Batman red-handed?

[AzBobby]

What do you think of this?

http://henryvallely.blogspot.com/2006/05/gang-busters-secret-origins-of-batman.html

I'm not sure what to think... A comment on the page mentions Bob Kane admitted to hacking plenty of his Batman work -- stealing ideas, hiring ghost artists, etc. Expediency was the name of the game, comics were not considered art back then and it was OK to rush. In this respect I can understand a degree of normal cribbing -- such as repeating a common pose of Batman swinging on a rope with hardly any alterations.

The Bruce Wayne panel still copies the Henry Vallely pose closely enough to disappoint me a bit, though. I'm not sure why I care... Maybe because it's a really important scene in Batman history. And maybe this is just interesting trivia.

One commenter on the blog asks, "No offense, but how many ways are there to draw a man in a suit thinking at a desk?" and the answer is, about a thousand ways that look nothing alike. It gets beyond normal "referencing" (as I've been doing in the effort to feature an elephant in a comic I'm working on, which means looking at many elephant photos to get the poses right) and darn near tracing, as you can see in the animated gif below:

http://img227.imageshack.us/img227/8362/batswipeup0.gif

[Sai]

Ah, yes, of course, shady loan sites are the answer.

Anyway, AzBobby, I can see why you're dissapointed (and to add insault to injury, the Vallely original is a better picture). But comic book artists did a lot of crazy stuff that I think they wouldn't get away with today (but then again, Greg Land still gets work). I think it's best to look at this piece of cribbing as a product of it's times and not get too hung up about it.

To cheer you up, here's a parody of Batman's origin that even uses the panel in question (warning: questionable humor ahead) http://jaypinkerton.cracked.com/blog/archives/000223.html

[Dawno]

Sai - sorry to put that first sentence of yours (above) out of context by banning the spammer and deleting the post - for the rest of the readers, he's not crazy :D

[wordmonkey]

Does it really matter?

The Batman thing, not the missing spam thing.

The character has gone through many incarnations and slight variants on the origin. The character is more than this image. Plus, in fairness, look at movies of the time, that pondering pose is a classic example of acting "I have a serious problem I must duly mull with clear and evident gravitas." Basil Rathbone did it in every Sherlock Holmes movie he did.

Me thinks a certain blogger has too much time on his hands.

[Axler]

Every comics artist has a "swipe file".

For the generation who worked in the 40s through the 60s, newspaper strip artists like Alex Raymond and Milton Caniff were the primary sources.

In the 70s and 80s, Jack Kirby's work provided most of the swipes.

Bob Kane was notorious as not only a swiper but a credit grabber.

[AzBobby]

Yes, it matters. It's a bit of history I didn't know, a new view of Bob Kane. Nothing crushing, though. I don't blame the blogger, he's just sharing trivia he finds interesting, as I did.

[wordmonkey]

Well, I can totally see you POV, Az. My point is more that the character has really moved well beyond it's origin.

I mean, to me, it's like complaining that Superman is somehow lacking because his earth name came from (Doc) CLARK (Savage Jr.) and KENT (The Shadow) Allard.

I would be more irked if this were a more contemporary issue. But as I said, we're well beyond that incarnation and the industry was less "ethical" than now. But again, classic pondering pose. I wouldn't hang the guy JUST on that panel.

[AzBobby]

But again, classic pondering pose. I wouldn't hang the guy JUST on that panel.

I'm not hanging him either; I get the point that such cribbing was normal and less frowned upon back in the day. Hell, a whole 64-page comic book sold for a dime -- how much time did they feel they owed us? So maybe it just wasn't supposed to be an art source.

This particular pose was definitely cribbed, though. No question. Far too many coincidences -- shoulderline, hairline, lips, fingers, shape of the brow, on and on. With much of this I'm focusing on the matched angle, which nails it -- if you Google images for "pondering" you'll see what I mean, where your Holmes-style classic pondering pose does indeed exist (hand, fingers or fist to the chin) but the angles, shapes of fingers, shapes of heads, etc. vary beyond count. This is without considering the coincidence of other examples with the same source and copier involved. Little enough was done to hide the fact to make it clear that the artist knew no one would really care.

This makes it interesting trivia to me. I didn't mean to imply that it damages my appreciation for the ongoing Batman character... don't think it does much.

[Stacia Kane]

That was my husband's point as well--that especially back then, comics weren't art, they were picture stories for kids, and nobody thought twice about cribbing like that. You did what you had to do to meet your deadline.