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Fangirls Attack isn’t out every day any more, but they made up for it with four vast, sprawling episodes of angst and ire:

June 22: LGBTQ in Comics edition
June 22: Giant Variety Funpack edition
June 22: Live-Action Blue Beetle edition
June 22: Women and Gender in Comics edition

As much as we like angst and ire as blogging fodder, (see previous statement) it is dispiriting that the blunders of company spokesmen continue to generate tons of blog posts while the reissue of STUCK RUBBER BABY, a multi-leveled work of enduring worth by a pioneering cartoonist that covers the gay experience from a unique viewpoint, gets only two links.

We all know DC sometimes has the sensitivity of a charging rhino, but the fact is they also put out some of the greatest comics of all times, and many of these — like STUCK RUBBER BABY — have a lot to say about the concerns of people of a multiplicity of genders, races. religions and nationalities. Books like Cairo, SENTENCES, Incognegro, the upcoming CUBA: MY REVOLUTION and so on.

If everyone who expressed alarm and concern over DC’s attitudes instead went and bought a work published by DC of greater insight and interest, maybe they would be a little more inclined to publish more such material. Come on people, let’s put that outrage to good use.

1 COMMENT

  1. STUCK RUBBER BABY continues to be underrated and underappreciated. DC has always seemed skittish about promoting it properly. It’s one of the truly great works of the past 20 years.

  2. Sadly, what most readers who want better representation in comics for minorities, women and LGBT people actually want isn’t books like STUCK RUBBER BABY and INCOGNEGRO.

    It’s Justice League and Avengers members representing those categories.

    And I say it’s sad not because they shouldn’t want LGBT, minority and female superheroes, but because both are worthwhile.

    The big superhero stages, though, will be hard places to make new stars, of any gender, ethnicity or preference, as long as they’re already crowded with characters who are famous, white, straight, male and not going to age, retire or die anytime soon. Which means they’re going to be crowded with existing heroes for a long time to come.

    Outside the big superhero stages, though, things are wide open. No surprise that when we do get a STUCK RUBBER BABY or a PERSEPOLIS, it happens outside the big, pre-crowded universes.

  3. Agree that STUCK RUBBER BABY is a good book. Are there any changes in the new edition other than the cover and Bechdel introduction?

    But really, if you’re going to say that it “deserves ATTENTION”, isn’t it kind of odd that The Beat hasn’t mentioned the book once since the new edition was announced until yesterday? Last mention of it is a post about the problems with the foreign editions from over two years ago.

  4. Bob, unfortunately a few posts mentioning Cruse are in the posts from the old Beat that haven’t been imported (yet, I hope.)

    However I count this as a wake up call myself. LET’S TALK ABOUT THE GOOD STUFF.

  5. Cairo and Incognegro are great books.

    I’ve read Stuck Rubber Baby, but I don’t really remember much about it.

  6. If the DCU is bringing Swamp Thing back in the fold, bring in Toland while they’re at it.

    Seriously though, DC should be commended for reprinting this. It is a mature work for a mature audience. I laugh at fanboy/girls who desperately want their superheroes to be taken as legitimate art when books like this bleed from their soul with little recognition.

  7. the only reason DC published Stuck Rubber Baby was because they thought they might be able to make a movie out of it, just like all the graphic novels they published under their Paradox Press.

    i can’t help but wonder if this truly magnificent book would have been much more well know if it was released and cared for by publishers like Fantagraphics or Drawn + Quarterly.

    are they keeping the Tony Kushner introduction as well?

  8. Cool— ANOTHER book to pick up and get signed at SDCC next month!

    Vertigo, eh? I’ll look for that giant banner of “Wendel” next to those of Supes and Bats hanging over DC Island, then…