Jim Lee Weighs In On DC’s Controversial ‘Harley Quinn’ Artist Tryout Script
By Empress Eve
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Saturday, September 7th, 2013 at 9:19 pm
Jim Lee, Co-Publisher of DC Comics, took to his Twitter tonight to publicly air his thoughts regarding the controversy surrounding the popular comics publisher’s current Open Talent Search artist contest, which was met with some backlash from those feeling that it was sexist and disrespectful to women.
The contest guidelines, which ran on DC’s website under the headline “Break into comics with Harley Quinn,” requires entrants to draw four panels featuring the DC female villain Harley Quinn attempting to commit suicide because of outlandish situations the DC writers put her in. The contest winner would then get to draw one page of DC’s Harley Quinn #0 by Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner to be released this November.
DC’s panel descriptions, which include showing Harley Quinn naked in a bathtub surrounded by hanging electronics preparing to launch another suicide attempt, prompted public outcry accusing DC of being sexist towards women and insensitive about suicide (you can read of this over at The Daily Dot). The general interest women’s website Jezebel, which is part of Gawker Media, felt that DC’s contest was “disturbing” and “showcases DC’s blatant disregard for women.” This issue comes on the heels of another recent controversy for the publisher, who were accused of being homophobic for not letting Batwoman marry her same-sex partner, which prompted Batwoman‘s creative team of J.H. Williams III and W. Haden Blackman to leave the title.
Since Twitter is not exactly the premiere platform for discussing delicate, polarizing subjects, we’ve compiled all of Lee’s tweets and photos all together here below. The end includes the sneak peek of Superman Unchained that Lee sent as his final tweet.
I thought I would take a lil time to address something called context as it has come up a bit in discussions.
still probably not the best of topics for an art contest considering September is Suicide Prevention Month….. explain it any way you want, i read the descriptions of the panels and they were all just “funny” ways of a “crazy” character trying to off herself….. i didnt “personally” find it funny in any way. And sorry for all the quote marks…. DC just another in a bunch of crappy choices from the editorial department/higher ups.
Comment by bill norris — September 7, 2013 @ 9:50 pm
What a load of cr@p. Dude, just admit that you guys did something monumentally stupid, come up with another idea for your try out and move on. I’ve had a friend, a former teacher, and two acquaintances who killed themselves. It’s not funny; and believe it or not, there are ways to tell stories about women that don’t involve them getting naked, near naked, or wearing costumes you have to put on with a paint sprayer. Yes, that is true, even in comics.
Comment by ltrasczak — September 7, 2013 @ 9:52 pm
Jim Lee missed the ever loving fuck outta the point.
Tone deaf as usual. Time Warner owns those guys, dont they? buy a PR department. I’m sure they can afford it. I don’t have a particular problem with it, (anything can be funny, yes ANYTHING) and it isn’t inherently sexualized, but adding up all of DC’s recent stumbles, and it looks like they don’t have a clue and may very well be psychos. oh, and twitteras the place to respond!? COME ON, MAN! What kind of operation are you running over there?
Comment by Mac Smith — September 7, 2013 @ 10:42 pm
Might want to avoid watching Groundhog Day in that case.
My favorite part was where Bill Murray was all naked in the bathtub.
Comment by Julie McCord — September 7, 2013 @ 11:54 pm
Context? I think the description was pretty straight forward … no A, B, or C panels. And really … I can’t think of various alternate scenarios for the picture. Maybe the pervs at DC can.
Or in a different reading of the first sequence he could find his girlfriend in there and the third panel shows his rage at her death.
I’ll add another wrinkle to all that’s being said about the tastelessness of this contest: the panels you chose for your PR contest put forward the worst stereotypes of comics. Sexualization of women, misogyny, and the fact that these panels are something the weird, introverted kid in study hall would draw. There is nothing of the empowerment that we love in comics. No complex stories that you try to portray. None of the fun. Just a “humorous” panel of a naked, disturbed woman trying to kill herself.
Comment by Eric Lane — September 8, 2013 @ 5:32 pm
I think it sounds like a difficult art project. And I think it is absurd to assume that these creators are attempting to aggrandize suicide or degrade a beloved character (who is a darkly psychotic character at that). I understand that this can be a personally emotional issue, and people react when nerves are touched, so it’s understandable that people might react to this… but that doesn’t change the fact that the negative reaction is basically knee-jerk, throwing out a lot of unnecessary assumptions and blame.
