would have been cool if the Fantastic Four movie had done better, if only so I'd get to see kids burst into flames on my doorstep, or ring the bell, then go invisible--but no, wait, they do that already.

My kind of Australian crawl

It's true, I am much more of a BatFan than a SupermanFan, but I couldn't resist a quick peek at BlueTights.net. From there I moved on to this Kevin Spacey fan site, which contains a tantalizing Newsweek article providing a behind-the-scenes look at the shooting of the new movie. Well, the tantalizing part is this little opening snippet:

Inside a soundstage in Sydney, Australia, Brandon Routh, as the Man of steel, crawls across a black, wet wasteland, pursued by the evil Lex Luthor (Kevin Spacey) and Luthor’s three henchmen. One of the thugs grabs Superman by his hair and shoves his face into a dark puddle, holding the hero’s head underwater as he struggles for air. Luthor strides up behind Superman, stabs him in the back with some sort of Kryptonite shiv and whispers a sentence so horrifying (and, for now, top secret) into his ear that Superman cries out in agony. He staggers to his feet, stumbles and topples backward over a cliff.

You should know that I happen to find Mr. Spacey one of the cutest actors on the planet, and the thought of him reducing Superman to tears is almost too hot to mention. (The new supersuit looks mighty fine, too, and the article closes with an amusing discussion of the star's bulge.) Thank goodness for the handy countdown on the Blue Tights site: as of this writing, the premiere of Superman Returns is a mere 8 months, 14 days, 19 hours, 46 minutes, and 26 seconds away--

--no, make that 25 seconds. Can't you just feel the excitement?

Faster than a speeding Winnebago

What's up with all the superhero-mobiles on the streets of Gotham City lately?
First came the Spiderman vehicle. Now it's Superman's pickup truck:



Apologies for the crappy photo, but I took it from behind the wheel of a moving Batmobile--the risks I take for you, dear reader!--and I didn't get a very good look at it myself. Not quite as decked out as the SpideyMobile, but the imagery continued on the side doors and perhaps on the hood.

For a split second I thought it was some sort of marketing stunt, this proliferation of moving advertisements, but then I remembered that DC and Marvel have different owners. Perhaps it's really just a bunch of guys (MUST be guys--what woman would be caught dead in such a thing?) who have enough disposable income at this point in their lives to carry out their childhood dreams? (Hmmm, sounds familiar--except that I've only managed to net the bucks for the outfits, not the wheels. Besides, I was never much of a car geek; no batmobile is half as hot as the man who drives it. I have been known to sprout wood at the sight of a police car or motorcycle, but, again, that has more to do with anticipation of the driver within.)

The funniest thing about the SuperTruck is the very notion of the Man of Steel behind the wheel. If you can fly (or, for that matter, spin a web), what the hell do you need this thing for? I know, I know: helping Lois move. Again.

Any super-mobile sightings of your own? Post 'em here.

Lycra Lovers Alert

If you're anything like me (and the fact that you've found this blog suggests we have a fetish or two in common), then you just may have a taste for tight-fitting superhero-style clothing (even if you don't quite have the body for it). For my money, UnderArmour is the second skin of choice--and if that sounds like the beginning of a commercial, read on.

One of the things I like about UA, beyond the obvious, is the fact their logos tend to be in places where they can easily be covered up with a cape or cowl. Wearing branded apparel, as they call it, on the field of battle reminds me a bit too much of that running gag in the movie Mystery Men about the costumed crimefighters suited up with more logos than Nascar drivers. True, the Nike swoosh does looks like it would suit some superpowered fellow quite nicely, and I've convinced myself that the UA logo over the right breast of my red tunic is a modified Robin "R," but it's all a bit unseemly.

The biggest problem with UA's stuff is how ludicrously expensive the best of it is. I can't justify paying $60 for a clingy, stretchy top I would never ever wear outside the privacy of my own batcave. (Okay, I confess I have dropped that much, or nearly that much, for an item or two, but I don't feel good about it.) And years of research have taught me that end-of-season clearance sales are hard to come by. They don't seem to phase out one line for another one and pass the savings along to the consumer, unfortunately.

