Apparently Superman 712 wasn't dismissed because of Sharif the Muslim character. It was shelfed because Superman starts the issue by saving a cat from a tree.
And this caused considerable problems with certain DC executives. They thought it was too sweet, too innocent, too anodyne, and not the kind of Superman stories they wanted to tell. The kitten up a tree image symbolised for them what was wrong with the Superman books. It became totemic in the office, standing for far more than it could possibly symbolise. It had to go.
Holy @#$%. Well, this is Dan "Countdown" Didio and Jim "Wildstorm" Lee publishing and Bob "Clone Saga" Harras as Editor in Chief.
At first I found this hilarious, then puzzling, and now I'm weirdly concerned for DC Comics. What the @#$%, ya'll?
As Bleeding Cool also notes:
And a story that started with a kitten has been replaced by a story starring a dog. I’m wondering if that was Superman editorial trying to make a point.
Looking forward to new Superman comics where kitties are left to fend for their @#$%ing selves.
I don't know as that doesn't seem to pass the BS test. Why couldn't they just drop the page or redo the panel with the offending kitty?
ReplyDeleteNot to be a conspiracy theory nut but it seems like they are trying to give some sort of reason other than pull the muslim super-hero book from the stands.
I don't know. I seriously have no idea. I do know Didio and occasionally Lee are tone-deaf to their own characters and company. I don't know Harras, but I do know the era at Marvel he oversaw and the attitude of the company at the time.
ReplyDeleteAnd you never, ever know what's going to cause a kerfuffle with certain people, how power plays are going to work out, etc...
I guess its one of those "this is so weird, it actually seems like it might be true" moments for me. I agree that the Muslim hero angle seems way, way dodgy after the "Superman citizenship" debacle, and I stand by my earlier interpretation of what could be going on. But given how screwy the heads are at DC, and how small things can represent much bigger problems in someone else's mind (its not the one time you left your glass on the coffee table, its the fact that you do it every time that drives her nuts) that I can see somebody making an irrational decision.
I really don't know. But the story is so stupid, it seems like there might be some grain of truth to it.