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“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie - deliberate, contrived and dishonest - but the myth - persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.” - John F. Kennedy It’s a small matter, I know. Righting it won’t feed a single hungry person, ease the suffering of the infirm, or rescue a single abused child. But this weekend, on thousands of cinema screens, a lie is repeated, one repeated so often it’s become a myth. “Batman created by Bob Kane.” In a just world it would read “Batman created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger.” In 1939, Bob Kane showed some sketches of a new character to Bill Finger. The sketches showed a man in a red suit with stiff bat wings attached at the shoulders, wearing a domino mask. Finger suggested darker colors, suggested a cowl to cover the top of the new hero’s head, and a cape that would spread out to suggest bat wings. Finger gave Batman’s alter ego his name, Bruce Wayne, named his home town Gotham City, and created adversaries with names like Catwoman, The Penguin, Two-Face, and the Riddler. I hope I don’t surprise you by telling you that Bill Finger died poor. In fact, Finger was fired by DC Comics for merely asking if someday, the artists and writers might possibly get health insurance. The award for excellence in comics writing is known as the Bill Finger Award, and whenever a comics writer feels like they’re getiing cheated out of rightful credit, they invoke Bill Finger’s name. The industry knows what he did, and what he deserved. We all should.
Posted by Doc Logan on 07/20 at 01:35 PM
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