That's why I was surprised and delighted to find that my local T. J. Maxx currently has a healthy stock of UA tops and tights at the moment. I don't know if individual stores tend to carry the same items at the same time or not, but I suspect they do, and it's worth a stop-by to find out. (Obligatory non-adlike comment: the stores are frequently a mess, with clothes strewn all over the place or on the wrong rack, etc.) I feel a bit like Tammy Faye plugging the Maxx, but I wouldn't want you to miss out.

On the other hand, this does leave bitchy supervillains with a new dis: "Where'd ya get your outfit, Captain Amazing? T. J. Maxx?" On the other other hand, it strikes me that "T. J. Maxx" could be the name of one of those short-lived comics that you always find in the clearance bins. "We can't let the Price Gouger get away with this--to the cash register, Checkout Girl!"

Knightfall 21: Here we go again

The long gap between updates on the Monk saga does not mean, sadly, that he's out of my life. Would that that were true! No, just because the Joker doesn't show up in every issue of Detective, it doesn't mean he's not still out there, plotting his next nefarious move.

The Monk's most recent move in our ongoing saga has been to sit and wait for me to come calling--and I've done so, I'm appalled to admit, more and more often in recent weeks. I've realized that the main "drug" in his arsenal is adrenaline: I get one charge when I venture out into his presence, and a second, larger one when he contacts me. I invariably come back to my senses after a few seconds of repartee, but each time I risk recapture... and each time it seems to get harder to make my exit before it's too late.

Obviously, there's a big part of me that wants to be caught (you can guess which literal body part I'm referring to). There's something extremely seductive for me about the chain of events that leads from initial failure to imprisonment to helplessness to utter submission. I've already lived through that cycle once with the Monk, and I can't deny that it evoked some powerful sensations for me.

In the process, by the way, I came into contact with lots of other superheroes. Some sought me out through these entries-- and I'm still always delighted to meet fellow travellers that way, BTW--while others I met when M would assign me to help him break them. In almost every case, I discovered that they shared my appetite for destruction at the hands of an unbeatable adversary. Not always to the same degree as me--though some would happily go even farther than I ever did.

Many of these heroes wanted to be able to control the details of their downfall: to come and go from captivity as they pleased; to decorate their cells according to their own desires, as it were. And lord knows there are times when I long for one single afternoon of surrender to my nemesis, after which I could pack up my mask and cape and be on my way. But the deal is, it doesn't work that way: the Monk will be satisfied with nothing less than my complete and irreversible elimination from the ranks of herodom. He vowed, long ago, that he would own me "mind, body, and soul," and there is no time-share option in a proposition like that.

One of the tactics he uses, shared by other nefarious types, is the gentle approach: to encourge me to relax, let my defenses go, and just surrender to the feeling of safety in his presence. Every time I hear this line (and I've employed it on numerous occasions in solo sessions), I want so badly to give in; I usually kick myself later for not doing so, foolish though it would be. But every time, something prevents me from letting go. I stand my ground--even when I feel myself sinking into quicksand.

And that's where I stand right this very minute: aware that I'm in danger of sinking, but not quite over my head just yet.

The imagination of disaster: 4 (The punisher)

Listening to this NPR program devoted to the life of Simon Wiesenthal, I couldn't help thinking of this legendary man as a real-life superhero.

Lord knows he's got the right back story: an unspeakable tragedy early on (including death of relatives) compels him to devote the remainder of his life to tracking down criminals and bringing them to justice, a somewhat controversial task he performs tirelessly, sacrificing any and all creature comforts, for decades. He generally works with the police, and always on the same side as them, but sometimes their negligence forces him to resort to other means. He's even got a nifty superhero moniker: "The Deputy."