Out of context of the story, the script for these panels is being viewed with a lot of assumptions. Frankly, imagine that artists had been called to depict the Joker removing his own face; Vandal Savage torturing torturing Jason Blood; or the junkie suicidal moments of Arsenal. Each of these moments has happened, and I bet the script didn’t ask for rainbows and butterflies. Additionally, I do not see any aspect of Arsenal, the Suicide Squad, or Joker’s self-mutilation as being aggrandized and glorified… but rather a part of a larger story. Heck, part of me wants to laugh and be horrified at the same time when I see Joker.
Now, maybe because we can’t see the whole context of the script, it wasn’t the best choice for a wide public contest. Maybe the public should only be drawing pictures of rainbows and butterflies. The idea of depicting the obviously complex mood of these panels, might be too much.
Go watch “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.” The rape scene in that movie is pretty stark, but the character is NOT considered a weak girl. She’s a heroine we tend to respect… and we sympathize because she’s obviously tortured by a violent past. As an artist, that was a difficult scene to create. The purpose of the scene was NOT to depict a womanly weakness, or to aggrandize violence. That scene could be considered a testing ground for the actress. Whoever hired that actress would need to know that she could convey that scene.
In a similar way, the artist has to hit a strange mood for this contest.
Agreed, that the script for those panels (OUT OF CONTEXT) seems pretty stark, and is probably not the best choice for out-of-context public consumption. So, that’s agreed. The emotional nerves attached to the subject matter, and the descriptions given might not be the best choice for a contest.
However, I maintain that the assumptions and blame being levied at the creators, with personal attacks about their character or purpose as creators, are overreaching and unnecessary.
Comment by Adam Nieman — September 9, 2013 @ 8:45 pm
Yeah, why are people getting so irrationally upset by the pile-up of bad decisions by DC from denying Batwoman’s marriage to possible fetishizing of Harley’s naked toaster suicide?
Some weirdoes just don’t get DC.
Comment by zakizakaria — September 9, 2013 @ 9:53 pm
This has nothing to do with the marriage issue, I said nothing about that. And only the most amatuer artists would find it a difficult task to draw the last panel without sexualizing it. If it were a man in her place people wouldn’t consider it sexual. It would just be a dude killing himself. Nudity is not the same as sexuality. Besides, you don’t know the context of the comic, somewhere along the lines fans got the idea that they have a right to change a product before it comes out because they think they won’t like it.
Jim Lee does get across the risks of misinterpreting the page, but the way comicbook art handles naked and underclad women, a discreet and sensitive, non-objectified, depiction really isn’t the way to bet. Just the character design, which any artist has to follow, is pushing hard in the bad directions. And what we will end up seeing is not the conclusion of a debate between the artist and the editor, it’s the art which best matches what the editor and the publisher wants.
And that’s how he misses the point.
Comment by Wolf Baginski — September 10, 2013 @ 8:02 pm
Context is totally important.
This is why DC have now realised their mistake and added this context to their competition pag… OH WAIT.
Comment by David Birch — September 13, 2013 @ 9:06 am
“Lady Gaga” for the Harley Quinn movie !!!! …. it could be as wonderfully underrated as Pamela Anderson’s Barb Wire :)
Comment by James Brown — September 14, 2013 @ 4:33 pm
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still probably not the best of topics for an art contest considering September is Suicide Prevention Month….. explain it any way you want, i read the descriptions of the panels and they were all just “funny” ways of a “crazy” character trying to off herself….. i didnt “personally” find it funny in any way. And sorry for all the quote marks…. DC just another in a bunch of crappy choices from the editorial department/higher ups.
Comment by bill norris — September 7, 2013 @ 9:50 pm
What a load of cr@p. Dude, just admit that you guys did something monumentally stupid, come up with another idea for your try out and move on. I’ve had a friend, a former teacher, and two acquaintances who killed themselves. It’s not funny; and believe it or not, there are ways to tell stories about women that don’t involve them getting naked, near naked, or wearing costumes you have to put on with a paint sprayer. Yes, that is true, even in comics.
Comment by ltrasczak — September 7, 2013 @ 9:52 pm
Jim Lee missed the ever loving fuck outta the point.
Comment by å’’ç´”è¨ŽåŽ — September 7, 2013 @ 10:05 pm
Tone deaf as usual. Time Warner owns those guys, dont they? buy a PR department. I’m sure they can afford it. I don’t have a particular problem with it, (anything can be funny, yes ANYTHING) and it isn’t inherently sexualized, but adding up all of DC’s recent stumbles, and it looks like they don’t have a clue and may very well be psychos. oh, and twitteras the place to respond!? COME ON, MAN! What kind of operation are you running over there?
Comment by Mac Smith — September 7, 2013 @ 10:42 pm
Might want to avoid watching Groundhog Day in that case.
Comment by Guest — September 7, 2013 @ 11:11 pm
My favorite part was where Bill Murray was all naked in the bathtub.
