Melissa de la Cruz is a Young Adult fantasy writer. Reasonably successful as such. And the newest purse-puppy hire for DC Comics.
She delights in her utterly abysmal ignorance of comics. In fact she is proud of it. She feels it gives her a fresh perspective – Which is true as such. However, a fresh perspective does not equal a good perspective. Witness; The Last Jedi.
In her new comic, Gotham High. Bruce Wayne is a half-Chinese brooding loaner with a gay butler, his girlfriend is future-Catwoman and his best friend is future-Joker. Who’s taking money on Viktor Fries being the “cool kid?”
Bruce Wayne is probably the richest billionaire teenager in his world. Certainly the richest in Gotham City. Question: Why the fuck is he going to a public high school?!?
de la Cruz openly admits that she made Bruce Wayne her own personal Mary Sue, basing his half-Chinese background on her own family. And yes, Alfred is now gay.
I made a joke about this sounding like a YouTube flash cartoon, but then I checked, it actually existed but Warner Brothers had the sense to cancel that thing before it launched.
Honestly, I can’t blame her for the abortion that she has created. She’s just doing what she does. She can’t help herself and truthfully she doesn’t need to. DC Comics knew what she was. They wanted a YA comic by Melissa de la Cruz and they didn’t care what it would look like. They offered her anything in their pantheon and she picked Batman because her husband likes it. Or to be more accurate her husband likes the movies. You can tell that’s the case because the Joker is Jack Napier again – for the first time in thirty years.
She isn’t a White Person Welfare, she actually is good at what she does but what she does is books for girls in their early teens. Her audience is not going to transfer and Batman fans will avoid it like Corvid-19.
Back to my original question: Who is Gotham High for?
Answer: It’s for the men who hired her. They didn’t hire her to increase sales, they hired her to increase their own status in New York.
This quarantine is hurting a lot of innocent people. But it’s also dishing out some just desserts. This thing will never ship because DC will have been heavily “restructured” by the time it’s supposed to go to press.
The Dark Herald 
“What do you mean with ‘Even for a woman you’re absurdly solipsistic’? Whatever that means, that’s sexist. And racist. And probably homophobic – but let me check with my gay best friend first, then I’ll tell you for sure.”
LikeLike
It is the comic equivalent of Piss Christ, and you are giving it mind share. The proper response is to avoid giving any money at all to that corporate conglomerate (torrent their content if you must), and/or when discussing it also direct readers to alternatives, such as Arkhaven.
LikeLike
I’ve lifted the ban.
You caught me in a bad mood.
LikeLike
What I clumsily tried to express is that the Left is engaging in the age-old practice of defiling the “holy” places of their opponents. And people not tuned into the reality of the culture war may even fall for their deception and buy their goods. I Know I kept buying SF&Fantasy books past the point where it made sense, in the hope of finding worthwhile books.
Not sure which blogger recently noted that people keep denouncing star wars or marvel comics, but without linking to alternatives. It made sense to him (and me) to guide people towards alternatives. In any case, your blog, your rules.
LikeLike
I’m sick of the argument that any talk at all about this stuff is promoting it. I LIKE hearing entertaining takes about the cringe, I wouldn’t accept a modern Marvel product as a gift, any I think it’s safe to assume anyone reading these blogs already KNOWS about the alternatives and is availing themselves of them.
LikeLike
Who is this for? I think the author is thinking of the Mary Jane Watson high school for girls book that was released about 10 years ago, It was the adventures of Spiderman as seen through the eyes of MJ with a lot of drama and gossip. It did all right.
However, it was written for girls and more importantly it did not contradict any of the previous Spiderman canon. I remember it, and while it wasn’t something I enjoyed I could see the audience that Marvel was trying to reach.
This DC abomination is a fundamental misunderstanding of what Batman is and how he got there. A creature fueled by rage who spent a lifetime in travel and training to become the ultimate vigilante. Sure the money is nice, but Bruce Wayne has never been about the money except as a tool to fuel his crusade.
Highschool is the last place you would meet a Bruce Wayne. Hell, even in our world the very rich scions do not experience life as we do and they certainly don’t go to the local high school unless they are being punished. Who is going to force Bruce Wayne to abandon his crusade and goo to high school?
Corey
LikeLike
Who is this for?
Absolutely no one. No one will miss it as it rots on DC’s shelves waiting to go nowhere.
LikeLike
The setup sounds a lot like poz poc Smallville if you ask me.
LikeLike