With his story in mind, I get on an even deeper level the point made in Cavalier and Clay and several recent nonfiction histories of comic books, about the close ties between the Holocaust and the origins of the superhero genre. Many of these books, as we know, were the creations of Jewish immigrants.

They fought their battles in the realm of imagination. Wiesenthal fought his in the daylight world.

Me, I'm thankful to both for making my own life a better one.

The imagination of disaster: 3 (The real and the fantastic)

The Hub and I finally made it to Fantastic Four tonight. Both of us were mighty glad we waited till it was at the cheap joint. As H said, "The only good thing about that movie was the costumes." And, yes, it was mighty refreshing to see spandex-clad superheroes actually clad in spandex, or something resembling it (though I also enjoyed the shots of bare-chested Michael Chiklis and Chris Evans).

But this isn't really a post about the movie; it's really a post about what was on the TV in the Mexican restaurant where we ate before the movie: an episode of America's Most Wanted about the "Erie Collar Bomber" who snapped an explosive device on a pizza delivery guy and ordered him to rob a bank, back in 2003. Amazingly enough, I don't recall hearing anything about the case at the time, though the Hub did. (Well, he is in law enforcement.) We couldn't make out most of the narrative over the Mexi-muzak in the restaurant, but we pieced together as much as possible, and then I looked up more online on the way to the movie.

Suffice to say that Fantastic Four could not possibly compete with the Pizza Bomber when it comes to mind-blowing adventure--spandex or no spandex. Turns out several people at the time of the crime in question (like this one and several of these) had the same thought I did: that this whole thing is straight out of a comic book. Joker? Riddler? Clock King? The Puzzler? Could be just about any of 'em...

For the record, the collar bomber/pizza bomber saga also reminds me of this almost equally bizarre (and equally comic-book-like) saga of an online gaming guy and the artists who essentially stalked him as an art project. Once again, an "innocent" bystander is plucked out of his daily routine and plunged into a surreal adventure involving false pretenses, clues, challenges, and the like--only this time the game is not a deadly one (and the "victim" lives to tell the tale in his own words, too).

I find both of these strange tales utterly fascinating, in much the same way that my own bat-adventures with the Monk and various other quasi-fictional but still-real characters blur the lines between fantasy and something more tangible. (Inevitable disclaimer: just as I don't want to end up the prey of a cannibal, I am not interested in tangling with actual master criminals, either.)

Could it be that, as real life feels more and more scripted and predictable, deviations from that script--deviations that resemble actual comic-book-movie scripts--are what keep us going?

The imagination of disaster: 2 (Heroes without tights)

At the risk of trivializing real-life tragedy, I've thought of a few ways that several characters in my "Beginnings" serial will be affected by the Katrina disaster. It's been one of my goals to incorporate real-time events in that story, and this seems like one I can't ignore. (Actually, I've been planning this for a couple of weeks--ever since I heard a real-life friend of mine talk about his plans to lend a hand--but I've been too busy in the daylight world to add any new chapters. Sorry about that. Promise I'll make up for lost time.)

But that's only fiction. In our real, daylight lives, it seems to me that each of us--make-believe heroes and villains alike--have a responsibility to do whatever we can to help our fellow citizens in need. That can take any number of forms, many of which have little to do with costumed crimefighting. I am thinking of not only the people heading down to the Gulf Coast to provide direct assistance, but individuals like...

•These two otherwise hilarious gossip-crazed bloggers, who maintain a growing list of Katrina-related charities of all sizes that you may wish to support. It's the best-organized, most coherent, most appealing such list I've seen so far.

•This ad-hoc group, holed up in a building with their own generator in downtown New Orleans since the hurricane hit and issuing regular reports, publishing photos and videos of things you probably haven't seen on TV, etc. The earliest entries are the most comic-book-like; I haven't quite pegged the political sentiment of these guys, but at the peak of the crisis they seemed to be functioning like a cross between Sgt. Rock/Blackhawk/GI Joe and some kind of vigilante/survivalist group. Much talk of command stations and patrols and such.