Comment by Julie McCord — September 7, 2013 @ 11:54 pm
Context? I think the description was pretty straight forward … no A, B, or C panels. And really … I can’t think of various alternate scenarios for the picture. Maybe the pervs at DC can.
Comment by Jack — September 8, 2013 @ 12:37 am
Or in a different reading of the first sequence he could find his girlfriend in there and the third panel shows his rage at her death.
I’ll add another wrinkle to all that’s being said about the tastelessness of this contest: the panels you chose for your PR contest put forward the worst stereotypes of comics. Sexualization of women, misogyny, and the fact that these panels are something the weird, introverted kid in study hall would draw. There is nothing of the empowerment that we love in comics. No complex stories that you try to portray. None of the fun. Just a “humorous” panel of a naked, disturbed woman trying to kill herself.
Comment by Eric Lane — September 8, 2013 @ 5:32 pm
People are so irrational to get upset by this.
Comment by Greg — September 9, 2013 @ 5:51 pm
I think it sounds like a difficult art project. And I think it is absurd to assume that these creators are attempting to aggrandize suicide or degrade a beloved character (who is a darkly psychotic character at that). I understand that this can be a personally emotional issue, and people react when nerves are touched, so it’s understandable that people might react to this… but that doesn’t change the fact that the negative reaction is basically knee-jerk, throwing out a lot of unnecessary assumptions and blame.
Out of context of the story, the script for these panels is being viewed with a lot of assumptions. Frankly, imagine that artists had been called to depict the Joker removing his own face; Vandal Savage torturing torturing Jason Blood; or the junkie suicidal moments of Arsenal. Each of these moments has happened, and I bet the script didn’t ask for rainbows and butterflies. Additionally, I do not see any aspect of Arsenal, the Suicide Squad, or Joker’s self-mutilation as being aggrandized and glorified… but rather a part of a larger story. Heck, part of me wants to laugh and be horrified at the same time when I see Joker.
Now, maybe because we can’t see the whole context of the script, it wasn’t the best choice for a wide public contest. Maybe the public should only be drawing pictures of rainbows and butterflies. The idea of depicting the obviously complex mood of these panels, might be too much.
Go watch “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.” The rape scene in that movie is pretty stark, but the character is NOT considered a weak girl. She’s a heroine we tend to respect… and we sympathize because she’s obviously tortured by a violent past. As an artist, that was a difficult scene to create. The purpose of the scene was NOT to depict a womanly weakness, or to aggrandize violence. That scene could be considered a testing ground for the actress. Whoever hired that actress would need to know that she could convey that scene.
In a similar way, the artist has to hit a strange mood for this contest.
Agreed, that the script for those panels (OUT OF CONTEXT) seems pretty stark, and is probably not the best choice for out-of-context public consumption. So, that’s agreed. The emotional nerves attached to the subject matter, and the descriptions given might not be the best choice for a contest.
However, I maintain that the assumptions and blame being levied at the creators, with personal attacks about their character or purpose as creators, are overreaching and unnecessary.
Comment by Adam Nieman — September 9, 2013 @ 8:45 pm
Yeah, why are people getting so irrationally upset by the pile-up of bad decisions by DC from denying Batwoman’s marriage to possible fetishizing of Harley’s naked toaster suicide?
Some weirdoes just don’t get DC.
Comment by zakizakaria — September 9, 2013 @ 9:53 pm
This has nothing to do with the marriage issue, I said nothing about that. And only the most amatuer artists would find it a difficult task to draw the last panel without sexualizing it. If it were a man in her place people wouldn’t consider it sexual. It would just be a dude killing himself. Nudity is not the same as sexuality. Besides, you don’t know the context of the comic, somewhere along the lines fans got the idea that they have a right to change a product before it comes out because they think they won’t like it.
Comment by Greg — September 10, 2013 @ 10:11 am
Jim Lee does get across the risks of misinterpreting the page, but the way comicbook art handles naked and underclad women, a discreet and sensitive, non-objectified, depiction really isn’t the way to bet. Just the character design, which any artist has to follow, is pushing hard in the bad directions. And what we will end up seeing is not the conclusion of a debate between the artist and the editor, it’s the art which best matches what the editor and the publisher wants.
And that’s how he misses the point.
Comment by Wolf Baginski — September 10, 2013 @ 8:02 pm
Context is totally important.
This is why DC have now realised their mistake and added this context to their competition pag… OH WAIT.
Comment by David Birch — September 13, 2013 @ 9:06 am
“Lady Gaga” for the Harley Quinn movie !!!! …. it could be as wonderfully underrated as Pamela Anderson’s Barb Wire :)
Comment by James Brown — September 14, 2013 @ 4:33 pm