Cripes, but some of you Marvel Zombie-types out there; getting your silly little knickers all in a bunch over the dopiest darned things imaginable.

I've received a fair-to-middlin' sampling of e-mail over the last few weeks -- and mucho thankyous, by the way, to everyone who's written in to compliment me on this site, and the every-week-or-so assortment of new "pages" herein -- some of which containing various pathetic mewlings to the effect of: "howcum you have a 'Marvel Comics Hall of Shame on your site, but no 'DC Comics Hall of Shame? Huh? Huh? Whyzat? Huh?"

Unca Cheeks advises one and all to kindly, wouldja please, get something vaguely resembling a grip, here.

I do these pages when I can. I have no set "schedule," this not exactly being anything in the line of a "paying job." That new pages show up every seven-to-ten days is -- believe you me -- something of a minor miracle, in and of itself. I don't feel particularly obligated to do 'em in any set sequence, re: "order of importance" (which is why -- just as a f'rinstance -- you see a JONAH HEX page, but no WONDER WOMAN page [as yet]; I'm getting to each and every Silver Age character as mood, whimsy and inspiration so move me).

Two words, in quick summation: CHILL. OUT.

... and that goes especially for the one guy who keeps bugging me about putting up a THOR page. When. I. GET. To. It. Man.

Ahem. Okay. So: lame Silver Age DC stuff. Was there any...?

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, yeah.

Superman and Batman both having so many titles and spin-offs and whatnot during the 1960's, in particular... these two characters are particularly well-represented, in this category. Therefore, Exhibitions One and Two of this "Hall" will revolve around them, and their supporting casts.

Possibly the all-time lowest moment in the Batman's fabled history occurred with the publication of a particularly ill-advised entry into the canon entitled "The Rainbow Batman." [see pictures, accompanying]

Here, the Darknight Detective is forced (by circumstances too hare-brained and contrived to bear repetition, herein) to ponce around Gotham City in a bewildering and tasteless array of variations of the standard "Bat"-regalia, all of which were (from the available evidence) designed by no less a fashion luminary than Helen Keller, her own bad self.

The most charitable statement one might make about this inept little episode is this: it might have made a darned cute episode of the old Adam West/Burt Ward BATMAN television show.

It has oft been said (and bears repeating; 'cause it's, y'know, true) that the Batman has the single finest, most time-tested and shudder-inducing rogues gallery in all of comics history.

While there's certainly no denying the obvious "staying power" and storytelling ooomph possessed by such classic foemen as the Joker; the Catwoman; the Scarecrow; Poison Ivy; Two-Face, etc., etc. ... neither can it be convincingly argued, alas, that every would-be arch-Bat-nemesis has been of that sort of caliber. (Sixty years is a long, loooonnnnnnng,time, after all. It'd actually be pretty darned incredible if the occasional turkey or lame-o hadn't made an appearance in one of the multitudinous "Bat"-books, over a span such as that.)

For example: there was the sad and pathetic example of one "Lenny Fiasco"... a.k.a., (I kid you not) "the Eraser." [see picture, accompanying]

All right... all right. Settle down, troops. Save some of it for later in the show; you haven't even smelled the biggest piles o' storytelling doody yet to come... much less SEEN 'em.

It seems that the unfortunately named Mr. Fiasco -- while still but a wee shaver of a lad -- was both: a.) one of Bruce Wayne's old grade school chums... and: b.) the original "Mr. Screw-Up," in matters academe. Wore his stolid and implacable way through many a chalkboard and pencil eraser during those oh-so-critical "wonder years," we are led to understand.

In the vainglorious tradition of peculiarly wretched and ill-conceived comic book villains everywhere, Our Little Lenny took it upon himself to make said lifelong leit motif his own peculiar "gimmick," crime-wise. He wore (as you've doubtless already noticed) a giant pencil eraser on his head, and could easily hold entire packs of girl scouts enthralled in numb, muted horror by means of his lethal "pencil point shoes."

He was, in short, The All-Time Biggest Dork Ever To Square Off Against the Silver Age Batman.

(In a wholly misguided attempt to add some dramatically legitimate "poignancy" to this sillyass character, the writer also gave him an additional impetus to seek out and humiliate/crush old classmate Bruce Wayne. It seems that the young Bruce -- Rotter! Cad! SCOUNDREL! -- actually had the unmitigated gall to ask that year's Senior Class "Ice Princess" to attend the school Snow Festival Dance with him, instead of Lenny!

Imagine, if you will, Dear Reader, the tears of bitter and impotent rage that were poor Lenny's portion, that crisp and fateful December afternoon! (Imagine also, if you will, the impotence period he must have suffered, later on in life. Hey -- you think it was tough getting a date in high school...? Just try it while walking around with a head like the butt-end of a big ol' Number #2 pencil. And sissy li'l pointy shoes.)

A close second in the BATMAN Goober-A-Thon, however, wasa night watchman by the name of "Reardon," who -- upon finding himself blinded in a freak accident, and then suffering the medical predations of a rogue doctor who'd taken it upon himself (for reasons never rendered sufficiently lucid) to "reconnect your optic nerves to the sensory cells in your fingertips" [see page, accompanying] -- took on the awe-inspiring cognomen of" "The Ten-Eyed Man."

The story -- written by the late Frank Robbins, who usually knew better than to fob stuff such as this off onto his readers -- never quite makes plain just what combat advantages (if any) might reasonably be expected to accrue from such an obviously inconvenient sensory arrangement... but: no matter. A deadline is a deadline, after all... and there were still ten pages yet to go in this particular issue of BATMAN (#226, to be precise). Worse things happen frequently (I am informed) during wartime.

(However: I would like to state -- for the record -- that the also late Irv Novick's artwork on behalf of said spavined and swaybacked storyline is nothing short of wonderful, throughout. The man made a career, having to close his eyes and Do It For the Flag on stuff such as this. That he deserved far, far better goes -- I should bloody well hope -- manifestly without requiring utterance.

Even my renowned twin senses of Mercy and Fair Play (*kaff*kaff) find themselves stretched to their very limits, however, by the unwelcome spectacle of the Batman -- the Batman, for the love of God! -- mouthing such utter inanities as the bit [see panels, accompanying] where he gaspingly refers to The Ten-Eyed Gomer as "the most dangerous man alive!" (It certainly seems quite a bit to grant, after all, to a man who can't even afford to wear mittens in the wintertime, if he wants to avoid sauntering off the curb and out into the traffic... to say nothing of several other more-or-less everyday occurrences which spring readily to mind; none of which I think bear especially close examination on this particular website, thankyouverymuch.)

Our final exhibit, here in the BATMAN wing of the DC Hall of Shame, is the following costume, last seen being sported by the "Robin"of the (now departed) alternate world known as "Earth-2." I implore one and all, at this point: if any of you reading these words are either pregnant, or suffer from any of the more debilitating cardiac conditions -- FOR CHRISSAKES: GO TO THE NEXT PAGE -- !!!

I have read, on occasion, that God is as merciless in his judgment as he is merciful.

Bearing that ancient dictum fully to mind, then: God grant the fullest measure of both upon the benighted brow(s) of whomever first wondered, idly, what form an amalgamation of the "Batman" and "Robin" costumes might ultimately take... and then settled upon this unholy eyesore as having duly "settled" the matter, for good and for all.

The DC Comics HALL OF SHAME
PAGE TWO (Superman, etc.)

PAGE THREE (Miscellaneous Atrocities)