•This woman, whose name happens to be Katrina, and who happened to own the "Katrina.com" domain before all the shit went down, who has subsequently turned her personal site into a clearinghouse for information since she's getting zillions of hits everyday anyway. (Though I gotta say, I just visited the site a few minutes ago for the first time in a week or so, and it appears she's gone pretty heavily into the god-and-country stuff lately. But hey--Wonder Woman's all about the red, white, and blue, too, right?)

These folks may not wear spandex (well, not that I know of, anyway), but they look like heroes to me, in a time that desperately needs us all to assume that role in our own idiosyncratic ways.

If you can think of any more examples, please add them in a comment!

I'm getting TENSE just thinking about it...

Hooray for the new Google Blog Search, which reveals almost 232,000 blog entries containing the word "Batman." The first of these that caught my eye was this one, consisting largely of scans from a bat-book I'd never heard of: Joe Casey's 2003 two-parter, Tenses. I also found a review of it here. At first I thought it was some sort of fan-generated thing, since it's evidently got graphic violence, S/M references, and gay subtext up the, uh, yin-yang.

Wait, did I say "subtext"? One of the supporting characters is a nosy reporter who is clearly, unmistakably queer, and assumes Bruce Wayne is, too. (BTW, I would clearly, unmistakably want to have sex with the journalist if I encountered him in real life.)



In one of the bitchy queen's later encounters with Our Hero, the flirtation becomes overt, and Bruce doesn't exactly handle it too well.



Looks like textbook homophobia, if you ask me, Bruce--and if you do, I'll say this whole School-of-George-Sanders-style 'mo subplot reeks of something out of some 60s/70s crime film of the sort chronicled at length in The Celluloid Closet. But hey, I'm totally intrigued by what I've read about this book. Anybody out there read it and care to comment?

The imagination of disaster: 1

Like many of you, I spent most of last week glued to the tv and heart-rending websites like this one absorbing all I can about the catastrophe in New Orleans. That city will always occupy a special place in my heart, and everything feels even more (sur)real because for several years the Hub and I headed down there on Labor Day weekend for Southern Decadence. (BTW, you'll be intrigued to learn that the rain of destruction visited upon that poor city is actually God's punishment for Decadence, according to this fucked-up web page. On the bright side, it seems a dozen or so Quarter residents held the parade after all.)

Any time something globally awful happens (9/11, the tsunami disaster, etc.), it seems trivial, if not downright offensive, to continue talking about superheroes. On the other hand, I can't help finding comic-book parallels to real-life events as a way to comprehend the otherwise incomprehensible. Such events aren't really "unimaginable," given how vividly they have been imagined in horror and fantasy fiction for decades. Osama bin Laden is nothing if not a member of the Legion of Doom, and the horrors of New Orleans (flooding, looting, fires, mass casualties, the apparent neglect of the federal government) keep bringing me back to the earthquake that turned Gotham City into a lawless zone a couple of years back during that whole "No Man's Land" saga that I didn't really follow too closely.

In other words, fictional worlds give us ways to envision disasters in the real one. "It's just like a movie" has been the recurring response to both 9/11 and Katrina. I have more to say about this, but I'll save it for a future post.

"The natural shape of the bat man": Turning Japanese, I really think so...

Hey, if you know Japanese you might want to visit the four sites listed in this Animania Blog entry on "Batman Doujinshi". The entry itself is in English, and explains (in a slightly sketchy way) that there are evidently printed slash comics circulating around Japan which involve American characters in compromising situations.

The Animania blogger recommends writing the Japanese sites in English and asking for info. Or you can do what I did, and submit the URLs to a Babelfish translation. The only problem is, when I did, I ended up with ... babble, as these tantalizing quasi-random excerpts illustrate. (The first image goes with the first excerpt; the rest I just find interesting and/or sexy.)



(At last: proof positive that Batman is a Friend of Dorothy!)

1. It is the serious story "of BATMAN." You speak a word from SONIC of the author: "Square Crowe is present. Pursuing the suitable good quality which we is thought, it tried drawing. Please try reading by all means."
Notice: * Note! Sound comes out.*

Don't you hate it when the sound comes out? Okay, moving right along... Not sure what Spiderman is doing at Arkham Asylum, but here he is:



2. "The cameraman who knows the natural shape of the bat man Is, but the photograph does not become the article.As for the cameraman story the which keeps facing to the residence of blues in attaching" … "The extent where when the thinking to we BATMAN does not be plugged too much being plugged, it increases…"



3. It made with the purpose which introduces, you call generally known propagation or, it is the brainwashing book. - it is in the person who knows main part with the contents which are said (?) Being to be, it does, but by some chance, the where one by one interpretation bears difference so! Whether with there is new discovery! (It is not or......)
As for contents the character explanation which it is related to is main. If possible you tried the multitude to introduce however it is, introducing, () pulled out improbable delightfully cruelly. Don't you think? - , for example... is! ! However only the costume it comes out, you drew knight wing what which has love. In addition, you drew in one evening of impact, (the ear, time it was not truly and, the picture material becoming firm, you could not use and), it consists 4 scene cartoons and the like. "Return of the Joker" topic possession.

Ah, the Brainwashing Book. Always a fave. This next cover has a DC logo on it, so I'm guessing it might be something official, but something about it seems suspect to me:



Damn, I loves me a good babelfish!

Bat-links, get your bat-links (and one Cap'n America)

These are all odds and ends I've found over the last few days during occasional breaks from unending immersion in the unending horrors currently unfolding in New Orleans (more on that in a later entry). They're all kinda random and kinda interconnected at the same time.

1. I found this extremely handy collection of reviews of Batman (and related) graphic novels, trade paperbacks, etc. while doing one of my characteristically kinky Google searches. (I forget the keywords in question this time, but seeing what emerges from combinations like "Batman+bondage+deathtrap" has long been one of my favorite uses of the world's greatest search engine.) There's nothing even remotely R-rated about this particular page, it just looks like a potentially valuable tool for sorting through the vast array of bat-books on the shelves these days.

2. The same Google search, whatever it was, also yielded this exhaustive Wikipedia entry on slash and fan fiction which should be of interest and use to all who share my close and personal connection to certain masked manhunters.

3. Speaking of which, the world always has room for another Seduction of the Innocent joke...

4.and for another gender-transgressive kid-related Batman reference in another indie comic. A Beaucoup Kevin find. Merci beaucoup, Kevin, indeed!

5. Shifting from sex to politics, here's an interesting collection of links to several reviews and think-pieces arguing that Batman Begins (and/or the title character) has an essentially conservative agenda. (BTW, a neighbor I had a crush on during the Dark Knight Returns era was on the cutting edge of this Batman-as-right-winger notion; as he saw it, the bat mythos glorifies the fabulously wealthy individual who vows to rid his city of crime. I hate to read it that way myself, but then as we know, I do have a soft spot in my heart--or a hard spot somewhere else--for sexy Republican dudes, even though, like Claire Fisher, I detest their politics.)

6. Perhaps I will remember to devote more attention to this one in that upcoming New Orleans post, but in case I forget or it doesn't fit, here's another fruit of that same Google expedition: a student term paper on Batman and postmodernism.The bulk of the essay is a fairly detailed history of the character as he has evolved over time and across genres. The postmodern part is iffy in the way most student term papers tend to be when juxtaposing fun pop culture and dreary critical theory, but I also found a lot of eye-opening stuff I may quote in future entries on various bat-subjects.



Finally, as promised, the non-Bat-related link:
7. I also have Beaucoup Kevin to thank for my discovery of this cartoon that proposes a government-sponsored Captain America clone used to create low-budget patriotic cartoons in the Vietnam era. If you liked Team America as much as I did, you'll dig this, too.